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More and more developers are using development tools produced by the open source community like JUnit, MySQL, Eclipse, PHP or JBoss. A recent poll asked to compare the quality of open source and commercial software development tools. And the winner is... not obvious.....

Open source versus commercial tools 2006 (2004 answers)

Same quality: 38% (32%)
There is no easy answer to this question: 22% (24%)
Superior in quality: 20% (26%)
Inferior in quality: 12% 13%
I do not use open source tools: 6% (4%)
I do not use commercial tools: 2% (1%)

Participants: 524 (312)

Source: http://www.methodsandtools.com

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By James Maguire
May 15, 2006

The old proverb says "Seek, and ye shall find," and that's certainly true of free software. The Internet is chock full of freebies: free software for e-commerce, auctions, business management and more. It's all available at the click of a mouse.

You might ask: why is it free? In many cases, the free download is a limited version of a company's premium product. A firm gives away a free version hoping that happy users will upgrade to the paid version.

Or, a company distributes a free program to draw traffic to its site. Sometimes freeware carries ads, so it's actually a source of income for whoever gives it away.

Because offering a freebie is such a popular sales tool, the following list is just the tip of the iceberg. But you'll find a little something for every online business need in this list.

Oh, and if you're looking for the best source for free information about your online store, check out ECommerce Guide (See what I mean? Free stuff often comes with an ad attached!)

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This article focuses on the advantages of going with an open source solution. It looks at application availability, software costs, license management, and other issues that must factor into a decision of whether to adopt open source in your environment.

By Jason Williams, Peter Clegg, Emmett Dulaney.

Sample Chapter from the book Expanding Choice: Moving to Linux and Open Source with Novell Open Enterprise Server is provided courtesy of Sams.

Why Open Source is Important to You

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Introduction

There's been an incredible amount of news and gossip about open source over the past year. Between the SCO lawsuits, the Microsoft Windows versus Linux TCO campaign, and the IBM "Linux Everywhere" advertising blitz, open source seems to have gotten more coverage than the Brad and Jennifer split. You might be forgiven for thinking the whole open source thing is overblown?plenty of smoke but no fire.

You'd be wrong. Open source has been gathering steam and is now a technology that you must take into account in your IT planning. Failing to do so isn't just about missing the "latest big thing," it may mean harming your company's financial performance.

There are two trends in open source adoption that make it imperative that you consider open source solutions for your future IT initiatives. This article describes each of the trends and discusses their importance for your business.