New software distribution methods are emerging, such as internet-based software, free software and software renting. The world is moving to ubiquitous software via personal digital assistants, smart phones and internet TVs. Although software markets are often marked by dominance at any particular point in time, some have cautioned against reading too much into this trend. After all, it was not so long ago that Lotus 123, and WordPerfect dominated the markets for spreadsheets and word processors respectively. With open-source software, the source code is made available to all actual or even potential users.
Users are free to modify the code to suit their needs.
Even before the users get it, the code may have been tested by a large number of software developers and programmers in a wide variety of environments and contexts, with the result that such software is likely to be more robust. Open-source software has been held up as an example of a potential challenge to Microsoft's traditional dominance in the PC operating system market. Open-source software is a part of the continuum of software development and distribution models, which is based on the degree of openness. Traditional software development, with its proprietary control over both the software code as well as control over the process of development, forms the other extreme. But there are other emerging models in between, such as FreeBSD unix, the Free Software Foundation community and the Sun community license.