Open source joins the mainstream

Open source software has indeed joined the mainstream.  However, open source still has it's own advantages and disadvantages.  In some situations, after accounting for customization, maintenance and support, using open source programs is much like buying proprietary software and in other instances it is more like making your own software.  Like all make versus buy decisions, it comes...

• While open source pricing is generally quite attractive, issues such as maintenance and support must also be considered • The open source market will continue to grow, especially in the BI sector, due to both growing BI demand and additional organizations deciding to give it a try. • Deploying a new BI tool doesn't necessarily mean abandoning an old one; BI tools, both proprietary...

Open systems transformation, like a wave has washed ashore. The genie is out of the bottle. We have seen the magic. It has been marvellous for many. Neither the wave can be turned back,nor can we forget the magic of the geanie: more flexibility, faster fixes, better customization, and sometimes even a lower maintenance cost.

Major open-source projects entered the mainstream -- GNU Linux, Apache, Perl/Python/PHP, MySQL and other databases systems -- long ago.  Over the last couple of years, additional open-source products have become standards in their niches, for instance Eclipse, and other well established tools have gone open source, most notably Java.  It now dominates the mainstream in many categories and...

Open source has established itself today as a platform of choice in the enterprize software market, its share is likely to continue to grow for the foreseeable future.  However although the amount and quality of professional support available nowadays for open source platforms has dramatically improved in the recent years, this will not tip the...

Fueled by the wider "Web 2.0" movement and technology protocols, marketing and advertising are also setting up to explore "open source" as an option -- a collaboration-based "operating system" for media and advertising metrics. M&A activity within media and digital advertising is also opening the doorway for shared access to consumer-facing ("attention" metadata ownership) and advertiser-side...

Open source is not likely to ever dominate the enterprise software market, but it will change the market permanently. The competition with open source is forcing proprietary software vendors to change or die.