Alternative To Windows Desktops 405
Eric_Z writes "Ace's Hardware has got a article called "The Mad Hatter meets the MSCE" by Paul Murphy, about the TCO benefits of using UNIX(Lintel) instead of Wintel. According to the piece: 'The subject of this article looks at alternatives to the Windows desktop, which is a hot topic these days with IBM/SuSe scoring a highly public win in Munich with desktop Linux, and Sun aiming to build on StarOffice being the leading alternative to Microsoft Office with a software stack code-named Mad Hatter which Sun also plans to use extensively in-house. But companies depending on Microsoft Certified Engineers to adapt to Linux will carry over a number of problems, significantly increasing the chance of project failure. Paul considers the alternatives, the migration problems, and in seeking a more reliable alternative takes the opportunity to look at the business desktop from an entirely different angle, and propose a more radical solution.'"
Good good (Score:3, Insightful)
The best way to counteract a fat monopoly like those microsoft whores is to put some good ol competition out there against them. Its tough to match those budgets and large scale operations, but more and more companies are fighting them from more and more directions...it can only lead to good things --- better products being produced by everyone.
Either that or more marketing.
Corporate directory services (Score:5, Insightful)
sPh
Desktop Corporate Linux... I tried (Score:5, Insightful)
I've been running Linux at home now for a few years, and am quite competitent running it. My first step was to replace the slackware/wmaker combination that I was happy with on my laptop to Redhat/Gnome/Bluecurve, and I was immidetely impressed with how far linux has come on the desktop, I figured this wouldn't be a problem.
I showed the owners of my company Linux, and they said they were fine with it on every machine... now the tricky part, application compatability.
Under Wine I was able to get my payroll software and estimating software running, but the accounting software proved impossible. Using older style database clients and VBA, I was totally unable to get it working.
I came to the conclusion that while I can use Linux on the desktop, application support from large corporate vendors need to be there before Linux can run on the desktop. I also came up with: "in 3 years, if we want to run a different accounting/estimating/etc package, will linux work for us?".. That question is unanswered atm, and therefore using Linux in a corporate enviroment seems to be a gamble right now, a gamble that I am not willing to wager on for my company. Another issue is support from our existing vendors... they supported running their software on Windows and 2 of them *REQUIRED* PCAnywhere to be available whenever needed... this was not possible with Linux.
Linux on the home desktop seems more than ready, but enterprise/corporate enviroments seem to need better application support before it's possible... while I do belive that the application support will be there in 3 years, I don't think it's a risk work taking atm.
Re:ha, funny (Score:2, Insightful)
It's the apps, silly (Score:5, Insightful)
These midrange apps are the bread-and-butter of corporate computing. They do not run on the Mac and do not run under Linux. Some are starting to move toward a web browser based model, but not all and not necessarily quickly.
Until Linux equivalents exist for these midrange apps, the Linux desktop will not be used in midsized organizations.
sPh
Troll (Score:3, Insightful)
I just stuck a fresh install of RH9 on a laptop. It installed amazingly well - in fact, it installed better OOTB than win2k.
But "better" lasted only until it came time to actually do stuff with it. Sure, samba seems to work well and it has no problem browsing shares on MS boxes. But try to play a video file... oops, no media codec installed in the RH9 default distro. Hmmm... well, try to play an MP3 then. Ooops, no can do - cannot play an MP3 file from a file in a samba share. Try copying the file to this machine and perhaps it can be played then...
I really want linux to live up to the promise. Really. And I'm looking forward to working with the new media structure in gonome, and hoping to do my part. But I'm honestly beginning to wonder if linux can ever catch up - much less take the lead - on a user friendly desktop.
Microsoft will be their worst enemy (Score:4, Insightful)
I am hoping that the kind folks at OpenAL and OpenGL make a compelling replacement for DirectX so that games will run natively on Linux. When you get the gamers, you will have won. MS has the gamers right now. When those gamers come to Linux, they'll learn the OS and show their friends. Windows will lose its ubiquity on the desktop because no one wants to pay to upgrade their copy of windows, or even pay for an original license when building a machine.
It is only a matter of time.
Re:A few problems with this (Score:3, Insightful)
2) Which is?
3) Benchmarks are where?
4) Not nearly enough said. Again, benchmarks are where? And why are they "Linux" FSs in #3, but now we're talking Solaris? Which is it?
5) People had to learn to use both Word and Excel as they migrated from packages like WordPerfect and Lotus 1-2-3. Not to mention the changes from version to version of just the MS software. I think your users will survive.
Re:Whats new? (Score:5, Insightful)
This isn't really all that true. You can't just dump a UI/functionality change on the average user and expect them to embrace it. Many have trouble with the interface that we've had since Win95.
These people have the right idea. Ease folks into it. Otherwise you will have a response similar to what happened with WinXP, where the interface was made more intuitive and easier, but casual computer users still complained (and rightly so, I think) because the things that took them so long to learn got turned topsy-turvy.
Re:Desktop Corporate Linux... I tried (Score:5, Insightful)
$ windows = OS cost + MSOffice cost
$ linux = free OS + free office app
There's nothing preventing you from running free (beer/speech) software on Windows.
If you need Windows to run legacy apps, why not do it in stages. In your case, upgrade your boxes from 98 to XP - but don't do the MSOffice route. Use Openoffice.org (assuming it will work for you since you were going to do a full linux switch anyway) and other open source software when applicable. (Mozilla Firebird instead of IE, etc.)
This way, you don't abandon your legacy apps
If you can do a full transition, good for you. But to compare costs the way you did isn't a real comparison.
The author is in a happy dreamworld (Score:5, Insightful)
Is he crazy? The reasons that machines are locked down is that the endusers are stupid. They know nothing about computers, and ideally they shouldn't have to - they are just tools to do their real jobs. Any extra capabilities will just allow them to break more things. Sun can only support so many users per admin by locking systems tighter than most MSCEs could dream of - the answers to what is wrong are so easy because there are no other options. The users aren't empowered, they are chained down as much as possible. All to the good; but believing you can take the same idiot endusers from a windows shop, give them magic Lintel boxen and some responsibility and rights to manage their own systems, and get *fewer* support calls is just delusional.
And thinking that it's the OS that is driving all those fast upgrades to physical machines is also absurd. A huge portion of all business desktop and laptop upgrades is driven by vanity, not need. Good luck thinking that a rational OS decision based on security and TCO will quickly stop "mine's bigger" purchasing. You think execs sending email, looking at excel spreadsheets, and playing solitaire need those multi-thousand dollar laptops? You think that running linux they'll stop buying them?
I liked the approach of the author, to look at the practices that will be reflexive to existing support staff and the effect they will have on a Linux implementation. But his take on the reflexive approaches of the *users* is completely unrealistic, and renders his article mostly useless. Face it, most of the people here on Slashdot have dealt with those endusers - you think the majority will agree that they will miraculously become wise if just given a chance? Or will the
Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Whats new? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Desktop Corporate Linux... I tried (Score:1, Insightful)
Anyway, if someone could provide seemless support for VB, Access, and FoxPro, you would remove 80% of technical reasons for not migrating off Windows.
Changing out a word processor or retraining for a new "desktop" are solvable problems -- Replacing all of your internal/vertical applicaitons written for the Windows evironment is not.
Unfortunately, it sees like the current group of Wine developers are more focused on video games than business applications.
*yeah, I'm aware that it's a common 'advanced' VB trick to call out to win32.
Re:Desktop Corporate Linux... I tried (Score:5, Insightful)
Bit, how is this different than the likes of Windows 2003. There are countless applications, even Microsoft applications such as Exchange 2000, that will not run on Windows 2003. For some people this will mean that they will not implement Windows 2003 but, as time wears on most if not all will move to Windows 2003 and upgrade or replace their existing applications to ones that do run on Windows 2003. They will buy Windows 2003 and they will also buy Exchange 2003.
So, rather than looking for a seamless drop in replacement to Windows in Linux, why not look at it from an upgrade/migration point of view? There are numerous accounting applications that do run natively on Linux. The specialty apps that are written in VB will need to be rewritten for Linux. But why not? Chances are that those same VB apps are right now being examined for a rewrite in C#.NET. They'll have to be for the sake of Windows 2003.
The point is that people seem unwilling to rewrite or migrate their apps for a Linux environment but, for some reason, they think nothing of doing this for their Windows environment. The thing that they fail to take into account is that in the Linux environment this will almost certainly be a one time affair. But, in the Windows environment it will be a recurring theme every few years because that is what Microsoft wants and has to do in order to keep selling the same companies more software.
All too often people say that it is not cost effective or it is too difficult to make the switch but they seem to disregard these same issues as they run on Microsoft's treadmill.
BTW, have you repatched your Microsoft RCP service?
Re:It's the apps, silly (Score:2, Insightful)
But what happens when you deploy Windows on the server? Yup, you're locked into Windows on the clients. Often, updating the server requires lots of little updates or major updates on the clients. Remember, they based their business model on the same practice that made a new car every year seem the thing to do. I.e., they push the new model as better than the old. Now Microsoft has done some really great business selling that to companies -- to the tune of billions upon billions of dollars -- and it's not likely that Windows will disappear entirely from business. But the problem is, unlike car manufacturers, businesses will be *forced* to upgrade because the old file formats and the apps won't run properly on the new system. If I'm running a business I don't want my technology policy dictated by another company. That's just not good business.
But Linux grows -- it's now in the "they fight you" phase since the laughter and apathy didn't squash the movement. Microsoft has been repeating "Linux costs more than Windows" and "Initial cost doesn't matter". Hmm, yeah sure. Deploying a Linux desktop for targeted applications is no more expensive than deploying Windows. And cost does matter. Lots of other articles will disabuse the blinded CEO of this latest Microsoft propaganda so I won't mention it here.
The important thing is that Linux puts the IT roadmap back into the hands of the business. Take Access and a SQL Server backend... Doesn't talk with much else properly. Try getting ODBC drivers to talk to that SQL Server reliably. That's lock-in at its finest. Funny thing though, if you replace that SQL Server with Oracle or Postgresql or even MySQL on a Linux backend and web browser frontends, you suddenly have lots of wiggle room. You can use Macs, your PDA, your text terminal, your Linux boxes that cost next to nothing to deploy.
(I can't let the TCO argument go though. Microsoft says Linux is more expensive in the long run. Lots of companies are now using essentially dumb machines -- PCs running a proprietary database frontend connecting to a database server. The cost to deploy these Windows machines will always have an associated OS cost. Always. With a Linux desktop you build it once then deploy it everywhere. You don't have to pay a penny more in licensing costs. Not a year down the line, not some hidden licensing cost, not ever. Wait, you say, you still need to pay for Linux expertise? Hardly, the current crop of Linux distros are easy enough to install and maintain that my 70yr old father can do it. Your existing Windows admin, if he is at all competent, should be able to do the same. If not, hire a couple college kids for 1/4 the salary of that Windows admin to maintain your Linux for you.)
What? 80% Linux desktops and 80% Windows servers? (Score:2, Insightful)
Okay, I'm a developer and not an IT guy, but this does not make sense to me. Why would a company run 80% of their desktops with Linux and 80% of their servers with Windows?
Am I just missing the whole point of the article?
Re:Desktop Corporate Linux... I tried (Score:3, Insightful)
Thiwas you can assure them that the data will always be accessible, regardless of who there main vendor is or what they do.
Ask them is they want to control the destiny of there company, or id they want MS to cotrol the destiny od there company.
Once they get data formats to not be dependent, migration will be much easier.
In corpration like yours, you need a plan. Probably a five year plan that involves new vendors software to use cross platform develepment techniques.
People who uyse a proprietary script language to do company critical software should be dealt with.
Re:Troll (Score:5, Insightful)
Red Hat would, I'm sure, love to include these in their distribution. Were it not for the fact that larger companies have made sure it's illegal for them to do so.
Rich.
You're not the target audience (Score:3, Insightful)
They need a snappy computer with basic productivity software that doesn't have to be administered constantly. This is where Linux has a chance.
Home and power users are going to have to wait longer for a Linux that has all the goodies, out of the box, working perfectly, that can compete with Windows. Or they can just learn how to add what they need.
Re:But I like Windows desktops (Score:5, Insightful)
The argument presented in the paper is more of a thin-client vs client-server/desktop approach.
With the software properly installed and managed on a central server, not individually on each PC, there are significantly less problems.
Whole industries have been built around the Windows PC that aren't necessary from a corporate standpoint. I speak of client-side firewalls, anti-virus and disk imaging software.
No need to "push" an image when the PC gets corrupt. No need to reboot the PC. No need to run and license individual anti-virus applications. No need to scan for spyware, etc on each PC.
"PC Empowerment" is a BS phrase. The only thing most PC's empowered the coporate user to do was send worms, catch viruses and play games. Applications like a word processor, spreadsheet, presentation program, CAD, project management, e-mail and other business software can just as easily be run via a central server. Administration is tons easier.
And with full-duplex, fast ethernet to the clients and gigbit or bonded channels to the servers, load and run times can often be faster than off of cheap PCs with hard drives.
I think the Mac is the only answer for now... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Desktop Corporate Linux... I tried (Score:4, Insightful)
Open data standards for payroll and accounting data? I'm sure there are some... they're probably old as dirt and about as fun to utilize nowadays too (yes, I've just spent a couple weeks learning the horrors of X.12 [x12.org] in the shipping industry -- it's used all over but it's archaic, has over 3 decades of different revisions, and an utter PITA to actually use). You can roll your own format (we did... we're in a position to) and make it reasonably open (again, we did... at least to our customers), but the odds of getting someone else to write to your format is low, especially for things like payroll/accounting. You could also reverse engineer their data files (a coworker did so for a flat file database at a former company, producing a real time importer for Sybase/Oracle), but that takes some pretty serious skill and money.
Don't think that it's just MS producing "proprietary" data. Virtually everyone does. And it's not the big, obvious formats that are a problem -- those have enough people looking at them to crack the nut eventually -- it's the small, uncommon formats that will keep you locked in. And it's equally unlikely that you'll easily find replacements that are low cost and open format. Companies have an incentive to lock you in... the counterbalancing force to this is that in a competitive market place they also have incentive to read other people's formats, which will either lead to a common format or to everyone figuring out how to import everyone else's data.
In general, without government mandates, it tends toward the latter rather than the former.
It doesn't matter! MSOffice == Windows (Score:5, Insightful)
To many corporate people, it would be just as hard to migrate the Office software as it would the OS. MSOffice is so ingrained in the corporate culture it is pathetic. I have to send my status report to my manager in a Word doc. Everything is stored in freaking Word docs around here. Want to show some people some pictures? Put them all in a Word doc, that way you can email one huge .doc file. I once complained to a guy because he was attaching screenshots to a bug report like this. I explained "do you realize that for someone to see these, they would have to use MSWord. They are just images". His response? "Everyone here has Word installed, that isn't a problem."
As for the others, you won't see IE go away as long as MS is the OS. Hell, our internal website won't work with Opera, the browser I use. I am actually surprised that my boss lets me run it. Gotta conform and everything.
Our department gets its MSWord licenses from Corporate, so it doesn't cost our department anything. That is what the managers are most concerned with, their budgets. As long as it doesn't cost them anything out of their budget, who cares? If we all have to upgrade to OfficeXP (which we are doing) from Office2K, then Corporate will take care of it.
It doesn't matter how compatable it is, if it looks like Office, acts like Office, is better than Office, or is 100% free. If it ain't MSOffice, a lot of places won't use it. Companies sign deals for their OS/Office licenses, so many times you can't split up the OS/Office software. Oh, and you have to upgrade every 3 or 4 years.
So while I appreciate your idea, in companies where MS has them by the short hairs, it doesn't fly. It is also one of those things that makes me yearn for a better economy, so I can quit this cubicle wasteland and go work for a small company again. The "corporate atmosphere" is slowly killing me. It is killing everyone else too, they just don't realize it.
Kee-rist, sounds like somebody has a case of the Mondays.
Re:Good good (Score:3, Insightful)
RTFA. Substantially or totally replacing MS in an enterprise is possible and even rewarding. It isn't easy and requires substantial commitments from the organizations' highest management. If MS desktops could easily replaced with turnkey solutions they'd really be in trouble. As it is, MS should be concerned.
If MS is smart, they won't fight this forever. Yes, they can realize gains from delaying their nascent compitition through means fair and foul. That will be governed by the law of diminishing returns and hopefully they'll know when to quit. MS has plenty of time to diversfy and design a new business model.
What I'm trying to say is that monopolies aren't necessarily immune to competition; they're just highly resistant. It took 10-13 years but they motivated business and developers enough to code and implement replacements to their tools from scratch. They don't have a monopoly on a natural resource like DeBeers...nothing will dethrone them soon. They have a monopoly on the functionality provided by a rather large collection of bits. Come up with a set of bits thats "Good Enough" and monopoly begins to fracture. They are an altogether easier target than the likes of DeBeers. IBM has had monopolies before. Those days are gone but IBM is still around. They even manage to be the good guys much of the time.
Oh, that again... (Score:5, Insightful)
This is quicky becoming the "All your base" of 2003.
ebooks (Score:3, Insightful)
If I want to find a quote in an ebook I can find it in seconds with a search. And all I have to do is cut and paste the quote. And, thanks to wireless networking, I can do this from anywhere just as easily as with pen and paper. No, scratch that - easier.
ebooks allow me to collect and catalog far more material than would be practical otherwise. With a forty dollar ebook reader I can carry a collection of books with me - like, for example, the whole shelf of linux references that were posted just the other day in warez.linux. And I can look up information from multiple volumes in just a second.
Saying "what's the point of ebooks" is like saying "what's the point of google! I can just surf the sites myself!"
Re:MCSE? (Score:5, Insightful)
My 2 cents...
Re:Troll (Score:3, Insightful)
Sure.
#1 First you have to pay MSFT for their stuff (via Dell/whoever or direct) which, although in the case of XP is pretty good, IMHO now no longer has a future. Just a couple of years ago this Slashdot story would have been full of far more serious problems. Now the level of comparison has been raised to how easy it is to play MP3s. Worth thinking about how the story will go in another couple of years.
#2 Then after install, you have to do product activation, which is compulsory. If you have no internet connection, you have to sit on the phone and recite numbers, then type them in. That's not very intuitive either.
#3 Then you have to go out on the Internet, or get shipped to you, so you can buy the shareware apps (like WinRar, a DVD player and so on) that you need to get Windows to do its job. MPlayer does a good job on DVDs for $0, rar support in in RH9. Having to pay another company to watch DVDs is not very intuitive either.
#4 Okay, now you can double-click on stuff. But my Redhat install would be halfway through Parsifal by then and I didn't touch my credit card.
"Total Cost of Ownership".
Re:Win32 Administration Blows Dogs - You moron. (Score:2, Insightful)
Adapt? (Score:2, Insightful)
Hmm... (Score:3, Insightful)
Catching a whiff of FUD there. They're playing that card with Linux too; they claim to be able to distribute the Linux kernel irrespective of the outcome of the IBM/SCO legal battle (At least that's the way I read it.) They may have a mexican stand-off with Microsoft over document technology, but IBM still has the biggest patent portfolio on the planet. No one but a complete idiot would attack them.
These sorts of tactics... annoy me.
Re:MSCE? (Score:3, Insightful)
Ttha si easeucb ti aws not luryt donmra.
Gnipiwph up a ucikq oapgrrm ot replpyor nmdiozear tghsin eaksm ti os cumh reom aeuderbnal. Ti osal saieintcd soeoenm wya oto nolg ot teiwr het etranp stpo airzmgnnodi is hcum arhder yb danh.
Obviously you did not understand the original poster. S/he specifically specified that the first and last letters in the word have to still be there for the word to be easy to read.
Having an MCSE (Score:3, Insightful)
I think most people understand that. The important point though is that if you ARE a dumbass, having an MCSE doesn't help, on the contrary, it just makes you that much more dangerous. And there's the problem. An MCSE should be treated, at MOST, like an A+ in Networking Methodologies 101 as taught at your school of choice. It should not be a job requirement. It should not make anybody go "Oh great, you can run our network then." It should only make folks say "That's nice that you're good at reading comprehension and regurgitation and are comfortable with taking multiple choice tests."
Having an MCSE doesn't make you a dumbass. Though framing the cert. and hanging it in your cube does. And so does listing it as a job requirement.