Open Source on Ulitzer

Geeknet network, which includes SourceForge, Slashdot, ThinkGeek, Ohloh, and Freshmeat, has conducted a study initiated by Microsoft and found that at the end of 2009, over 82% of open source software was compatible with Windows Operating System. The results are a significant improvement from 2005 when only 72% of Open source software worked on Microsoft’s proprietary OS . In fact 23 out of the top 25 all-time-most downloaded projects on SourceForge also ran on Windows and 14 of them work exclusively on Windows. It’s not surprising that Microsoft is patting itself on its back for its headway on the OSS front.

Scott Collison who is Chief Product Officer and Head of Corporate Development, at Geeknet, Inc.said:

“In terms of actual numbers, this means that some 350,000 Open Source projects are now Windows compatible, out of a total of about 433,000 Open Source projects,” Collison explained. “This growth pretty much mirrors Microsoft's increased engagement with Open Source Software, with increased participation in open source projects, supporting open source applications on its platforms and even using open source code in some of its products.”

According to Collison , Microsoft’s Open source breakthroughs have been made easier due to the fact that open source developers are increasingly creating Operating System agnostic products thanks to the availability of scripting languages and managed runtimes. Also the open source community has found it more and more difficult to ignore Window’s commanding Market share and has concluded that it is in its interests to enable platform compatibility with Windows to further its reach.