Because it lacks the expensive licensing that is often the hallmark of proprietary software, open source is regularly touted as a way for IT departments to make their budget stretch a little bit further and it has already enjoyed considerable success in certain areas of the enterprise, such as web servers.

The recession is apparently driving some firms to look at Linux as a cost-saving alternative to Microsoft – is it time for open source to take off?

The latest example of Microsoft applying OOXML-esque tactics to block national migrations to Open Source, just as it stifled a shift towards open standards

Like me, you've probably read articles on how free software, or open source, is going to thrive in 2009, and how businesses everywhere are going to survive the recession by migrating to it. Perhaps you agree with those views; perhaps you don't. However, what I find most interesting is what people mean by the words "open source" and, to be even more specific, what business model they have in mind.

There’s a lot of chatter going around that open source excels in recession environments. I’m a little on the fence about that claim... but what I’m interested in talking about today is whether open source benefits anyone looking for a job right now. In theory, if open source companies grow in a recession, they should also be hiring.

Something new will emerge from this recession but open source enters it on a fairly mature level. The legal framework and values of it are established. There are serious open source players.

There is a popular notion among open source advocates that open source software will do well in a recession as enterprises seek low cost alternatives. Open source vendor Novell's CEO Ron Hovsepian (NASDAQ: NOVL) might beg to differ.

Lofty oil prices. Sub-prime mortgage woes. Financial companies (Citigroup, Etrade) stumbling badly. Ouch. Ouch. And Ouch. Whispers of a potential recession ahead continue. That made The VAR Guy wonder: If the U.S. heads into a recession soon, are open source companies better positioned to weather the storm than their closed source counterparts? Let’s take a look.

CEO Jim Whitehurst says Red Hat will perform robustly through a recession. Is that true or is he engaged in wishful thinking? InformationWeek's cover story this week, "The Open Source Enterprise," concludes that open source code gets taken more seriously in a time of IT budget cutbacks. Will that help Red Hat?