Cloud Computing: VMware Joins Open Source Software Institute
January 17, 2013
Grazed from TalkinCloud. Author: Christopher Tozzi.
Within the virtualization world, VMware (NYSE: VMW) can hardly claim to be more friendly to open source than competing platforms such as KVM and Xen. Nonetheless, the company has signed on as a leading member of the Open Source Software Institute (OSSI), a trade organization dedicated to promoting open source solutions in government. Is this a sign of renewed commitment to open source by VMware, or a more mercenary move by the company to protect its slice of the open source market? Here are some thoughts.
VMware’s relationship with the open source community is a complex one. Most core commercial VMware products are not open source, but the company does maintain some open source tools. In addition, most of its virtualization solutions support Linux as well as proprietary operating systems. Still, now that open source virtualization platforms have matured to become as feature-rich and robust as many of VMware’s tools—and are also available for free—the company faces an increasingly difficult market within the open source space…
In one sense, then, the recent announcement of VMware’s membership in the OSSI seems to signal an effort by the company to protect its influence within a channel where competition is heating up. As one of only a handful of "platinum"-level corporate OSSI members—a title VMware holds alongside such titans of the open source world as SUSE and Red Hat (NYSE: RHT)—the company is now in a stronger position to advance its interests among customers in the government sector…
Read more from the source @ http://talkincloud.com/cloud-computing-and-open-source/vmware-joins-open-source-software-institute