Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Linux Usage in the UK

Posted by michael on from the penguins-in-peterborough dept.

pdajames writes "Techies don't seem to understand that businesses want to have a support contract with their usual supplier before they will buy Linux, even though the likelihood is that they may never need support. A survey in the UK showed that support concerns were the No. 1 factor keeping companies from investing in open source software."

5 of 280 comments (clear)

  1. Some companies aren't scared of it. by caluml · · Score: 3, Informative
    Some companies aren't scared of it.

    It's just a case of time before everyone else gets in on it.
    Of course there are still those companies that will always eat the dog food they're given, rushing to pull the money out of their pockets.

    --
    Get your own free personal location tracker
  2. IBM does sell support. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    And they have for years.

    IBM will sell you worldwide, 24x7x365 support for Linux.

  3. Re:I blame the British 'techie' environment. by Cassius105 · · Score: 2, Informative

    I totaly agree

    im at college in the UK at the moment just finishing off a national diploma in computing

    and i was talking to the sysadmin at out college

    even though it would save the college money and make the network run faster he is actualy forbiden from using non microsoft software to run the college network

    its fucking rediculouse

  4. Re:the usual supplier by eht · · Score: 2, Informative

    They also made the award winning Microsoft Services for Unix 3, that's right, Microsoft won a LinuxWorld award.

  5. From previous Linux article in Slashdot! by wukie · · Score: 2, Informative
    The following is from the Zdnet.co.uk link provide in the following article: Analysis of SuSE Linux Desktop

    First of all, some background. SuSE Linux Desktop (SLD) is one of several SuSE distributions that could be considered end-user oriented: there's also SuSE Linux Office Desktop, aimed at small businesses, as well as the standard SuSE Linux Personal and Professional editions. The key difference with SLD is it uses the same code base as SuSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES): this is intended to fulfil the needs of large businesses, with an 18-month release schedule (instead of twice a year, like SuSE's other software) and five years of support. It is binary-compatible with SuSE Linux 8.1, meaning you should be able to install any application that's been packaged for that OS version with no problems.

    So much for the "Linux commercial support not being available" argument.