List of software created and maintained by people other than the manufacturer of the product. The extent of support for (and testing on) particular hardware varies from project to project.

Embedded

Notable custom-firmware projects for

wireless router A wireless router is a device that performs the functions of a router and also includes the functions of a wireless access point. It is used to provide access to the Internet or a private computer network. Depending on the manufacturer and mode ...

s. Many of these will run on various brands such as Linksys, Asus, Netgear, etc. *

OpenWrt OpenWrt (from ''open wireless router'') is an open-source project for embedded operating systems based on Linux, primarily used on embedded devices to route network traffic. The main components are Linux, util-linux, musl, and BusyBox. All ...

– Customizable

FOSS Fos or FOSS may refer to: Companies * Foss A/S, a Danish analytical instrument company *Foss Brewery, a former brewery in Oslo, Norway * Foss Maritime, a tugboat and shipping company Historic houses * Foss House (New Brighton, Minnesota), Unite ...

firmware written from scratch; features a combined

SquashFS Squashfs is a compressed read-only file system for Linux. Squashfs compresses files, inodes and directories, and supports block sizes from 4 KiB up to 1 MiB for greater compression. Several compression algorithms are supported. Squashfs is ...

/ JFFS2 file system and the package manager

opkg opkg (''open package management'') is a lightweight package management system based upon ipkg. It is written in C and resembles Advanced Package Tool (APT)/dpkg in operation. It is intended for use on embedded Linux devices and is used in this ...

with over 3000 available packages (Linux/ GPL); now merged with

LEDE Lede may refer to: * Lead paragraph (US English), the first paragraph of a composition Places * Lede, Belgium, a municipality in Flanders * Lède, a river in France * Lede Formation, a geologic formation in Belgium People * Marquess of Lede ...

. **

– A fork of the OpenWrt project that shared many of the same goals; merged back into

as of v. 18.06 (2018). **

Commotion Wireless Commotion Wireless is an open-source wireless mesh network for electronic communication. The project was developed by the Open Technology Institute, and development included a $2 million grant from the United States Department of State in 2011 ...

– FOSS mesh networking. **

DD-WRT DD-WRT is Linux-based firmware for wireless routers and access points. Originally designed for the Linksys WRT54G series, it now runs on a wide variety of models. DD-WRT is one of a handful of third-party firmware projects designed to replace ...

– Based on OpenWrt kernel since v. 23 (Dec. 2005), paid and free versions available. **

Gargoyle In architecture, and specifically Gothic architecture, a gargoyle () is a carved or formed grotesque with a spout designed to convey water from a roof and away from the side of a building, thereby preventing it from running down masonry wa ...

– A free OpenWrt-based Linux distribution for a range of Broadcom and Atheros chipset based wireless routers. **

LibreCMC LibreCMC is a Linux-libre distribution for computers with minimal resources, such as the Ben NanoNote, ath9k-based Wi-Fi routers, and other hardware with emphasis on free software. Based on OpenWrt, the project's goal is to aim for compliance wi ...

– An FSF-endorsed derivation of OpenWRT with the proprietary blobs removed **

Roofnet Roofnet was an experimental 802.11b/g mesh network developed by the Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Research included link-level measurements of 802.11, finding high-thr ...

– A now defunct experimental 802.11 based mesh network project developed at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. The technology developed by the Roofnet project formed the basis for the company Meraki, now owned by

Cisco Cisco Systems, Inc., commonly known as Cisco, is an American-based multinational digital communications technology conglomerate corporation headquartered in San Jose, California. Cisco develops, manufactures, and sells networking hardware, ...

. ** DebWRT – A discontinued project that combines the Linux kernel from

and the

package management system A package manager or package-management system is a collection of software tools that automates the process of installing, upgrading, configuring, and removing computer programs for a computer in a consistent manner. A package manager deals w ...

from

Debian Debian (), also known as Debian GNU/Linux, is a Linux distribution composed of free and open-source software, developed by the community-supported Debian Project, which was established by Ian Murdock on August 16, 1993. The first version of De ...

(Linux/GPL). * HyperWRT – Early power-boosting firmware project to stay close to the official WRT54G and WRT54GS firmware but add features such as transmit power, port triggers, scripts, telnet, etc. **

Tomato The tomato is the edible berry of the plant ''Solanum lycopersicum'', commonly known as the tomato plant. The species originated in western South America, Mexico, and Central America. The Mexican Nahuatl word gave rise to the Spanish word ...

– The successor to HyperWRT, features advanced QoS as well as

Ajax Ajax may refer to: Greek mythology and tragedy * Ajax the Great, a Greek mythological hero, son of King Telamon and Periboea * Ajax the Lesser, a Greek mythological hero, son of Oileus, the king of Locris * ''Ajax'' (play), by the ancient Gree ...

and

SVG Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) is an XML-based vector image format for defining two-dimensional graphics, having support for interactivity and animation. The SVG specification is an open standard developed by the World Wide Web Consortium s ...

graphs. *** Asuswrt **** Asuswrt-Merlin

Other

Software distributions for routers with >5 GB Storage and >1 GB RAM

FreeBSD FreeBSD is a free and open-source Unix-like operating system descended from the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD), which was based on Research Unix. The first version of FreeBSD was released in 1993. In 2005, FreeBSD was the most popular ...

* m0n0wall - m0n0wall is abandoned, but it was built on FreeBSD and boots off of flash storage or CD ROM media in under 12 megabytes. * pfsense - an open source firewall/router computer software distribution based on FreeBSD that can be installed on a physical computer or a virtual machine. ** OPNsense - a fork of pfSense.

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, whi ...

Zeroshell Zeroshell is a small open-source Linux distribution for servers and embedded systems which aims to provide network services. Its administration relies on a web-based graphical interface; no shell is needed to administer and configure it. Zeros ...

– Routers and bridges with VPN, QoS, load balancing and other functions * IPFire - Advanced firmware written from scratch with customizable firewall and optional packages in the form of add ons. * TNSR - Router software from Netgate (originally based on

CentOS CentOS (, from Community Enterprise Operating System; also known as CentOS Linux) is a Linux distribution that provides a free and open-source community-supported computing platform, functionally compatible with its upstream source, Red Hat En ...

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, whi ...

, however recent versions are based on

Ubuntu Ubuntu ( ) is a Linux distribution based on Debian and composed mostly of free and open-source software. Ubuntu is officially released in three editions: '' Desktop'', ''Server'', and ''Core'' for Internet of things devices and robots. All ...

) that incorporates Vector Packet Processing, Data Plane Development Kit, FRRouting, and Clixon technologies. *

VyOS VyOS is an open source network operating system based on Debian. VyOS provides a free routing platform that competes directly with other commercially available solutions from well known network providers. Because VyOS is run on standard amd64 s ...

- Open source network operating system based on

Embedded

Other

FreeBSD FreeBSD is a free and open-source Unix-like operating system descended from the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD), which was based on Research Unix. The first version of FreeBSD was released in 1993. In 2005, FreeBSD was the most popular ...

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, whi ...

See also

References

Further reading