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IBM's Linux Upgrade Roadmap
petrus4 writes "IBM have put together a nine-part series on upgrading from various incarnations of Windows (NT in particular) to Linux. Although it's mainly aimed at corporate customers, it's a good read, and could help the Linux advocacy effort in general."
While some may consider it an upgrade (and pretty much everyone here at least would call it an upgrade), most average joe PC users might not. Afterall, he loses MS Office (and yes, I'm aware of the alternatives, but again, Joe Average might not), a lot of his games (WINE/etc might not be the best option), and everything he is familiar with.
We're assuming you already have Linux installed.
While the article does point you to linux.org for choosing a distro and whatnot, any good guide to switching to linux should at least cover the basic installation methods and what you'll need to think about before installing. Since distros have different installers, you don't want to get too indepth or focus on any one installer, but it should at least cover ideas that would be universal or at least common to getting ready to install linux.
WWJD.... for a Klondike bar?
The title of this post is a bit misleading--the series doesn't really tell you how to upgrade your system landscape from NT to Linux at all, it's merely a Linux tutorial for Windows users. I can see no corporate aspects discussed.
To start with, because the interface is so similar, plus "Hey it's just Windows!" comments from superiors means that few are taking the time to learn the intricate differences. (such as permissions and account handling)
Then you get the broken programs.
Then you get the boss who has [what he calls] critical data in an older version of Access that you must now move to [new] Access, which seems to be impossible in certain (read many) cases.
Or, I can implement an IBM-driven Linux-based solution that would force superiors to treat it differently, plus I would have more control over whether or not to continue on the upgrade path to future versions. Microsoft doesn't give me that. To stay secure, even using their loose definition, means continually upgrading, breaking software, data, and perceptions all the while sending them more money.
Oh, how I wanted to get out of that cycle at my last job. Now, I might be stuck implementing it, but at least I'm not responsible for the mess my superiors make trying to fall in line behind Microsoft.
Kudos to IBM for making it reasonably easy to know what's in store for those trying to get away from Microsoft.
"Are you on some kind of medication?"
"No"
"Well, you should be."
--Bean
What? That is sooo far from the truth. IBM's core business is based on services. In fact they are a bigger company (by revenue) then MS. In the end, IBM's global services will help you with whatever tasks you want. They will help you with MS solutions, Linux solutions and Unix solutions. IBM is in a great position, because no matter what, they can deliver their services on any platform. I think IBM is pushing Linux because they don't want to have to bend over for MS. I think most of the big companies are starting to get tired of bending over for MS with maybe the exception of Dell. To be able to truly leverage the MS Windows platform, you need to make some "partnership" with MS to be able to get undocumented features, API's, document formats and protocols. And MS drops those "partnerships" at the drop of a hat. And not only that, if MS thinks your core business is a big money maker, that "partnership" is over and they will "embrace and extend" your business out of the market with their own competing product. Look at all the Anti-virus and personal firewall companies now. With MS putting their own AV and personal firewall out, over the next 2-5 years, those companies will need to look for some other way to make cash since the home market will no longer need their software. So much for all those "partnerships". With Linux, all these large companies start on a level playing field and can add on top of that their "special sauce" and services to differentiate their business and we would have some great competition which means great products and technology advancing at a much faster pace.
If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land,
it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. -James Madison
For stability, XFree is much nicer; if an app goes down or spins it's wheels looking for a resource, the rest of the system doesn't care one whit.
Untrue. It's still fairly easy for a program using XFree86 to freeze or crash the entire Xserver, killing any other process using it.
It is especially easy for one program to accidently starve all others of input- this will happen, for example, if a Motif program freezes while a menu is pulled down. (In a case like that, a user with an alternative means of access can kill the offending process remotely- but only experts can do that, so this case must still be counted as a severe failure of interprocess protection)
The only best way to fix this problem would require major changes to the X11 protocol- probably big enough to deserve a major version increase up to R7. It should be possible for applications to survive the shutdown/crash of the display server they are using, and attach to another one later. (Protocols like VNC and RDE allow that to a certain extent, as do some TTY consoles; X11 should too)