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Active Sites
Developer November 2000 Percent December 2000 Percent Change
Apache 5770634 59.95 6218326 59.54 -0.41
Microsoft 2483691 25.80 2615133 25.04 -0.76
iPlanet 247976 2.58 278724 2.67 0.09
Around the Net
Linux distribution trial of force
Competition between the Linux distributions has been particularly
fierce since the release of Red Hat 7.0, which has provoked a great
deal of controversy, initially because the C compiler produces
binaries incompatible with other Linux distributions. The argument has
escalated to a point well beyond a difference of opinion over the
technicalities, with part of the Linux community suggesting that Red
Hat is using its leading position in the market to marginalise the
other distributions, while Linus Torvalds [1]called Red Hat 7.0
"idiotic", "broken", and "unusable as a development platform".
It poses the question whether the Red Hat brand and market position is
strong enough to withstand this kind of assault.
On a crude count of Linux Apache sites found by Netcraft where the
Apache signature has been branded by the Linux distribution company,
Red Hat currently has 69%. SUSE and Debian are the closest challengers
with 9% and 8% respectively on a worldwide basis, though SUSE is the
leading distribution in German speaking countries. Critically, Red Hat
is established as the standard install at most well known dedicated
server companies and Linux hardware vendors, is the base distribution
