An Evans Data survey of software development trends in North America finds that Microsoft Windows is losing ground to Linux as a target development platform, although it is still the most popular by a significant margin.

Evans Data’s survey of 400 developers and IT managers found that 11.8% of developers are now targeting Linux compared to 8.8% last year, but developers targeting Windows have declined from 74% to 64.8% in the same period. John Andrews, Evans Data’s CEO said that Windows’ decline might have been worse but for the arrival of Vista.

The survey also highlights growing interest in virtualization, with one third of developers already developing applications for virtual environments, and 42% planning to do so within a year.