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Servers with a Smile

Posted by michael on from the would-you-like-fries-with-that dept.

9jack9 writes "Fortune Magazine has this article entitled Servers with a Smile. While they probably get almost as much wrong as they get right, it's still an interesting article, if for no other reason than it's in Fortune, with a readership undoubtedly consisting of people more focused on business than technology. To me the strange thing is that in portions of the computing world Linux and related phenomena (GNU/Linux, OSS, etc) does seem to be "the hottest thing", but in other parts of the computing world it is all but invisible. It reminds me of NT in the early days. There is also a related article Does Software Yearn to be Free?."

7 of 141 comments (clear)

  1. Journalism has never been a hard science. by drhairston · · Score: 4, Interesting

    'It will never beat Windows on the desktop, but the Linux operating system has an undeniable charm in the world of corporate computing: It's free.'

    One draws the impression from this statement that these capitalists are using the word 'free' to describe the cost of Linux, rather than its nature. Hopefully the recent move by Linux's premier distributor to solidify the Linux desktop and put an end to the endless bickering over controls and widgets will do something to dispel this notion of Microsoft's invincibility in the user interface department.

    --
    Dr. Joseph Hairston
    Superintendent, CCBC
  2. Most disturbing quote by JUSTONEMORELATTE · · Score: 3, Interesting
    [Amazon.com head systems engineer Jacob] Levanon says the hardware and software savings are nice, but what has really made the conversion compelling is that his labor costs are down 10% to 20%. Linux has become the main operating system used in university computer science classes at places like Berkeley, Stanford, and Cornell. That means Linux programmers are more plentiful and cheaper to hire than ever.
    Translation:
    When we had Solaris machines, we needed professional Unix system administrators. Now that we have Linux instead, any geek with an undergrad degree can do the job for 80% of the pay!

    Scary. Keep in mind he's talking about the sysadmins for production e-commerce server farms, and explains the cheaper labor by saying "Linux programmers are more plentiful and cheaper to hire than ever."
  3. Canibalizing by ivanandre · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I just cannot stop thinking that the great growing of Linux is because is eating Unix share, not microsoft...

    1. Re:Canibalizing by miffo.swe · · Score: 3, Interesting

      "I just cannot stop thinking that the great growing of Linux is because is eating Unix share, not microsoft."

      Who in their right mind cares? Ofcourse the *nux guys pick it up first. They are "home" at first boot. I would be more surprised if the MCSE's would be the first to pick linux up when they dont know anything about unix. Its easier to go from someting you know to something almost the same.

      After the unix guys have changed is when the Microsoft camps will start to think about it seriously.

      --
      HTTP/1.1 400
  4. Ballmer's "Linux is cancer" pitch misfired! Great! by dpbsmith · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The article says:

    "A year ago Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer called Linux a 'cancer' that would cause the death of intellectual property as we know it. Microsofties were encouraged to make that saber-rattling pitch on their corporate sales calls. But that just made IT executives angry. Peter Houston, Microsoft's head of industry strategies, says, 'became clear that we were being seen as having a polarizing and myopic view.'"

    All right! Maybe there's hope.

    (Now let's just hope that the same IT executives are savvy enough to see what Palladium can do to them--and don't see it just as a way of stopping college students from trading music).

    --

    "How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!

  5. backhanded compliment by jaymzter · · Score: 2, Interesting

    A Linux conversion is not for the faint-hearted. Companies must install new hardware and software on a large scale and prepare for bugs and hardware incompatibilities galore

    What a crock, so as soon as you put GNU/Linux on a system it might explode?

    This article is full of misinformation, the worst being the focus on "free"! How many times have we read here on Slashdot that PHB's don't want free (gratis)? You can't give anything away, you have to charge for it. Sun showed us that with Star Office. Am I happy Fortune did a write up on GNU/Linux? Sure, but I think articles like this do more injustice to us than anything. At least thanks to IBM (per the article) GNU/Linux didn't die a death of neglect!

    By the way, is granolaed a word?

    --
    If thou see a fair woman pay court to her, for thus thou wilt obtain love
  6. Is this a contradiction? by Luddite+Slayer · · Score: 2, Interesting
    "A Linux conversion is not for the faint-hearted. Companies must install new hardware and software on a large scale and prepare for bugs and hardware incompatibilities galore."

    Then later the article reads, "Levanon says the hardware and software savings are nice, but what has really made the conversion compelling is that his labor costs are down 10% to 20%."

    If there are so many bugs and incompatibilities then why does administration cost 10% 20% less?

    --

    My personality is like a coupon, it's 10% off.