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Linux TCO: Less Than Half The Cost of Windows
ggruschow writes "Linux Today reports 'The cost of running Linux is roughly 40% that of Microsoft Windows, and only 14% that of Sun Microsystem's Solaris, according to a new study which examined the actual costs of running various operating systems over three years.'"
What a surprise... Linux today says linux is cheaper. There are many ways of calculating TCO. What makes this more credible than the next?
According to this article, only 27% of the Linux servers studied used purchased copies of their Distribution...So the majority of the costs are based on the server admin's cost, which averages $71,xxx a year...my question is, where are this jobs as linux admins for $71k/ year? Who were they talking to about this, or did they just make it up?
How Jaded Are You?
I think it's more interesting to hear Ballmer acknowledging this too.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
I've always thought something was wrong with those TCO studies that say MS has a lower TCO than Linux. It just seems blindingly obvious that free software would give you a much lower TCO than something that comes with massive license fees, regardless of what other factors you work into the equation - - - and I've always suspected that those other factors are mostly just handwaving and smoke and mirrors.
The PDF for the study is hosted on IBM's website... I'd be willing to bet that it was IBM that commissioned the study. Anybody know?
;-)
**begin sarcasm**
What a big suprise that would be if a study funded by IBM finds that their Linux solutions perform better than Windows and Sun!
**end sarcasm**
That said, it is nice to have some pro-Linux FUD out there!
Ben
So the article says that Linux web servers are cheaper to run than Windows ones. Is anyone surprised by this? Is it actually news?
I'm still waiting for the article to come out discussing TCO as it relates to desktops, which is where most of the money is lost in support dollars....
If you could put a price on both sanity and your precious, precious soul, then I'm sure linux would come out ahead even further.
---------------------------
So the majority of the costs are based on the server admin's cost, which averages $71,xxx a year...my question is, where are this jobs as linux admins for $71k/ year?
An employee's gross pay is typically less than half of what it costs to employ him or her. An employer needs to buy office space, power, lighting, air circulation, health benefits, not to mention the employer's share of the taxes (in the USA, payroll tax and Social Insecurity matching payments).
Will I retire or break 10K?
I am assuming that the Linux and Solaris admins are using the CLI to manage the servers via SSH but I believe the slowest way to manage a server is through a keyboard and mouse -- pointing and clicking away. Most of the Windows servers I have managed in my career were through a GUI interface using a remote control program like PC Anywhere and Microsoft's Remote Admin software. With Linux, Solaris and now Mac OS X Server, I use SSH and a keyboard to do my work. With shell scripts and other tricks, I can blaze through server management that I would never be able to do in a GUI environment at the same speed. Even with Mac OS X Server's great GUI management tools, I prefer to fire up Terminal and remotely manage the system through a CLI -- or maybe I just long for the days of my Apple ][.
On the other hand, with the massive numbers of zombied Windows machines probing my networks, it could be that Windows-only Admins are just plain idiots with a MCSE which accounts for the productivity gains of Linux and Solaris admins.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
For example, at the University of Waterloo, you can get a Windows XP CD for free if you are a student. I'm sorry, but I don't know how much Waterloo paid Microsoft for this... so maybe it isn't quite free. I actually got Windows XP from them. I'm mostly a Linux user, but they sucked me in with the free CD thing. Came with a unique activation ID and everything. How soon will it be before Microsoft starts giving away Windows XP to small businesses, home users, then big businesses. They can still make their main money from Office and other things. I think they're going to have to keep cutting costs, in order to match the cost of Linux.
Basically what I'm trying to say is that Microsoft fully realizes that Linux is a somewhat cheaper system to opearate, and this is one way that it is trying to change that. By giving it away free, they've reduced the cost of running Windows by a lot.
Start a timer, tell each admin they need to perform some obscure task. Now see who gets it done first, assuming their skills are the same for their respective systems. A windows person might be lightening fast because they just have to click in a couple of places. Then again, they will probably have to reboot. A Linux person might need to check the info (or man) page and pray it is well written for their part then try to implement it. However they will most likely not have to restart anything except that particular service. Solaris? Well I suppose that depends on the version.
No- it's not the other way around. This is exactly what happened w/my company.
We decided that using Linux could help us out w/a couple things that we wanted to do- but we were short on cash to go the MS route.
So I went to Frys Electronics and picked up RedHat. I installed it, learned how to do the stuff we wanted to do, and found out 2 things. Pretty much all the software - and support- you need are available for free.
The community provides so much more than development.
One project we needed was a server running SSH for transfering files over a dedicated T1 between us and a client. You don't need me to tell you that it was cake.
Our other larger project is focused on Apache, PHP and PostgreSQL. There is great, free support out there for all those products.
We bought the box to get started - planned to buy support but dropped those plans when we say that the open source community will provide you with tons of support.
That may not be good enough for some big companies- but for someone in the middle and (always) strapped for cash- it is great.
.
It's hard to believe that's how Micronians are made. Why don't we see it right now by having you both kiss one another?
As for productivity, there will be significantly less time spent on Blue Screens of death, software updates that break most of the functioning, software virii commandeering programs and wiping your hard drive clean and the like.
Your KIA/BMW comparison is highly inaccurate. Linux to Windows is comparing a Honda and a Ford Pinto with a full tank of gas and a bunch of near-sighted rage drivers right behind you rushing home to find their glasses.
There's an interesting book at http://www.winface.com that looks at how to re-orient a whole IT department from Windows to Unix/Linux. It's mainly about using Unix, but Linux gives the same advantages, only even more so due to improved compatibility across Linuxes compared to the various Unixes, and much lower licensing costs, lower hardware costs for Intel deployments and so on. The book has some annoying errors in places, but the guts of it are very useful for costing out complete deployments of Windows vs. Unix, for small through medium to enterprise scales.
You can download some parts of the book for free to get a flavour of what it's about. I actually bought a copy and would recommend it for anyone thinking about converting from Windows to Linux - it's only $30.
Last year we decided to migrate off Windows.
We first moved to OpenOffice. Painful, when your clients all use MS Office, but it's possible.
Now we're moving to Mozilla-based browsers.
All our servers (except one) went to Linux in the last year or two.
Now we're killing the last Windows desktops, putting Lindows-OS in their place.
Apart from the license savings, everything just runs better.
There is a huge fear of change, and this works in Windows' favor.
But there is no doubt that open software is better built and cheaper to run.
Changing costs something. But there is no doubt about the TCO of Linux (and its applications) being lower.
Sig for sale or rent. One previous user. Inquire within.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Meanwhile, here on /., people seem to be saying that the report came from Linux Today, and therefore is too biased to be trusted.
So on the one hand, you're wrong about the source of the report, just like a lot of other posters. On the other hand, you're wrong about /.'s response to the report.
But hey, at least things are somewhat better than you expected, which is always pleasant.
Any sufficiently well-organized community is indistinguishable from Government.
So, let me get this straight... they actually expect us to believe that WinAdmins make almost 70K a year to handle 10 machines? I don't know what kind of fantasy world this study was done in, but I want in!!!
Of course, far be it from me to suggest that this portrayal of WinAdmins might be a bit off... but, for reference, I support close to 200 WinTel machines and 5 servers, and I don't make anywhere close to 70K US a year... I think I may print this article and see if I can get a raise out of it...
Lesse... 70K per 10 boxes, 200 boxes, equals... woohoo!
If I knew the wedgies I gave you back in 6th grade would have resulted in this . . . I might have taken a moments pause.
If they want to do TCO of apples to apples, maybe they should have used Sun LX-50 x86 box, instead of their Enterprise class machines. There are feature sets in that class of machine (eg domaining, redundant hardware, hotswap etc) that are just not available in an x86 box. The cost of those features greatly inflates the TCO for Solaris.
"The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding."
Not only can Pirates get Windows XP (with a haxxored activation ID) but they can additionally get Office XP for an additional 0 dollars and 0 cents!
Our source was Lee T. Hacksor, a 13 yr-old who claims to have "0wn3d" XP for a little over a year now.
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
...it is simply the fact that Windows systems just generally take more time and effort to secure. Whether it is simply because there are more patches, or that those patches just take forever to install, or that those patches create further problems that have to be addressed, I can firmly say in my 6 or 7 years of administration, the few Windows boxes I've had to manage have been a far larger administration headache than any of the Linux, FreeBSD, or even Solaris machines.
Perl - $Just @when->$you ${thought} s/yn/tax/ &couldn\'t %get $worse;
I've worked as a Unix and Windows admin at various times. And here's the deal: A company that knows enough about IT issues to seriously consider UNIX probably hires good admins, whether they are Windows admins *or* UNIX admins. The companies that just blindly buy a bunch of Microsoft stuff to slap on the boss's old Dell machine (which is now the "server") probably don't hire good admins. Or, honestly, have any kind of cohesive idea about what they are using their PC's and the network for. Which means they will ALWAYS be dumping money into it to try to make it work, to cover up for their lack of planning. UNIX, on the other hand, isn't even CONSIDERED by shops that aren't pretty fuckin' serious about their network/workstation/applications, and they'll keep costs down, because they aren't screwing around. What I'm saying is, Windows works fine, if it does what you need it to do, and you hire people that know how to do it. But that's rarely the case with Windows shops. And it's almost *always* the case with UNIX shops.
i recently asked my new admin (at a new job) if i could bring in my iBook and use it.
"No. No personal machines on the network."
"Oh, any reason? Other than just policy?"
"Well, they are mostly concerned with viruses and stuff, we can't control your personal computer's virus protection. But its mostly a policy thing."
"Oh, its okay, its an iBook - running Mac OS X."
"There are plenty of viruses out there for the Mac and Linux too, not just windows."
"Really? Name one virus on Mac and the ssh hole doesn't count."
Its been 3 days now. He's started calling me at home late at night, breathing heavy... mumbling something about burning down the building and his stapler...
guns kill people like spoons make Rosie O'Donnell fat.
Half the price and half as useful!
God, poor karma.
Seriously though folks, there is a reason Windows is expensive as it is. It's part corporate greed, but it's also part quality of product.
I run Linux on quite a few web servers and a database server here and there and I love it for my servers. It's fast, stable and black and white. Just like I like em. I run Windows on my desktops. Recently I decided to install RedHat 7.3 just to see how things were coming on the desktop front. It was pretty smooth, until I decided I wanted to move my mouse, at which point the X installer locked up.
Seems the X mouse drivers can't figure out a plain ol' optical mouse running through a Linksys KVM. I searched and searched to no avail. The mouse just resets over and over, every second or so.
Screw it. Back to the server room with you! Where's my XP CD?
OK Here is the shattered remains of this pathetic TCO. Warning STRONG language later on as I was getting very pissed at the half assed job they did. This is a rant about the TCO NOT LINUX. Keep that in mind.
..."
... is... beyond comprehension.
First of all this thing is 8 pages? The last 15 or so TCOs I've had to read through have been in the area of 70 to 400 pages in length. This looks like something a 10 year old would write in highschool. But I digress. Here we go:
1 - Executive Summary
Who are these numerous executives? (I had coffee with Elvis)
How many is many? Many people have Aids but MOST people do not. (I eat a lot of food compared to a starving Ethiopian)
Survey Participants? Who are they? How do I know you didn't make this shit up? Where is your work sited information? The least you could do is say Client - A, and Client - B if there was a NDA issue.
2 - Methodology
Ok so their WHOLE concept of this TCO factors ONLY web servers? This should be titled as TCO of LINUX WEB SERVERS. Holy Shit I'd fire these guys if they were my consulting shop.
One or two processors in the machines? How do I know the majority of the MS or Solaris machines are not Single versus Dual on the Linux Boxes? Where is my node breakdown summary?
"External" support hardware and software were excluded?! Holy Fuck! Ahem! I consider hardware and software compatibility pretty fucking important. The NIC performance is crucial! If I have to alter my NIC choices based on driver availability that can totally skew a cost per MB in a TCO. The difference, for example, in a web server using Intel and 3Com NICs amounted to $1500 dollars when placed into a Proliant server doing SQL after boiling the TCO numbers. BIG difference if I have to have 100-200 of those.
All prices are based on retail!? What moron pays retail for a corporate purchase on Mid to Large sized companies!? Mother of God are these guys scamming their clients? I get a bulk discount on orders greater than 20 from 3Com. Used to level the playing field? Ahem this is a COST analysis! Enterprise discounts are not irrelevant THEY ARE CRUCIAL! Case in point if Intel gives my 20% off on an order of 2000 NIC cards and 3Com gives me 25% off and Linux won't support the 3Com card (for the sake of argument) THAT IS RELIVANT TO THE TCO!
3 - Cost Breakdown
Software purchase costs per processing unit? Ahem where is the implementation costs, maintenance costs, or as I like to put HOW COULD THESE DOLTS COMPLETELY IGNORE THE SYSTEM LIFE CYCLE!?
Paragraph 3, line 4 "beyond the purchase of the software", ahem DOES LINUX INSTALLS AND CONFIGURES ITSELF!!?? FUCK DUDE I'M SWITCHING NOW! They cover this later; I'll bitch about it when I get there.
CALs are primarily used only in Intranets unless your are running remote services like Outlook's Mail program. But authenticated services are NOT being specified on both systems, only MS. Are we running software here besides Apache and IIS comparisons? Now we have a whole separate TCO on just the application alone! God this TCO is a mess.
Also there is no lie in the last paragraph, the new terms from MS are terrible.
No lie here, Linux is cheaper cost wise for the software. Too bad like in automobiles labor is the major cost. Even then the data is terrible at best.
3.2 - Hardware Cost Breakdown
Wow Linux only beat out MS by about $1000 bucks? I'd rather pay the $1000 bucks and write that off as application compatibility, hardware compatibility, and more importantly I actually have the MAJORITY of hardware vendors writing drivers NOW for Microsoft. Don't tell me "But that is changing" TCOs are a static snapshot, "What-Ifs" are not allowed, otherwise they become Cost Projection Reports.
Concerning their benchmark concept per processing unit how do we know we have the same data going across? Where are these number coming from? I have yet to see any concrete data. I get the results but how was the data collected? Was the test based on identical web pages? Was it base on client side or server sides scripts? WHERE IS THIS DATA COMING FROM? When I play cards and my friend says he has a full house he's gotta show me the cards. SHOW ME THE DATA!
3.3 - Support
Oh God I loved this part:
"Support Costs Were Those Fees Paid To Consulting Providers or Product Vendors...." "Many administrators were taking advantage of mailing lists, free news groups, support,
Hmmm how many of those groups will mail me monthly CDs like TechNet for a fee? I wonder if that added to the cost? WE DON'T KNOW THEY STILL HAVEN'T GIVEN US ANY DATA. WE ARE SHORT ON BRENT SPENER (Did I get his name right? I'm not a Trekkie) JUST RESULTS. Did your result of 42 come from 40+2 or 21x2 or WHAT!? They say $46,360 for MS. I have been consulting 8 years and have NEVER seen an administrative expenditure like that. Show me the data! Are we looking at 1000 Linux Workstations for every 4000 NT based systems? Right there the admin costs should be x4 as much. No data, no trust. Tell me where that 46k went and then I'll listen.
Oh how about this one,"... for the purpose of this survey administrators...."
Ok so my NT guy that handles my SQL server, Exchange, and 4 other servers is only going to be counted for the web part. Hmmm... Wouldn't that deflate the number of Web specific servers per admin? WE DON'T KNOW! GUESS WHAT? STILL NO DATA! If the 1 Linux admin handles 10 web servers, but all he does is handle 10 web servers that is going to drastically skew results of the MS web guys all share duties on 5 other types of server which is the case.
How about bullet #2 "... System automation tasks... had not been written yet for Linux..." Is this guy drunk?! Holy try going to one of hundreds of scripting pages for Linux you dolt!
4 - Soft Costs
"... Difficult to assign values to..."
Let me think, WRONG. I can roughly estimate over 3 years what those costs are by taking fixed costs and subtracting budget expenditures for the year and I can write THE WHOLE GOD DAMN THING OFF as a soft costs and estimates. That is how you in part determine the next year's budget. The more years you factor in the better the estimate. There is a reason TCOs I read are at least 30 pages long. I accept nothing less.
4.1 - Security
No arguments save one, The reason Linux SEEMS more secure than MS is that is hasn't been as critical of a target. I remember some Linux admins (back when Slashdot was just starting) making the claim that Linux was IMMUNE to viruses. No, people just haven't been writing Linux based viruses. Same with hacks in general. Here is a real solid fact:
Based on the number of attempts and system penetration MS products are 20% more likely to be hacked and infected than Linux. This is a basic arithmetic case of market share. If 60% of the targets are red and the other 40% are blue. Red is 20% more likely to be targeted than blue. It's that simple.
4.2 Availability
Holy this doesn't even get a page?! If I do 4 billion dollar of transaction a week this had better fucking be at least 30 pages long with in-depth up-time analysis including MTF ratings and severity analysis. This is a glaring example of RFG's TOTAL AND COMPLETE LACK OF CREDEBILITY. If I am Amazon or Barnes and Noble if my site isn't up I have no business. How they could blow over this is
4.3 Scalability
One word, Datacenter.
From a cpu standpoint MS leads, note the fact they kind of gloss over this section. Damn near a page for software costs with some statistics but virtually nothing here. This fucking piece of trash looks more like a poorly disguised outsourcing bid from some half-assed Linux shop. With the advent of cheap blade servers and AMD's entry into SMP this should have been a 60 to 100 page section! What about support RAID systems, Fibre Channel links, high speed switching systems, clustering, FUCK THE LIST JUST KEEPS GOING ON AND ON AND ON....
These people have NO FUCKING clue how to do a TCO. NONE. ZERO. ZIP. My 14 year old non-techie niece could do a better cost analysis.
I am not going to even bother on the rest of this crap. I have only one thing to say in my summary:
IF RFG IS WORKING FOR YOU, FIND BETTER. THE HOMELESS GUY DOWN THE STREET MIGHT EVEN BE BETTER.
Suggestion to web sites that quote this: Give Linux a real chance to succeed Bullshit like this doesn't help.
-=[ Who Is John Galt? ]=-
Where did they get those machine to tech ratios? Maybe small businesses that only have a few machines anyway. The shops I have worked in and friends in the industry the ratio is MUCH higher anywhere from 50 to 1 and up. We were mainly Windows shop and added Unix systems to the mix as time went on. In fact our management kept showing us reports from industry groups showing 100 to 1 as a common ratio. My argument was and still is what type of systems were they? In an ISP or ecommerse site with farms of servers the ratio can be high, because a system can go down with minimal effect. I worked more on large databases, and business systems and when systems were down it affected revenue and we had to get them back on-line ASAP.
Articles like this don't do Linux any good, when management see bogus numbers in them. This is not a an artice I would show to management to try and get Linux system integrated.
www.ibm.com...
The link at the bottom goes to ibm.com(/FUD)
I wonder if they would per chance be biased against solaris in anyway?
Maybe that explains why they think people will use 6800's to run a web farm. Their hardware comparison is dell pcs and 6800's and 4800's.
Really...
I was principal architect for Excite Clubs for 4 years. During a period of one year, we went from 100K page views to over 20M page views a day.
,the page generation times went down to .1 seconds and the highest observable CPU load was less than 10%.
We had a rather unique situation. We started the project on Windows NT 4.0 and later migrated to Win2K. During that time, we were barely able to handle 1M page views per day on the windows boxes. In addition, the average page generation time was 2 seconds. The 20 windows boxes we had in production cost approximately 17K a piece (quad compaq proliant with 1 gig of ram) and were all experiencing 80% or more CPU usage.
The 20 boxes were managed by 1 sysadmin (6 years experience from MS consulting services) with a full time assistant. This does not count the high school students we had wandering the racks hard rebooting terminally ill boxes.
Most admin time was spent on upgrades, boxes that would just stop working (we called it spontaneous server rot) and trying to use a host of opaque, inadequate tools to detect and eliminate bottlenecks. Build, rollout and staging tools were also a big time synch. Finally, the installation of software onto a new machine in the right order with all configuration parameters took an extradinary amount of time.
In addition, I had one full time engineer writing noting but 'nanny' programs to monitor the program and restart the process when there were problems.
With all this work, the system still went down daily.
After much politicking we translated the program to JSP (straight page per page translation) and moved to solaris machines. The java middle tier ran as on solaris. The 20 compaq boxes were replaced with 16 solaris boxes. Oddly, we paid almost the same amount per box (20K versus 16K).
Immediately, we were able to more that 5M pageviews per day with no changes to the software. In addition
Our sysadmins were replaced with a part time (less than 5 hours per week) solaris admin. The roll out scritps were trivial to write and maintain. We had very few upgrades/security patches.
Most important, the host of tools provided to monitor system performance and tell exactly where bottle necks were and the truly deep understanding of the system internals by the sys admins allowed us to eliminate the remaining problems and scale to 20M pageviews per day.
That is right. two orders of magnitude better performance for precisely the same code. And and order of magnitude less admin time.
Those were measurable results. Here is my 'opinion' of why the differnces were so dramatic.
I taught Win32 programming and system internals for four years. I was also chief scientist for Redmond Communications who publish a technical journal on Microsoft Software/strategies. So I am not a linux bigot.
My observation has been, that no one truly understands the internals of a windows system. Just as I start to get a handle on the latest caching, memory management, threading issues, there is an 'upgrade' via some patch that changes many of the internals. In addition, as shown by the above threads, most windows sys admins seem to have vastly difference experience and understanding of how to configure and maintain systems.
Unlike most nerds, I will not blame the admin, but blame the system. In the scientific community, windows, in practice, has proven to be somewhat opaque.
Unix, on the other hand, is incredibly well documented and all source is available. Uncertain how inodes are locked and released? No problem, there are many books and references to help you. If worst comes to worst, crack open the damn code.
This has nothing to do with open source, but more to do with the which communities evolved the techonlogy and the underlying motivations of companies hawking their wares.
Note, this is not a good thing, or a bad thing it is only a thing.
There were many people out there criticizing the studies accuracy. I must say I do not have a single colleague that I have spoken with that doubts its varisity from personal experience on BOTH sides of the isle. I just knew that I had to share my own experience with you. My only doubt about the story is that I would say 'order of magnitude' for production servers.
Thank you for your time,
Carmine Mangione
Even though I'm not a heavy scripter my story follows:
I used NT/IIS 4.0 for several years switching to 2000/IIS 5.0 when it was available. I have a small business and primarily use my websites for testing solutions that are implemented for my clients and for e-mail. That being said I had to check my servers daily for hacks and patches and got rooted several times. After switching (sorry Apple) to Linux I've been rooted 1 time (my fault for leaving a known bug open via ftp). Going from checking daily (sometimes 3 to 4 times a day) and still getting hacked, to checking weekly (unless I notice an article here a la openSSL, etc.). My TCO is dramatically less. It has also allowed me to confidently recommend Linux solutions at my full time job.
Time is $$$ and the less I spend trying to avoid script kiddies the more time I have to do real work and get paid.
You know, you don't have to subscribe to software assurance. If you (as a company) prefer, you can just pay the one-time license fee per computer. You only run into SA if you take Microsoft up on one of their volume licensing plans.
Lots of people complain about the new licensing. But let's not forget that nobody's got a gun to your head. If you want, you can just pay full price for every computer in your company and be done with Microsoft forever.
What's funny is they'll post TCO stories from LINUX TODAY, but won't post any from MICROSOFT such as this point-by-point comparison found here. How is it FAIR to link LINUX TODAY, but not MICROSOFT? Ahh... more classic Slashdot bias (notice all of the other OS's get real icons, MS get a borg Bill Gates... very mature)
Basically, the LINUX TODAY article is saying the TCP (Total cost to purchase) is equivalent to TCO (Total cost of ownership)... in effect saying that any positives and negatives Windows may have in the software itself has NO value. As other above have said, you can calculate TCO in many different ways. If you want to assign EVERYTHING other than software licensing a VALUE of $0... maybe this article strikes a chord with you.
All I am saying is consider the source!
Prevent linux based DDOS's!
http://linux.denialofservice.org/
Scripting is close to the true reason linux admin takes less effort.
With linux the admin's education is never limited because everything is open to inspection. With windows the admin's education is limited to what M$ wants them to know. Thus severly handicapping their diagnostic abilities and their intuition.
This effectively reduces the effect of eXPerience for the windows admin. A 5 year windows vet will likely be no smarter than a 3 year vet. However, a 5 year linux vet has every opportunity to exceed his 3 year counterpart.
Qhat a surprise, their figures are based on totally bogus reasoning.
They equate single and dual-CPU commodity x86 boxes with 24-CPU US3 servers with 100% redundancy for guaranteed uptime.
No wonder their figures are utterly bogus.
If you take their own calculations, factor in COMPARABLE figures across all 3 platofrms, then you get Windows as the most expensive, Linux second and Solaris woith the lowest TCO.
But then, that would not have made for a good story, would it...
People should not be afraid of their governments - Governments should be afraid of their people.
Computers are getting fast enough that we don't need firm-ware intregration of everything and can apply some abstraction layers/components. If we abstract the following features:
1. Execution environment (like a run-time engine)
2. Database
3. File System (use #2 instead?)
4. Networking protocols
5. Workspace managers (desktops)
6. Graphics and hardware interface
behind standard paradigm-neutrual protocols, then the God-Damned OS does NOT mean diddly squat.
I have too much existing Windows software to just chuck Windows. I don't want to depend on MS, but I don't want to start over. Thus, if you want to make MS irrelavent, then make the OS irrelavent using/making the above standards, then we don't have to marry neither Bill Gates NOR a smiling penguin.
F the OS wars. Think beyond it people. Think abstraction and standards. Windows will shrink when standards make it so that you don't need Windows, not because Linux crashes slightly less.
The Penguin can go fuck Clippey for all I care. You are all fighting the wrong war.
Table-ized A.I.