If Google’s initial $350,000 pledge to Oregon State University’s Open Source Lab wasn’t enough, take note. Numerous news sources of Oregonian relation, and now the Associated Press, have relayed information from Oregon State University to the effect that the Web giant donated an additional $300,000 to the incubator.
Open source has for years been a label experiencing a continual ebb and flow of lesser and greater notability. Yet it keeps on keeping on, as it were. Indeed, the most famous title in the land of the digitally free is Firefox. That is due to its extensibility, quickly and well-refined security parameters, and a concerted grassroots effort to challenge the dominance of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer, an arguably inferior product, through populist campaigns to grow its install base. The record-breaking success affixed to the debut of Version 3 of the browser only emphasizes the point.
Linux, in its various forms and flavors, endures as a result of a similar people-powered push for attention, development, and, thus, progress.
Apache, while not an everyday term for the everyday Web user, it is employed by the connected class in droves. It is leading Web server technology employed today, serving 49.12% of all websites presently online (circa June 2008).