Grep FOSSBiz

LXer Feature: 20-Jul-2006 LXer goes on the search for businesses that provide migration and support services, software development, and products related to Free and Open Source Software. Do you know of a business focused on Free and Open Source Software?

You know, I'm really curious. The first thing you hear from proprietary proponents is, "I want to make money from the software I develop". Yet, the FOSS marketplace seems to be booming, or at least moving towards a boom. Venture Capitalists are investing in free software development. Governments and businesses alike are developing FOSS "procurement" policies. Mozilla has launched a business entity. Canonical sells commercial support for the Ubuntu GNU/Linux distribution.

I know individuals and some businesses are moving over to GNU/Linux on the desktop and lots of businesses are using or migrating to GNU/Linux on the server. We even hear about companies being shy about discussing their use of FOSS, for fear of the Microsoft machine. But I'm pretty sure there are companies out there willing to talk about their migration exploits, even if they don't, or can't, name their customers. So I want to find the consultants, the developers, the system admins and integrators out there. Who is making money from FOSS, and how?

From the grep man page: " Grep searches the named input FILEs (or standard input if no files are named, or the file name - is given) for lines containing a match to the given PATTERN. By default, grep prints the matching lines. So I'm grepping - searching, that is - for businesses that offer support services and software related to Free and Open Source Software. I am running grep on my FOSSBiz file. And I'm looking for various patterns as I go. Of course, where grep prints out the matching lines, I'll be 'printing' an article, usually an interview.

You'll come to know some companies and people you've never met before. You'll begin to see just how big our community really is. You'll see how much power we really have. You might even be able to counter FUD a little bit better. And you might read here about the keynote speaker for the next big GNU/Linux or FOSS event.

It's a tribute to the nature of the business world that a number of businesses I've learned about no longer exist. Yet, in my scouring the globe, I have come across single-person consulting businesses, independent contractors, and sizable firms catering to the government and Fortune 500 companies. Some started recently, and others have been around since before GNU or Linux came along. Some appear to have pretty interesting histories, while others seem to have interesting characters.

I'm starting in all the obvious places. I have a few thousand businesses so far, and I'm just getting started. Chances are, you may know of a 'FOSSBiz' that I should 'grep'. If so, you can drop me a line.