Editing Open Sound System (section)

{{Short description|Sound server for Unix-like operating systems}}
{{Infobox software
| name                   = Open Sound System
| logo                   =
| screenshot             =
| caption                =
| collapsible            =
| author                 = Hannu Savolainen
| developer              = [[NCR Corporation]]
| latest release version = 4.2 build 2019
| latest release date    = {{release date and age|2019|03|05}}<ref>{{citation |url=http://ossnext.trueinstruments.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=5876 |title=OSS v4.2 build 2019 |access-date=2019-05-10 |archive-date=2022-09-25 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220925110149/http://ossnext.trueinstruments.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=5876 |url-status=dead }}</ref>
| latest preview version =
| latest preview date    =
| programming language   =
| operating system       = [[Cross-platform]]<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.opensound.com/download.cgi|title = OSS Download Registration}}</ref>
| platform               =
| size                   =
| language               =
| genre                  = Audio
| license                = {{ubl|[[BSD License|BSD-2-Clause]]|[[Common Development and Distribution License|CDDL-1.0]]|[[GNU General Public License|GPL-2.0-only]]|[[Proprietary software|Proprietary]] (formerly)}}
| website                = {{URL|http://www.opensound.com/}}
}}

The '''Open Sound System''' (OSS) is an interface for making and capturing sound in [[Unix]] and [[Unix-like]] operating systems.  It is based on standard Unix [[device node|devices]] [[system call]]s (i.e. [[POSIX]] [[read (system call)|read]], [[write (system call)|write]], [[ioctl]], etc.). The term also sometimes refers to the software in a Unix kernel that provides the OSS interface; it can be thought of as a [[device driver]] (or a collection of device drivers) for [[sound card|sound controller]] hardware. The goal of OSS is to allow the writing of sound-based applications that are agnostic of the underlying sound hardware.

OSS was created by [[Hannu Savolainen]] and is distributed under [[Multi-licensing|four license options]], three of which are [[free software licences]], thus making OSS [[free software]].<ref name="OSS-liberated-2007">{{citation|url=http://www.linuxpr.com/releases/9766.html |title=4Front technologies releases the source code for open sound system |publisher=Linux PR |access-date=2012-01-08 |url-status=usurped |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110725173831/http://www.linuxpr.com/releases/9766.html |archive-date=July 25, 2011 }}</ref>