The history of open source software is really interesting.
We talk so much about Apple’s history and the likes, it’s easy to overlook the brand-less face of open source.
Here’s a cool look at the history of open source software, and I’m sure you’ll something you didn’t know before!
[Click for Larger View]
What do you think the future of open source software is?
[via Pixel77]
Raoul Snyman says
Just a note: Remember that most statistics about Linux and open source software are lower than reality. This is because most software statistics are tracked through sales, and because anybody can download and install Linux without needing to pay for it, those particular installations are unknown, and therefore don’t feature in most statistics about open source software.
For instance, at my previous job, we had in the region of 40 Ubuntu servers, none of which were “sold” to us, and therefore do not appear in any statistics on open source software. Additionally, a lot of folks use Netcraft’s statistics to give an indication of open source software, but even then those are not accurate. They track websites, some of which might be running on a single server with a dozen other sites, or in the case of bigger sites, on multiple servers (like my previous job’s site, running on 20 odd servers). They don’t take internal servers at companies into account, which are just as critical to the businesses as the external servers, nor do they track application servers like database servers, filesystem servers, or monitoring servers.
Of course servers aren’t the only machines that run Linux/open source software either. I have 2 desktop machines, 2 laptops and 2 servers at home, all of which run Ubuntu or Kubuntu. Our church laptop runs Kubuntu as well. Interestingly, those laptops all are counted as Windows machines because they came with Windows pre-installed. They don’t run Windows anymore, so the numbers for Windows installations is therefore actually higher than it should be.
Eric Dye says
Awesome. Thank’s Raoul, I had a feeling you would have something to add!