Hold it, bottle it up and save it for the next one

Linux is far better development platform for a number of reasons.

1. If something breaks, or a driver does not work as expected, I can drop down to kernel code at any time and fix it myself (and have done so in the past and submitted patches). I can also go to developers of X portion of the OS directly and work with them to resolve the issue as well. If there is a driver or kernel-level issue on an NT platform, you can submit a bug report, and then you are out of luck until a vendor decides it is going to be profitable enough for them to fix.

2. Linux is highly scriptable. Any task that you have to do though hundreds of point and click operations in windows, can be scripted, often in a few lines of code, and even the base shells like bash have hundreds of thousands of scrip-table commands available, and most software on the platform also can be integrated directly into scripts. On windows one has to try to write hacks and complex macros to point and click things for them in hopes the vendor does not change the interface.

3. Linux is far more portable. One can write applications on a linux stack that can be run on anything from xboxes, wiis, toasters, computers, mobile phones, routers, firewalls, servers, GPS devices, etc.. where most of these types of devices not ship with a basic Linux stack out of the box.

4. Linux distros virtually all come with package management systems to maintain huge troves of developer tools centrally. I can one-click install any of a good 30,000 pieces of software out of the box on most distros, and the distro will keep any installed software up to date for me, and track every single change it makes to the system. It also checks CRCs on files and can let me know if any files have been changed since I installed a particular piece of software which is vital for security.

5. Most software available for linux is free and open source. You can try it for free, use it for free, fix it for free, and usually find developers more than willing to talk to you if something does not work as expected.

6. Far wider range of developers: Microsoft has a few hundred employees in redmond working on windows, and test and develop on an extremely limited range of hardware. Linux has millions of developers with code access around the world testing and – on pretty much every device with the vast majority of every type of processor-driven device on the planet.

7. Linux has a proven track record of security, which compared to windows reputation is not even a fair comparison. Due to the fact that critical companies have to depend on Microsoft to fix things when they go wrong, or trusting their code for security blindly, companies like Google, and Government organizations like the NSA have  switched to Linux years ago, and both regularly contribute to its development. Google, has gone as far as to ban Windows from their campuses since there is no reasonable controllable way to secure it.

8. Linux is not owned or completely controlled by any one party, and many organizations all contribute to it for their own purposes and agendas, but everyone shares the benefits. Even Microsoft itself has contributed over 20,000 lines of code to the Linux kernel in order to try to stay relevant by assisting in Linux server virtualization support.

9. Most Linux developers are not paid to do so: If something is not done by x deadline, then you keep working on it until it is ready, rather ran releasing something that can endanger people in order to make money or keep a vendor agreement.

10. Linux and most of its software is free, open, and built by other developers who have spent just as much time using windows as you have, and desired something better.