The popularity of PHP is unquestionable, but what operating system is most conducive for developers to hammer out code? There have been a few studies in the past and the latest one from Zend gives us some interesting news.
In a study involving 2,000 developers conducted at the end of last year, Zend discovered that in terms of a production environment, 85 % of those surveyed preferred Linux. Windows was far behind with a measly 11 % and Mac OS X was almost non-existent with just 2 %. However, these results change when the preferred development OS comes in to play.
Windows leads these rankings with 42 %, Linux comes in second place with 38.5 % and Mac OS X still comes last but this time with a respectable 19.1 %. Although the Microsoft OS is in the lead, this may not be for long. Three years ago, it was reported that almost 85 % of developers preferred Windows; it appears that that lead is being worn down by the other OS’, Linux in particular.
The FOSS aspect of Linux and PHP seems to be the driving force behind this trend. The FOSS movement has been gathering momentum in the last few years, with Linux being one of the oldest heralds. The rising cost of successive OS versions of Windows has also made it unaffordable for many individual developers as well as offices and companies. Currently, Windows 7 retails for over $300 making it the most expensive OS on the market.