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Driving Out Costs with Open Source Tools?
zO1inks asks: "I work for a custom web solutions company and I'm working on a white paper and presentation that outlines the merits of open source software, particularly the cost savings that can be achieved by using free (or low cost) open source software (OS's, Server, Utilities, etc.) vs typical (and more costly) Microsoft solutions. The material is targeted towards Fortune 500 companies that would have an interest in driving down the costs of custom web development, design, construction, migration, and support. I'm wondering where the largest gains are to be had and what supporting statistics show the validity of such strategies? (e.g. Bank xyz uses Linux to conduct X number of transactions per day with a downtime of only Y hours per month) Bottom Line: Is Fortune 500 ready to embrace Open Source?"
Unfortunately OSS engineers typically cost much more than MCSEs.
Not if you are comparing people of similar skill levels, and you should. If you hire a "dummy" to run your systems... then the problem is you have a "dummy" running your system, and you get what you pay for. If you hire a highly skilled UNIX or OSS engineer and a highly skilled MCSE, chances are the cost is not going to be that much different. If the rewards for building skills aren't there, why would anyone want to pay all that money to become an MCSE? Microsoft must be lying to someone -- they tell workers "become and MCSE and make buttloads of money" and they tell bosses "hire MCSE's, they don't make jack squat compared to real engineers".
While there may be a lot more MSCE's than UNIX or OSS engineers out there that are "dummies" because of the effort that has been made by Microsoft and their partners to push a lot of people through training classes and whatnot, I have to say "Who cares?". I don't know why you'd want that sort of person in your employ. And if you have to pay about the same amount per person, then UNIX or OSS typically wins because most people find that they need fewer people to support UNIX and OSS systems than they do Microsoft based systems because they break less often.
One of the big myths about Microsoft's stuff is that it is "easier" to administer or somehow less complex than *nix. I don't think that is true at all. It merely hides its complexity under a GUI that lulls people into a false sense of understanding. But when things break, the complexity underneath can rear its ugly head, and since so many things inside the black box are secrets people often find themselves unable to solve problems without help. *nix on the other hand puts everything right out there in the open, which can be daunting for a newbie, but by forcing people to do their homework up front, they build real understanding more quickly, and get to use and build on that knowledge faster.
If I want to get Sun's C++ compiler for SPARC Solaris, I need to get a purchase order, I need to wait for the software to arrive, I may need to wait for a CD-ROM to arrive, I certainly need to wait 24 hours for my host-specific licensing information to be processed by Sun. As the project grows, I need to ensure we have enough licenses; if we don't, I need to go through the whole deal all over again. That's a lot of my time. (I've done this on several projects.)
If I want to get g++, I download it.
I can assure you that at least two Fortune 500 companies use gcc/g++ as their production compiler for commercial software. (Only LGPL libraries are used; great care is taken to avoid GPL libraries.) Sorry, no names.
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Bullshit. I work for a division of a fortune 100 company. We use lots of Open Source software including Linux.
We *also* use a lot of proprietary software, including Windows NT, AIX, Solaris, and Novell.
We use whatever we think works best for each particular situation. Some Open Source programs have compelling advantages, including price, customizability, and (for some programs, like OpenBSD) security.
Will this guys paper convince CEOs and CIOs to drop all of thier proprietary software? Hell no. But it might make help them to understand what their tech staff already knows. Open Source programs *can* sometimes be a valuable addition to any IT departments "bag of tricks".
Whenever I try to get my employer to try some open source app, the main thing they scream about is upport. If it breaks, they want someone to blame/fix it, and they are willing to pay big bucks for that.
Then contract with Cygnus Support!
That's what they DO!
(Besides upgrade many of the Gnu tools, cut distributions, and maintain archives for them - with money from the support contracts.)
Think of Cygnus as a software company that happens to put its products under the GPL. Or think of it as a service organization specializing in GPLed software tools.
And they're no pikers, either.
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That's odd...
My students are quite capable with Apache, CGI, and databases, but they have incredible difficulty getting someone to pay them anything. They've trained themselves on Free/OpenSource software because it's available, and because they can work with it and learn from it.
These folk will work for dirt cheap.
I ask my friend Ross, marketing analyst and owner of a company, "Why are you installing IIS? It costs much more than Linux, and a well maintained Linux system is far more secure, and comes with good free database software, should you ever decide to grow that way." He says, "Because UNIX admins cost $100,000/yr, whereas an MCSE lackey costs half that."
I've got one student who has set up ArsDigita Community systems, Oracle databases, Linux, FreeBSD, reads kernel source, and has written some programs in C, tcl, Perl, and Python. He's working as a stocker for some odd store. He's configured systems left and right. He's dying to get a $38,000/year job somewhere doing anything. In his free time, he works on studying embedded systems and attending GSLUG meetings.
He's not an isolated case, I have many other well talented students who are working hard and doing well, developing their talents.
They want jobs. Any jobs, just to show off their talent and get experience.
So when I read: "Unfortunately OSS engineers typically cost much more than MCSEs," I wonder: What crack is everybody smoking? There's plenty of great UNIX people out there. who will work for cheap..!