Enterprise Linux: Are We There Yet?

Simon Crosby writes " Network Computing is running an special report on Linux in the enterprise. It evaluates strengths and weaknesses of Linux useage in the enterprise. It also discusses perceptions, roadblocks, security, clustering and other Linux enterprise issues."

Comments

"who do you sue?"

[kevin lyda]

could this question please die? considering the realities behind shrinkwrap licenses and ever dedicated support contracts, you can't sue anyone. and even if you could - how can you hope to win? the us gov't sued microsoft and look at how victorious it was?

a better question is: if things go wrong with widget x, what are my options to get it fixed? with closed s/w, the only option is the vendor you got it from (and really, knowing that, do you want to sue them?). with free software you can use your vendor, another vendor, your own staff, or private contractors (and knowing that, you could feel free to sue your vendor; assuming they failed to live up to their support contract).
note: i'm assuming in an enterprise situation you'd have some sort of support contract with ibm, redhat, microsoft, suse, sun, linuxcare, apple, etc.

Re:The definition of 'Enterprise'

[smoon]

"Enterprise" has two components, first is the relatively straightforward "Core Application" of a company, which might be some sort of ERP system like PeopleSoft, or some other commercial produce. For many companies, this will be an amalgamation of custom programs written over many years. These applications are typically based on some form of transaction processing system (e.g. CICS on the Mainframe, Tuxedo on Unix, or even database-driven transactions ala Oracle, DB2, etc.)

The second, and more critical part of 'Enterprise' is the nature of the computing service. Generally any outage is measured in dollars per minute or hour. It's not unusual for a large company to face severe monetary losses for even slight outages. Think millions of dollars an hour (or even per minute). This measure tends to be a little slippery, but with some analysis a pretty solid figure can usually be determined.

For some enterprises, Linux might make complete sense (e.g. Google). For others, the potential of saving a few thousand or hundred thousand in licensing costs pales in comparison to the probable re-training, new hardware, and "potential" instability of moving to Linux. If you've got something that works, why fix it?

Given the above, even if all of the big 'Enterprise' vendors port their software to Linux, you're not done. Linux clustering in a business context such as Solaris, AIX, and (in the good old days) VMS provide would be one stumbling block. The lack of high-end hardware is another -- and yes I know that Linux runs on anything from a PC to a SPARC server to a S/390 mainframe. In reality, you're unlikely to drop $2million on a big Sun box then load Linux -- you'll want to take advantage of Solaris's dynamic partitioning and other proprietary hooks.

Loading Linux on diverse old hardware makes business sense -- turn that old Sun box into something useful. It doesn't make nearly as much business sense when buying a new non-intel server, since the license fee of the OS (if any) is negligable compared to the overall value of the system in the 'Enterprise'.

Over time this is likely to change, since Linux represents a constantly improving and freely available system, vendors will start adopting it as 'their' OS. IBM is an early starter here, but the process will take time. And like a battle of attrition Linux has the advantage over time, since it is constantly improving (for free), while commercial vendors have to dump $millions into R&D to bring out each new version of their OS.

"could this question please die?"

[dpilot]

No, because the question itself is wrong, and is really a red herring.

It isn't "Who do you sue?" because instead it's really "Who can I blame and send the heat somewhere besides me?" The IT management structure will take heat for any service problems, but with a Microsoft solution they have the perfect blame target. Between "Everybody uses Microsoft," which absolves blame for having chosen them, and the fact that Microsoft is essentially lawsuit-proof, between their EULA and size/tactics, things are nicely diffused. Doesn't keep the systems up an running, but at least you're suffering in the same boat with everyone else, and there's the general, "Nothing can be done any better," to protect you.

Contrast that with Linux and outsourced support. First off, you've chosen something different, and hence inherently risky. Second, your outsourced support is probably less lawsuit-proof, and therefore maybe something might actually have to be done, rather than sighing in resignation.

Also contrast with Linux and internal support. Now you're to your own resources, and directly and immediately responsible for anything that goes wrong.

Note that NONE of this says a single thing about service levels, outages, or whatever. It's merely about adequate 'diffusion or responsibility' to keep the IT peoples' jobs protected. Microsoft provides a great 'responsibility diffusion sink,' one of the best at that.