NetApplications is out with a couple of new metrics of market share for operating systems and browsers, and the news is good for open source. Topping their findings, Microsoft Windows' market share has dropped below 90 percent for the first time in its measurements. The share erosion is largely attributed to increased interest in the Mac platform, but Linux is cited as on the rise as well.

IDC figures show that Linux has actually lost market share to Windows Server over the last three years.

So it is time to start screaming in panic, start selling Novell and Red Hat stock for anything we can get, and enroll in MCSE (Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer) night classes? Eh, I don't think so.

At the beginning of December, we warned the Copyright Office that operating system vendors would use UEFI secure boot anticompetitively, by colluding with hardware partners to exclude alternative operating systems.

A quick search on Google for tutorials regarding Linux and Windows interoperability, will reveal a lot of guides on how to install (emulate) Windows on a virtual machine inside Linux or how to migrate from Windows to Linux or how to dual boot Windows and Linux, but what I was really looking for was a way to run Windows and Linux at the same time, on the same machine; sharing the same desktop, work

It was not long ago when Microsoft Windows had a tight stranglehold on the operating system market. Linux is hovering just beneath 1% of the overall market share in operating systems. And although that might sound like a small number, Linux is far more than just a fringe OS.

Among the three major operating systems, you may know that Linux has the lowest market share on the desktop but is leading the server market. However, Linux on the desktop is slowly but surely going mainstream that's enough to scare the crap out of Microsoft.

Anti-virus software has become a critical aspect of computing at all levels. Although to this point it seems the only operating system that is really targeted by viruses is Microsoft Windows, the time will come when UNIX-based operating systems will be equally as marked.

Microsoft Windows remains the dominant desktop operating system with approximately 90% of the client operating system market. If Microsoft's monopoly is ever going to be challenged by Linux, there has to be an easy way for Windows' users to be able to learn about this rival operating system.

Question please, Mr Ballmer:

If we “stole” our operating systems from Microsoft, then how come our operating systems never “crash” in the monotonously regular fashion that every Windows OS has done since Windows 3.11?