Summary: As we approach another Thanksgiving, let’s take a look at a common question from a business angle. What is your business thankful for this year? In the spirit of Thanksgiving, we’ve come up with a list of 7 free technologies that we’re thankful for. Can you add anything to the list?

In the Thanksgiving spirit, I’d like to ask you a question: What is your business thankful for? Or–seeing as this is a business technology blog–what technology is your business thankful for this year?

We rely on technology every day, yet much of it goes unnoticed. Today, let’s take a step back and focus on the technology that we depend on to run our business.

I’ve put together a list of my own…with a small twist. Rather than include just any technology, I’d like to highlight a list of free technology that we’re thankful for. Many items on this list are things that businesses often take for granted. But, while free of cost, most are indispensable to our business:

This year, we are thankful for:

HTML5 – which is constantly improving–bringing more ‘native’ features to the web on a regular basis.

CSS3 – which is the driving force behind cross-platform applications–helping us view mobile web apps across any device.

jQuery – which lets us add new features to our web apps without building them from scratch.

Google Maps API – which lets us integrate mapping and plot geographical data in our applications.

Hadoop – which lets businesses of all sizes capitalize on big data.

Ajax – which drives real-time apps, and makes applications like the user-defined dashboard possible.

Web services – which connect data from disparate systems, helping us get a clear view of our business.

How about you? What technology is your business thankful for? Feel free to share in the comments.

Finally, from all of us here at mrc, we wish you safe travels and a very happy Thanksgiving!