Open Source in Software Development

Open source software has fundamentally transformed how we build and maintain applications.

Before widespread open source adoption, every company had to write their own custom components. Today, we can rely on multiple, battle-tested alternatives that thousands of developers have scrutinized and improved on.

Popular open source libraries, like React or Express.js, are used across thousands of different applications, in everything from high-traffic e-commerce sites to embedded systems to mobile apps. Each use case stresses the code differently and exposes edge cases that the original authors never anticipated.

This level of adoption and exposure minimizes the risk of failure because it enforces comprehensive testing across different environments. Someone working on financial systems might spot a precision error that a web developer would never encounter. A security researcher might identify a vulnerability that application developers wouldn't think to look for.

The peer review process in open source is also quite rigorous. If that security researcher submits a pull request to a major open source project, they’re essentially defending their submission against multiple experts from around the world.

The transparency of open source also makes it easier to catch potential bugs. Any active contributor can dig into the code and fix it without waiting until a vendor steps in. Plus, the sheer number of collaborators often means bugs get caught faster.

In short, open source provides robust tools, faster development, tighter security, and community leverage. These benefits made engineers at Janea Systems naturally gravitate toward open source solutions.

Today, we’re sharing five open-source tools (plus one honorable mention) that have consistently proven their worth in our development environment.

Visual Studio Code: The Developer's Swiss Army Knife

Visual Studio Code

VS Code is essentially a supercharged code editor that Microsoft built on open source foundations. It's lightweight and fast - starts up quickly, doesn't bog down your system - but packs serious developer tools like debugging, Git integration, and intelligent code completion.

The real magic is in its extensibility. There are over 60,000 extensions available, so you can customize it for virtually any language or workflow. Need to work with React? There's an extension. Kubernetes? Covered. Want to change how it looks? Pick from thousands of themes.

VS Code also beats Microsoft's own proprietary Visual Studio for pure editing tasks, has better project navigation, cleaner interface, and works identically across Windows, Mac, and Linux. Plus, the network effect of its popularity (it’s used by 73.6% of respondents in Stack Overflow's 2024 survey) means developers can collaborate seamlessly regardless of their individual setups.

What makes it especially appealing at Janea Systems is that it handles multi-language projects beautifully. When consulting for different clients that use various tech stacks, we don't want to juggle multiple IDEs. VS Code gives us one consistent environment that adapts to whatever we’re working on.

It's basically the Swiss Army knife of code editors - versatile enough for any project, but still lightweight enough for daily use.

Windows Subsystem for Linux: Bridging Two Worlds

The next entry on our list is quite unique in that it was not originally open source. Microsoft decided to change this state of affairs in May 2025. We’re happy they did. Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) has been running on our machines for ages, and now we can spread the word about this magnificent tool.

WSL lets developers run a full Linux environment directly inside Windows without the overhead of a virtual machine. You get access to the actual Linux kernel and all the command-line tools that come with it.

The real value is in those Linux command-line utilities. Tools like sed, grep, find, and awk are incredibly powerful for text processing and file manipulation. One of our engineers put it perfectly: these Linux tools are better than what Windows can offer natively.

Another advantage of WSL is the seamless integration. You can access Windows files from Linux and vice versa, run Windows executables from the Linux shell, and even use GUI Linux applications that integrate right into your Windows desktop. So rather than switching between two separate worlds, you're getting the best of both in one unified environment.

WSL is also a game-changer for developers working on Windows and deploying to Linux servers. They can develop and test in an environment that's virtually identical to their production setup, without the resource overhead of running a full VM. Plus, WSL supports hardware acceleration for ML workloads, so you can leverage your Windows NVIDIA drivers while running Linux-based AI frameworks.

Ack3: Pattern Search for Developers

Imagine you're working on a large codebase with thousands of files, and you need to find everywhere a specific function name appears, or all the places where you used a particular variable. That's where text search tools come in.

Grep is the classic Unix tool that searches through files for text patterns. It's incredibly powerful but treats every file the same way. It doesn't understand the difference between source code, documentation, or binary files.

Ack3 is like grep's smarter cousin, designed specifically for programmers. It automatically knows what programming languages you're working with and searches accordingly. So if you're looking for a function called "getUserData", Ack3 can distinguish between the actual function definition and just a mention of it in a comment.

The really nice thing is that Ack3 automatically ignores stuff you don't want to search - like .git folders, compiled binaries, or node_modules directories. With grep, you'd have to manually exclude all that noise. Ack3 also color-codes the results, making them much easier to read.

Ack3’s speed and accuracy make it indispensable for code refactoring, bug hunting, and understanding unfamiliar codebases. Think of it as the difference between using a basic flashlight versus a headlamp with adjustable focus - both help you see in the dark, but one is designed specifically for the task at hand.

PowerToys: Windows Enhancement Done Right

PowerToys main window

PowerToys is Microsoft's collection of utilities designed for Windows "power users" - people who want more control and productivity features than what Windows provides out of the box.

It has an interesting history. Originally included in Windows 95, it completely disappeared in later Windows releases until Microsoft revived it in 2019 as an open source project. That's where Janea Systems came in. We were actually the team Microsoft hired to bring it back to life for Windows 10 and 11.

The toolkit includes about 25+ utilities now. Some of the most popular ones are:

• FancyZones - lets you create custom window layouts across multiple monitors. Instead of just snapping windows left/right, you can define complex grid layouts.
• PowerToys Run - think extended Windows Start Menu. Hit Alt+Space and you get a quick launcher that lets you find files, apps, run calculations, etc.
• Text Extractor - OCR tool that can grab text from anywhere on your screen, including images.
• PowerRename - bulk file renaming with regex support.

The cool thing is it's completely open source with over 100k GitHub stars and attracts tons of first-time contributors. What’s more, Microsoft uses it as a testing ground, so features that work well in PowerToys may sometimes make their way into Windows itself.

LLVM: The Foundation of Modern Compilers

LLVM is an invisible foundation that makes most modern programming work. Think of it as a universal translator between programming languages and computer hardware.

Imagine you write code in Python, C++, Rust, etc., but your computer's processor only understands very specific, low-level instructions. Back in the day, this discrepancy was why every programming language needed its own complete compiler for every type of computer chip. That's tons of duplicated work.

LLVM's breakthrough was creating a "middle language" - an intermediate representation (IR) that sits between human code and machine code. Now, language creators just need to translate to LLVM IR, and chip makers need to support LLVM. Everyone benefits without reinventing the wheel.

When Apple switched to M1 chips, most development tools still worked on the new Apple machines because these tools were built on LLVM. When someone creates a new language like Rust, they don't need to build code generation from scratch. Instead, they target LLVM and instantly get support for dozens of platforms.

At Janea, we love LLVM because it contains some of the greatest tools for building compilers, optimizers, and run-time environments. For example, LLVM/Clang is one of the best bets if you want to build compilers for new platforms. Other notable LLVM tools include Clang, a compiler front end with cross-platform support; clang-format for configuring style options; or LLDB for debugging.

In addition, LLVM and Clang power Emscripten, a compiler used for porting C/C++ projects to WebAssembly or HTML5, including in game engines such as Unity or Godot.

Honorable Mention: WiX Toolset

WiX Toolset is the go-to tool for creating professional Windows installers - those setup.exe files that install software on Windows machines.

Instead of using proprietary, black-box installer builders, WiX uses XML-based source files that you can read, edit, and version control just like regular code. This means your installation process becomes as transparent and maintainable as your application code itself.

WiX gives you precise control over every aspect of the installation process: where files go, what registry entries get created, how the user interface flows, and how uninstallation works. Plus, since it's XML, your entire team can review installer changes in pull requests.

Interestingly, it was Microsoft that released WiX back in 2004 as its first-ever open source project. You might say it paved the way for PowerToys!

One of Janea Systems’ engineers contributes to WiX, giving back to the open source community we all depend on. It's the kind of unglamorous but essential infrastructure that makes professional software deployment possible.

Janea Systems and Open Source: Building Tomorrow's Solutions

What’s great about open source and Janea Systems is that we’re moving towards actively contributing back. It's not just one developer helping develop WiX. We have also revived PowerToys and even created our own projects like JECQ for efficient vector search.

We’re proving that you can build a successful engineering consultancy while being deeply committed to open source principles. Our clients get world-class solutions, the community gets better tools, and we get the flexibility and transparency that enables us to do our best work.

It's honestly the best way to build software - together.