It's no secret that Linux skills are a hot commodity in today's job market, and on Wednesday the Linux Foundation will publish some data that paints that picture in finer detail.

Specifically, focusing on jobs posted on the Linux.com Jobs Board between Sept. 1 and Nov. 30, the group has pulled out some key hiring trends by skill areas, job types, and locations.

Java and Android are the two most sought-after skills on the Linux hiring front, the Linux Foundation reports, followed by C++, J2EE, and MySQL. A slight majority of jobs advertised--53 percent--are for Linux developers, meanwhile, with the remainder made up by Linux systems administrators.

Australia Ranks No. 2

As for geographic locations, the United States by far dominates the Linux Foundation's base of Linux job ads with a full 70 percent, though I have trouble believing that that's truly indicative of where jobs actually exist--the fact that the foundation is based in the U.S. must surely have something to do with it.

In any case, the next biggest location for Linux jobs is Australia, the group reports, followed by Germany, the U.K., Canada, and the Netherlands.

Within the United States, it's not just the coasts that dominate the Linux hiring picture, as you can see in the infographic at right.

Increasing Salaries

"The data we've surfaced is just a snapshot,” Amanda McPherson, the Linux Foundation's vice president of marketing and developer programs, told me this morning.

“It gives us a quick look at some of the trends we're seeing emerge in our Linux jobs space as we embark on a new year,” McPherson added. “A quick look at Dice.com, Monster, and other boards show similar trends with even more jobs."

Indeed, on Tuesday Dice published its own summary of the tech hiring picture, and it's nothing if not a rosy one. A full 65 percent of the 1,200 hiring professionals Dice recently surveyed said their companies or clients will add technology professionals in the first half of 2012, with 27 percent of those hiring looking to expand their staffs by more than 20 percent in the next six months.

Tech professionals with between six and 10 years of experience are in particular demand, Dice reports, followed by those with two to five years in the trenches.

Perhaps even more encouraging is that 42 percent said that salaries for new hires would increase in the coming year.

10,625 Linux Jobs

I did a search on the term “Linux” on Dice.com today, and found no fewer than 10,625 Linux jobs out of 79,946 tech jobs overall. A search on “Java” turned up 16,218 while “Android” produced 1,635.

Need to boost your skills in any of these key areas? As I reported not long ago, there are lots of ways to do that online.