http://www.osnews.com/story/5367/Issues_Surrounding_Linux_and_Implications_for_IT_Managers Exploring the Future of Computing en-us Copyright 2001-2009, David Adams adam+nospam@osnews.com Tue, 07 Jul 2009 01:18:12 GMT http://www.osnews.com/images/osnews.gif http://www.osnews.com http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? This paper gives the SCO lawsuit far more credit than it deserves: "IT managers should carefully watch this issue before investing heavily in Linux infrastructure". Um - why? Assuming they've watching the developments up 'til now, I don't think they have much to worry about. SCO haven't provided a shred of real evidence to back up their claims since day one, and have contradicted themselves several times. Thankfully it'll be over soon - they were recently ordered to disclose their evidence (http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/12/05/2021209) and laughably their legal representatives didn't even bother to show up for the hearing.

I'm also curious where the market share statistics came from. Specifically, that "Linux has recently garnered 10% of the market share" and "an estimated 18 million users across the world". Sources, please? Wed, 10 Dec 2003 21:05:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Instead of doing jobs, they will probably arguing why it is or it is not ready for the Desktop or switching between KDE or Gnome sessions - wasting any alleged savings from using linux and then some. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 21:30:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? I never knew Linux' market share was that large though. Overall, I thought it was a balanced view of the state of affairs. Definitely not a FUD article. It calls "a spade a spade" and it's well written. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 21:42:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? I would like to know where he gets 10% market share from.

From what I have seen Linux has around 1/2% market share on desktops and about 1/4 (25%+/-) of the server market.

Where do these people get these numbers? Wed, 10 Dec 2003 21:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? From what I have seen Linux has around 1/2% market share on desktops and about 1/4 (25%+/-) of the server market.

Source please, where did you get ur numbers?

No, 1%+ market share on desktops
http://www.google.com/press/zeitgeist.html

Developer October 2003 Percent November 2003 Percent Change
Apache 28235972 64.61 30298060 67.41 2.80
Microsoft 10252227 23.46 9449180 21.02 -2.44
SunONE 1528090 3.50 1525202 3.39 -0.11
Zeus 735179 1.68 743611 1.65 -0.03
http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2003/11/index.html

question is how many apache run on linux. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 21:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? for an enterprise to adopt Linux/open source SW is that their IT infrastructure remains under their control, and does not become subject to the whims of a vendor who is trying to "flush and roll" their customer to meet their revenue expectations. "Free" is as much about "Freedom" as it is about "no cost". This is perhaps the most underrated advantage of Linux and open source software. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 22:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? First, who is this guy? How is he qualified at doing an analysis at all. Does he have any experience in research? Almost all references are to oridinary news articles from the Internet, not the best references IMO. Maybe it's just me but a paper to me is a research paper and they are very different from this. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 22:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? I seem to have forgotten to include that in my bibliography but the source is from here:

http://www.linuxmednews.com/linuxmednews/1066189575

Really I think 10% is quite a conservative figure given that China is very heavily into Linux and they have a population of something around 2 Billion. This figure was meant to be a worldwide estimation. I don't believe at this time that there is little else but estimations on Linux market usage. Does everyone who runs a Linux based system report that they are using Linux? This was merely meant to be a stabbing guess.

Hope that clarrifies things a bit. This essay was done as a 4th year term paper for one of my Computer Information Systems courses. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 22:18:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? As to why my articles are all internet based. The reasoning behind this is that I found it VERY difficult to get my hands on printed material that covered the topic as it is still a very modern issue. Our university library did not have any information whatsoever on the topic, and I could not find any books on the subject online either. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 22:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Linux has more like 75% of the desktop as it gets deployed in China. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 22:34:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Like I said before Linux is good, but it will never be anywhere near what Windows is today. Really come on, Windows on the Server and Windows on the end users pc makes any network easy to work with and it saves companies money in the long run. Why would you not want that? Plus you get good techs for cheap because every techie knows windows. Having a Linux guru would mean companies would have to pay more for a skilled Linux zealot. Not to mention scaring the CIO from firing them cause who would look after the Linux servers? I am glad the days of paying techs $95,000 a year, letting them get away with slack dress code, and doing basically anything they see fit for the IT department are over. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 22:54:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Pleasingly detailed, but you need someone to proof-read it before handing it around (plenty of corporate types will pick up on errors and may develop a negative view).

For example:

SUSE (no longer SuSE)
Red Hat (not Redhat)
OpenOffice.org (not Openoffice.org)
there are / there is confusion
"for peace of mind there a number of organizations that continue offer"

etc. etc. etc.

Otherwise it's well written, but if you want it to look professional and clean then get someone to go over it! Wed, 10 Dec 2003 22:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Overall good and honest article. It's not going to be easy for the Linux to gain any share of the Enterprise Desktop market. I agree with the author. Lack of good/solid professional applications written for Linux is the problem. I spend a lot of time video / graphics editing. Professional tools I use are not easy to understand. I had to buy books to figure out how to use them. There ARE NO books available MainActor and Jahshaka. I don't even know if I'll be able to install these applications in the first place. This is one of the reasons that stop me from using Linux.
I wanted to install Debian. As many times I attempted I failed every time. Try searching for any Debian books on amazon. There is NONE. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 22:58:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Tomcat - A stripped down version of Apache used primarily as a lightweight web server.

Not quite. Tomcat is a servlet container, used to run JSP or Servlet web applications. It does not share any code with Apache HTTPD (which is the Apache you are thinking of), and can hardly be considered lightweight since it needs a JRE to run. Tomcat can be integrated into Apache HTTPD, or run by itself as a webserver. It is usually daisy chained/proxied into Apache because Apache is much better at serving static content. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 23:19:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? I've noticed a new trend among anti-Linux posters: they start by saying how much they like Linux, and then proceed to spread as much FUD about it as possible (i.e. "Linux is more expensives", "Linux gurus are zealots" and my favorite, "Windows networks are easier to administer" - even though it takes almost twice as many admins to run a Windows network than a Linux one).

Spare the fake niceties. Sugar-coated poison is still poison. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 23:23:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? i think this author is hot. He gives credit where it deserves and i look forward to more of his upcoming articles Wed, 10 Dec 2003 23:43:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? I wanted to install Debian. As many times I attempted I failed every time. Try searching for any Debian books on amazon. There is NONE.

Huh? Are you sure your spelled "Debian" right? I tried an Amazon search and got 307 results (admittedly, not all specific to Debian, just had Debian named in their description, but still). Try looking again. I recommend "The Linux Cookbook" and "Linux Administration Handbook" (covers RH and SuSE, too).

Anyway, about the article. It statesv (pg.1):
the main distributions are Redhat, Mandrake, and SuSE. Really? A quick Google for "linux distribution poll" netted me
http://www.desktoplinux.com/cgi-bin/survey/survey.cgi?view=results&...
http://www.osnews.com/story.php?news_id=3640
both of which show Debian at/near the top. Why was Debian ignored? Perhaps if it wasn't you would have not made this erroneous statement as well (pg.2):

A good example of this is an application (A), which requires for package A to be built, packages B and C are also necessary. However where the trick comes in, is that for C to be built you must get packages D, E, and F.

apt-get install
will automatically retreive and install ALL related packages (after, of course, showing you a list and getting your permission). Nothing could be easier. Easier, in fact, than most auto-installing Windows apps I've come across.

Cheers Wed, 10 Dec 2003 23:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Kudos...very fair and balanced article.

I really like how you used the term "trade secrets." IBM authored the code in question, and it is GPL licensed (free for anyone to use). Even Darl McBride can't get the terminology regarding his own company's lawsuit right.

Actually SCO is asking for $699 per processor. Considering the fact that SCI doesn't own the rights to the code in question, this is extortion. But that is a story all to itself. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 23:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? What Americans choose doesn't amount to a hill of beans, the future is being decided in China right now. You will do what you are told to do by your employers, and you will think what you are told to think, how else did you become a supporter of a monopoly? Wed, 10 Dec 2003 23:50:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? I thought the SCO lawsuit was blown out of proportion in importance and quoting anything from Rob Enderle is undoubtedly a questionable practice as the man is a Microsoft stooge. Otherwise, I thought the rest was fairly good. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 23:56:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? One and a third billion people, and an economy that grows 8 percent per year. China is going to steam roll the United States, and they will not be using Microsoft. Wed, 10 Dec 2003 23:57:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? The truth is that the Unix (and unix-like OSes) is the future !

Even if Linux fail, all investiment made to learn Unix is not wasted. You can use FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD or any other Unix-like ou commercial Unix (including MacOS X too).

People should not be slaves from a monopoly. Windows is a proprietary and closed operating system, totally different from the true standard of modern operating systems: the Unix.

Unix-based technology is the future. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 00:22:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? "there is only a couple hundred viruses for Linux most of which are not nearly as severe as their Windows"

What? Couple hundred? Where does he get "couple hundred" from? I have yet to see a single virus or worm for Linux in over eight years of usage. They simply don't exist in the wild. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 00:25:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? I think this was a well written article. I think the author has some very good points about the role of Linux in the future. And for all you MS people out there...if China, the biggest nation in the world is primarily using Linux (or other non MS software), isn't that a sign of things to come? Keep them articles comming! Thu, 11 Dec 2003 00:45:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Linux has more like 75% of the desktop as it gets deployed in China.

I don't think that is right. That Chinese goverment deploying Linux doesn't mean every Chinese will use Linux on his/her desktop system. As I have heard many times they can get illegal copies of Windows at a very very low price (like few bucks). Why on Earth they want to use Linux instead Windows? They already use Windows programs intensibly. Also for games young people not gonna switch from Windows to Linux. Goverment may use Linux though, not individuals.

Do you have any proof? Thu, 11 Dec 2003 01:36:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? it's obvious the guy hasn't gained much experience with linux though, at least he's not researched packaging. sure RPM based distros can get stuck in dependancy hell, but debian and gentoo obviously have much less of these problems if at all. the statements about buggy code is true for sure though, that's why i like debian stable and older versions of slackware. get past the eye candy and go for stability. I could see linux as a desktop solution, but people fear change, plain and simple. throw a change like from windows to linux and if the people (you've essentially interrupted) don't pick it up and run with it, productivity could be hurt dramatically. That's the real issue about 'making the switch'. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 01:36:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Like I said before Linux is good, but it will never be anywhere near what Windows is today.
--------------
A lot of people think its a lot better than Windows is today.

Really come on, Windows on the Server and Windows on the end users pc makes any network easy to work with and it saves companies money in the long run.
>>>>>>>>>>
Windows is easy? Hardly. Ever since I set up my first Windows network with Win95, I've never been able to get the damn things to work properly. There are always annoying issues with file sharing or printer sharing. I'm about as advanced a PC user as you'll get, and I still can't get WinXP to print over the network to our Canon i850. Hell, just transferring files can be a pain. In our college dorm, we've taken to using AIM file transfer for everything because Windows file sharing is just such a pain.

Why would you not want that? Plus you get good techs for cheap because every techie knows windows.
-----------
A cheap tech is worth exactly what you paid for him.

Having a Linux guru would mean companies would have to pay more for a skilled Linux zealot.
------------
No, it would mean you'd have to hire someone with UNIX skills. For the enterprise, there are tons of old guys who still have UNIX skills, and for small businesses, college students with Linux experience are a dime a dozen. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 01:55:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? "For companies into digital movie editing/production, MainActor and Jahshaka provide professional grade multimedia editing capabilities, and are quite easy to learn."

Have you actually used these programs? If so, have you actually used some competing products like Premiere, Final Cut Pro, Shake, or DDC? MainActor and Jahshaka are not professional grade multimedia editing applications by any stretch of the imagination. They are prosumer at best. I seriously doubt your going to find Lucas Arts running MainActor or any other "companies inot digital movie editing production".

"What this means for IT managers everywhere, is that they can download a completely free fully licensed operating system and distribute it amongst as many computers as they wish."

Thankyou. I've been saying for quite sometime that people around here have this idiotic notion that random downloaded ISOs from some distro website = an IT infrastructure. I was hoping that someone would finally come out and say it since it is what all the linux seem to think in the back of their heads.

"Customized security programs such as Bastille can lock down your system into a very secure state within a couple of minutes, and provide much better security than the default servers built into newer version of Windows."

Let me get this straight, you're going to compare using customised security programs that are obviously not installed nor enabled by default in linux, to a default built in server on windows. I don't even like linux all that much and I can think of better ways to show linux is more secure than that mess of words you're calling an example. Why not mention something like support for CFS, competent usage of acls, or great patch response time? It would be a hell of a lot more effect than stating the equivalent of "windows is more secure than palm OS because Norton makes anti-virus software for windows". Thu, 11 Dec 2003 02:00:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? What are you talking about? UNIX is as closed as Windows.

SCO owns the code, and OpenGroup owns the trademark/specification.

Sure, there's lots of clones, but the UNIX IP is not open. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 02:20:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? > Linux has more like 75% of the desktop as it gets deployed
> in China.

Not when you speak of 90% piracy rate in China.

Even leave that out I don't see Linux has 75% market share or install base yet. However, the coming years for JDS from Sun will be very interesting for China.

> "For companies into digital movie editing/production,
> MainActor and Jahshaka provide professional grade
> multimedia editing capabilities, and are quite easy to
> learn."

>Have you actually used these programs? If so, have you
>actually used some competing products like Premiere, Final
>Cut Pro, Shake, or DDC? MainActor and Jahshaka are not
>professional grade multimedia editing applications by any
>stretch of the imagination. They are prosumer at best. I
>seriously doubt your going to find Lucas Arts running
>MainActor or any other "companies inot digital movie
>editing production".

Shake is available on Linux, but the price tag of Linux version vs that of Mac OS X version will make people think again: you would rather buy a G5 "for free" rather than buying the double-priced Linux version.

Fairly speaking, there is not a single open source Media app really designed to rival commercial app quality on Linux; But when you have several open source apps work together you might just get what you want from a commercial app at a much lower cost. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 04:07:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? In so far, SCO's lawsuit is overhyped.

The evidence on code showing is lackluster, the only uncertainty to be worried about is SCO-IBM's contract issue.

Take a look at this article by a real IP lawyer:

The SCO Litigation: Maintaining Walls Around Trade Secrets or Attacking the Knowledge of Those Outside the Walls?

by Douglas L. Rogers

http://www.vssp.com/CM/Articles/Articles1016.asp Thu, 11 Dec 2003 04:13:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Really I think 10% is quite a conservative figure given that China is very heavily into Linux and they have a population of something around 2 Billion. This figure was meant to be a worldwide estimation.

China has a population of 1.2billion and Indian has one of 1.0x billion; Indians "billionth" child was born last year and there was a lot of hoo-ha made about it.

I don't believe at this time that there is little else but estimations on Linux market usage. Does everyone who runs a Linux based system report that they are using Linux? This was merely meant to be a stabbing guess.

The better question is how many people use Windows; not as a platform to run a telnet session and do 99% of the worth with, how many actually USE Windows. Go into ANZ, all of their systems run Windows, yet, the only application ever open is a dumb terminal session to the mainframe.

Out of the "millions" of installations, I would be very curious to know how many of these systems are used for more than just being a low cost thin client. If the operating system is being used as a thin client platform and all the work is done on some other one, won't it be there for logical to assume that there are alot more mainframe and UNIX users out there than what the so-called "analysts" say? Thu, 11 Dec 2003 05:39:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Hi

Google search results are not a good estimate of the amount of linux desktops deployed. Its is a result of how many people search for something like "linux desktop". Present better results next time Thu, 11 Dec 2003 06:28:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? In what way is this article a research paper? What has the author researched? I think reading a few news items on Linux hardly qualifies. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 11:47:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Tomcat being a stripped down version of Apache mamde my day. Is obvious that this guy knows what he's talking about. I wonder if he uses Tomcat as web server only. I hardly doubt that someone will ever use Tomcat just to display static content via coyote. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 11:57:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Poorly researched. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 12:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? "I am glad the days of paying techs $95,000 a year, letting them get away with slack dress code, and doing basically anything they see fit for the IT department are over."

Yeah, this is what the business weenies are trying to do but in the end everyone will eventually see that companies need the techies more than they do the overpaid execs. As more engineers rise to higher positions in the company (due to technology becoming more and more integrated into business) you will begin to see programmers/administrators begin to get the compensation and recognition they deserve. Face it, without them most companies today would not run (not for long anyway). Thu, 11 Dec 2003 13:01:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? "Over the last 20 odd years, Linux has progressively built on its code foundation due to generous donations of code by single programmers, groups of programmers, and companies."

Assuming we're talking Gregorian Calander years that number should be halved as Linux hasn't been around since 1983, but rather 1991. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 14:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? While not being surrounded with FUD, this article certainly skips more than a little on the details of installing and supporting linux.

It doesn't address how difficult linux is *still* to configure for a variety of hardware, and how linux could address single-sign on for example in as simple as fashion as microsoft has.

Remember kids:

Adding value doesn't mean doing the same thing a different way.

Linux adds value when it doesn't crash. This means its no better than Windows 2000 or Windows xp. It is better than windows 98 or ME.

Linux adds value when you can easily manage and expand the network. Its not there yet.

- Microsoft Fan Thu, 11 Dec 2003 15:15:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? "Google search results are not a good estimate of the amount of linux desktops deployed. Its is a result of how many people search for something like "linux desktop". Present better results next time."

Wrong! - the figures come come from the operating system the browser identifies itself as using when a google search is performed.

Linux use may be underestimated by the fact that a proportion of Linux users masquerade their browsers as IE running on Windows (This is exceptionally easy with Konqueror but may be done with the Gecko based browsers as well) in order to get into sites that put up an IE only barrier.

Linux use may be overestimated by the fact that Linux users may search Google more than Windows users who are more likely to be ignorant and use MSN instead.

So it probably balances out. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 15:59:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? It doesn't address how difficult linux is *still* to configure for a variety of hardware, and how linux could address single-sign on for example in as simple as fashion as microsoft has.

Humm, as a microsoft fan you should know better. It's just as hard in a mircosoft environment to have a end-to-end single signon solution as it is in any other OS. Oh you mean the Active Directory stuff? Yeah, indeed, that lets you sign onto the network, but you seem to forget that infrastructure is designed to support applications, and those in general couldn't care less abou single signon...Oracle Forms login boxes, anyone?

So, blame the applications first for not honouring anything standard with respect to single signon technology, and then start complaining about how one OS does it "better" than the other. I fact, I dare to contend that the situation in the linux world is much better with a *lot* of services allowing for LDAP backends for their authentication than the Windows world. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 16:17:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? A stripped down web server....

You have GOT to be kidding me.

Is this person employed? If so, why so?

-gc Thu, 11 Dec 2003 20:08:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? Well I think some of you are clearly overshooting the point of this article. Its meant to be directed at an IT manager. If you were an IT manager wouldn't you want to know the worst case scenarios for any major switch you were about to implement? As for minor things like Tomcat definitions being wrong and a few slight grammatical errors I still think this is a good article. The problem with the Linux community in general is that it can't take criticism. This guy is blatently stating that Linux is a good O/S and its getting closer to adoption on a mass scale... and all you guys can do is bitch. I don't know if you've noticed but no other editorial has even bothered including their sources in a proper bibliography, or even bothered to include a glossary. A lot of time and effort went into this and I think this article brought up some very good points. A job overall well done. Thu, 11 Dec 2003 23:09:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? I too think the Article is honest. He made good points about the growth of linux in other countries, especially linux's potential in countries in Asia (China) or the middle east, including the difficulty of installing linux an its related sofwares along with the SCO lawsuit. However, I think the point he made about "linux will never be anywhere what windows is today" can not be determine now. Besides, if the new release of Microsoft Longhorn in 2005 doesn't meet expections (e.g security), microsoft will experience a backlash by companies looking for alternative sofwares. I have seen many System Desingers switching to LindowsOS as a viable option to microsoft deskstop operating system on their netwok (e.g not for server purposes). Many IT consultants express their satisfaction towards the CLick_N_Run feature lindows offer--which automatically install software packages without any configuration on the user's part. Check it out for yourself at www.Lindows.com ! It is true Lindows is not free, but for $59 dollors you get a lot more than you get on Microsoft operating system alone, remember there is no license fee per seat, just buy one copy per computer and you are ready to go. In addition, you could buy a membership for $14 dollors a month and get access to thousands of opensource softwares at the lindows software warehouse. Some of the powerfull enterprise softwares carry additional charges, but they worth the headache of installing software under linux and don't have to worry about additianal charges for downloading the same software. Also, if you want to run some microsoft compatible software under linux, just buy Win4linux, it runs many of the microsoft compatible sofwares with no license fee. Works for me! The bottons line is, companies are looking for choices and trying to lower their TCO (e.g Total Cost Of Ownership). As far as 'the days of IT professianl making $90,000 and walking around with baggy jeans are over', remember this, companies will rather pay $90,000 per IT personel in other to save $500,000 a year in TCO (.eg Total Cost of Ownership) trust me. Finally, its a matter of time before the opensource movement floods the IT industry. In response to your statemet in your analysis I quoted above, we have to wait and see!!! Fri, 12 Dec 2003 00:23:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? No doubt SOME of you guys can't take criticism. Freaken out about little things like "stripped down version of Tomcat". I have better things to do with my time than pick out small details like that. Fri, 12 Dec 2003 05:17:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? The author and several commentors expressed a wide range of opinions as to just how ready open source software is for everyday commercial use. That doesn't mean that any of the opinions are wrong. It means that different pieces of software are at wildly different stages of maturity. But there's a logical reason for that.
The parts of the system that code hackers care about got done first. The actual operating system -- kernel, utilities, C compiler, windowing system, and so on -- is a cast-iron industrial-strength heavyweight. Almost unnoticed, it's quietly taken over the lead in kernel technical development. That happened precisely because the source code is accessible to anyone seeking to add capabilities or correct errors.
About 5 years back, those components were stable enough to go to work in corporate network infrastructures. That's when news started trickling out about Linux and BSD print servers, file servers, web servers, and so on quietly carrying the load, out of sight of upper management.
With the bare operating system proving itself in a business environment, development priorities began shifting toward applications, particularly business applications. Hardware manufacturers, eager to lower their cost structures and selling prices while improving margins, saw the benefit of developing only the features they needed, instead of the whole system. Major data base vendors saw an opportunity to reach a wider market by porting to less expensive hardware and software platforms, without compromising reliability. Other companies saw strategic reasons to throw previously closed applications open to cooperative development -- so now we have complete open source office suites that major corporations and entire governments are bringing into mainstream service. Some of these still have noticeable rough edges, particularly in their backwards compatibility with closed-source equivalents. But they meet most definitions of "good enough" now, and will continue to improve. They also present special advantages, such as stable and fully documented file formats, which are of critical importance for permanent public records.
Consumer applications, such as manipulating sound and video streams, operating CD burners and DVD drives, got started much later. Quite a bit of this software is in very early alpha stages, and it doesn't help any that hardware device manufacturers give little or no help, even to publishing technical specifications. This is one area where tales of frustration, failure, and devices that just don't work are still common.
Specialty technical software for open source platforms is probably the least mature category. It's hardly gotten started. Commercial vendors of truly professional software, such as packages for desktop publishing, printed circuit board design, chip design, and mechanical drafting, are still focused on Unix and Microsoft platforms. Open source developers haven't gotten where they are by waiting around for commercial suppliers to meet their needs, though. Projects are under way in many application areas. Some have achieved at least minimal usability, others haven't. Probably the most outstanding success of this kind to date is The GIMP, often compared favorably to Adobe Photoshop. Much less far along, but good enough to get actual work done, is Lilypond, which does a beautiful job of music typesetting. In chip design, there are projects that show promise, and some programs that do parts of the project, but nothing that can handle the whole job. A few years out, when more of the installed base is running on open source platforms, the commercial application vendors will have to follow in order to survive. That's already starting to happen in high-end chip design software. But mostly that's in the future.
So... is open source software ready to be a workhorse in your business? The right answer is, it depends on what you want to do.
If you want it to run your on-line web sales system and your corporate data base, absolutely.
If you want to run standard office applications such as word processors, spreadsheets, web browsers, and so on, yes with some qualifications. Documents that use particularly obscure features of legacy systems may not render the same or be fully functional. Some web sites with abnormal, browser-specific code do still exist, though they're getting less common. Other than that, users presented with something like OpenOffice on KDE have sometimes hardly noticed that they weren't on their old familiar systems. Expensive retraining for end users? Baloney!
If you want to edit video clips and burn them to DVDs, well, probably not. Right now doing that on Linux as a primary business process is for major movie studios, who have systems specialists on staff. Same thing for running video games; there aren't that many for open source systems, and the kernel infrastructure for that is still in active development.
(By the way, look a little deeper than salary comparisions to get a handle on relative support costs. Unix and Linux sysadmins don't have their time consumed recovering from crashes. Consequently their users don't spend their time waiting for systems to come back up. So these support staffs are smaller and handle more machines, they have more time to add new equipment and features, and they tend not to incur overtime.)
Any accurate statement about what's ready for business use and what isn't, is necessarily a snapshot. In six months the answers will be different. In a year they'll be different again. So by all means evaluate what's out there against your own requirements. Run small-scale trials before committing to large-scale deployments. Check back periodically. And if an application appears to be almost ready, except for one important thing you need, you aren't stuck waiting around the way you would be with closed-source, vendor-controlled software. You have the option of adding the feature in-house or contracting with a local consultant. You can get it done according to your own needs and schedule. That freedom is what open source software is all about. Fri, 12 Dec 2003 05:46:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments http://osnews.com/thread? http://osnews.com/thread? "Tomcat - A stripped down version of Apache used primarily as a lightweight web server."

This kind of comment does a fine job to help evaluate the author's knowledge. Add his description of dependencies and what he is considering to be major distributions, and this evaluation becomes more precise.

One may hope that his assumptions are based upon something more reliable than his shaky grasp on Apache and Linux. Sun, 14 Dec 2003 14:49:00 GMT donotreply@osnews.com (Anonymous) Comments