Open source consulting and integration firm Optaros has released a catalogue of open source projects that it says should help IT managers separate the wheat from the chaff when considering free software.
The Open Source Catalogue 2007, available on the https://www.optaros.com/ (registration required), reviews 262 open source software projects that fit into four software categories: operating systems, application development, infrastructure solutions and business applications. The applications range from projects such as Red Hat Enterprise Linux and the MySQL database to the Enhydra Shark workflow engine and the Bricolage content management system.
The software projects, selected from more than 140,000 open source applications currently available, all meet the basic requirements for enterprise readiness, according to Optaros. The software was selected based on the experience of Optaros’ consulting and integration team, which has been aiding enterprises with their open source deployments since 2004, as well as additional research and evaluation and discussion with the open source community.
Specifically, the software was evaluated against four criteria:
· Features — evaluating the software based on corporate needs, a measurement typically driven by what commercial products have to offer.
· Community — making sure that there is an active and well-supported group of developers behind the project.
· Maturity — ensuring that the product is stable and error free.
· Trend — determining the future progress of the software.
Optaros took these measurements, adding in other factors, such as how easily the product can be integrated into an enterprise environment or how the product supports open standards, and came up with an Enterprise Readiness (ER) rating for each software project.
The ER rating indicates how capable an open source product is when it comes to meeting the needs of midsize and large enterprises and organizations.
Analysts say that as companies add open source alternatives to their buying list, determining which free software offerings would work in their environments will become a tougher task.
Optaros’ aim with the new catalogue is to help IT decision makers narrow down their open source options, says Bruno von Rotz, an Optaros vice president who authored the report.
“The Open Source Catalogue is not intended to replace detailed evaluation or proof of concepts, but provide some help to conduct a first selection,” he writes in the report.
Optaros plans to update the catalogue and has opened discussion on its contents. Input can be sent to OSS-Catalogue@optaros.com.
