The Debian Social Contract is a document which frames the moral agenda of the Debian project. The values outlined in the Social Contract provide the basic principles for the rules set forth in the Debian Free Software Guidelines. Those guidelines serve as the basis for the Open Source Definition.
Debian believes that the makers of a free software operating system should provide certain guarantees when a user entrusts them with control of a computer. These guarantees include:
- Ensuring that the operating system remains open and Free.
- Giving improvements back to the community which made the operating system possible.
- Not hiding problems with the software or organization.
- Staying focused on the users and the software that started the phenomena.
- Making it possible for the software to be used with non-free software.
Famous quotes containing the words social and/or contract:
“[In early adolescence] she becomes acutely aware of herself as a being perceived by others, judged by others, though she herself is the harshest judge, quick to list her physical flaws, quick to undervalue and under-rate herself not only in terms of physical appearance but across a wide range of talents, capacities and even social status, whereas boys of the same age will cite their abilities, their talents and their social status pretty accurately.”
—Terri Apter (20th century)
“Any intelligent woman who reads the marriage contract and then goes into it, deserves all the consequences.”
—Isadora Duncan (1878–1927)