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New Numbers on Linux Market Share Soon
prostoalex writes "New numbers on Linux market share are due this week. As far as global PC market is concerned, Gartner claims 5% of all PCs shipped this year ran Linux OS, although by the time the PCs were actually on the user's desk, only 2% of them run Linux. In the server world IDC estimates that Linux-powered servers comprise 28.3% of all server sales in 2004."
And how many people buy PCs with Windows on them, and immediately format the disk(s) and install Linux?
And here goes the danger of thinking that your family if somewhat representative. Or the slashdot community for that matter.
Write boring code, not shiny code!
Legal issues aside, most of us do not use Linux because it is cheaper, we use it because it is a superior operating system. Hell I already have the Windows OS that came with my PC (so it might as well be free for me as well). The fallacy that people only use Linux because they are cheap unemployed hackers is just that, a fallacy.
Mathematics is made of 50 percent formulas, 50 percent proofs, and 50 percent imagination.
They're a pet peeve of mine. It seems like what they do is interview CIO types about their opinions on various technologies and then turn that information into speculation about where the industry is going.
The result is a bunch of very credible sounding propoganda that reflects all the biases prevalent among their target audience: CIOs who need backing for their opinions. The CIOs naturally buy the reports and use them to pursuade other people in the company that the CIO's favourite pet project or technology is "industry best practices".
Gartner reports tell a lot about what people who worked in technology ten years ago (and have since moved to management) think. They consistently overlook trends that are bubbling under the surface, obvious practitioners, but not yet noticed by management.
If you want to know what your boss thinks about the industry, read Gartner. If you want to know about what's really happening, read the Usenet group that deals with the specific technology you're interested in.
It is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail. - Abraham Maslow
If I'm not mistaken, Dell offered business users a choice of some random flavor of Linux or FreeDOS preinstalled on their computers.
The logic was thusly: Licensing agreements force them to ship the computer with SOME OS on it, but a lot of businesses already have a Windows site license. Because the price of the non-windows Dells was slightly lower than effectively purchasing the license a second time, the companies order these computers with one of those two OSes preinstalled, then wipe the drive and install WinXP/2000.
So while there are a small number of users purchasing their computers with Windows pre-installed and migrating to Linux, that number is effectively buried by businesses doing just the opposite.
I still sometimes get a little pissy about articles/reports/surveys like this. Then after I spout my peace, I can't help but laugh. Linux has an advantage that most commercial desktops can't even approach. See, if I sell Windows, Solaris, Mac, or any of the other commercial operating systems, I know exactly how I'm doing.
We all "know" MS has 90-95% of the market. The numbers shipped, the dollar amounts, all point to this "fact". Same with the others.
Linux doesn't come close. From a dollar perspective, most distros pale compared to the others. From a "shipped" point of view, well, who counts little Linux shops in their numbers? This is about Dell and the big folks. And there is the dualboot/wipe issue.
So, why do I laugh? Because, using these statistics, nobody will realize how many people actually use Linux until it's right in their faces. In other words, theoretically, MS could still ship 90-95% of the market, only to turn around one day, and find out that only 10-20% of users actually use Windows (with a few more using it occasionally).
So, realisically, the better way of measuring this would be to measure the "other" sales related to Windows. Antivirus software wouldn't count, neither would Office software, or games. (These are necessities for dual booters, or things that might only be available for one OS.)
My pick would be the "cheapy" software that people tend to buy for their computers. The productivity stuff, or "make your computer easier to use" kind of stuff. Better yet, if you want a long term guage, try the "educational" aisle.
In other words, to guage an OS's success, compare it's market. Find something unusual about that OS, something that no other can share, and use that as a guage. Exact numbers don't matter, but trends can point out a lot.
If money/users seem to be disappearing from these markets, yet the hardware folks are actually doing pretty well, you might want to bump up your Linux/OSS numbers a little.
Microsoft has just released their much anticipated hands-free cordless mouse. Warning, it may hurt a little at first.