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Verizon Switches Programmers to Linux

Posted by timothy on from the these-numbers-need-some-looking-at dept.

wackysootroom writes: "According to this article at News.com, Verizon saved $6 million in equipment costs by switching its programmers from UNIX and Windows workstations to Linux workstations running OpenOffice. The article says that the average cost per desktop workstation was cut from $22,000 to $3,000." jeffmurphy noted the same story, and wonders "What kind of (Windows) desktops were they buying previously at an average cost of $22k? It seems like software alone wouldn't account for that big of a cut."

10 of 240 comments (clear)

  1. That's insane. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    I'm assuming that includes more than just the computer and Windows. That has to includes a great deal of licensed software.

  2. What kind of desktops were they buying for 22k ? by unixmaster · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Micosoft Office License Fees
    Visual Studio ( Development ) Fees
    Windows itself License Fees

    and many others....

    sum up all !

    --
    Never learn by your mistakes, if you do you may never dare to try again
  3. Programmers and *Office? by Sloppy · · Score: 1, Insightful

    WTF are programmers doing with MS Office and OpenOffice? I have had to use OpenOffice a few times to read RFPs, but I work at a tiny company where everybody wears more than one hat. I would think that a company as big as Verizon would have some kind of layer in between programmers and anyone who has to run spreadsheets and word processors. Programmers should be in gvim all day. :-)

    --
    As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
    1. Re:Programmers and *Office? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful
      WTF are programmers doing with MS Office and OpenOffice?

      We are three weeks into a new project which I am the lead developer for. In the last three weeks I have produced four documents in openoffice. One for the high level design 60 pages, one for the hardware requirements and procurement 20 pages, one for the client user documentation ( what they will be getting ) 40 pages and one on how the software will impact the business model which will use the software 20 pages. Each one of those documents will be updated with each acceptance test. Openoffice is my friend :)

      omico--

    2. Re:Programmers and *Office? by Sabbac · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Us developers at large companies have a standard that must be followed (in my case ISO9000). ISO is all about documentation (and procedure (and documented procedure)). Our company standerized on MS office for the documentation.

      Some things that lowly developers have to write are External Interface Specs, Design Specs, Statements of Work, etc. They even often want it documented before you start coding, but it isn;t enforced since prototyping is allowed.

  4. $22k boxen by Lechter · · Score: 2, Insightful

    If you consider software plus development licenses I'm sure you can easily run up a $22k bill when putting a box together. Consider you have the cost of the
    + PC
    + monitor (or two for really cool developers)
    + Windows 2k pro + Office Pro + Visual Studio Pro + development library licenses (which can get really expensive like +$5k)
    + Unixish sofware licenses - software to make Windows boxes perform the tasks of Unix boxes, even simple things long GPL'd can get really really expensive think $500 for grep

    With all sorts of proprietary per-user licenses (especially dev tools licenses) it's easy to see how a workstation could get up that high. Similarly, considering all the tools and libraries available under the GPL, you can put together a damn impressive dev platform and save yourself a raft of cash...

    --
    credo quia absurdum
  5. Replacing real workstations with Pee Cees? Eeew. by nbvb · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Yuck.
    I'm sure that $22k was for a real workstation, like an IBM zSeries or an HP Visualize or a Sun Blade 1k/2k (Or U60/U80).

    I'm a sysadmin at a large company and I've got a Blade 1000 on my desk (with Sun's 24" LCD + XVR-1000 video board, thankyouverymuch :)

    Anyway, the LCD is somewhat excessive, but the workstation certainly isn't. I'm constantly compiling code and doing testing on my desktop -- I need a good, reliable piece of hardware that'll function under stress.

    A cheap Pee Cee running some Yugoslavian 14-year-old's idea of a kernel?

    Forget it!

    The other thing that nobody mentioned is that that $22,000 workstation will probably last 6 or 7 years. Not so with that cheap PC.

    I had one developer who was still using his SPARCstation 10 until less than a month ago when we replaced it with a spare Ultra 2. Why? Because it still worked. All he used it for was basically an X display via SSH into the development boxes....

    Would the Dell-of-the-week from 1991 still be useful today? Somehow I doubt it.

    You get what you pay for. And sometimes, not even that.

    --NBVB

  6. Re:EASILY cost $22,000/workstation by marauder404 · · Score: 1, Insightful

    To me, that suggests that somebody made a really stupid decision to buy $22k machines in the first place. So $3k machines isn't saving them $6M dollars ... it's that they should have saved $6M in the first place by not buying such expensive machines in the first place. On top of that, if they're going to replace them, they're probably obsolete. This guy doesn't deserve a promotion for doing this job -- someone else needs to be fired.

  7. Re:$22,000 for Windows? Easy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    That's minimum $1,200 PER YEAR. *Not* a flat $1,200. So let's see: free software for 5 years: $0 + maintenance costs; MSDN subscription for 5 years: $6,000 + maintenance costs. I still say the TCM (total cost of maintenance) is higher on the M$ side of the force.

  8. Accounting and overheads by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Its quite likely that part of the 22k actually represents the overhead spares/replacements/tech support labour/accessories/whatever). Its possible 2 cents of its for tissues to clean up the VDU after an attack of hayfever...any downtime would itself register as a financial cost. When accounting for assets you sometimes do this: its not the cost of the physical stuff alone and the software licenses necessarily, rather, the true cost of the workstation over its predicted lifespan (as corrollary: a 'cheap' car rarely remains a cheap-to-run car).

    Perhaps windows is just unreliable leading to unaccptable (and in accounting terms costly) periods of downtime...(surely not?!)