操作系统与服务器爱好者
调查揭秘国内Linux到底如何赚钱？
从1996年Linux操作系统进入中国，到现在经过了10年的发展历程，Linux在中国的普及程度有了显著提高，据计世资讯（CCWResearch）数据显示，在2005年期间，国内Linux操作系统产品本身市场销售额已达1.12亿元人民币，而其带动相关产业的发展更是非常可观。从目前的发展趋势来看，Linux操作系统今后有望成为继Windows之后，第二大操作系统。
这两大操作系统厂商盈利模式有很大不同。对于Windows操作系统，一方面精通的专业人才很多，产品成熟度高，另一方面，拥有数目庞大的系统应用软件开发商和系统集成商，它们只需把产品本身做好，并提供接口参数，其他应用软件开发商就可以在其基础上进行独立开发。而对于Linux操作系统，了解他的专业人员有限，产品在不断更新，版本众多，而且不同厂家的产品，也有差异，支持Linux操作系统的应用软件开发商和系统集成商数量较少，因此对于Linux操作系统厂商，不但要将产品做好，还要积极和硬件厂商及应用软件开发商进行合作。据计世资讯（CCWResearch）长期跟踪研究发现，对于中国的Linux操作系统厂商，其销售收入除部分来自产品本身的直接销售外，相当大一部分主要来自厂商根据不同的应用需求对Linux操作系统所做的优化和适配后的再销售。目前来看根据应用环境不同，可分以下两大类：
作为一般通用类服务器进行优化和适配
作为一般通用类服务器中的某一种，如：WEB服务器、邮件服务器、数据库服务器、高可用性集群系统、负载均衡集群系统等，根据该业务的特定要求，Linux操作系统厂家做一些预配置和优化工作，以及和硬件系统的兼容性测试工作，以确保其Linux操作系统能够更有效的发挥出它的作用。
根据不同行业的业务系统进行优化和适配
在不同的行业，针对不同的业务又有众多行业应用系统，目前Linux几乎在国内各个行业均有应用，在一些行业，甚至应用于核心业务系统。由于在不同的行业和业务系统中，系统所要求的软硬件环境千差万别，而且很多专有的设备仅仅是在本系统内部应用，其使用的普遍性并不是很高，而不同的应用软件所需要的操作系统适配环境也迥然不同，应此，需要Linux操作系统厂商针对这些具体的要求进行测试和修改，直到整个系统能够正常、稳定的使用。
另外，随着用户对硬件和应用软件的变更，都会需要Linux操作系统厂商提供相关的技术支持服务，这也是Linux操作系统厂商收入的重要组成部分。
仅靠一些优化和适配工作所带来的销售利润毕竟非常有限，因此为终端用户提供全套行业解决方案是各个操作系统厂商追求的方向之一，这部分工作可为Linux操作系统厂商带来丰厚的利润。但提供全套完整的行业解决方案，对于当前国内普遍规模较小的Linux操作系统厂商，具有一定的难度，从当前情况来看，目前国内的Linux操作系统厂商所能提供的解决方案并不是很多，只占整体收入的极少部分，这将是今后国内Linux操作系统厂商重点发展的方向之一。
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How Do Companies Make Money with Linux?
Open source enthusiasts believe that better software can result from an open source software development model than from proprietary development models. So in theory, any company creating software for its own use can save money by adding its software contributions to those of others to gain a much better end product for themselves.
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Companies that want to make money selling software need to be more creative than they did in the old days. While you can sell the software you create that includes GPL software, you must pass the source code of that software forward. Of course, others can then recompile that product, basically using your product without charge. Here are a few ways that companies are dealing with that issue:
??Software subscriptions—Red Hat, Inc. sells its Red Hat Enterprise Linux products on a subscription basis. For a certain amount of money per year, you get binary code to run Linux (so you don‘t have to compile it yourself), guaranteed support, tools for tracking the hardware and software on your computer, and access to the company‘s knowledge base.
While Red Hat‘s Fedora project includes much of the same software and is also available in binary form, there are no guarantees associated with the software or future updates of that software. A small office or personal user might take the risk on Fedora (which is itself an excellent operating system) but a big company that‘s running mission-critical applications will probably put down a few dollars for RHEL.
??Donations—Many open source projects accept donations from individuals or open source companies that use code from their projects. Amazingly, many open source projects support one or two developers and run exclusively on donations.
??Bounties—The concept of software bounties is a fascinating way for open source software companies to make money. Let‘s say that you are using XYZ software package and you need a new feature right away. By paying a software bounty to the project itself, or to other software developers, you can have your needed improvements moved to the head of the queue. The software you pay for will remain covered by its open source license, but you will have the features you need, at probably a fraction of the cost of building the project from scratch.
??Boxed sets, mugs, and T-shirts—Many open source projects have online stores where you can buy boxed sets (some people still like physical CDs and hard copies of documentation) and a variety of mugs, T-shirts, mouse pads, and other items. If you really love a project, for goodness sake, buy a T-shirt!
