To recap, WebSphere CE uses a different code base form the mainstream WebSphere application server line, stemming from IBM’s acquisition of Gluecode last year. The technology is based on the Apache Geronimo project.
The Evans Data report estimates that WebSphere CE grew 16% in penetrating the Eclipse developer community, compared to 6.6% for JBoss. IBM is using the figures to back its claim that WebSphere CE is now becoming a credible competitor to JBoss.
Of course, the fact that WebSphere CE is growing faster than JBoss shouldn’t be surprising given that it’s the newer kid on the block. More importantly, according to IBM, since April, weekly downloads have averaged 10,000, placing it roughly at par with JBoss.
And it boasts that over 600 third party software vendors have joined the WebSphere CE partner program, and that 200 of them have developed products that support or embed it. Some of the examples aren’t terribly surprising. For instance, Novell bundles WebSphere CE and DB2 Express into SuSE Linux.
IBM differentiates WebSphere CE primarily from its Apache roots. In effect, it’s claiming that WebSphere CE is a truer open source project, as they claim that the Apache license and community is more collaborative than JBoss.
JBoss counters that, with its three-year headstart, there’s a lot more of its offering in production compared to WebSphere CE. It cites numbers from BZ Research showing it tied with the regular version of WebSphere (not CE), and ahead of BEA and Oracle.
What JBoss doesn’t cite, however, is the number of customers who are paid subscribers.
