When Corel first began working with Linux three years ago, we considered it to be one of the most significant technological advancements in computing this decade. Today, Linux is rapidly becoming the next tidal wave of technology and is causing huge excitement in the computer industry and investment community. Ever since Netscape released the source code for Netscape Communicator and the Mozilla open source development project began, a cottage industry of commentary and prediction has sprung up. Pundits have alternately hailed Mozilla as a breakthrough for the open source philosophy, observed it as an interesting business trend, and dismissed it as an outright failure. As a cryptography and computer security expert, I have never understood the current fuss about the open source software movement.
Public security is always more secure than proprietary security.
It's true for cryptographic algorithms, security protocols, and security source code. Sure, Linus Torvalds has been there from the start, hacking the kernel and nurturing its growth. But today companies, as well as individual developers, are looking for ways to contribute to Linux. Firms like IBM, SGI, and Intel all want to bring their big company technology and big company resources to the Linux community. We have also seen major software vendors such as Oracle, Computer Associates, SAP, Corel and others announce their intentions to make their applications available for Linux.