What can I find in the way of statistics documenting the usage, objective popularity, or commercial success (where applicable) of the various Linux distributions? Or of open-source software in general. Any particular websites--or, for that matter, sources in other media? I'm interested in studying such information, if I can gather enough of it, for a research project. The only things I have considered so far are this site, Distrowatch, and the sites belonging to the distributions themselves. If anyone already knows that there is not enough objective and reliable information, let me know so I can scrap my idea and move on.

objective??---In the Linux and OpenSource community?? You have got to be kidding.

Seriously, you are dealing here with the 21st century frontier---complete with cowboys, bandits, and just about every other metaphor. There are very few metrics because there is really no way of knowing who is using this stuff.

Clearly, one thing you need to watch is what governments are doing: Brazil, Massachusetts, Munich--to name a few.

I had a feeling that would be the case: not enough tracking, because most of the software isn't commercial. Bloody hell.

Only place I can think of that **might** provide some useful statistics is http://counter.li.org/ but linux users obviously need to register themselve for this so it's not going to give you overall numbers of everyone using linux.

Moved: This thread is more suitable in General and has been moved accordingly to help your thread/question get the exposure it deserves.

... complete with cowboys, bandits, and just about every ... erh ... damn !! Bloody hell !!

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Linux almost always counts in at roughly 3 percent of the American desktop market. It's about 3 percent for Macs as well. It's negligibly higher in the EU and considerably higher in Asia. That's just the desktop market, however. Linux is substantially growing in American business and enterprise environments and even more in those markets in Europe. Asia I'd say is the farthest ahead with practially all of their systems on some sort of open source platform, or at least using all open source office suites etc.
BTW, something like 97% of supercomputers run *nix.

Then I expect that China is also using Linux heavily, and can credit its economic growth partly to it.

Here is a message from the future on the subject of Linux popularity:

As of 2011 - Linux is firmly ensconced in datacenters - in one case that I'm aware of, it has pushed out Sun, HP and SCO Unices completely (as one sign of the times: Oracle bought Sun, and while they may be able to save the hardware side of the business, it seems the OS and Java is heading towards dead in the water as of this writing). The only holdout in the datacenter is a few MS Windows-boxen used for antivirus and some management tools for specific vendor black-boxen. As for distros - Red Hat is probably the most popular in the datacenter - primarily due to having a vendor behind it who can be squeezed via SLAs/maintenance contracts that limit liability for the datacenter. Another important aspect of this shift is also a parallel shift towards virtualization - powered by Linux kernel based VMWare on Intel or AMD commodity hardware; a key component of making 'cloud' computing a reality.

Unfortunately, on the desktop front Windows continues to rule - primarily due to game developers continuing to focus on building their products for the Windows SDK - which includes the DirectX 11 graphics interfaces. I love OpenGL - in particular it's cross platform capabilities (you can't run DirectX on a MAC as one example, but you can run OpenGL on Windows and the MAC...and Linux for that matter - grrrr - a pet peeve of mine). In this same time, PC gaming has seen some erosion from an influx of new technology on the game console front (Wii controllers, and more recently the Kinect for XBox 360 that allows control of games without a physical control device, reading the movements of the user's body). Game consoles are cheaper than full blown workstation computers, and are now providing experiences that are approaching the quality and complexity of the PC games...but there are still some holdout genres that remain firmly on the PC/Laptop (MMORPGs, SocialMMORPGs, FPSs to name a few).

However, in the past 2 years another upstart in the form of mobile devices has started to show promise: Android - which is a mobile phone operating system based upon the Linux kernel. Android has just recently (2Q 2011) outpaced the Apple iPhone/iPad/iPod operating system on mobile devices (oops didn't tell you about the iPhone/iPad - which is based on another free operating system - Free BSD - did I?), and is starting to show up on tablets and laptop/netbooks as a mainstream 'workstation' operating system; the key aspect here is we are beginning to see a shift in focus from fixed 'workstation' or 'desktop' machines, to portable devices that have the power to serve the same functions in various situations (some devices even come with, or you can acquire ancillary devices to provide full size wireless keyboards, displays and other functions to extend the capabilities without having to transfer to a desktop at all). You can take it with you - and users have embraced the idea in droves; one key example of the impact of this change is the growing integration of social networking and gaming applications on these devices - and a big shift as a result to the acceptability and reliability of downloading software from and hosting/saving data to the 'cloud'. These new devices - primarily running Linux - are naturally positioned to take advantage of the new paradigm. It should be noted that Microsoft is trying to enter this area with a new Windows mobile phone operating system and hardware partnerships - but they have not shown the same level of success as Android and Apple who continue to run out of reach.

Looking into the future, what do I see? I believe Linux will have 'won' - but it isn't as clearly obvious to the community of Linux users, and my never be (depending on the timeline you inhabit, you may or may not have also had to defend against ravening zombies, natural mega-disasters, or encroachment of time traveling dinosaurs, which would make the issue of Linux supremacy a moot point...then again maybe nothing unusual happens in yours).

We are on the cusp of seeing the total number of devices running Linux or derivatives to exceed all other operating systems. Is this 'Linux on the Desktop'? Given the changes we are seeing in mobile computing - I don't know if that term even has relevance anymore. As the capabilities of these devices improves, we are going to see a trend that started with Laptops replacing desktops as primary computing platforms to further acceleration of highly capable mobile devices replacing laptops and desktops for most general purpose computing (communications, and basic office suite functionality).

Further technology development of high speed data streaming - both wired and wireless - will allow future mobile devices to drive large screens to also capture the remaining high performance gaming arena; furthermore, games will be designed to play on the small *and* large screens - allowing gamers more flexibility in where they play their favorite game. These devices will be primarily running Linux - in the form of Android. Most Linux users won't even know they are using it. As the market is consolidated in this area, there will be more scrutiny of these systems in terms of programability and open standards - hobbyists and developers certainly want to continue to enjoy the benefits of a general purpose computing platform, and civil rights activists will continue to be concerned about such consolidation of control of information and software distribution in a few hands.

Linux will continue to consolidate it's win in the datacenter space - with large clusters of powerful commodity rack mounted servers with advanced virtual machine management features and capabilities growing to outnumber the remaining specialized stand-alone servers as massively parallel processor costs drop. I think the commoditization of the operating system will reach a level that Microsoft will not be able to compete with; the age of shrink-wrapped operating systems and software will be effectively over by 2014. What Linux users have been experiencing since the 1990s will be ubiquitous: downloading everything they need in terms of software and running lightweight clients to access other applications running in the cloud. It will be far more sophisticated and integrated - with notable holdouts (such as Microsoft) doing all they can do to subvert interface standardization - ultimately to their own detriment over the long term.

We should look for someone from the future to comment on the accuracy of this view as it will have come to pass (John Titor - where are you when we need you?).

Linux is generally not concerned about desktops, anyway.

"Think outside the desktop." In a year's time, it's gonna be all about pads. And phones. And guess what ... these platforms run Unix and Linux.

There's just no room for popularity contests. They just don't matter. Folks running desktops probably give precious little concern to what operating system's installed as long as they're familiar with it and it does what they want it to do. They don't distinguish between "the operating system" and "the computer." What they want is the shortest distance between two points.

Internet servers ... by now, millions of them ... are, without a doubt, chiefly running Unix or Linux systems. (But even so, it's all for a purpose. There are no brownie-points for: "Looky! I'm running Linux!")

Just in case you haven't noticed it: the thread is almost 5 years old.

Lock it, then. These threads are like Energizer bunnies.