Microsoft-Funded Linux Studies Benefit ... Microsoft 431
mr.big_pig writes "The Seattle PI had a front page article analyzing the Microsoft's Get The Facts website and related ads compairing Windows to Linux. The short and sweet: follow the money and see just how 'independent' is this research. What caught my eye was that this was on the front page and not buried in the business section."
By your logic (Score:1, Interesting)
Microsoft's new PR war (Score:5, Interesting)
On the
Even Slashdot has been running Microsoft ads, and almost any tech news site you go to is crawling with them. Microsoft has a definite advantage against Linux when it comes to ad budget, as only IBM seems to be really pushing Linux in terms of PR and advertising.. and even then it's more about IBM's solutions than Linux, which is not surprising really. And so Microsoft is going to continue funding studies and surveys, slightly tweaking the questions to favor them ("How easy do you find it to connect to an Active Directory from Linux?"), showing the world the results which are good, and dismissing the surveys which are bad.
I wonder if there are any Linux mad advertising zealots with deep pockets to get some ads on those sites, and to generally kick up a stink and get us lots more stories in the papers and magazines. This is a PR war, and if you're a Linux devotee, make sure you fight back against it in some way (even if it's just winning your clients over to Linux even more).
Best quote ever... (Score:5, Interesting)
Not entirely BS (Score:5, Interesting)
+ Realistically, the software & hardware costs aren't going to be significantly different between Windows and Linux. Yes, you can download Linux for free, but your boss is going to pay real money for RedHat or SuSE.
+ Unix admins are more expensive than Windows admins, although they generally have a much higher skill level. Maybe as Linux penetrates the market, this will equalize (both in cost and skill level).
+ MS selected specific scenerios to favor them. For example, File and Print have never been a strong spot for Unix -- Novell and MS have owned that segement for years and years. It will be interesting to see what Novell/SuSE puts on the market.
And attacking Linux on Mainframes is like hitting the broad side of a barn -- There might be some scenarios where it makes sense, but for the most part a mainframe has pathetic price/performance and is very expensive to keep running. (Although, that wouldn't stop IBM from selling you one.)
And as for J2EE -- some of the tools are ridiclously expensive, so that's a pretty easy cost study to rig.
Re:Best quote ever... (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course they are. MS is probably not intentionally conspiring with SCO to kill Linux. But SCO got their mind-altering stuff from Microsoft and now they seem like they are the same company.
This may sound like a joke, but think about it. MS may not be saying "Hey, SCO, sue IBM!" Instead, the shared delusions are enough that they don't have to-- SCO will be MS's lackey without either one of them having to afferm the relationship in any official way. The SCOX execs get fraudulant profit from it, while MS gets PR. Match made in heaven.
I shouldn't even post this (Score:5, Interesting)
Disclaimer: I've not read all the reports, just the article and the IDC report.
Microsoft's Taylor said that findings are also presented in such a way that they can be duplicated by others. I'm not sure. The reasoning for the quantification method is weird at best. On p.10 of the IDC report, every item for Linux is more expensive.
Let's take hardware. The hardware for Linux is more expensive because it is assumed that for the same hardware, Linux can handle less load than Windows, therefore, you need more hardware if you deploy Linux, hence higher cost. That's weird, how did they come up with that assumption? It's certainly not explained in the "open methodology".
Software: how did they come to the conclusion that Linux softwares are more expensive? I can't find the list of comparable softwares they used in their study. If this methodology is really open, let's provide the data, shall we? And they claim that Linux is used mostly for print, file serving, and web serving. Well, if that's the case, the softwares for those functionalities cost almost nothing, except for support, which is more or less the same for both platform. How come I remember I used to pay thousands of dollars for a Windows Server allowing only 5 connections?
Staffing: Sure, Linux/Unix admin are more expensive. That's true only if you assume that each Linux/Unix admin can only do the same amount of work as an MCSE monkey. You draw your own conclusion.
Downtime: Whoa, Linux cost more for downtime (in a couple of cases)? Real data please?
Training: That, I'm not sure. It's probably easier to pick up Windows, as every new kid is already familiar (more or less) with windows interface already, before the training? Ok, let's say the data here are correct, but I still want data.
Outsourcing: I can't seem to understand how did they come up with that conclusion. I'd like to see the raw data.
The funny thing is this: the report said that Linux is used only for "light workload on the edge", and not for the real stuff.
Hmm, I guess they didn't talk to the CIO of amazon.com (hint: based on their previous experience with Linux for other things with a $16M cost savings, they are moving their mission-critical terabyte database to Linux!)
Re:Interesting (Score:5, Interesting)
Where as I think most of the linux vs ms studies that get done are alot more closer to real apples vs real apples. But I haven't seen very many studies at all in detail poing linux over windows.. Its just my guess they are alot closer to a direct comparison than what I have seen in windows vs linux with windows on top.
I think this is great news... (Score:5, Interesting)
This could explain why Linux adoption continues to increase despite all the media hype and study reports - users and organisations are probly doing the study reports themselves..... consumers getting wiser is a highly undesirable phenomenon for the Corporat types - I think we'll soon see Ask Slashdot article on "How to Keep the Consumer Stupid?"
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Re:Microsoft's new PR war (Score:4, Interesting)
I don't understand it (Score:5, Interesting)
Step number one was completly negleting OSS and hoping customers wouldn't notice. *That* was a time when M$ should have prepared to sell it's own Linux distro with DX 9 and some other embrace and extend stuff. They missed it and screwed up. Lucky was we.
Step two was bashing the GPL as 'unamerican' and other bullshit and bringing customers to look twice at licensing where they used to give a hoot about the small print. Thus causing them to also look at M$ licenses and notice what BS they have been subscribing to for years allready. Ballmer backed of merely a half a year later and admited it was a bad plan to draw so much attention to OSS by bashing Linux/GPL in such a way.
Step three: Publish studies were everybody with more than 2 braincells notices in an instant that Linux/OSS is on top of things and M$ knows nothing other to do about it than flail the bullshitting-club left right and center.
Can a company of this size with marketing departments on a budget as big as the anual throughput of something like the third of afrika be so stupid and windows focused to pull such a mindless stunt?
Honestly, if I were a stockholder of M$ I'd be somewhat pissed and would want a question or two answered on that matter. M$ better get a grip and start preparing to change their business model or else they're gonna be in deep shit faster than any of us had ever hoped for.
$subject is $adjective for $object (Score:4, Interesting)
There is approximately 42^42 reports published yearly on any given subject. If you cannot find your truth in one of them you just don't know what you want your truth to be like.
Re:Sun and IBM... (Score:3, Interesting)
If I was an IT manager, I would consider Linux to follow a "best effort" sort of approach, whereas Windows, being far less than free, should come with guarantees about stability and performance. However, at least in terms of stability and security, Linux certainly outperforms Windows, if not by much these days. And it probably isn't far from Windows in terms of raw speed.
So, basically, those studies compare apples and oranges. In the cycle racing world, if Joe Bike, with no funding, no top-level medical staff and a simple bike, was to finish a race second or third to Lance Armstrong, everybody would herald him as a great hero, and Lance Armstrong's team wouldn't put up a website pointing out Joe Bike's poor performances compared to Lance Armstrong. Fact is, Microsoft has much vaster resources than the Linux community, and only manages to perform marginally better than Linux at best. That's what the studies should show. Throw Microsoft's billions at Linux and Windows would instantly become a laughable joke.
Re:I shouldn't even post this (Score:3, Interesting)
This is a fundamental flaw in logic known as "begging the question" - by assuming what you want to prove and then "proving" your conclusion based on that incorrect assumption.
I.E. "Linux is less cost-effective in performance than Windows, therefore you need more expensive hardware to run it, therefore you have to spend more to achieve the same performance, therefore Linux is less cost-effective in performance than Windows."
If this is truly what they are saying, then I would be tempted to dismiss the whole campaign as illogical garbage.
K
True if they assume Oracle and WebLogic everywhere (Score:5, Interesting)
The reviewer compares the cost of WebLogic+Oracle versus Windows Server+ SQL server. While the OS is much cheaper (and they omit costs of securing the platform against repeated worms), it is the cost of the proprietary software that gives MS its 25% cost saving.
The thing is, the cost of the app server and database are huge; they dwarf everything. So a large size company would only pay $5K for Redhat versus $40K for windows, but then pay $160K for WebLogic and $40K for oracle (versus $0 and $20K for the MS solution). And of course the annual maintenance fees are simply a fraction of the software costs, so they are more on the j2ee system.
Really the survey says 'J2EE using Oracle and WebLogic is more expensive than
So yes, the study was utterly rigged. It makes a valid critique of using WebLogic and Oracle, but says nothing about Linux/JBoss/mysql.
Re:By your logic (Score:3, Interesting)
Someone owns every media outlet that exists...by it's very nature, it is impossible to be impartial. However, this is ok. This is how it's been since the beginning of news media. It is incumbent upon us to corroborate information and to value-judge what we read in print,watch on tv, or hear on the radio.
Use several sources. Usually the truth lies somewhere in the middle of all of them.
K
Comment removed (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:True if they assume Oracle and WebLogic everywh (Score:2, Interesting)
You've got to be kidding me. Postgre, while a capable midrange database is nowhere near the performance or capability of Oracle, and MySQL isn't even in the same universe given that it lacks such basic features as stored procedures and transactions. This isn't even counting all the "value add" that oracle provides with their support tools and programming environments.
If your needs can be met by MySQL or Postgre, sure... don't buy Oracle, but then you'd be stupid to buy Oracle even if those open source tools weren't available. You'd probably use Access on Windows instead.
As for JBoss vs. Weblogic, i don't have enough experience with either to make a valid comparison, but Weblogic is ceratinly a much more capable product by features alone.
Re:By your logic (Score:5, Interesting)
For example: our company writes software for Microsoft's
If I were to write an article for an IT magazine praising
Microsoft feels that their way of doing software is best. If they didn't, they'd be building on top of Open Source the way Apple is. Obviously, since they've got the biggest selling operating system in the world, other people think so as well. This can't be explained away by marketshare and FUD...I own several Linux machines and an OSX laptops, and I still use my Windows based PC most often. Mostly because my wife steals the laptop, but truth be told, I'm on the dumb PC. If a researcher called, and asked which machine I used most, and which machine I've spent the least time fighting with to get what I have to do done, I'd say the PC. Sorry guys.
I'm not saying this particular study isn't sleazy -- but if a third party comes up with valid data through valid double blind studies, the validity isn't immediately invalidated JUST because it favors the company that paid it to do the research in the first place. After all, drug companys have to pay to have their drugs tested -- that doesn't mean they're necessarily going to be passed every time. My wife works as a contract archeologist. She's paid by developers to do research into the history of their projects, ostensibly to prove that there's no historic value. And you know, she's really objective about it. If there's something of historical merit, she reports it, even though it gets her screamed at by developers (whose projects are then set back MONTHS while the State Historic Preservation Office does its thing). In short: the fact that Microsoft funded this study does make it suspicious. But unless you've read it and found a problem with your data, you can't immediately assume it's been skewed.
Well, of course... (Score:3, Interesting)
The real problem is that the studies are geared toward benchmarking the few strengths of the Windows platform. A perceptive reader would note that the IDG study actually confirmed that Windows was significantly less reliable that Linux.
The IDG study mentioned that among file and print servers, Linux servers on Intel platforms averaged a higher workload with a lower failure rate. However, faithful to their master, IDG goes on to contradict itself by noting that Linux admins get paid more than Windows admins. Which means that taken on a per machine basis, Windows is cheaper, but when taken on a workload volume basis, Linux is less expensive.
The problem with such studies is that they are slanted toward the situations in which Microsoft's products do perform reasonably well. Consider for example the Windows-server against Linux-on-mainframe benchmark: a totally useless comparison. In the first place, companies don't buy mainframes for web-serving; they buy them for corporate datacenters. Then, when they want to provide web functionality, they either augment with Windows boxen which must connect to the mainframe for database access, or they run Linux servers on the mainframe. The first case involves hiring additional Windows admins, the second, merely training the existing mainframe systems programmer on Linux. Furthermore, you will never find a situation in which a company's mainframe-based webserver is outperformed by a Windows box. The reason? In real world corporate environments, business critical data is always stored on the mainframe simply because it is the most reliable platform. Thus, the screamingly-fast webserver on a windows box can never run faster than the mainframe simply because it must wait on both the mainframe database and network latency when filling requests.
In reality, the studies are worthless because they simply don't address the manner in which businesses actually use the systems. They ignore the crucial questions of reliability, robustness, compatibility, and support.
Comment removed (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Not entirely BS (Score:3, Interesting)
Last I checked, the 'official' prices for BEA or WebSphere were something like $10,000 per developer.
Sorta like how you can do MS dev for free, or you can drop $3000 for MSDN & VisualStudio.
Statistics (Score:2, Interesting)
There are lies, damn lies, and then, statistics.
Interesting.. (Score:2, Interesting)
So how about it? It looks to me like Microsoft may have better throughput on these tests. Who can prove them wrong?
Re:Microsoft's new PR war (Score:3, Interesting)
Hmm. 4 out of 5... that's 80%. But supposedly Microsoft has 90%+ of the market. So Microsoft just paid to run an ad urging over 10% of the market to leave them for Linux >:)