Comments on: Survey finds Ubuntu is the fastest-growing Linux distribution

Ubuntu is on a tear. But then, so is all of the open-source stack, as a new survey shows.

[kiwibuntu]

How about a graph showing the changing relative share of distros that sold out and made patent agreements with Microsoft and those that didn't. A simple two-line chart but an interesting one.

[KrisBuytaert]

Linux Other is also on the rise it seems.
Do you have more detail on that ? What part of that would be say CentOS or another RedHat based product

[praddie]

Ubuntu is undoubtedly the best distro that i've used. But yes on a comparison scale it would be more clear if Ubuntu is weighed with others with facts n figures.

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[unoengborg]

I don't know if Ubuntu is the best distro or not, but it is certainly the best marketed one. So, the Alfresco statistics isn't really that surprising. The thing that Canonical does right, or at least better than Novell, is that they give away their distro for free and sell the support separately. That way they have a better chance to create mindshare.

The high figures for Red Hat is no surprice either, they have been around longer than Novell (as a Linux distro), and they have a more clear focus on the server side than Novell. I don't think Microsoft deal with Novell have much to do with the figures. If you are shoping for these distros you probably are in it for business and then you can't afford to be idealistic, you simply go for what gets you best return of investment.

[tristanbob]

Matt,

I think it would be useful to see the growth rates of the data in your line graphs. That makes it very easy to identify the rates of change.

Tristan

[Aimache]

That's really interesting, and I've read many figures on a number of websites but something sounds weird. Many articles say "survey participants coming from 260 countries" but ... there's less than 260 countries in the world as far as I know (194 seems to be typicallly admitted).

That should be a typo (160 sounds better).