Computer business Microsoft is losing popularity points with its Windows platform as more developers decide it is not right for them.  In North America, it is still the top platform used, but a new survey suggests that these same developers are starting to choose alternatives.  The number of developers that used Windows for applications decreased by 12 percent from a year ago, with 64.8 percent using the platform as opposed to 74 percent in 2006.

The computer business survey targeted 400 developers and IT managers in North America.  John Andrews, CEO of Evans Data – the company that conducted the survey – stated that he believes the decline is due to an increased interest in Novell’s and Red Hat’s Linux-based systems.  The release of Windows Vista kept numbers from being worse, but the Windows share is supposed to drop another 2 percent in 2007.  

Developers in the computer business are using Linux 34 percent more than in the previous year.  Industry experts predict the numbers for Linux will go up to 16 percent within the next year.  

The battle in the computer business between Windows and Linux has been translated by many experts, including Evans as evidence that open source is evolving.  Use of the Windows on the development desktop has not changed a great deal, despite other changes for the system.  

The survey conducted related to both client and server application development.  Evans Data reported that a transition from Windows to alternatives probably began two years ago and has picked up in speed recently.  The survey also included Unix and Mac OS, but these computer business numbers were not released.  

While open source software is definitely changing the commercial software market, Andrews believes that there will always be room for Windows and Linux-based systems in the computer business.  

Other findings of the computer business report included the realization that JavaScript is the most widely used scripting language, having surpassed PHP, Ruby and Python.

Submitted By:  Joshua Feinberg