Apple's iOS platform has managed to pass a major desktop OS for the first time in web use as it now has more share than Linux, Net Applications found today. It just took the lead in July but held and widened it in August, with iPads, iPhones and iPods taking 1.13 percent; Linux has declined to a new low at just 0.85 percent. The figure doesn't include Android, though it has far lower share at just 0.2 percent.
The analysts didn't explain the reasoning, though the rapid growth of iOS may have pushed Linux share downwards. While Linux has routinely struggled to keep its share, it may also have been hurt by the season; the summer often marks a higher instance of web traffic from home, where most don't have Linux systems.
Mac OS X actually declined slightly, to exactly five percent, but Windows was nearly flat at 91.34 percent. Apple's desktop slip can be attributed both to iOS and to a slight uptick in Java ME.
In browsers, Microsoft's Internet Explorer gains were now known to be short-lived and have dropped it back to 60.4 percent of traffic. Most of the gains were for Chrome, which hit a new high of 7.52 percent, and Safari, which hit 5.16 percent. Firefox was virtually flat at 22.93 percent.
Some of Internet Explorer's tenure was helped by China; although Internet Explorer 6 was dropping off rapidly, 46.35 percent of all IE use was in China, much of it using the older version. The country has historically clung to older PCs and often older software as well.
