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He could have created The Washington Monument, that does NOT change the fact that the whacko thought it was perfectly acceptable to sit down ON STAGE no less and ATE TOE CHEESE in front of God and everybody!

Ya know just because somebody was ONCE an insightful person does not mean that they will always be insightful, hell or even sane for that matter. Here we have a person that shows he has no concept of correct public behavior, openly brags about being a homeless squatter, and his views are often frankly self contradictory and don't follow logic (see his "what is a circuit" for some truly amazing logic hoop jumping) and the man doesn't even have the grace or good sense not to piss on his own license by having a childish tantrum and naming a clause after a company he believed didn't uphold "the spirit" of the GPL instead of simply admitting he made errors when coming up with GPL V2. Any way you slice it the man is the best poster child MSFT and Apple ever had, he looks, dresses, and behaves like its 1979 and computers are just toys for homebrew clubs and academia.

As for TFA? Sadly Pottering is another one that MSFT and Apple really should send a fruit basket to, because its him and the devs of his ilk that keep Linux in the backroom instead of the showroom and the reason why is simple...they will NEVER EVER let Linux become fucking stable! I swear these devs and their "itch scratching" are from bizarro world, they are like "Oh noes, things am stable and most stuff am working! This is no good, users am happy and can update without breakage! Quick lets change enough internals that many devices am broken and stability worse than Win2K, that will make users miserable!".

I mean for fucks sake you had MSFT being run by STEVE "Buzzword McBingo" BALMER and you STILL can't gain share, ever wonder why? Well you had the DE devs help out MSFT by taking a steaming dump on the UI with the barely alpha quality KDE 4 release, The Gnome 3 mess, or yeah and Linus made sure to fiddle with the kernel just enough to cause serious driver issues, not to mention the Mickey Mouse Pulse audio which to this very day is usually the most crash prone part of any Linux build. Then you had the whole "What is gonna replace the shitty X Server" mess, Mozilla having to disable hardware acceleration in Linux (which frankly is still piss poor and a decade behind Windows), not to mention here it is 2015 and Linux STILL doesn't have a simple GUI for rolling back drivers or the system if an update takes a steamer on the system (something Windows has had for a decade and a half) and the driver situation is still such a mess hardware OEMs can't just put a penguin on the box and a Linux driver on a CD because hey, what works now may not work 6 months from now!

Sadly at the end of the day Linux is never gonna get any better, its just gonna get different. This is why Linux is getting its ass handed to it by "other" because at the end of the day the devs would rather crank out a new version with new bugs and new problems than fix what they have. Cranking out new software is a hell of a lot more enjoyable than bug fixing, regression testing, writing docs, hell this is the real reason why Linus won't allow Linux to have a stable driver ABI, something every. other. OS. has. because it might mean he couldn't just tweak and twiddle with the kernel like its still 1993 and Linux was only a hobbyist project!

Its a damned shame that FOSS advocates won't hold Linux to the same standards they hold MSFT and Apple, if they flat up refused to take the Mickey Mouse alpha quality shit you could probably whip Linux into an OS that would make Windows 10 look like Windows 3 and OSX look like System 7, all the parts are there, if the devs would actually work to make things better instead of crapping out new versions every other year.

Which leads us to the sadly all too true obligatory XKCD which is why Linux on the desktop is so low its getting its ass handed to it by "other" and has gotten so low its literally below the margin for error.

Considering that every time Linux starts to get stable the devs take a big steaming shit on it, Pulse, KDE 4, Gnome 3, Systemd, not to mention Torvalds constant kernel fiddling, is anybody really surprised by the plummeting numbers? Its a damned shame but as long as devs would rather put out yet another release instead of fixing the bugs in the previous release Linux will always remain in alpha quality.

July 2014: 9.78%

I don't like the posting of netmarketshare as gospel especially when they adjust their data, but quoting wikipedia as a measure is simply spinning figures in a "I don't even give a fuck about reality way" A quick look at statcounter shows firefox usage slightly down http://gs.statcounter.com/#bro... and at 18%. Netshare shows firefox slightly down at http://marketshare.hitslink.co... as 15%. Not a million miles from each other, but the trends basically show firefox usage is pretty flat. Even these figures are less of a reflection of how badly firefox is doing, but how well chrome is.

http://www.w3counter.com/trends
http://gs.statcounter.com/
http://marketshare.hitslink.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=1&qpcustomb=0

There is an unexplained trend upwards in Internet Explorer

You lost us as soon as you said XP is better than 7.

It isn't

Actually there are a few ways that XP is better than 7, Hardware requirements being a major one (It was sold on netbooks for years after it had been replaced...and never ran with 7). It is part of the reason why http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=10&qpcustomd=0 for Windows XP is still around 40%.

Secure Boot isn't secure nor is it a security feature. It's sole purpose is to keep Linux off of x86 computers.

Not a problem.

Top 7 Operating Systems From June 2012 to June 2013. Desktop Operating System Market Share, OS Platform Statistics 2003-2013

NetApplications doesn't track sales, they track unique browser hits on a wide range of web sites and derive the platform from the user agent string. If you bought a Windows 8 laptop and put Windows 7 on it they would identify it as Windows 7, not as Windows 8, assuming that you haven't spoofed the user agent string.

http://marketshare.hitslink.com/faq.aspx#Methodology

The vast majority of people use the stock browser, and defaults in general. Not everyone is a geek.

http://www.androidpolice.com/2013/04/03/according-to-net-applications-stock-android-browser-usage-is-still-way-out-in-front-of-chrome/

It does not change your point of your comment but netmarketshare http://marketshare.hitslink.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=0&qpcustomd=1 where the data comes from, has something wrong with the way records data, especially with mobile usage. Its often quoted on Apple sites due to its heavy bias towards Apple(that does not reflect real world use). They have heavily massage figures, and they do not match those of independent larger sources. Here is statcounter http://gs.statcounter.com/#mobile_browser-ww-monthly-201205-201305 (Again it does not dispute your point but the source data)

No need to attack. I stated my personal evaluation and decision. As far as decline: http://marketshare.hitslink.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=1&qpsp=2008&qpnp=6&qptimeframe=Y It's clear they peaked in market share a couple years ago. I believe it is due to quality more than platform integration. You can do your own performance evaluation, but I imagine you will find greater memory consumption with Firefox. Options are good. I wish them well.

Where do those stats came from and how old are they?

Latest stats from two well-known sources show quite different numbers:

NetApplications - North America + Europe:
Win7 43%
WinXP 21%
http://marketshare.hitslink.com/report.aspx?qprid=10&qpaf=-000%09100%090%0DO000%09100%091%0D

Statcounter - WORLDWIDE
Win7 53%
WinXP 26%
Source: http://gs.statcounter.com/#os-ww-monthly-201111-201211

Ie is well above 50% and Chrome only has 19% usage according to Netmarketshare. Infact, IE 6 still has 7% of the market!

Ie is well above 50% and Chrome only has 19% usage according to Netmarketshare. Infact, IE 6 still has 7% of the market!

Europe's biggest claim to Linux is Linus Torvalds being a Finn, but he has moved to California in ~1996, and is now a US citizen. (I too am a naturalized US citizen, having been born in the USSR.)

The history of UNIX is rooted in AT&T research, and later corporate America, and simultaneously Berkeley, MIT (and I don't just mean that silly GNU hippie), and many other US universities. Top contributors to Linux are American corps! Many contributions also came from English-speaking countries that are culturally closer to US than the US-bashing continental Europeans. Open source projects get contributions from all over the world, but you'll find very few important FLOSS projects where European contributors dominate over North American ones.

So, if you want to make it a contest...

North America has Microsoft (still 83% of Web clients), oldest and most popular UNIXen (BSD's, MacOS X, Oracle's sunset, RedHat, etc), Commodore / AmigaOS, EMC / VMware, BeOS / Haiku, Plan9 from New Jersey, old IBM / HP / DR / Honeywell / Apple / Novell OS'es, etc, etc, etc.

Europe has Nokia, Amoeba, a few obscure UNIX-like systems (MINIX, my dear native U-NAS (Soviet BSD fork), etc), and of course Atari. (Did SAP or Ericsson ever make any noteworthy OS'es? Did I miss anything?)

The contrast is obvious.

The point is that USA (and other national champions of Economic Freedom, most of which speak English and are merely small satellites [topic.ref.pun] orbiting around USA) presently constitute the world's leading civilization, and the bulk of Europe is secondary in its aggregate merit, benefiting from diffusional ("trickle down") benefits of USA's achievements. There's nothing wrong with that, and USA has always acted benevolently toward the Europeans, but when you engage in America-bashing you are in contradiction of solid inescapable facts.

--libman

Only support current browsers

8 was released in 2009. IE9 last year. I'm not really sure it matters for google, but if you do custom web applications 3 years isn't really a long time to have to keep it alive.

The big thing with IE8 is that it's the last IE for windows XP. Which is why it has a larger markeshare than IE9 still. marketshare from June and more marketshare by a lot. (25% vs 18%).

If windows 8 looked like it was about to take off like a rocket and Windows XP was on a rapid trajectory to obsolescence then sure, but that isn't really what's happening. Windows XP is slowly dying away, but it's still slowly, and especially in the business market lots of potential customers are locked into the browser on XP for the moment.

Granted, google probably has a lot of metrics and they probably know this isn't a problem for *their* products, but for the us little guys it's a different problem.

"If price were the most important thing, Lenovo and Dell would be the market leaders."

http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=8&qpcustomd=0

Yeah it looks like the PC builders must really be hurting at the moment.

These ARE meaningless!

This is a sampling of browsers that just visit their site!!

The actual June numbers are:
IE (all versions) 54%
Firefox (all versions) 20%
Chrome (all versions) 19%
Safari (all versions) 5%
Opera (all versions) 2%

...and the trend is pretty flat, too.
Comparing August 2011 to June 2012:

Month____________IE Firefox Chrome Safari Opera Other
August___2011 55.31% 22.57% 15.51% 4.64% 1.68% 0.29%
June_____2012 54.02% 20.06% 19.08% 4.73% 1.60% 0.51%

(Source: Net Market Share for June 2012, Desktops: http://marketshare.hitslink.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=0&qpcustomd=0&qptimeframe=M)

W3Schools is a website for people with an interest for web technologies. These people are more interested in using alternative browsers than the average user. The average user tends to the browser that comes preinstalled with their computer, and do not seek out other browser alternatives.

These facts indicate that the browser figures above are not 100% realistic. Other web sites have statistics showing that Internet Explorer is a more popular browser.

Net Applications collects stats for 12,415 clients the size of Disney, Apple, Microsoft, Roche, the Moz Foundation, CNN, the WSJ, the New York Times and so on. The guys paying for these stats don't give a damn about the geek. They do give a damn about what is happening in their core markets.

Desktop Browser Market Share

Statcounter exposes more of its stats --- and there can be some big surprises:

Top 12 Browser Versions In China

Mobile vs. Desktop in China

Ya know, when I hear Linux guys bitch about the reg i just have to LMAO, because frankly you have NOTHING that comes close to the ease of use of the reg. I have a customer with a problem? I can just email them a .reg file and tell them "clicky clicky and reboot" and voila! Problem solved. And I can do that with 1 machine or a thousand just as easily.

In the end all the bitching and whining about how much worse Windows is, yet your free OS couldn't even beat Vista, the most hated OS MSFT put out since WinME, what does that tell you? Hell more people pirate Windows than take your OS for free, doesn't that tell you that you are doing something wrong?

CLI is a server tech that deserves to stay in the server room and NOT on the desktop. the world has spoken, since Win 3.x CLI based OSes have gone exactly nowhere and after 20 years that is where Linux is, why? Because at the heart of the matter CLI has become a crutch, that's why. Have a problem? Bash. Can't make a GUI to save your life? Bash. Problem with sound, video, networking? Bash.

If you think your OS is so superior step right up and take the hairyfeet challenge. Simply remove CLI from your OS for 1 YEAR, that's all. Personally I doubt you'll even get it to boot, much less make even the 6 month mark, simply because CLI has become the all purpose crutch in Linux. Don't believe me, go ask for help with a common problem like say WiFi issues in ANY Linux forum and tell them you need a non CLI solution, I dare you. You'll will get cursed and insulted because in reality THEY CAN'T DO IT WITHOUT CLI.

So when you get to even 15% then you can jump on that high horse, but right now acting elitist about an OS that has barely beaten JavaME after being given away free for 20 years? that's just sad dude, and not something to be acting all elitist over.

For your convenience Windows vastly out numbers other operating systems either by market share or by usage.

Sourced from first hits (at least for me) on searches for operating system market share and operating system by usage respectively.

It also helps that MS ties its browser to its own operating systems. As tablets and smart phones are used more and more to access the Internet and with so many of those devices running non MS operating systems, Internet Explorer market share will continue to fall. Four short years ago Windows had 95% market share. For 2012 it is at 85%. The real danger for MS is that as more and more people become familiar with other operating systems like iOS and android they will eventually become more comfortable with the idea of a non-MS pc. If I were MS I would segregate my products and let each compete on its own on any OS. Even for businesses, there is a move to web apps and making sure they work on iOS and android so there is becoming less and less need for Windows (there are still a lot of businesses that need Windows but the trend is clear).

Microsoft couldn't provide IE for iOS even if they wanted to, Apple doesn't allow alternative browsers on the platform (that are not just front-ends to the built in Safari engine, or as Opera Mini offloading the rendering/script engine to a server)

It also helps that MS ties its browser to its own operating systems. As tablets and smart phones are used more and more to access the Internet and with so many of those devices running non MS operating systems, Internet Explorer market share will continue to fall. Four short years ago Windows had 95% market share. For 2012 it is at 85%. The real danger for MS is that as more and more people become familiar with other operating systems like iOS and android they will eventually become more comfortable with the idea of a non-MS pc. If I were MS I would segregate my products and let each compete on its own on any OS. Even for businesses, there is a move to web apps and making sure they work on iOS and android so there is becoming less and less need for Windows (there are still a lot of businesses that need Windows but the trend is clear).

Microsoft couldn't provide IE for iOS even if they wanted to, Apple doesn't allow alternative browsers on the platform (that are not just front-ends to the built in Safari engine, or as Opera Mini offloading the rendering/script engine to a server)

Those stats are cooked using "geo-weighting":
http://marketshare.hitslink.com/faq.aspx#Country

You might want to this blog, which explains it better:

http://encosia.com/cooking-the-books-is-hard-and-doesnt-help-anyone/

It also helps that MS ties its browser to its own operating systems. As tablets and smart phones are used more and more to access the Internet and with so many of those devices running non MS operating systems, Internet Explorer market share will continue to fall. Four short years ago Windows had 95% market share. For 2012 it is at 85%.

The real danger for MS is that as more and more people become familiar with other operating systems like iOS and android they will eventually become more comfortable with the idea of a non-MS pc. If I were MS I would segregate my products and let each compete on its own on any OS. Even for businesses, there is a move to web apps and making sure they work on iOS and android so there is becoming less and less need for Windows (there are still a lot of businesses that need Windows but the trend is clear).

It also helps that MS ties its browser to its own operating systems. As tablets and smart phones are used more and more to access the Internet and with so many of those devices running non MS operating systems, Internet Explorer market share will continue to fall. Four short years ago Windows had 95% market share. For 2012 it is at 85%.

The real danger for MS is that as more and more people become familiar with other operating systems like iOS and android they will eventually become more comfortable with the idea of a non-MS pc. If I were MS I would segregate my products and let each compete on its own on any OS. Even for businesses, there is a move to web apps and making sure they work on iOS and android so there is becoming less and less need for Windows (there are still a lot of businesses that need Windows but the trend is clear).

I see a problem with StatCounter stats -- biased demography. StatCounter (in contrast to other players) is used predominantly by small to medium sites.

Now who is the most frequent visitor to a small or obscure site? The webmaster! They keep looking at their site many times every day.

Hence, most of the StatCounter stats are from the webmaster demography. I can assure you that webmasters are biased towards Google. That means that they are more likely to use Google browser.

If you use a stats source that is used only by the biggest players (a la microsoft.com), you will see totally different stats:

IE: 54.09%
Firefox: 20.20%
Chrome: 18.85%

http://marketshare.hitslink.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=0&qpcustomd=0

Bing's only a Two billion dollar a year money pit. But at least that investment's making a dent on Google, right? Um, no. Wow. That is an amazing. What qualifications do you have to have to run a business like that? I think I could do that.

Oh shit son, did they just unthaw you?

Linux doesn't have 1% marketshare of anything. It has closer to 10% desktop marketshare and dominates the mobile, server and embedded spaces.

Recent surveys by respectable groups like Gartner put Linux at 1.1% share on the desktop.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_systems
http://marketshare.hitslink.com/report.aspx?qprid=9&qpcustom=Linux

Linux is still hovering around 20% in the server market, hardly what I'd call dominating. Sure Android is based on a linux kernel, but Iit's a stretch to call it Linux. I will believe you on embedded systems though.

WinXP still had nearly 50% of the huge Microsoft user base at August/2011 http://marketshare.hitslink.com/report.aspx?qprid=11

J2ME phones still sells as popcorn in "third world" (by lack of a better term) markets. And this is a lot of phones, something as a few hundred's of thousands a day.

Your argument says SQUAT about the stagnation (or not) of the iOS.

I guess you didn't look at the links. Who cares that Safari is only used on iPads... iPads dominate the market. Just look at the chart:
http://marketshare.hitslink.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=1&qpcustomb=1

And as for nobody using the Android browser... again, look at the chart. 16% doesn't sound like "nobody."

And we would still have Safari running on iPads.

The trenders these days are Chrome on computers and Safari on tablets (and to some extent Android Browser). IE and Firefox are on downward slopes.

And we would still have Safari running on iPads.

The trenders these days are Chrome on computers and Safari on tablets (and to some extent Android Browser). IE and Firefox are on downward slopes.

So your reply is...bullshit,bullshit,bullshit and bullshit, correct? I gave you my answer as to ABIs, give me a single reason why EVERYONE ELSE ON THE PLANET is wrong and you are right. Give me a SINGLE EXAMPLE of the magical never break drivers that are called for in that religious text. Hey if that technique works there must be thousands of those that exist, yes? the kernel hackers have had the code FOR YEARS NOW so they must have the 80% in never break quality yes? but guess what Sparky THEY BREAK CONSTANTLY which shows that kernel dev was talking out his ass. Do you REALLY think he is smarter than the entire kernel teams for OSX, Windows, OS/2, Solaris, BSD, etc? I repeat, arrogant much?

And did you even read the post above me? How the guy had enterprise hardware and is stuck with an old kernel because guess what THE DRIVERS ARE BROKEN for ALL the new kernels? Care to tell HIM he should throw away thousands of dollars in hardware? It is THIS arrogant elitist horseshit without the code to back it up that helps keep people as far away from your shitpile OS as possible! With Windows you get a MINIMUM of 8 YEARS of support, often longer. Your OS? You can't even give me a 100% guarantee the stuff you have running now will continue running in 6 months! Yep, sure gonna lure the masses with that level of QA buddy. And oh yeah all those OSes are complete shit, even though most have quite huge numbers, why they just don't know how sweet the Linux koolaid is do they daddy-o? Doesn't matter that their drivers actually WORK and CONTINUE WORKING because CLI gives you gonad powers!

Which brings us to the two bad jokes of your religion, the "Linux is a kernel" and "CLI gives you gonad powers" jokes. you DO realize I can replace every. single. argument. that you have made with the appropriate Linux TM yes? Do you know why that is? Because after all these years you've been coming up with the same tired old horseshit about how it is everyone's fault but yours, how if people would only "embrace the power of CLI" like it is the God damned force that the world would be hearts and flowers. But you know what? NUMBERS DO NOT LIE and you have NOTHING to show for damned near 20 years of work! Read it and weep fucking JavaME is kicking your ass! Don't feel even a little bit ashamed at such shit numbers? or do you think being a dead end with less numbers than a shit cellphone OS just makes you "leet" and connects you to the neckbeards of old, when IRL all you do is copypasta into a term ?

I'll repeat this until it sinks in, i'll even highlight it, Do you know what the definition of insanity is? It is doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome and that is EXACTLY what you and the community have been doing for damned near a decade now. What were your numbers 3 years ago? why they were at 1%. What will your numbers be 3 years from now? I bet my last dollar they'll be 1%. It don't take Kojak to solve this case, and it isn't some conspiracy by Gates and the Illuminati, nor is it payoffs to the OEMs that ended over a decade ago.

Now it is the fact that YOU DON'T LISTEN, not to your customers, nor to the OEMs, nor to the retailers. Wanna read something sad? Dell the current number 3 OEM, even though they only offer Linux on a token amount of frankly outdated hardware, has to run their own repo at considerable out of pocket expense. Why is that? Because if they don't the DRIVERS DIE HARD. And you sir have NO excuse nor argument that can justify that, none at all. That is just typical shitty QA from Canonical and typical Linus Goatse bullshit. But I'm sure you'll say dell is "doin it wrong" or that every retailer and mom&pop shop on the planet should pay programmers to run their own repos so they can bless their customers with your sacred cow. But i

The latest numbers I saw at Gartner had Linux at about a 2% market share. Compare that with OSX's 4%.

Source please.
Hitslink: 0,91% vs 5,61%
Statcounter: 0.77% vs 6.27%

If you saw anything like 2%, it probably includes Android which has somewhat over 1% of the browser market, most of which use the built in browser. At least "What's the best browser for an Android phone?" is a completely different test...

Wrong question with "firefox is better", etc etc. The real question is, who the hell uses IE9 in the first place?

About 7 in 10 Windows 7 users in the states.

As we've mentioned before, Microsoft skipped XP support for Internet Explorer 9 in order to compete more effectively on Windows 7. In July on Windows 7, Internet Explorer 9 hit 18.5% share worldwide and 24.8% in the United States. There are indications that this strategy is working. Although Internet Explorer lost usage share on XP, on Windows 7, Microsoft increased global usage share, going from 54.6% in June to 54.8% in July. And in the U.S., Internet Explorer share on Windows 7 grew 0.6% to 68.1%.

Browser Wars [August 1, 2011]

I dont' care how good it is at "blocking malicious content" if the underlying OS is still completely unsafe, which is due to what consumers put on their PC's.

Unpatched 0%
Vendor Patch 100%

Microsoft Windows 7 Solution Status (Based on 28 advisories from 2011)

Why does Mozilla keep treating Firefox like it's something they need to apologize for? Why are they acting like Chrome and others are setting the standards now? Why do they act like they're in some kind of pissing contest with Google?

Because Moz lives and dies by the add-click.

A cool $100 million in royalties each year or damn close to it - and almost all of it from Google.

The one thing Moz cannot allow to happen is to lose market share to up-and-coming Chrome browser. Not when Internet Explorer, Safari and the rest are looking reasonably secure in their core markets:

In July on Windows 7, Internet Explorer 9 hit 18.5% share worldwide and 24.8% in the United States.

Browser Wars

According to the statement, a whopping 97% of Mozilla's income comes from the search deals. Unfortunately, [the] company did not disclose the percentage of searches it sends to each search provider.

Mozilla's 2009 Financial Statement [Nov 19, 2010]

The Corporation has a contract with a search engine provider which expires November 2011. Aproximately 86% and 91% of royalty revenue for 2009 and 2008, respectively was derived from this contract.

Mozilla Foundation and Susidiaries: Consolidated Financial Statements : Notes: Note 9: Concentration of Risk [August 23, 2010]

When your only source of funding is the "add-supported" browser, the Windows OS is the air you breathe and the water you drink.
You cannot survive without it.

Windows 88%
OSX 6%
iOS 3%
Linux 1%
Android 1%

Operating System Market Share [August 5, 2011] [Rounded] [Global]

Desktop: 95%

Mobile vs Desktop [July 10 to July 11] [Rounded] [Global]

Windows XP 50%
Win 7 28%
Vista 15%
OSX 6%
Linux 1%
Other 1%

Top 5 Operating Systems [July 10 to July 11] [Rounded] [Global]

Windows is a commercial, proprietary and closed source OS. That is in many ways extraordinarly open to the user, the recreational programmer and the professional developer.

I have over 200 programs on this Win 7 system. I am not bound to any single repository or app store. I am not hectored by RMS. Steve Jobs or Bill Gates when I install a program which they would not approve.

Microsoft began with the stand-alone PC for the school, the home and small business. It began with the user. It began with a market.

The producer Samuel Goldwyn is usually credited for the line "If you've got a message, send a telegram."

Good advice for anyone whose Grand Design is about to collide head-on with a world that is skeptical, pragmatic and more than a little weary of those Who Think They Know What Is Best For Me.

IE7 doesn't have a lot of market share at all, IE9 is already topping it according to NetApplications. Most IE-users are on IE8 right now, so they're not that far away of using a proper browser, really. It's just a matter of a little time and those users will be on IE9, which as you correctly state offers a lot things other browsers have been shipping for a long time, like HTML5, CSS3 and a decent Javascript engine.

IE6 is a problem when you look at the numbers. The thing is however, I haven't shipped a single website in the past 12 months that supports IE6 and I had literally 0 complaints from any client. I develop websites for all sorts of businesses (including schools) and I don't see any of them using IE6 anymore. I don't know who is still using it, but nobody I'm in contact with anyway.

I don't really understand why owning 27% of the search market is being shown as a failure.

Perhaps because they don't "own" 27% of the search market, or anywhere close to it?

Google has 83.62%, Yahoo 6.21% (not "owned" by Microsoft but I suppose you could see it as rented) and Bing 3.57%.

They may have a larger share local to you but that isn't enough to avoid losing billions of dollars on an ongoing basis. To get anywhere close to Google's market share (and thus hopefully reduce their losses) would take massive gains over what they have now.

Opera has more than 200 million users (on desktop and mobile combined), so I think they're doing pretty well as it is.

This number is repeated in many posts here. But are those users not using the Internet? Total number of Internet users, on any device, is estimated at around 2.1 billion. With 200 million users Opera should have close to 10% share of users, but statistics only have them at a third of that, around 3%, for desktop and mobile combined.

Two sources for numbers but have also seen other sources with about same numbers: http://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm. http://marketshare.hitslink.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=0

Thank you! And notice how anyone who dares to not suckle the kool aid gets labeled troll or flamebait? As you pointed out the very first post and hundreds after it were "ZOMG dump Skype NOW!" and then the community has the unmitigated gall to bitch when proprietary companies won't support them? Why should they, when you treat them like lepers?

Frankly they can waste their mod points ALL THEY WANT but there is nothing i find more disgusting than hypocrites and right now the Linux community is overflowing with them. What do they say in many a post? "If proprietary companies would only support us too we would buy from them!" and then what do they do "ZOMG Its teh M$! They won't give uz teh codez and they will set trapz RUN AWAY!"

What did they say about hardware? "If the companies would release the code we would buy AND support them wholeheartedly!" So what happened when AMD actually did what the "community" asked and opened up every damned bit of code as fast as they could get the lawyers to sign off? "You should buy Intel and Nvidia if you run Linux" even though Nvidia ain't giving you shit and Intel has been going PowerVR which don't support Linux!

In the end while I can support (even if I don't agree with) RMS because the man has consistently walked the walk as well as talked the talk, frankly if the community were any more full of shit you could solve the energy crisis just by squeezing them! Lies, bullshit, hypocrisy, elitism and FUD, those words sum up the current community IMHO pretty damned well.

You expect the whole damned world to bend over backwards to accommodate you, even when the numbers aren't there to make it worth the effort, and then when a company DOES reach out, or do as you ask? You are more than happy to shit on them or buy from the competition who gives you the finger.

No damned wonder Linux is such a niche OS, with no support or retail presence, you go out of your way to ensure nobody wants anything to do with you! Now watch them waste mod points because they know my words are 100% correct. That is the thing about hypocrites, always ready to shit on others rather than take a good hard look in the mirror. But if after 20 years you have less users than JavaME? It is high time the community asks itself "What are we doing wrong?" and I'd say making sure no proprietary company will have a damned thing to do with your OS is a start.

SVG sounds like it would work great here -- you should check out SMIL

According to caniuse.com, browser support for W3C's SMIL recommendation is far from universal. Firefox 3.6 didn't support it, and IE 9 still doesn't support it. Nor does Android Browser for phones support it. And what authoring tool for SVG+SMIL animations do you recommend?

XP is 10 years old this year.

And still in wide use. Any name-brand PC purchased even in 2006 will have come with Windows XP on it.

IE6 is well under 3% now and falling

I didn't say IE 6; I said IE on Windows XP, which by now should mean upgradable to IE 8, as opposed to IE 9. According to this page, IE 8 has 33.06%, IE 7 has 7.35%, IE 6 has 10.85%, and IE 9 has only 2.41%. What source did you use, so that I can see its own breakdown of IE 6 through 8 (which doesn't support SVG) vs. IE 9 (which does)?

Oh so fucking bullshit. I'm sorry but the fanboi horseshit in this place is getting a little deep. What MSFT tried to do with Java is EXACTLY what Google is trying to do now to Java and yet you see the fanbois tripping over their own damned feet trying to get in line to be Google Apologists!

And in case you ain't notice there are these two little words called "vertical integration" which everybody in their damned dog is doing right now. Just look at how Apple ties everything to iTunes, even crap like Safari that the user would have no need of just to load some tunes on his iPod, or how Google is spamming the living shit out of Chrome worse than Google Toolbars. What MSFT needs is vertical integration because customers want simple and the way you give them simple is to tie everything together nice and neat so everything talks to everything and to steal an Apple meme it "all just works".

What you are gonna see with Skype is integration everywhere and it'll probably make them a ton! Replace your business VoIP services with a bundled Skype WinServer backend, all with nice little GPOs and controls for OUs so any MCSE can control the whole smash, have Skype on your X360 at home and your WinPhone in your pocket, probably with a nice little plugin for Windows 7 that gives you features based on which version you have, such as business features for those on Win Pro, and maybe even a deal with someone like Cisco like what AT&T has for their mini cell base stations to have Skype routers for home and business, everything together all nice and neat.

Finally as for Linux support? If the businesses scream for it they may keep it but in the end they will probably let it wither on the vine and why the hell shouldn't they? Linux users last I checked were something like maybe 1% of the market (hell according to this even Java ME beats Linux) and Linux users are notorious for being "free as in we'll never spend a damned dime" so why the hell would MSFT bother with that market? Especially after not only giving .NET as a standard, not only giving a legally binding community promise that would ensure they'd get laughed out of court if they tried anything, but after all that even invited the head Mono guy to developer conferences to give lectures and STILL after 11 years it is looked at as some trap that is just taking a really really REALLY long time to spring?

In the end Linux just isn't a good market unless you are gonna TiVo some hardware and want an OS for free (MSFT don't need one) or you want to try to scrape by selling support (with their profits MSFT don't need the chicken scratch). Because despite all the talk of "support us and we'll support you!" the Linux guys are frankly a bunch of cheapskate hypocrites. Despite RH giving back more code than all the other Linux bunches COMBINED a good two thirds last I saw the numbers of web servers out there are running CentOS, which BTW was started by a company that wanted to sell hardware but were too damned greedy to even buy the RH licenses their hardware needed, and despite AMD doing EXACTLY what the community asked of them and giving every spec and code not nailed down the community tripped over themselves to this day to recommend Nvidia.

So I'm sorry Linux guys, and if you want to waste mod points go right ahead as I have more karma than God, but I got to call it as I see it. Unless you want to just snatch shit away from the community doing the TiVo trick in the end Linux just ain't worth the trouble, especially for anything by MSFT. The users are paranoid, have a seriously bad attitude and sense of elitism that they don't have the numbers to back up, and you KNOW anything owned by MSFT even if they gave it away would be treated like poison, even if the community has to recommend a piss poor pile of hacked together bullshit to "kinda sorta but not really' give you the same functionality. Frankly MSFT would have to be nuts to bother wasting resources on the Linux client.

It's not the 90s anymore, dude.

Your Uncle Joe was a success - pretty much like every other Linux conversion story posted to Slashdot in the last fifteen years.

But there is often more to be learned from failure.

It doesn't much matter whether you look at Net Applications, W3Schools or Statcounter.

The numbers for Linux are eminently lousy.

Surfing the web from a mobile device can be clumsy and expensive.

It is all the more telling then that in the Net Applications stats for May 1, the iOS mobile device alone has twice the market share of Linux -

all distros, all platforms.

Operating System Market Share

So your answers are, in no particular order, YouDisagreeWithMeThereforeYou AreATroll along with WorksForMeAtHomeItDoesReally and ImaginaryProblemsKillWindows with a bit of LinuxSupportsMoreHardwareThan Windows when in reality you get ThisIsAKnownProblemNowGetLost and YouAreUsingTheWrongHardware

Isn't it kinda sad that I can answer EVERY SINGLE THING you and the other FOSS zealots here say with TMs? Doesn't it bother you, even just a little? You know why I can do that so easily? It is because you have been spouting the same bullshit so long there are TMs for it and have been for some time. You are like birthers, same shit, different day.

So I suppose those THOUSANDS asking for help on ANY forum, you pick, are ALL trolls? Maybe you want to list them as paid shills? And you STILL haven't posted an answer to Torvalds and his "We don't need no steenkin plans" which is OUT OF HIS OWN MOUTH.

Look if you want to dumpster dive, or use old hardware, then Linux works fine on a desktop. On a laptop, which is practically proprietary in a box? You'll spend more time fiddling with bullshit than you will using the thing. Tell me AC, when was the last time you had to go CLI? This week? Today? And I bet you had to go CLI when the last 6 month upgrade death march came out didn't you?

But no, stick your head in the sand, label everyone that points out problems a shill, instead of asking yourself this fundamental econ 101 question: What am I doing wrong, that my competitors are doing right? Because NO B&M stores will touch you, from little shops like mine to big shops like Walmart. Do you think we like paying for Windows? It gives us a warm fuzzy?

Nope the answer is your DRIVER MODEL IS ASS, your kernel is run by a douchebag, with every update TWO things break for every ONE fixed, your DEs seem to be run by Bizzaro "Quick, things am getting stable! Must break things by starting over, will cause much am joy for users!" and stability wise you are MAYBE at Win98. How many program lockups have you had? Freezes? Hangs? After I got away from Linux those things just faded away, like a fart in the wind...

So believe what you want, nobody will be able to refute you, even with evidence that the users don't want you, or that given a choice users run in droves AWAY from you or that OEMs now look at you like the clap or that you have less marketshare than JavaME. Nope, instead just cheer that Linux reached 1% while doing what you do best: Ignoring users, ignoring problems, letting Torvalds Goatse the kernel, and generally acting like asses. Hey, maybe in another 20 years you'll be at 2%!

I put the FACT in front to separate points, as making lists in /. comments is kinda hit or miss right now in my version of Chromium and since anyone that doesn't suck down the kool aid will be labeled a 'ShillTrollAstroturfer(TM)" I might as well point out that most FOSSie bullshit is INDEED bullshit. And I noticed you STILL haven't answered the main question: What are you doing wrong, that your competitors doing right?

Because if you were actually correct and "ItWorksForMe(TM)" applied to more than just you then why has every B&M and OEM ran away from your product like it is the black death? I'll tell you why because your driver model is a picture of a turd with "Fix it yourself LOL!" written underneath. here try to defend the words of Linus Torvalds himself where he says there is NO PLAN for the kernel and he just "lets it grow like a virus". Yeah Linus its called an STD and that kind of Mickey Mouse shit would get you FIRED anywhere else. Can you imagine telling your boss on a multimillion dollar project "Plans? We don't need no steenkin plans! We gonna let it grow like teh clap LOL!"

And let me see if I have your complaint correct: You use an OS which everyone acknowledges is broken which even Ballmer himself said was "a mistake" at one of his speeches, use an even more broken OEM disc filled with trialware garbage, which BTW it is trivial to turn into a "good" (which is a relative term with Vista, aka "WinMe Part Deux") DVD with VLite or any number of freeware tools, and THEN you bitch it doesn't work?

Well I could use a FOSSie meme and say "ItWorksForMe(TM)" but instead I'll just point out you are using an abandoned OS that NO major OEM is putting on their devices now, that most retailers (myself included) wouldn't take a crate of if you gave it to us for free, and which will NEVER be fixed. Throw away WinME II and get Win 7 and you'll have a beautiful experience. Besides isn't that what FOSSies do on the "BiannualDeathMarch(TM)" with Ubuntu?

But its okay, you just keep right on believing there is nothing wrong, and that myself and millions of other B&M stores are avoiding your product because its a "Conspiracy(TM)" while Ignoring the fact that if your product actually worked on bigger than basement scale retailers could increase profits by not having to shell out for Windows licenses, and in the cutthroat world of PCs any money saved would make us better at competing.

You just ignore that Walmart, Staples, Best Buy, hell even little shops like myself have found your product to be a fiddly little bitch, or that I can provide link after link after link showing retailers RUNNING AWAY and users simply not touching it (Be sure to notice in the last link how JAVA ME is actually kicking your ass LOL!) but hey, those are just numbers right?

But I would point out this final bit of wisdom: If your product costs $0, and would save both the B&Ms and OEMs significant money by adopting, yet they refuse to take it over competitors that cost a minimum $100 and $700 respectfully? Then something IS rotten in Denmark friend. If your shit didn't stink then everyone in the business wouldn't be treating it like a turd in the urinal, and going out of their way to avoid it so.

Linux is to servers and windows is to desktops.

On the servers, I based my assumptions from the data of http://www.top500.org/stats/list/36/osfam
On the desktops, I based my assumptions from the data of http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=10

As a Linux user (both servers and desktop), I accept the reality that Linux dominates the server market and Windows on the desktop market. But on the occasion that somebody claims that Linux dominates the desktop market or WIndows dominates the server market, I usually ask for some citations or do some research a.k.a using google.

IMHO, it is good for us to have these two options. It creates competition. When there is competition, the competitors try to improve their product so that they can win the seat of their competitor while maintaining the achivements that they currently have. The end result is simple... USERS WIN!!!

I saw what you did there. Figures particularly world wide percentages. For instance your 3% for Linux users, Does not say 35% of smartphones users use Linux. Or Firefox has the majority market share in Europe. Or IE9 is only available on the Microsoft OS SP2 and above. While the rest are cross platform...work on smartphones tablets etc.

Linux has 0.92% share of web users. Android (eg. all your smartphone users) has 0.52%. http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=8

As for IE9 OS limitation, Win7+Vista has 34.1% of users, with most of them (23.1%) being on Win7. http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=10

I saw what you did there. Figures particularly world wide percentages. For instance your 3% for Linux users, Does not say 35% of smartphones users use Linux. Or Firefox has the majority market share in Europe. Or IE9 is only available on the Microsoft OS SP2 and above. While the rest are cross platform...work on smartphones tablets etc.

Linux has 0.92% share of web users. Android (eg. all your smartphone users) has 0.52%. http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=8

As for IE9 OS limitation, Win7+Vista has 34.1% of users, with most of them (23.1%) being on Win7. http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=10

What lunacy...I guess Linux didn't go anywhere either cause it's open source...or Chrome.....or Firefox.....

The Mozilla Foundation lives and dies by the add click.Where would Firefox be without the port to Windows?

Unrestricted net assets - Revenues and other support (2009)

Royalties: $101,537,000
Contributions: $50,000

Note 2 - Summary of significant accounting practices

(e) Receivables

Receivables consist primarilly of amounts due from contracts with multiple search engine and information providers

Mozilla Foundation and Subsidiaries

As a desktop client OS, the traditional community-oriented Linux distribution may not be six feet under. But neither is it in the best of health:

Net Applications (March)

Linux 0.92%
iOS 1.8%
Android 0.5%
Operating System Market Share

Statcounter (March)

Linux 1%
Top 5 Operating Systems

W3Schools (January)

Win 7 31%
Up 31% since January 2009
Linux 5%
Up 3% since March 2003
OS PLatform Statistics

Oh don't worry I expected it. if you look at my past comments they are always evenly split between insightful and troll/flamebait, with the nasty mods coming from zealots that stick their heads in the sand and refuse to accept the truth. instead of actual debate all you get is accusations of "shill" astroturfer, etc.

And I agree wholeheartedly that Apple fanboys ain't got shit on the RDF that surrounds FOSSies as I call them. I've found there is a BIG difference between a FOSS users and a FOSSie, but sadly it seems the FOSSies are winning control and the fact that any that dare to say anything other than "Gee Biff, isn't Linux perfect? It sure is Bill, and RMS's beard smells like roses!" gets modded down is just proof of that.

Is Linux ready for the masses? Sadly not by a long shot, as while Canonical has made great strides once you get past the top layer it is just a mess, and one of the reason why he is trying to ditch X-Server and GNOME for Unity/Wayland. With Windows a good 90% of problems can be solved by GUI alone, and most fixed with a simple reboot or system restore.

With Linux even trivial problems will often give you as the ONLY answer "open up bash and type" this big huge CLI mess that 1.-Assumes the users even understands half of it, 2.-The user has intimate knowledge of the hardware since it is nearly always tailored to a VERY specific chipset/hardware combo, 3.- the skill to "tweak" said "fix" because they have hardware f rev d and the fix was designed for hardware c rev b and simply won't work without tweaking, and 4.-That the user has the skill to type a huge list of arcane commands into a 70s era term with NO autocorrect or spellcheck and get everything perfectly right, with a serious risk of breaking the machine if they get anything wrong (which they will get NO visual cues before getting boned).

But if they want to look up server numbers by absolute share which is what seems to have so many butthurt by my earlier links here is the latest I could find by Gartner which shows Windows-66.8% and climbing, Linux-23.2 and falling while Unix-6.8% and falling. The other link I found with overall shows 89% Windows, 5.9% Mac, 2.05% iOS, and Linux just barely above Java ME in overall share at 0.95%.

So I'm sorry if the numbers make FOSSies all butthurt but just remember you have the power to change it by giving the customers what they want. Lose the CLI, demand a hardware abi so drivers that work in foo won't be broken in foo+1, push for better UIs and simpler layouts, etc. And for the one that says "Linux thanks to Ubuntu is ALREADY dumbed down?" if you think Ubuntu is dumbed down enough for the masses it just shows why Linux hasn't got a chance. Try Windows 7 sometime, it is simple enough my 67 year old clueless dad installed it by himself with NO assistance required and EVERYTHING "just worked". All the drivers were downloaded and installed FOR him the worst question it asked him was whether he was at home or at work (which set up the firewall policy without him having to touch it) and frankly the ONLY thing I had to do when I got there a week later was show him how to get Firefox. Hell it even pointed out he had no AV on first boot and pointed him to a free one. So I'm sorry but while Shuttleworth is making strides Ubuntu is in NO way up to that level of simple yet, it just isn't.