Last year saw the likes of Drupal, WordPress, Plone and ImpressCMS in the winner’s circle and this year promises to be even better. New categories and new names are sure to impress surprise and hopefully delight.

Nominations begin today, August 9, 2010 for the Open Source Awards.

Some New, Some Old Open Source Categories

• Open Source CMS
• Hall of Fame CMS
• Most Promising Open Source Project
• Open Source E-Commerce Applications
• Open Source JavaScript Libraries
• Open Source Graphics Software

Look for big things from the “Most Promising Open Source Project,” this could spell future trends in the industry. Don’t overlook the other new categories such as Open Source E-Commerce Applications and Graphics Software, though, which simply add to an already prestigious award.

Predictions

Look for Drupal, Joomla and WordPress to dominate much of the Open Source CMS portion of the awards, but others such as ImpressCMS, Plone, and possibly even Magnolia may show their worth as well (much the same as last year).

Magento and ZenCart are likely to be mentioned at least in the E-Commerce category, while Gimp is sure to show up in the Graphics Software category.

Whether any of these predictions are correct will have to wait to be seen. One thing is for certain though, this year promises to be the biggest and hopefully the best Open Source Awards from PacktPublishing to date. Stay tuned to see if predictions are accurate and if your favorite Open Source project makes the list.

Timeline of the Awards

• August 9 | Nominations Open
• September 17 | Nominations Close
• September 27 | Voting Begins
• November 5 | Voting Ends
• November 15 | Winners Announced

Check out PacktPub for more information on rules and prizes.

Plone once again has taken the first place prize as PacktPub’s 2009 Best Other Open Source CMS. The Plone has been around for about 8 years now and for two years running has won first place in the Open Source CMS Awards. Python + Zope system allows non-developers the ease of maintaining and administrating a website and talks to nearly any database. The first place spot carries a $2000 prize with it as well.

Other winners in the Best Other Open Source CMS category are dotCMS in the first runner up place with a prize of $500 and MojoPortal in second place with a $500 prize. Congratulations to this year’s winners in the Best Other Open Source CMS. Other category winners to be announced this week as well so check back for daily announcements through the week.