[MacPerl] Perl Usage Survey

[Rich Morin <rdm@cfcl.com>]

I'm pleased to report that MacPerl is still on the charts (a solid 5th
place) in the Perl Usage Survey.  If you haven't signed up, however,
we could still use your support (http://www.perl.org/cgi-bin/survey).

Anyway, here are the standings (as of 981116.0943 in California):

  Respondents so far: 3967

  Top 10 most used platforms

    Linux                 2697
    Solaris               1872
    Win 95, 98, NT        1754
    SunOS                 1006
 -> MacOS                  900
    HP-UX                  628
    Free-, Net-, OpenBSD   577
    IRIX                   529
    AIX                    455
    DEC Unix, OSF/1        390

I'm not sure how much these numbers mean.  Higher scores would seem to
indicate either that:

  *  the OS has lots of activists

  *  the OS has lots of ballot-stuffers

  *  the OS is being used a lot for Perl

We _know_ that Linux and Mac OS have lots of devoted users, so these
numbers may be a bit distorted.  I don't really think there is much
ballot-stuffing going on; why would anyone bother?

To the extent that the survey reflects reality, however, many conven-
tional Unix vendors should be worried.  I am particularly struck by
the absence of any SCO entrants in the top 10.  SCO used to be the
dominant player, in terms of boxes, then they bought the UNIX code
base (from AT&T, by way of Novell).  So, where are they?

This is getting dangerously off-topic, however, so I'll sign off...

-r
Rich Morin:          rdm@cfcl.com, +1 650-873-7841, http://www.ptf.com/~rdm
Prime Time Freeware: info@ptf.com, +1 408-433-9662, http://www.ptf.com
MacPerl: http://www.ptf.com/macperl,   http://www.ptf.com/ptf/products/MPPE
MkLinux: http://www.mklinux.apple.com, http://www.ptf.com/ptf/products/MKLP

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