Wednesday, October 3, 2001

Hampshire College Favors Noncommercial Web Software Open to All By SCOTT CARLSON Most people never see the software behind a Web site. But some students and faculty and staff members at Hampshire College are nevertheless making very deliberate decisions about the programs that run the college's sites: They have to be nonproprietary programs with codes that the students or staff members can read, rewrite, and customize -- not the secret, immutable codes owned by companies like Microsoft. "The students on this campus are very active in the free-software movement," says Lee Spector, an associate professor of computer science who is helping redesign the college's Web site. "What became clear to me and the students and many others was that our Web presence would become a vital part of our community. It's how we present ourselves to ourselves, to prospective students, parents, and the world. As such, we want it to have a certain type of behavior." At the urging of a core group of students and faculty members in the computer-science department, Hampshire has hired companies that use so-called open-source software for its Web-site projects. The college, in Amherst, Mass., has not yet put those open-source programs to use, as the Web site's design is still being hammered out. However, some Hampshire students have used open-source software to create a site with student-community news and announcements. Open-source software has source code that can be read and changed by the user. Linux, an open-source operating system, is perhaps the best-known example of open-source software. The core of the program was written by Linus Torvalds, a Finnish programmer; he let the world see it, add to it, and improve it. Such an arrangement makes the software easy to customize. And because many programmers have checked and doublechecked the software, it is less susceptible to computer viruses, which prey on weaknesses in code. Many open-source software programs are free, making the price right. "The price is a big benefit," says Jared Benedict, a Hampshire senior who is working on the sites. "And a lot of people believe that the open-source programs are a lot better because the source is a available -- they're a lot more configurable, powerful, and faster." But there were also philosophical motivations at the college. Many supporters of the open-source system say that the software takes power away from powerful multinational corporations. "Hampshire is a political place," Mr. Benedict says. "Some people use it because it's not Microsoft." One such student is Benjamin (Mako) Hill, a Hampshire junior who describes himself as open-source software's "biggest advocate" on campus. "I use it for ideological reasons," he says. "To me it's a matter of freedom. In using proprietary software, people are giving up their freedom." "Even if there were some closed corporate solution that offered what we want, by buying that system we would be throwing our support behind a system that locks out individuals and users that want control," Mr. Spector says. "Politically, I think the control over the means of production of technological materials is an economic and political battle of the 21st century that has clear parallels to control over the industrial production of the 19th and 20th century." Mr. Spector, who is part of a committee that oversees the Web site's redesign, says that one site-design company was passed up because it used proprietary software. "We turned down a major vendor, who was one of the top candidates, because it was clear that they had a commitment to using particular corporate and closed systems," he says. "But what probably won the day was not the political concerns but the pragmatic concerns that our community needs to have flexibility. We did not want to be beholden to this corporation and limited by what they said we can and cannot do." Easy-to-print version E-mail this article

Counselors say number of students coming to college with mental-health problems is on rise NCAA penalizes U. of Wisconsin for athletes' shoe-store discounts NSF awards grants to assess damage at terrorist-attack sites Hampshire College favors noncommercial Web software open to all Science foundation announces $156-million in IT grants Scholar calls for governments to take a realistic view toward distance education