Pop quiz: How many commercial open source business models can you think of? Most people would probably say two or three. How about 10?

The good news is the deployment of open source is growing. The bad news is that policies managing those projects are an afterthought.

One of the intriguing battles I have been watching over the past couple of months is a silent battle between Sun Microsystems and Red Hat. It’s silent because it is being played out deep inside the New York Stock Exchange and, unless you’re actively watching, you’ll have missed the tussle.

Novell has found a creative way to put Netbooks and SUSE Linux Enterprise 11 in the hands of IT managers and channel partners — even with Microsoft sitting in the same room.

Google also shows up all over the balance sheet of Mozilla, creator of the Firefox browser and other software. To date, the arrangement has proved mutually beneficial. How much longer this pairing can last has been called into question since September.

A new research report from AMI Partners reveals some promising trends in the business intelligence market. As BI sales heat up in certain regions, The VAR Guy wonders who will benefit most: Traditional BI software companies, open source alternatives or software as a service (SaaS) options? Here’s The VAR Guy’s best guess.

Ready to get jealous? How would you like to work in an industry that benefits from economic downturns and for companies that see revenue, customer acquisition and budgets grow during these toughest of times? While the majority of b-to-b marketers struggle with budget cuts, layoffs and an overall need to do more with less, one specialized sector is reporting a relative boom time...