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10 Years of Pushing For Linux — and Giving Up
Posted by
kdawson
on Thu Feb 01, 2007 12:12 PM
from the one-thing-after-another dept.
from the one-thing-after-another dept.
boyko.at.netqos writes "Jim Sampson at Network Performance Daily writes about his attempts over a decade to get Linux working in a business/enterprise environment, but each time, he says, something critical just didn't work, and eventually, he just gave up. The article caps with his attempts to use Ubuntu Edgy Eft — only to find a bug that still prevented him from doing work." Quoting: "For the next ten years, I would go off and on back to this thought: I wanted to support the Open Source community, and to use Linux, but every time, the reality was that Linux just was not ready... Over the last six years, I've tried periodically to get Linux working in the enterprise, thinking, logically, that things must have improved. But every time, something — sometimes something very basic — prevented me from doing what I needed to do in Linux."
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Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
In fact, I've experienced them both at home and at work with Linux.
But I would like to point out that some of the problems you faced (like integration with MS Exchange server) are simply Microsoft not wanting to release/support/adapt to standards. I know you're not directly blaming the Linux community for your (and the seemingly global) failure in adopting it but what is putting a real big halt on it in the corporate environment is companies working against it. Maybe this will change but I highly doubt it.
The shortcomings that Linux suffers are a result of poor design. Poor design of third party devices, software & services. If all the wireless card manufacturers got together and agreed on a interoperable adapter interface to their cards, it would mean that the OS developers would just need to write one other side for ever driver of every wireless card to work. The problem is that if they opened this up, they perceive their competitors would grow stronger by seeing their research. I suppose something could be said about this hampering innovation or removing the option to continually change chipsets in the search for the cheaper/better hardware, I don't know enough about wireless cards. But one would think everyone could agree on some interface to use. This is apparently a good design practice but poor business move.
I reiterate that you are not alone in your frustration. You didn't fail to adopt Linux, Linux didn't fail to meet your needs, it was the entire community and their business practices that failed you.
Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:4, Interesting)
What really astonishes me is that open source has made such great leaps in other areas yet there's no apparent replacement for Outlook & Exchange. For a huge number of folk in business, having an open office suite is useless if they don't have calendar sharing, resource scheduling and email/contact sharing amongst groups. Is this really so difficult to achieve?
Push email has already taken off - where's the open source version mobile operators can take up (Though I presume this needs to be developed outside the US to avoid software patent litigation)?
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
Probably not, but perhaps open source developers are not interested in providing such a solution.
The flip side of "Linus is inhibited by greed" is that "Linux is not responsive to the needs of the marketplace". There are no dollars on the line for linux.
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
Uhhh.. no, there are a lot of dollars on the line for linux. Just because many of the developers don't get paid and most of the software is available free of charge does not mean that there has not been a great deal of commercial investment in Linux/FOSS.
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
This is my point. Developers who do things in their spare time don't like to write boring software, even if that's what most people would use.
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Funny)
Especially if it's software that enables random people to schedule them into time-wasting meetings at a click of a button.
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
Especially if it's software that enables random people to schedule them into time-wasting meetings at a click of a button.
Ah. I'm glad someone has a grasp of the true business need.
The fact that you don't approve, is both an indication that you're sane, and that a sign that your opinion is not relevant to the business case. Exchange compatibility is a non-negotiable, non-finesseable, titanium-clad, gotta-have-it-no-kidding, requirement. And it's boring, boring, ad nauseum boring, tedious, bores-me-to-tears boring. No bling, no eye candy, no Google job offers. No accolades, no developer street cred, absolutely no Open Source groupies.
Welcome to reality. What the business masses need is not what anyone sane and competent is willing to develop gratis. And that's the root of the problem. That's proprietary development's superweapon. That's Free Software's kryptonite.
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
Nope. That is where every fortune 500 company and every national government that wants to have that functionality on linux needs to look at their yearly exchange costs and kick in 10% to some development group to write such a program that will run on linux.
This just could be businesses showing their blind spot. They need it or they don't. If they do need it, they have the bucks to pay to have it. If they don't, they can stop crying out that they do. Fairly simple. Now, if it is patents that the governments have awarded on software that are holding things up, the governments at least have to look in the mirror.
Yes? No?
all the best,
drew
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
You seem to be assuming that free software implies volunteer work, and that paying developers demands proprietary licensing. That's unfortunate for you. The good thing is that your lack of imagination doesn't prevent companies like Red Hat and IBM from making a nice profit in the free software industry.
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Interesting)
This looks promising
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Informative)
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Groupwise (Score:5, Insightful)
I have to agree with some of the other comments I've seen - your expectations are all wrong.
You're defining "Enterprise" as "work seamlessly in an all-Microsoft shop" and those aren't necessarily the same thing.
You also seem to be defining a good Linux experience as doing exactly what you were totally happy about in Windows but without paying.
If what you're looking for is a computer whose function is to attach to a Microsoft domain server and a Microsoft Exchange server and use all the newest Microsoft technologies relatively seamlessly, you should just install Windows. If you're happy with Windows, you should install Windows. Heck, even Microsoft Entourage for OS X can't talk to Exchange right most of the time, and MS MAKES that.
If you're talking about a transition, you're doing it backwards; put Linux on the servers first, where no non-techs have to get used to using it, where you have a greater guarantee of a limited application set, and where Linux has more experience. Also where Windows charges you more in licensing fees for fewer benefits. Samba is great.
THEN start rolling it out on desktops, starting with the thinnest ones, and using your choice of Linux-style or Windows style methods based on the situation.
But if you really want to talk fairly about Linux in Enterprise you need to talk about legitimately comparing a Linux environment with a Windows one.
You need to talk about better natural security and less time trying to clean up stupid-user infections. You need to talk about the ease of remotely configuring, updating, and reinstalling large numbers of machines. You need to talk about running remote applications via X being free. You need to talk about the registry mostly being replaced with a large number of text files you can easily and remotely overwrite and a total lack of DLL-hell, meaning you almost never HAVE to totally reinstall a machine - and if you do, you never have to open a control panel on any client machine ever to set a single setting unless you want to. A seamless ability to use any convenient desktop in the office.
Certainly there's add-on Windows enterprise software to do many of these things that Linux does naturally. And I'd point out that OS X does most of them too and has a more user friendly desktop. Some studies show substantially lower costs in terms of administrators with Linux - if the administrators know Linux.
But if all you want is a Windows machine, USE a Windows machine. Saving $129 is not, alone, a sound rationale for using Linux in a professional environment where all you seem to want is Windows.
Arete
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No Replacement for Exchange? (Score:5, Interesting)
I believe that's a complete replacement for both Outlook and Exchange, and I even added some nifty security features while I did so. Total cost is $0 for software, and about 2 hours of my time (at most) to set it up. That comes in comfortably under the cost of Exchange + Outlook, even if my time is worth $500/hr.
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Re:You're saying basically what the original post (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
Not to berate the Evolution developers too much, but I've personally found almost every release of Evolution to be horribly unstable.I say this with sadness because I was once a true believer in Evolution. Like the author, every year or two I try Evolution yet again, but unlike the author I usually give it a chance for about 6 months to maybe a year, and always I find something horribly broken about it: random crashes, data loss/corruption, memory leaks, performance problems, stuff not working (especially the Exchange connector stuff), etc. And sometimes I send in bugzilla reports and they get ignored for months and months. I think the problem has been worse since Novell took over, too.
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
I'll admit I have not read the article...
But I find it strangely stupifying that someone would use a distribution intended to be a cutting edge user desktop installation for what he called Enterprise Solutions.
Only the insane or stupifyingly owned will roll Vista into all their Enterprise environments on the first day it's released. Most wait 6 months to a year. Wouldn't the same consideration hold some merit for Linux distros?
I'm picking on Ubuntu specifically because I think they author made the wrong choice. There are a lot of really well operating distributions out there that work very well. There are few, if any, products that don't pay homage to MSFT that will work with Exchange. And when you talk about using Thunderbird to get Exchange email keep in mind you are only using IMAP and not the whole Exchange Experience kind of thing. He might as well bash Oracle for not making MS Access drivers.
I gave up fighting for Linux a long time ago. Not because it isn't a really great OS. But because people who are in Corporation IT don't want good software. They want simple contracts. As often as something goes wrong with Microsoft, there is almost always someone on a help desk phone number they can yell at. And that makes them feel like they are doing their job.
Bunch of Vogons...
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Funny)
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"I was once a true believer in Evolution" (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
"You are experiencing problems similar to many other to-Linux migrators. Don't worry, the problem isn't you or Linux, it's everyone else - all the hardware manufacturers and software vendors."
Sorry, blaming problems on everyone but us doesn't do anything except prevent the problems from being solved (and it can cause even more problems). Other groups have adapted to this kind of mentality, even within the Linux borders. Passing the buck, like this post implicitly suggest isn't a good idea for getting things working. Don't get me wrong, I'd like to see those solutions you mentioned also, but to say the problem is all on the other side is not only wrong, it's counter productive. Linux could use more developers (most OSS projects could), and Linux could cooperative developers, a bit of competition is good to encourage improvment, but too much competition (dozes of projects that do more or less the same thing for example) can spread the resources too thin to get anything done in a timely manner.
Are things as easy as they could be? No
Are things as easy as they should be? No
Will bitching and moaning about it, or logical reasoning change it? Hasn't yet, so most likely: No.
Answer: Deal with the problem at your end.
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Re:Linux is Inhibited by Greed (Score:5, Insightful)
Dude, like it or not, you gotta interoperate with the common environment, even if they don't want you to.
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I love these articles... (Score:5, Insightful)
Many companies were able to switch when they got buy in and support from management to do so. You HAVE To replace your infrastructure and backend way before you replace the fontend. Then you can slowly change what people see and touch. It's a lot of work to pry microsoft from your server rooms.
The best solution is to not let it in to begin with or not allow it to touch anything new.
Misleading, and retarded (Score:5, Insightful)
From the "article":
I hate to use such strong language, but this guy is a total retard.
How is this news, exactly? This is like me taking a fine American car to UK and complaining that the car sucks because I have to drive on the other side of the road!
Re:Misleading, and retarded (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem was that he couldn'g get Evolution to work with Exchange Server which it was designed to do.
This is like me taking a fine American car to UK and complaining that the car sucks because I have to drive on the other side of the road!
This is like you taking a fine American car to the UK and finding that no one will buy it because the steering wheel is on the wrong side of the car. And then complaining that the Brits are stupid because they won't buy such a fine car.
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Re:Misleading, and retarded (Score:5, Interesting)
Often times, the reason Linux is the wrong tool for the job because the job has the unstated requirement of being doable by people who only have experience with Windows.
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And Windows is any better? (Score:5, Insightful)
There is no silver bullet. Running a Microsoft OS (or even an Apple OS) doesn't magically make everything work. There will still be things that don't work right - it'll just be different things.
Your computer is a tool. If it doesn't do what you need, then fine; get a different tool. But for many businesses, the appropriate tool *is* linux, and it does the job well. Please don't presume to be the voice of everyman.
Skip the blog post masquerading as an article. (Score:5, Insightful)
Wherever the author says "business/enterprise/IT environment", he forgets a critical proper noun: he means "Microsoft-centric business/enterprise/IT environment".
Author Gripe #1: Ancient (1998) StarOffice sucked at Word/PowerPoint files.
Author Gripe #2: In 2004, nothing played with Exchange, and "you can't function" without Exchange.
Author Gripe #3: In 2006, one version of Evolution on one distro didn't have a "subscribe" button for Exchange Server public folders.
Author Solution: Give up on Linux.
Okay... Note that none of the above have much to do with Linux. And I don't mean to be a "omg it's userspace, not the kernel" zealotroll, but really. His gripes are in two apps. The last gripe is particularly weak; I'm not knowledgeable if the problem is fixed in Evolution (or if it's even a bug), but what is potentially "there are missing buttons" does not "Linux unprepared for the enterprise environment!!!" make.
On an unrelated note (and I don't mean this as ad hominim or anything, just curious), is this site anything more than a NetQoS company blog? These kinds of posts hitting
Can't get it to work? *yawn* (Score:5, Insightful)
In other words: "I blame Linux, because the company I work for is too lazy, or too stubborn, or just plain too stupid to use standard-compliant software , instead of being a Microsoft-only shop". Yeah, right. Microsoft Excel and Power Point and Word run into all kind of problems when you try to use their files under Open Office. That's not a surprise, it's a Microsoft policy and it is exactly designed to lock the competition (Linux or others) out. And, guess what? It works!
A little bit like the poor South Koreans that used Windows for everything and are now stuck with a new OS (Microsoft Vista) that is incompatible with the ActiveX encryption utilities that are used by... well, 90%+ of the population.
What this article reveals (beyond the obvious FUD) is precisely that Linux is not the problem: Microsoft is the problem, as well as its closed standards and its closed filed formats . End of story.
News Flash (Score:5, Insightful)
Alert the blogosphere!
I mean, I feel for the guy trying to get Linux to work in a Microsoft-only environment, but this isn't exactly surprising, at all. Hell, Microsoft has problems getting their own software (Entourage in Office Mac) working with Exchange. The answer is to never use Exchange in the first place. If you're already locked into Exchange and its feature set as a driving force within your business, you're going to have to suck up and deal, or go through the pain of a switchover to something that's reasonably open. I've got the same problem with a client which is a marketing department of a large Netware based company, and the marketing people all use Macs exclusively, and the Novell Mac client is too buggy to use, forcing them to install VirtualPC on their machines so they can to basic e-mail and scheduling stuff. Costly, you bet, especially in my time because of how buggy it all is, and the idiotic design flaws of their network, but they can't just switch over because they're locked in to Netware after years of use, and they're paying for that shortsighted decision. However, it's still cheaper than dealing with the upheaval of switching from Netware to something reasonable.
OSs in General are Annoying (Score:5, Insightful)
The truth is that each of them has shortcomings. The good news I guess is that most of these are irritating, not fatal.
Windows IMHO is not a long term option because of the creeping DRM and the obsessive control of the computing environment that MS seems to want. Frankly I have this horrible feeling that Vista will open a can of worms that will never end.
OS X just has too many irritating or dumb features, or lack thereof, that drive me around the bend. [community-media.com] I'm not talking about things that are different from Windows, I'm talking about boneheaded design and UI mistakes that no-one in Mac land seems to be willing to admit are a problem.
Linux, well at this point for me it works 90% out of the box, much better than a few years ago, but that last 10% can be a nightmare. As always with Linux, if it works it's lovely, but if it doesn't you're off into that hell of MAN pages and web forums, filled with half answers, slightly incorrect assumptions, and Linux arrogance.
I'm weary of tinkering with computers. I just want to turn it on and have it do what I want easily and without irritation. And I want to be able to TURN OFF "features" that annoy me.
No OS does that yet.
Two way street. (Score:4, Insightful)
The Open Source community can develop BSD and/or Linux and associated applications until the cows come home to roost, but Microsoft and their products will never go away. There will always be people using Windows, Office, and whatever. Try as one might, true interoperability will be difficult until Microsoft cares to participate in the effort.
At present, Microsoft is part of the problem, not the solution. They don't care if Open Source software succeeds and have no desire to help.
That is why I get paid the big bucks (Score:4, Insightful)
"Those who are limited to a single platform or language will always be limited"
Wrong approach? (Score:4, Insightful)
I can plug in any Windows 2000 and upward PC into the network I manage, and within minutes, it'll be fully patched, have all the software we need installed, and be fully locked-down & generally configured (company screen-saver, explorer bar and such things) - all without actually touching it.
But I digress, my point really is that there are few cases where a network is running well without a mix of technology. Running one without the other is a bad idea if you ask me.
I wonder how his car runs... (Score:5, Interesting)
Yup. The obvious inference is that Dodge makes the worst cars in the world, since their parts won't fit into a Ford...
It All Depends on What You Do (Score:4, Interesting)
Now, I understand that not all IT people have the power and control that I have and they are saddled with what their company offers them. But that's no reflection on Linux. If there is an application that you MUST have on your desktop to get work done and it only runs on Windows, then by all means use Windows. But again, don't blame Linux for restrictions that come from your software vendor or market segment. Hell, if there were a professional job that required you to play the latest and greatest PC games, you'd be an idiot to say "I'd use Linux here at work if it didn't suck so much". You can't fault companies who don't develop for Linux because they are concerned about their bottom line. But you also can't fault Linux because those companies chose their financial destiny vs. a potential darkhorse.
From TFA: I purchased third-party provided connectors into Exchange, and ran Office-type applications as well.
I would say that's his first mistake. I suspect he's talking about Ximian Gnome's Evolution and OpenOffice.org. Evolution is a nice application, but it's not the best way to go if you live in an Exchange shop. You'd be better off using RDP or Citrix to publish the app from a server and having a thin client app on your Linux desktop. Or, you could at the very least access Outlook Web Agent using IE in Wine, a virtual machine or again via RDP or Citrix. OpenOffice.org? Hard for me to say as I have little use for Office software. When I use OpenOffice.org 2.0, it "just works" for me in terms of opening documents. I don't really have much need to edit them, so I don't know of the woes of conversion. But... again, I'd suggest, CrossOver Office, virtualization of a Windows machine or RDP/Citrix. These work for me as the need arises.
One thing I question in all of this is why people seem so averse to virtualization? It's the perfect solution especially with the new hardware assistance in new CPUs (AMD's Pacifica and Intel's Vanderpool). I used virtualization since VMWare came out in 97/98, moved to QEMU circa 2004 and then Xen in 2005. Outside of gaming, virtualization is perfect. It allows you access to all applications you would need for most businesses. If you are truly in an enterprise situation then it's likely that you have VLK for Windows XP anyway... so installing Windows in a VM shouldn't be a licensing issue either. And in terms of performance, with hardware assistance and Xen, you can get close to 99% of the bare metal speed. Not to mention that unlike older virtualization technologies, your virtualized OS IS running on the metal for the most part. It's NOT running within another OS at all. Reread that last line so it sinks in. I repeat, with virtualization software like Xen and hardware assisted virtualization, your "guest" OS is running NEXT TO and NOT on top of the managing OS instance.
Since the performance is there, and true enterprises use VLK for Windows desktop, why not use virtualization for that small handful of apps you really need? Or remote desktop/Citrix? Unless you're trying to run some really niche market visualization software that requires 3D acceleration, or you're in multimedia content production, Linux has been ready for the desktop for close to a decade.
Use the right tool for the job (Score:5, Informative)
I don't think this guy is a professional. I really don't. His writing sounds like he's more interested in trolling Linux users than actually imparting wisdom.
So I'll bite.
A professor of mine once said, "I use operating systems for what they're good at, not what they're bad at..." This guy could use that advice. At the time, the college was a mixture of Windows NT and Linux machines - the Linux boxes were used for file and print sharing, and the NT boxes for Exchange.
Complaining that Linux doesn't support Exchange is like complaining that Windows can't read your ext3 formatted floppy, or that it can't see your NFS shares. Windows wasn't built to use UNIX filesystems; Linux wasn't built to use Exchange.
So why don't we turn the argument around: Microsoft failed to build software that interoperated with UNIX. After, their web site [microsoft.com] says it does. I think the real failure here is Microsoft's: Office doesn't support OO.org file formats. And they don't support using the UNIX mail command, either. I mean, clearly, this is all Microsoft's fault because their software doesn't do what it wasn't designed to do, right?
I don't have problems using Linux and Windows, mostly because I've come to know the strengths and shortcomings of each. I'm not going to bang my head against a wall because Windows doesn't support OO.org file formats, or because Linux doesn't support Exchange.
Instead, I'm going to use the right tool for the job.
Same Old, Same Old Story (Score:5, Insightful)
This is the SAME CRAP EVERY Windows shill writes on every Web site and in every article on the subject:
"Gee, I really LOVE Linux and OSS, BUT..."
It's bullshit. That type of sentence is a DEAD GIVEAWAY that this guy is a paid shill for Microsoft. Period.
If you want to integrate with Microsoft Exchange, you're an idiot in the first place.
There is nothing from Exchange either that most companies need or can't be found in other mail/groupware clients.
The article is the same bullshit we've seen from every other article from shills.
Re:Waaaaa. (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Waaaaa. (Score:4, Insightful)
My advice is always to go with Lotus, but Lotus is slow and it's a bear to customize, so even though it runs well in Linux, you've got people to soothe. Same with OpenOffice.
What it comes down to is: There is nothing wrong with Linux. We just don't have a killer office suite, or a killer server based productivity suite. End of story.
And as long as we're forced to use our biggest competitions Office and Productivity suites, we're always going to have problems.
And SMB support is HUGELY easier than having an Office/Exchange substitute.
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Re:Waaaaa. (Score:4, Insightful)
Although there is a lot of talk about TCO and such with Linux versus OS X versus Windows, it's only part of the story. Corporations, especially the large corporations which lie behind Microsoft's market share dominance, have money to burn, so it Windows costs them x more bucks per user per year, it isn't a huge issue. What they need, however, is an office suite which can make read and use the millions of documents they have on hand and the millions they need to produce We all know what office suite that is. This problem isn't unique to Linux. If MS Office for OS X disappeared overnight it would be a disaster for Apple.
Part of the problem of getting Linux accepted into wider circles is the habit of arguing on technical merit alone.
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Re:Waaaaa. (Score:5, Interesting)
no it's not. Install a small group of citrix servers and use a linux client. works great.
your incredibly important windows apps (no do not allow office, only the vertical apps) work 100% on that linux desktop.
It's half assed linux transitions that dont take account for ways to run those applications that fail and get an article published how "they gave up"
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Re:Waaaaa. (Score:4, Insightful)
All too often the reaction to just such a statement is...well, what the parent says. "It can't/won't be done, you need to just use what we/they give you, you're doing it wrong." The response of the user raising the issue is almost always to drop Linux and return to Windows, which does what they need without the hoops of Terminal Services and incomplete WINE compatibility.
You want more people using Linux? Listen when they ask for something.
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Re:Waaaaa. (Score:5, Insightful)
If you structure your IT to not be Microsoft centric, then Linux, Mac's, and Windows can all work together. If you design your entire infrastructure around Microsoft technologies, then good fracking luck.
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Re:It is the general Linux Comunity fault. (Score:5, Insightful)
The entire original article could be summed up in one phrase: "imperfect Microsoft emulation". This isn't just a "Linux" issue. It's a problem for ANYONE that wants to use something else, even on Windows.
This "microsoft or nothing" mentality is what really alienated me from Windows.
I should be able to run the word processor of my choice and the email client of my choice REGARDLESS OF PLATFORM.
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Re:It is the general Linux Comunity fault. (Score:5, Informative)
Being a veteran of many different Linux migrations, some successful, others dismal failures, it always comes down to a few applications:
Office: StarOffice/OpenOffice is not as good.
Exchange: Goddamn managers and their shared calendars.
Unsupported Widget: Every goddamn company has an Unsupported Widget written by a savant who was killed by a bolt of lightning. The Widget is always absolutely critical to their business, and ALWAYS runs on some piece of hardware that doesn't exist anywhere else in the world, and only talks to certain versions of Windows.
Every one of these things will come up, and even if you're successful in talking them into going over to OpenOffice and Lotus, and you manage to slay or replace the widget, it's going to take longer and cost more than you would have thought.
In the end, it's always about the damn tool. Use the right tool for the job. Don't try to force Linux in where you know there are going to be problems. The jackass in the article was subcontracting for DELL, the king of the Windows shops, and he thinks he's going to be able to get by on a pure Linux environment? He's a fool.
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Re:It is the general Linux Comunity fault. (Score:5, Insightful)
When you've got a vendor who actively works to prevent you from interoperating with a different vendor, who is "at fault" here? Everything that you're bitching about not working was reverse engineered, from scratch, at an enormous cost in resources and ingenuity. The fact that it works at all is a massive testament to the power of the open source development model. It could be seamless. It could work much better than Windows works with itself. But there is active, continuing work done by Microsoft to prevent it.
So don't pull your snout out of the MS trough and gasp out between stuffing your face with proprietary, locked in interfaces that "Linux isn't ready". Linux is *perfectly* ready. You're the one who isn't ready, and your Microsoft owners won't let you be.
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Re:It is the general Linux Comunity fault. (Score:4, Insightful)
So by that logic, anything wrong that happens to me while I'm using my computer is my fault because I'm not properly ready for the idiosyncrasies of whatever OS I'm using? That's crazy talk, whether you're talking about Linux, Windows, OS X, or the Canon-friggin'-Cat.
This is a classic example of the silly defensiveness that drives me nuts. Windows users just want to use Windows because they can get stuff done. Linux users fight like dogs to try to prove the mettle and superiority of their OSes and interfaces and have ready excuses for stuff that doesn't work as expected (or intended or promised). These excuses often include user fault or laziness (we should all be happy to occasionally open a terminal window and type a bunch of arcane gibberish to make something work). I'm reminded of baseball fans here in Chicago -- generally speaking, Sox fans deeply hate the Cubs and Cubs fans, and Cubs fans tend not to have strong opinions one way or the other about the Sox. There's a certain level of comfort in one's own skin among Cubs fans (and Windows users) that doesn't seem to come out as often in Sox fans/Linux advocates.
Windows is far from perfect, as are Microsoft's business practices. But this doesn't automatically make Linux OSes and windowing environments the right solution. What makes a better solution is user comfort, and (frankly) Microsoft often does a better job of instilling this comfort. Are their solutions the best possible? Almost always not. But the average business is not interested in spending its time fighting the good fight for open source software. It's interested in doing whatever it actually does, and using its computers as tools to help accomplish that. They know what to expect from Windows, it generally works pretty well for its intended uses, and life goes on for yet another day of not thinking more about their chosen OS than the task at hand.
For the record, I use Kubuntu, XP, Vista, and OS X (often all in one day). Each has its advantages and disadvantages, and each can be used well or poorly (I do both). That's that. The holy war thing is getting old, and does nothing to dissuade people from viewing Linux users as geeks and defensive fanatics.
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Re:It is the general Linux Comunity fault. (Score:4, Insightful)
He can't get linux to interoperate with exchange fully, exchange is designed this way - to sell more copies of outlook. Even the mac equivalent (entourage) doesn't connect to exchange in the same way as outlook does, and doesn't support all the same features.
Microsoft do not publish documentation on how to interoperate with exchange, people have to reverse engineer it every time there's an update, which is a very time consuming process. Also, the protocol must be very difficult to implement because microsoft haven't even bothered fully implementing it into their own products (entourage). Perhaps they don't even have full documentation for it themselves, and outlook is relying on a lot of undocumented legacy code to talk to exchange.
If this guy had been using standard methods of doing the same things, he would have had no problems using it with linux, there are standard ways to share folders, access mail and share calendars etc.
If microsoft were forced to open up their protocols and file formats, open source software would implement them pretty fast and all the problems this guy had would disappear overnight. Similarly, if he wasn't already dangerously locked in to microsoft, this problem wouldn't exist. This is why vendor lockin is dangerous, this guy is effectively being blackmailed into continuing to buy microsoft products "keep using our products everywhere or you'l need to replace EVERYTHING at once and lose access to all your data"
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And another problem (Score:4, Insightful)
Along those lines there's this idea that a major amount of effort should be considered acceptable for any task. If an alternative takes 50 hours to get done what the commercial package takes 1, well that's better because it's free! There's no consideration of valuation of time. You are a fool if you'd rather spend $50 than hours and hours of effort. Well of course that's not the case for many of us. I value my time and if you want to look at it in a dollar amount, I bill consulting at $100 an hour so it doesn't take much time to equal the cost of most software.
It's not that people always aren't willing to switch to a new tool/system, often they are, but it needs to offer them what their old system did. You can't present a half-assed solution and expect people to love you for it, even if it is free.
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Re:Yup (Score:5, Insightful)
With all these tech companies supposedly "selling" Linux solutions, the time has never been better to offer an Evolution client for Linux, Windows, and Mac that works with a feature-rich server on the order of Exchange Server. Yet there has been (to my knowledge) no real effort to improve the groupware solutions beyound straight-up LDAP, SMTP, IMAP, and NNTP. Those are great technologies, but they're not particularly good at providing a cohesive groupware solution. At least, not without some sort of design for how they could be used to provide the missing functionality. (Calendaring is perhaps the least addressed of the missing features.)
If such a server were developed, Linux would have a much better chance in Corporate America. Especially if the said server could keep ahead of Microsoft rather than behind them. Witness Firefox as an example. Microsoft slacked on IE (as they're prone to do when they have an uncontested lead) and paid the price by being surpassed. Exchange hasn't changed to any appreciable degree for a long time now, so the opportunity exists. Strike while the iron is hot.
But then again, what do I know? I'm just another developer in this crazy corporate world.
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