Written by Hilary Carter, Senior Vice President of Linux Foundation Research

The beauty of open source collaboration is that, unlike commercial aviation, it never relies on a single flight path or a single carrier to reach its destination. Mumbai was my destination this week for Open Source Summit India. However, what began with a significant and highly disruptive administrative failure regarding permissions to land in Mumbai for one of the airlines responsible for my travel, set off a chain reaction of cancellations, increasing costs, and backlog, and so, regrettably my journey to Mumbai did not come to pass. The code, however, moves forward, and today I remotely bring the core insights of “Zephyr at 10: The Open RTOS for India’s IoT” directly to you.

The crucial role of community feedback

To truly understand an open source project’s trajectory, project stakeholders cannot rely on guesswork. Empirical research serves as a critical diagnostic tool to measure market adoption, collect direct feedback from developers, and establish objective baselines for future strategy.

We recently saw the power of this structured approach with the release of the comprehensive report, “Zephyr Turns 10: A Decade of Adoption, Maturity, and Ecosystem Evolution.” To continue capturing the pulse of the ecosystem, the project has officially launched the 2026 Zephyr Developer Survey. This short, anonymous questionnaire will directly shape the next ten years of strategy and technical priorities for project leadership.

Shape the Next Decade: The 2026 Developer Survey is open until June 30. If you are building on or contributing to Zephyr, take 10 minutes to make your voice heard.