This article is more than 1 year old

Linux developers ignoring SCO

So says Evans Data

New research indicates that SCO's legal threat against Linux may go down as the "shot ignored around the world."

Evans Data polled more than 400 software developers and found that 70 percent of them are not too concerned about SCO's IP assault. The developers largely agreed that SCO's actions will have little bearing on whether or not they deploy Linux in their enterprise. A paltry 12 percent of the respondents said that SCO has scared them enough to kick their Linux habit.

"Developers seem unimpressed with the SCO lawsuit," said Nicholas Petreley, an analyst with Evans Data in a statement. "They are certainly not concerned enough to change their plans for Linux, since only one out of ten are considering it a factor in their adoption plans."

It should come as no surprise to see developers ignoring SCO's claims to own some of the code found in Linux. The Linux users have spoken out against SCO in force and don't think the company has a legal leg to stand on. CIOs and CTOs, however, might have a different feeling on the matter, and a survey of their opinions would be of interest.

Along with the SCO info, Evans Data picked up on some other trends in the open source world.

KDE has moved ahead of GNOME as the desktop of choice among Linux users. Sixty-five percent of those surveyed use KDE versus 56 percent of the users who pick GNOME. Clearly, some Linux types like to use both desktops on the same machine.

Evans Data also found that 36 percent of developers prefer a commercial version of Linux, while 15 percent tend toward non-commercial distros. Most users, however, said they don't really care one way or another with 49 percent voting in the undecided camp. ®

Related Link

Evans Data data

More about

TIP US OFF

Send us news


Other stories you might like