Admit it - you'd really, really like to see some of the lofty promises your CRM vendor made come true. Not all of them, you know the game, but, well… some of them would be nice.

Step back and consider the question of open source versus the CRM you probably went with, let's guess Microsoft (News - Alert). Industry observer Stephen T. Richards notes that the main thing putting open source ahead "is its adaptability. Open source software is published under licenses that allow everyone access to the source code, letting them change, download add-ons and explore the real nuts and bolts of the software."

Basically, if you have the skills, you can access the source code and change it to suit your particular situation. Microsoft, as Richards rather drily puts it, "isn't quite so flexible. It may be powerful, but its source code is unreachable, set in stone and packaged to perform particular functions without that ability to manipulate the coding if it doesn't quite do what you want it to do."

But hey, with Microsoft, you get set programs, "lesson plans can be formulated within selected parameters, everyone knows their way around Microsoft and is familiar with the layout and operation," Richards says. And these are not advantages to be sniffed at. Ignore their appeal at your peril.

Open source, however, does have it over Microsoft on one particular aspect, Richards writes: "Because the source code is accessible to anyone with the right training, if the software doesn't do exactly what you want it to then you can change it." Yes it'll take you a bit longer to train everybody up in the way they're supposed to use it, but think of the long run: Won't it be a savings?

Richards admits that open source's appeal "starts to waver slightly" when one realizes that "its trustworthiness as a resource could be called into question." Microsoft, despite its rigid inflexibility and bugs, is generally reliable.

In a school environment, Richards says, "a balance has to be struck between dependable resources and innovation, development and exploration." Basically, friends, decide which is more important to you. The answer may surprise you.