Where Open Source Is Successful

This chapter discusses the areas where open source is succeeding, and then the areas where open source has advantages and disadvantages, real or apparent. It is extensively used on the Internet backbone, by IBM, the U.S. government, Ford, Wal-Mart, Exxon, GM, Amazon.com, and Merrill Lynch, among others, in the United States, and by large enterprises and government organizations around the world. The major products widely used are Linux and FreeBSD operating systems, Apache Web server, MySQL and PostgreSQL databases, Open Office and other office suites, BIND and Send mail and so on. In some areas, such as embedded devices, Web servers, and engineering workstations, the open source choices are already the leading installed systems. In others, including infrastructure servers, application servers, and large academic clusters, open source is gaining the majority of the new install decisions. However, not everyone can necessarily benefit by adopting these products. Some may have sunk costs in existing solutions, and there can be large transitional costs in other cases. However, open source solutions are sufficiently compelling that every organization should be looking at them as possibilities now.