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Gartner Claims Less Linux Than IDC
Quite a few readers submitted news about a recent Gartner study which implies a far-lower-than-usually-supposed percentage of servers running GNU/Linux. Reader mfarver, for instance, writes: "Only 8.6 percent of servers shipped in 3rd quarter 2000 were running Linux, claims a recent Gartner Dataquest report. A previous study published by IDC estimated linux held about 24% of the server market share. Unsurprisingly the Gartner study was partially commissioned by Microsoft." Roblimo has penned an interesting piece up at NewsForge about why those numbers might smell a little funny. Hint: how many machines have you bought running any Free operating system from the get-go?
Three points.
As has already been stated, Gartner asked end-users what they installed on their computers after they bought them. Not what was pre-installed on their computer. Implication: either Linux doesn't have the marketshare zealots want to belive, or accurately assessing server marketshare is difficult. You decide.
Garter is a research agency that has its value locked in its reputation. If it produces poor quality research on a regular basis, people will stop subscribing or purchasing its reports. Short term gains (ie fabricating truths in reports for specific companies) will lead to long term losses (ie loss of reputation leading to loss of credibility and revenue). Are you arrogant enough to believe they haven't thought of this? The reality is, they analysed the information available to them and made the best, least biased forecast as they could.
Garter is not in the business of assessing obscure technical facts. They provide a strategic business perspective on technology. Tech-heads are not their market. They don't care about the operational aspects of the technology. The people who run business (which, most commonly, are not tech-heads and have different skills) are their market. They care about the strategic implications of the technology and longer-term market trends.
You think you could do a better job and produce higher quality research? Don't whinge - go out and do it. If you produce research of such a high calibre, you'll drive Gartner out of business in months. I'm constantly amazed at how many people on Slashdot are willing to spout off on things they know nothing about. I don't tell people how to fly a plane - I realise I don't know how. But, the village idiots on slashdot are always willing to provide legal advice, assume everyone in management is a PHB, that companies never ever know what they're doing, that everything is part of a conspiracy and that anyone who doesn't know how to write a sound compression script using bash is an idiot. On the other hand, some people here have some seriously big clues. You my friend, are not one.
In summary, read the bloody report and get some perspective before spouting off.
This is your life, and it's ending one minute at a time.
At least according to Gartner:
Respondents were screened to ensure they were knowledgeable about server purchases over the quarter, and they were asked what percentage of their server purchases were Linux servers, he said.
"We went to end users, rather than looking at just sales numbers, and asked them what servers they had bought over the past three months and what operating system they had installed on it over the same period," Hewitt said. "There was no question about whether Linux was preinstalled or not, we simply asked about new shipments and this is what we found."
Just Microsoft is involved does not necessarily mean the numbers are bad. It is hard to say.
"The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed." - Alexander Hamilton
Are corporations buying more Windows servers than Linux servers? Yes. Are corporations buying more Windows licenses than using free software? Yes. Are corporations buying more MS support contracts than Linux support? Yes. Do the majority of corporations operate efficiently? Hell no. Are corporate decision-makers aware of the benefits of open source? Typically not.
Studies like this do nothing to prove or disprove the value of opensource. What I would like to see are comparisons of similar-sized companies that use either Windows or opensource... how do their server-farms compare? Who's more stable, more secure? Who's budget is lower? How much does each company spend on support, hardware, etc? How about some real side-by-side comparisons of real-life scenarios, rather than a guess of how many servers are out there?
Another thing - all of my servers were bought without Linux (some with no OS, some came with windows). I download distros and keep them on an FTP on my LAN. I install from that with the bootnet image. Even if Gartner asked the purchaser what the machines were intended to run, they would not have known and said windows since we are main an MS shop, except for my systems.
I'm not the one you bashed, but I was wondering where do you get this information?
As has already been stated, Gartner asked end-users what they installed on their computers after they bought them.
As one of a Gartner customers, we failed to get hold of the detail information on how they did the survey, they (inofficially) said it's commercial secret. All we know is the market segment and sample size. So, are you sure they really did?
Garter is a research agency that has its value locked in its reputation. If it produces poor quality research on a regular basis, people will stop subscribing or purchasing its reports.
Good point, but in fact customers choose Gartner because they want to get what they want to hear, and Gartner chooses who to list in their report. Once my friend's company complaint Gartner on their unfair comparison to their product. Their response was like "You were lucky we ever listed you" attitude. Gartner offered to come over to evaluate the situation, turn out gave them an opportunity to make business. My friend has then grown up thereafter any never take their study seriously.
Are you arrogant enough to believe they haven't thought of this?
Are you naive enough to believe they haven't thought of doing study in favour of big corps. for long term benefit?
Garter is not in the business of assessing obscure technical facts. They provide a strategic business perspective on technology. Tech-heads are not their market. They don't care about the operational aspects of the technology. The people who run business (which, most commonly, are not tech-heads and have different skills) are their market. They care about the strategic implications of the technology and longer-term market trends.
Hmm, isn't that exactly the major problem here?.....no wonder why they rated Rambus having brilliant future....
But, the village idiots on slashdot are always willing to provide legal advice, assume everyone in management is a PHB, that companies never ever know what they're doing, that everything is part of a conspiracy and that anyone who doesn't know how to write a sound compression script using bash is an idiot.
village idiots on slashdot? Compare to people like you who are so naive to believe that reports from big and rich companies must always be trusted, we are real idiots.
In summary, read the bloody report and get some perspective before spouting off.
I read those bloody reports quite frequently for my job. Have you ever wonder how do they come up with those probability factors that predict future trends on something, and how accurate do they turn out to be? I'd be much grateful if you could talk Gartner's to release the details, formula and source data of their research. (No Sir, it's company's secret!)
In my previous job, my company did a lot of contract work for the State of West Virginia, which uses the "Gartner Group's Tier" standards for all their purchases.
Many things on it were illogical, such as the blatant RAMBUS memory cheerleading, etc, despite benchmarks that proved that PC-133 SDRAM was faster on Pentium 3 systems than RAMBUS (and was cheaper).
Basically Gartner, like any company of it's type, says what it's paid to say. Why do they do this? Because they wanted to get paid. Remember when Ziff-Davis would only talk about Liuux when parroting Microsoft's "Haloween Documents"? That changed overnight when Linux companies formed and started advertising in ZD magazines.
The same will happen with Gartner when a Linux company buys their seal of approval.
As the article stated, this "study" used the flawed model of judging server OS's by what OS shipped with the system, rather than actually surveying what was actually USED on that server sold.
This is like measuring what radio station is #1 in the market by what station the radio was set to when it was sold. Or how many people buy Ashland Gasoline because that was the fuel in the car when it was sold...
Unfortunately, Gartner's flaws are not well known by the people who use them as the HOLY WRIT (usually the non-techical people in corporate and government bureaucracy).
=== The price of freedom is eternal vigilance
No doubt, within minutes, the board will be awash in criticisms of Slashdot's anti-microsoft stance and defences of that stance.
I've noticed a trend with regard to this process. No matter how passionately the stoical marketeers defend Microsoft, nor how predictably Linux' yes-men define the particular news story as the turning point in the eternal battle between the forces of freedom and the forces of evil, the truth will lie somewhere in the middle. What's depressing is that those who take the middle ground are morbidly few. Who would have thought the tech sector would create such starry-eyed romantics (as many online activists seem to be)?
Well, 100% of the machines (1) in my apartment came with no operating system at all. So in this part of the country I guess the dominant OS would be AMIBIOS 95.