Out of inquisitiveness, I set out to find out how popular has LINUX become in presence of OS giants like Microsoft and Mac. Linux is hovering just beneath 1% of the overall market share in operating systems. And although that might sound like a small number, Linux is far more than just a fringe OS. In fact, it's running in quite a few more places than you probably suspect.
Below are few places Linux is running today in place of Windows or Mac.
US Dept of Defense: The United States Department of Defence is the "single biggest install base for Red Hat Linux" in the world. Nor was it an unconscious choice, as Brigadier General Nick Justice, the Deputy Program Officer for the Army's Program Executive Office proclaims "open source software is part of the integrated network fabric which connects and enables our command and control system to work effectively, as people's lives depend on it." Justice went on to state that "when we rolled into Baghdad, we did it using open source", and that he was indeed Red Hat's "biggest customer."
French Parliament: French Parliament opted in November 2006 to dump Windows in favour of Ubuntu Linux. The move was part of a comprehensive shake-up in the software run on Parliament computers, resulting ultimately in "1,154 French parliamentary workstations running on Linux, with OpenOffice.org productivity software, the Firefox Web browser and an open-source e-mail client." Despite the training costs, Parliament officials named cost savings and technological superiority of open-source software for parliamentary purposes as reasons for the switch.
The Indian State of Tamil Nadu: After being put off by Microsoft's bundling tactics for academic users, the Indian state of Tamil Nadu decided instead to "distribute 100,000 Linux laptops to students there." The laptops were to be sold to students for $800, a "considerable markdown compared to retail value." While the government proposed to license Windows at $12 per copy, Microsoft stood firm at $57 per copy, prompting Tamil Nadu to go with Linux instead.
Business Users of Linux: Businesses giants have slowly begun to realize the various benefits that Linux and open source software can provide. In fact, given that costs are more important to the decision making of businesses than governments, they arguably have an even greater incentive to check it out. Below are several businesses that have made the switch or begun making the switch from Windows to Linux. To name a few, Novel, Google, IBM, Panasonic, Virgin America, Cisco, ConocoPhillips, Amazon, Wikipedia, Tommy Hilfiger, Toyota Motor Sales, Sony Playstation 3, CERN are just the beginning of the list.
It was not long ago when Microsoft Windows had a tight stranglehold on the operating system market. Walk into any City or Street, it seemed, and virtually any computer you took home would be running the most current flavor of Windows. Ditto for computers ordered direct from a manufacturer. In the last decade, though, the operating system market has begun to change.
Kudos to LINUX!!!
