Today, everyone uses cellular networks, whether it’s ancient 2G, 3G or more modern 4G or 5G. However, very few people outside the commercial mobile operators are actually operating their own cellular networks – and even less know they can do so using Free and Open Source Software (FOSS).
For the first 16 years of digital cellular communications from 1991 (when the first digital cellular GSM network went operational) to 2007, there were virtually no FOSS implementations of cellular network infrastructure. Meanwhile, the situation has [luckily] changed significantly: Projects like Osmocom, open5gs, srsRAN and many others have been thriving.
This presentation provides an overview over various FOSS projects in this area, and explains what you can use them for, respectively.
