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Australian TCO Study: Linux Wins Again
An anonymous reader writes "An updated Linux vs Windows TCO study has found that a 250-seat company can end up saving 36 percent if it were to equip its users with the open source operating system and applications that run on it."
It would be interresting to see the results of a similar study when applied to a company with a much larger number of employees. Would the results be similar in a world-wide company with 10.000 employees located in different countries?
Isnt that pretty obvious ?? Why waste all the money in a study/survey and come up with such results. The only thing that we werent aware of was the "36%" value. Strange, thought it would be much more than that.
Note for slashdot bias fans: "Linux wins again" is actually in the story in the link, rather than a bit of spin on the part of everyone's favourite news site :)
http://www.cybersource.com.au/about/linux_vs_windo ws_tco_comparison.pdf
Linked to in the article.
but the Microsoft adverts on Slashdot keep telling me that Linux has a higher TCO...?!?
But you underestimate the staffing issues there. Firing all your MSFT IT guys and hiring new "LinuxCompatible" admins is a big pain for most companies. Of course you fire 3 Win32 admins and hire one Linux admin by default :)
For a new startup, a Linux desktop is invaluable , especially if you have a couple of in-house developers who use it regularly. That's where linux is slowly creeping into the desktop - not in the big companies with million dollar CTOs and kickbacks from Microsoft.Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
what if the company is a partner of the microsoft and is working on security issues in IE ? This is a generalised statement. It depends on the needs of the company. Neither MS nor the Linux group would be bothered by this.
It is very interesting the assumptions that they state have been made to bias this report in Microsoft's favour.
Wow!
This is like the 400th time the editors have posted the same boring news this week. It's all basically the same concept rehashed. Yes, Linux will save you $100,000,000. We get the point.
Every TCO study I have seen into the cost benefits of Linux over Windows, and vice versa, seem to all be flawed. They are always paid for by someone with a vested interest in getting one "answer" or another. How can they be taken seriously... it's like going to Sun and IBM and saying "Whose hardware is better?"... I wonder what answer each company would give.
"An updated Linux vs Windows TCO study has found that microsoft still sucks sucks sucks."
A random study indicates that the actual cost of the licenses themselves is roughly 36% of the total cost of setup and maintenance of 250-seat corporate deployment.
This study is crap. They admitted bias toward open source solutions, so they decided to take countermeasures by disregarding from things like viruses, and tripled the maintenance costs for Linux, ignoring research that found that Linux needs 82% fewer staff to maintain.
Then they found Linux 36% cheaper, and RHEL 27% cheaper than Windows.
Let me ask you. With all these factors that clearly distort the measurements, how can they come to such ridiculously accurate figures? What's the level of confidence?
It's almost as bad as the "Windows 14% cheaper" study from MS's get the facts campaign - only that one goes a bit further by not mentioning at all what they measured or how - I'm assuming this study does, although I can't get to the PDF.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
I'm a subscriber, you insensitive clod ...
Of course, I've seen VS.NET ads when browsing from some other computer .
The previous victory here
fifteen jugglers, five believers
I'm tired of all this TCO crap. I know that they are just doing it to offset some of the "studies" that Microsoft has funded, but I wish linux groups would focus on something else.
In fact, I wish Microsoft would focus on something else. It's funny, but *cost* isn't something that seems to be a strength of MS. They should focus on their strengths (like consistent interface that everyone knows, massive hardware support, number of applications available, good multimedia support, etc). They have a lot going for them. Why do they always focus on the thing that they don't have going for them!!!!
--End rant.
Don't count your messages before they ACK.
Linux has a much higher cost of 0wn3rship. Windows is much cheaper to 0wn.
Skippy has a point, but...
TCO studies are just standard business cost estimation models, with assumptions chosen by the authors of the study. Most of the models are pretty good, in theory, with sound reasoning and empirically-supportable construction. If they didn't work, or if they tended to provide misleading results when applied properly, why would businesses use them at all?
The problem is with the assumptions. Give me any financial model, from cost estimation to marketing models to arbitrage scenarios, and I can plug assumptions into it that will give any result you want. The models are fine, but the results are "the pits", as it were, unless the assumptions are carefully and honestly chosen.
This isn't to say that a TCO model, even with well-chosen assumptions, can provide an incredible amount of precision, but it CAN provide accuracy of result. That's what REALLY pisses me off about this article--they're quoting numbers to a whole percent, when it's pretty obvious that the precision of the result isn't anywhere near %10. If the article is to be believed, they're using intentionally pessimistic assumptions in order to bias the study against F/OSS, and still coming out with F/OSS on top. They're acknowledging that they can't bring supportable, precise assumptions into it!
So really, the study is saying "F/OSS is cheaper than MS by a good margin, but our precision is shitty enough that our actual number doesn't mean much. It might be %37 cheaper, it might be %80 cheaper, or it might be %1 cheaper--but we're pretty sure it's cheaper."
I guess it's like that old joke, where the museum guest asks the tour guide "How old are these dinosaur bones?" The guide says "The bones are 2 million and 10 years old." The guest, astonished, exclaims "That's amazing! How can we know the age so precisely, when it's that old?"
The guide responds, "Well, it was 2 million years old when I started working here, and I've been working here for 10 years."
Seriously, they really may be. They are mostly so powerful because their dominance has been self-sustaining. Everyone uses Word and Internet Explorer, because everyone else uses them, and documents are made with no concern for people with different software preferences. Word and IE tie people to Windows.
But the tide is changing. IE marketshare is falling. According to some reports, about a fifth of surfers use alteranitve browsers. That gives serious reason to make websites that work with other browsers (yes, that means you, gmail).
People are increasingly eager to abandon Windows. It's funny that lately, many of my non-CS friends have started learning to work with Linux, and it's mostly the people who think they can handle their computers who stick to Windows.
Of course, there are still applications that will tie people to Windows. However, if people actually attempt to switch, they will learn which applications and file formats cause problems, and be more open to using alternatives. I've seen this happen in several places.
Now, all this is not to say that Microsoft will go down (I personally believe they will at least survive, if not prosper). However, now that their dominance is starting to slip, there are serious opportunities for competitiors to establish themselves in the market.
And they're trying. The other day, I heard a Novell ad advocating open source on the radio. Even if they are the only one now, where one leads, others will follow.
What would really kill Microsoft's deathgrip would be if a competitor not only did the same things better, but also offered features that Microsoft doesn't. Two examples would be efficient use of metadata (a la BeOS; this is being worked on by all camps) and truly interactive web applications (like XAML promises; Java and XUL are just not good enough).
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
TCO is only useful as an internal evaluation tool; anyone using a TCO as a generalization of how things are is only something a complete idiot would do.
If a company get a lower TCO from doing whatever, it doesn't mean jack shit if someone else does the same thing, the resault will be different.
All these reports on TCO, well, you can shove them up the ass, 'cause that's where they belong.
In fact, I hate all people who do these idiotic things, especially Cybersource and the likes, because they obviously don't understand what they are doing; and yet, people still listen. Amazing!
Sorry if I come of as a flamer, but dammit, this needs to be said.
That site is crumbling under the slashdotting.
Since this is their second time around, you'd think they'd learned by now...
Cooper
--
Your cat has once again urinated out of bounds and
received an educational electric shock to the offending
organ as per your instructions, mr. Jerusalem.
- Transmetropolitan 16, House Security System -
Ah Yes, but in Soviet Russia, the point gets YOU! And in Soviet Russia, Using Linux allows Money to save YOU!
My Favourite Meme
I love the way the article just says '36%' and people discuss it seriously as if it were an actual statistic.
36% of IT costs? Of software costs? Of TCO over a year? Over 5 years? Of initial cost? Of OS cost?
Presumably the original (unloadable for me)
But anyway, yeah, back to discussing it really seriously.
I'm amazed it's not at least 38.675%. 36% seems awfully low -- in fact if they had used Mandrake it could probably have been 39.825%!
Whence? Hence. Whither? Thither.
In other news 100 percent of all percentages are 25 percent subjective. The remaining 76 percent are conjecture and personal speculation.
Si tacuisses philosophus mansisses. If you had kept quiet, you would have remained a philosopher.
Linux and open source is great, but things get very iffy in the transition to the work place. Almost all problems are tired to one factor, that the average computer user barely knows how to use a computer. They can check email, browse the internet, and type up some documents, but that is basically it.
All of us slashdot folk probably would have no problem adapting to a different OS, but the moment you take away that familiar setting from the average employee problems are going to arise. Few companies are going to take the initiative to train all their employees for a new OS, the cost and time involved is something that is not in their bottom line.
Software is the other questionable area. Sure there are able applications available to get most work done, but the larger variety and familiarity of products for Windows is one more reason to not change things.
Company size is a big factor, only a small one could pull this off with ease.
no its :Yes, Linux will save you... (put pinky to mouth) one MILLION dollars!
So why aren't we still using IBM products if no one ever got fired for buying them?
Did anyone ever take into account what it costs to install a critical patch on every system in the enterprise and have to reboot each machine afterwards? I guess you need large numbers to compute the costs of such an operation in bigger corporations.
Now, how often would you have to do that on which OS?
Tell that news to someone working in photoshop or dreamweaver or programming windows apps for living (something like 70% of programmers are developing for windoze now, today).
Yeah Linux needs bigger market share and it will do good to all of us but TCO for many companies tied to an OS by definition makes no sense at all.
It reminds me of the kids cartoon which has the 3 little ducks sitting round, playing, saying to each other in turn " I don't know Louie, what do you want to do?" , "I don't know Dewie, What do you want to do?" round in a circle. Except this time It's " I dont know if I should go against MS and earn more money for my company, What are you going to do?" etc...
What about a piece of shear genius showing most if not all OS's , how much they cost (initial and licences per year) and how much they cost or save in terms of productivity over time. I can guarantee you the saving of inital cost is only important to some companies but only in relation to the gains made by happier faster workers who can actually do thier work. Thats where the money is.
"Persistance is Fertile" - Me. I can quote myself if I want to.
I love you!
don't ever stop being you.
You asked.
o in-antipatent-push/2004/11/24/1101219585103.html
- subpoenas-on-Nmap-creator/2004/11/24/1101219605187 .html
c ked-to-plant-backdoor/2004/11/24/1101219605013.htm l
s -critical-flaw-in-JVM/2004/11/24/1101219583495.htm l
k s-MPAAs-bulldozer-strategy/2004/11/24/110121959502 8.html
e n-computer-spy-powers/2004/12/13/1102786981816.htm l?from=moreStories
o p-on-online-pirates/2004/12/13/1102786983643.html
- drives-new-services/2004/12/06/1102182189429.html
Big Guns join anti-patent push
http://www.theage.com.au/news/Breaking/Big-guns-j
FBI serves subpoenas on Nmap creator
http://www.theage.com.au/news/Breaking/FBI-serves
Sites attacked to plant backdoor
http://www.theage.com.au/news/Breaking/Sites-atta
Sun patches critical flaw in JVM
http://www.theage.com.au/news/Breaking/Sun-patche
Court blocks MPAA's 'bulldozer strategy'
http://www.theage.com.au/news/Breaking/Court-bloc
Police given computer spy powers
http://www.theage.com.au/news/Breaking/Police-giv
German swoop on online pirates
http://www.theage.com.au/news/Breaking/German-swo
Sharing drives new services
http://www.theage.com.au/news/In-Training/Sharing
That should keep you busy.
In this particular study, the biggest flaw is that decided that they had to pay full retail for the software installed on the machines (as opposed to getting a site license, which would cut costs dramatically; but as the study will later show, all they did was do a few searches on the internet to compile their information before they spent the 10 minutes it took to write this up). Not to mention that they absolutely must have the most expensive version of each package. Especially considering that they don't say what KIND of business it is they are trying to model. It also appears that every person in the company requires direct access to the database. Riight...
A secondary flaw is their costing of employees. They don't factor in differences between contracting and hires, benefits, etc. Nor do they mention any cost of living factors for the study. Apparently they did some dumbass search on Dice.com to arrive to this figure. Then they do some handwaving and say that anything that can't be handle by the staff will be handled by consultants.
And those consultants, boy howdy, will be used equally for both operating systems and cost exactly the same. No justification, no research.
I could keep going, but it would just be a waste of time.
take setting up a new website:
"oh - there's a GUI tool for that... if you installed the right package... did you pick gnome or KDE?... X isn't starting? it might just be easier to modify the .conf file with Pico... don't have that? try vi - httpd.conf should be under /etc/httpd - unless you..."
Any idiot (like myself) can fumble through doing this stuff on Windows.
Security? Go to Windowsupdate.com once a month and install all the patches. I wish I had as straight forward a solution for my Linux boxes.
don't get me wrong - I want to see open source crush microsoft - it's just there's some significant work that needs to be done on the usability / supportability front.
MirrorDot Copy8 5d793efecac38/linux_vs_windows_tco_comparison.pdf
http://www.mirrordot.org/media/61cff3191771a4162a
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Just because it's "Open Source" doesn't mean it's less expensive by any stretch of the imagination. People are more comfortable sticking with windows because they use this software at home.
The biggest short term win in TCO will come when the organisation is of such a size and complexity that it really only needs 1(one) committed open systems evangelist to drive through change. What slows down change in most organisations is the fact that most of the workers (and managers...) are not hugely intelligent - even in IT - and oppose anything that involves change or learning.
If this is right, OSS will only really start to gain momentum where smaller companies which are adopters gain a competitive advantage that enables them to grow faster than the competition. Although IT is only a few percent of the business, a large saving in IT can make a considerable difference to the net profit - but it needs to be a large saving as a percentage of IT costs to make a real impact.
This is good news for call centres and bad news for heavy industry. It would be a pity if OSS is associated in most people's minds with the modern version of cotton picking rather than high tech, but that could be the outcome.
Panurge has posted for the last time. Thanks for the positive moderations.
"Now, here are the facts as they're found by SEVERAL INDEPENDENT RESEARCH INSTITUTES:[...]
... That's a bold statement to do.
When a Company gets as big AND as dominant as Microsoft, there's no way of validating the indipendence of research anymore. Now, that's not like saying that the Borg entity bought off all studies, but no, I cannot accept the indipendence claim.
One fact nags me, tough. The worst mob to please should evidently be Indipendent internet service providers: they are more competent than the general public, they're in it for the money and not the mojo... a host of factor. So, how come that Apache server has triple the Market share of Microsoft?
"If a boss demands loyalty, give him integrity. But if he demands integrity, give him loyalty." (John Boyd, 1927-1997)
There was a time when 0wn3rship by spam bots were not even considered a problem because everyone was on dialup anyway. More recently with the coming of broadband and lots of stupid users to the internet - that has become the major headache (ie spyware, malware and trojans are local issues, spam bots are bigger).
It's a real cost when the ISP cuts you off or sends you a fat bandwidth billQuidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
THANK YOU for introducing me to adblock. I searched around for it and installed it. It makes a *huge* difference for me and now I've got an ad free slashdot (which seems to load noticibly faster now).
Thanks again!
One of the things these studies never take into account is productivity. I was a windows user for about 8 years and my productivity had completely platue'd out. For the last 6 months I have been using slackware and suddenly my productivity is increasing at a rapid rate - much more than I'd ever be able to do on a windows box.
But conversely, in Korea only old people use Linux.
The BeOS had a Find dialog that would let you search for files not only by name, but also by attribute. This a much more powerful feature than the traditional searching directory trees for files matching a name.
.NET is going to fill this void and provide an easy way to develop truly interactive web applications. However, I hope that, with all its potential, the open source community can produce a good solution before Microsoft releases theirs - I don't like dependence on any large corporation.
BeOS even took it a step further and allowed saved queries and live queries. This means that you could, for example, save a query that finds all files modified in the last 24 hours, and it would be automatically updated as time progressed and files were updated.
All of this could supposedly be implemented on modern filesystems (such as reiser4), but it's not quite there yet.
Then interactive web applications. Nowadays, many services that have traditionally been offered through client software are offered through web interfaces. This has the advantage that everyone with a web browser can use the service, and everyone would automatically be using the current version. There's no need to implement different versions for different platforms, no need to distribute the software, and a lot fewer compatibility issues to worry about.
The disadvantage is that web interfaces are very limited in their interactive abilities. In true client software, you can have things like search forms that display matching results as you enter text in the search box. Or a form could give you a list of cities depending on the state you chose. Or updates to the state can be displayed as soon as they happen, without the user requesting an update. Many of these and similar things are difficult or impossible to accomplish with HTML.
The gap is being filled. JavaScript can be used to make webpages more interactive. Flash allows adding interactive content to webpages. Java and ActiveX allows real applications to integrate with webpages to a limited extent. XUL aims to provide a full widget toolkit (as opposed to HTML's ad-hoc choice of widgets) to web applications. However, all of these fall short in one area or another, and there's a glaring absence of standardization (just look at how much trouble Gmail is having making a limited set of features available in a limited number of browsers).
I suspect Microsoft's XAML and
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
And being free is no influence?
Maybe if you'd read the article....
We've seen this before:
Here
There is another kind of evil which we must fear most, and that is the indifference of good men. -- Boondock Saints
That all depends really. The best tool always changes depending on the job that needs to be done. I would like to know some other veriables used in this study in additionto "250-seat".
Someone does a study and, Windows people clap...
Someone else does a study and, Gnu people brag...
What's with the inconsistencies?
Is it because we don't know all the veriables?
Or is it because the people who study this cannot be trusted for one reason or another?
Anyway, i don't think that any results of this kind are to be trusted. The results will not always be thesome. I suggest that everyone who's about to choose an operating system to really look at when their needs are and work from there.
Because those results aren't doing anyone any good.
An updated Linux vs Windows TCO study has found that a 250-seat company can end up saving 36 percent if it were to equip its users with the open source operating system and applications that run on it.
The study, by Melbourne-based open source firm Cybersource, found that even use of a commercial Linux distribution such as Red Hat Enterprise Linux, would result in 27 percent lower costs.
The study was first issued in April 2002. "We have now updated this report to accommodate the changes in both platforms. We have also extended the model to increase its relevance and accuracy," said Con Zymaris, chief executive officer of Cybersource.
The study covers the average requirements over a period of three years. Zymaris said the timeframe was chosen because the costs of upgrading had to be borne repeatedly in the case of Windows.
He said given the fact that the company deals in open source products, four aspects had been factored in to tip the scales towards Microsoft:
"The costing models include expenses such as workstations, servers, networking, IT staff, consultancy fees, internet service charges, file, mail and print servers, e-commerce servers, SQL and network infrastructure servers, internet and intranet servers, line-of-business software, desktop productivity applications, external training, printers as well as miscellaneous systems costs," Zymaris said.
TFA stated explicitly that Open Source _is_ cheaper, by quite a margin.
What a long, strange trip it's been.
TCO isn't all that matters. Sometimes the prejudices and biases of the executives making the decisions matter a whole lot more.
How am I supposed to fit a pithy, relevant quote into 120 characters?
Hi all guess what? The news is not new at all. The press release on the site is dated 2002-04-26 (look http://www.cyber.com.au/cyber/press/linux_vs_windo ws_tco_comparison.html).
Actually I had got the same problem trying to reach the PDF doc, but I think the Australian "The Age" failed.
Saludos
Stefano
That's the real problem.. Just like Real programmers can write Fortran in any language, Windows users can f*ck up in any OS. No matter how much you think you've got it covered.
Switching OS's gives new and exciting potential for creative new ways to f*ck something up!
TCO is a PHB metric. Managers who don't understand the role of technology in their organization view technology as a necessary evil and want to keep the cost as low as possible.
Before looking at TCO, managers should looks at:
- how much IT increases productivity
- how much IT cuts costs in other parts of the company
These metrics are notoriously hard to measure while TCO is mostly contained within the IT budget and so is easier to calculate. An astute office politician can claim some benefits just by reducing his IT costs while ignoring the effects on the rest of the organization.However, the big gains are outside IT. If IT offers a mere 1% increase in productivity in the organization as a whole it would dwarf any savings in IT costs. If IT isn't providing those types of benefits annually, it is doing something very wrong.
Return on investment, not TCO, is a better measurement of value. Businesses that think they can cost-cut their way to success are generally doomed anyway.
My fault!/ linux_vs_windows_tco_comparison.pdf
The press page was note updated.
The study is really news: i downloaded it from their mirror site http://www.cybersource.com.au.nyud.net:8090/about
Regards
If you get past that, the inclusion of Fedora Core 2 as an OS option should stop you in your tracks.
And if you manage to get past that, the needless use of, for example, enterprise versions of Windows 2003 Server should be the final indicator at how flawed their methods are.
But all those impartial TCO reports on microsoft.com always come out in favour of Windows having a lower TCO, so how can this be right?!
Am I the only one wondering when we're going to see a TCO study involving the use of Mac OS? Surely there has to be some cost savings in reduced downtime and administration with using a Mac...
well, anyways... i'm going to totally ignore the weird creepy brainwashed feeling i always get when i read a bunch of microsoft marketing hype reiterated to sound like an Opinion (tm).
and just going to point out: that bedroom coder Thorwaldes who publicly admits that he is in fact A HACKER???
you seem to be ignoring two things here..
1. hackers (real hackers) are really damn smart.
2. you obviously don't see that when Linus uses the term hacker he means it in a completely different way.. ie, it just means a guy who is a really good programmer, who happens to not give a f*** about being "certified".
anyways, glad to here there are still good old fashioned people out there who are willing to believe the marketing hype. what would the world be without you?
ps. what the hell is an MS Office Specialist? I was assistant teacher for a course in MS Office on year, does that make me a Specialist?
I have heard of a report that Novel did before its migration of many/all of its systems to Linux (aparently) They saw a much greater saving than this report. Can anyone shed any light on that?
as opposed to the comparision of w2k3 on an ordinary server against Linux on a Z series mainframe??? Microsoft got slammed for that one in the UK
Donald 'Duck' Dunn: We had a band powerful enough to turn goat piss into gasoline.
The IT Staff has a budget That gets renewed once a year. In order to migrate from Windows to Linux they will need to ask for a lot of money for the migration, port over all their written custom applications, Train employees on the new software, Install all the systems. Needless to say a large undertaking, Now try to explain to you boss that you will need an additional 100k in your budget to move to a different platform. And you are not going to explain this 30% cost savings to them because if you do then you will get 30% less budget the next year. If you are a starting company then Linux may look like a better solution because to starting costs with linux is less then windows because you don't need all these licenses.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
I've worked in IT for 25 years. I firmly believe that the best system for your company is completely situational. I can easily imagine a situation where an AS/400 is by far the best choice.
What I would like to know is: do these TCO studies - or any other such pop-media swill - have any influence? I've never known these studies to be influential; but maybe others have?
You're telling me that OSDN can't support this website without banner ads? Have you checked to see what advertisers are paying for banner ad "eyeballs" these days? Not very much. I doubt the ad revenue contributes much more than statistical noise to OSDN's revenue.
I'd rather pay than be annoyed and inconvenienced by banners and popups.
HI, I know it's easy to migrate all the email to imap and postfix or sendmail, but what are you doing about the groupware, folder sharing etc.. functions of exchange?
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
They don't realise that other countries use . instead of , and visa-versa for numerical denominations.
"So why aren't we still using IBM products if no one ever got fired for buying them?"
Because Microsoft managed to introduce a shift into the buying paradigm. Just analize what "noone is fired by buying IBM" really means: that the technician was the one choosing what to buy (and it *really* made sense). Microsoft focused not in technicians but in "high rank decition-makers"... clueless (regarding IT technology) by definition. Once it is the boss the one who decide what the IT platform will be, it won't be fired no matter what he chooses (for the very reason he won't fire himself). In the very end it is that *you* (the technician) can be fired because of what seems to be a bad decition, but the boss won't ever be fired because of the same reason, so you won't be fired if you're bound to make a "false" decition if you choose whatever your boss has already made his mind up (and that usually meant IBM twenty years ago, and means Microsoft nowadays).
TCO studies are always based upon conditional
variables that can diverge widely across
different companies. They were designed for
PBHs who can't figure out their own company
requirements. And like any "economic" study
these days, those that sponser the study expect
to see a specific resultant conclusion.
Depending upon which side of the F/OSS line that
you are standing on, TCO studies all boil down
to being "Faith-Based".
YMMV (drastically!)
Identify the functionality that each of those provides and WHY it is necessary for an administrator.
Only then can you compare/contrast the two platforms.I don't see anyone claiming that.
Here's an example: Package management.
On Debian, it is ultra-simple. And every file belongs to a package and that is controlled by the package management system.
On Windows, there isn't any system-based link between the files and what package installed them. Any package can update any file.
This becomes important when you're managing multiple workstations. With Debian, it is trivial to verify files to packages and packages between machines to troubleshoot a problem.
With Windows, it is far more difficult and usually results in the proverbial reboot, reload, re-install.
I guess they are talking money -- the article never really says what that 36% is 36% *of*.
My guess is that Microsoft will point to all the stuff they didn't bother to measure and chant "flawed study" until the headache goes away.
I wonder how much saving accrues from not spending a week diving in the docset to find an answer to a single question that should come up all the time?
But the majority of your costs are tied up in administration, not the price of software.
If Apache didn't work, you couldn't give it away.
More on this: in the eighties the tipical IT-guy rant was the problems he had with managment/bean counters regarding getting alotted the money they needed to support their projects/toys. Nowadays the rant is usually how they have to deal with the last dumb purchase management/bean counters impossed over IT staff.
With this paradigm shift came two important changes: one was going from actually useful tools to pretty colorful tools (since the buyer didn't really understood what the tool served and how actually integrated into their environments you couldn't count on technical excelence to sell your product but you needed to make it candy-pretty).
Once management/bean counters went into this bussiness, savvy tech guys became quite disturbing since they could tell you how idiot you were thrasing big money on substandard tools, so the preferred choices shifted even more into the eye-candy even-a-monkey-can-use-it ones. This way you can hire people that is even more idiot than you so you are not confronted with your ill choices on a retro-feedbacked spiral (the clueless the managers/technicians, the easiest for a heavy-marketed company to sell their candy-like useless "tools", the clueless the managers/technicians become... up to date).
You have to look at who did the study, a firm that makes their living by pushing open source ware. That's like putting stock in a Microsoft TCO study. I am surprised to see Linux firms (and Slashdot) stooping to the low levels that MS and others have done in heralding studies that they conducted themselves. It means NOTHING to the people who are not currently using that product. They take one look at who conducted the study and throw it in the trash. To soap box this 'study', like slashdot is doing, does nothing but undermine the cause they say they are fighting for.
Come on, I want to see this stuff (Open Source) take off, but not with tactics like these. This will make Open Source slathered with the same marketing nonsense that we have to plow through to buy the right commercial ware. The beauty of Open Source has been that there is not all of the 'puffing up' of the products capabilities as in commercial software. "Yea we can do that too!" type of stuff, only to find out that there are extra costs buried in the implementation and/or it can only really do that if you also buy this. When Open Source ware takes that path, it seriously degrades the believability of the product line.
We've looked at Linux time and time again, and we've found that it works well as database and web servers, but we can't use it for much else.
This may change with Novell's Enterprise Server comming out in January.
Central user management with single sign-on? It's a pain in the butt right now on Linux. How does that impact TCO?
What about all our apps that don't run on Linux? Speech to Text stuff that always falls apart in Wine, special educational packages that aren't supported on Linux? That doesn't help the TCO analysis either.
We've got lots of hardware that won't EVER work in linux - network scanners, copiers and printers, raid controllers, CD-burners, network fax machines...etc. This isn't really Linux's fault - it's the hardware manufacturer's fault - but the TCO problem falls squarely on "Linux". Should we pay BIG bucks to replace all that hardware so we can save a little money on the OS?
These studies aren't very good for anything except "rallying the troops".
Those MS TCO studies that claim you only need 2 or 3 guys to support 15,000 windows users all over the world are also good for a laugh as well.
-ted
Companies. Even the best companies, hire humans, and whilst they can draw in superior management while they are still small, as they grow, they have to promote in order to motivate. Also, sheer numbers force mediocrity: the cream is already taken, or else is needed higher up in the company structure.
Regardless of the advantage that better companies have over inferior ones, they're still faced with the same (aggregate) workforce, and as redundant management are redeployed into other companies (possibly the one[s] that defeated the inferior one), the workforce still has to suffer the same degree of inferiority, as the same people have simply been shuffled around.
The rest of what you write about empiricism reveals that your faith in the market is too strong, for the market is not perfect, although it is usually better than government. In this case the market does not eliminate inferior management, but simply moves it to where it will do the least strictly economic harm. People will still have to suffer the same degree of awful management, it's just that they'll be people in more economically marginal jobs. In fact, economic efficiency is likely to result in more people suffering inferior management, as the same situations that make in worthwhile to hire superior management also can afford not to overburden that management, so that they are better able to make good strategic decisions. This means: fewer workers. This must imply that fewer people have good managers.
Read Dilbert: it is based upon empirical observation.
Wikileaks, no DNS
These TCOs never fail to completely drop any context which might create a questionable result. As Samuel Clemens famously wrote, there are lies, damned lies, and statistics... Microsoft's familiars dutifully ignore Windows' shortcomings and Linux's daemons faithfully turn a blind eye to Linux's. How is this useful for anyone except those who view OSes like football teams or wrestlers to root for?
I'd like to see some anecdotal reports from companies who actually took any of the parade of TCO recommendations from both camps' PR generators and switched, tracked over 6 months. Both ways, Linux->Windows and vice-versa. I tend to think in both cases you would waste a lot of money and create a lot of irate and confused users. You could switch from the worst system available to the Platonic ideal of what a system should be and not change that. There's a reason COBOL is still in use, and it isn't low TCO.
"If you give me 20k more this year, by next year all new hires will be trained in the Linux OS we choose to install and support. Furthermore, all new systems will be built on a platform that encourages interoperability instead of hindering it, like Microsoft Windows products will.
"The installation of new Linux-based PCs will lower the cost of hardware necessary to run said machines, while providing a compatible link with Windows machines, Macintosh machines, BeOS, all *nixes, and whatever OS suits your needs in the future.
"With this gradual migration to Linux, we will have the ability to spend more money on our valued employees who would be able to develop a customized and customizable open platform suited directly to our needs instead of outsourcing our software budget to Redmond, Washington
--------
How's that? Try it.
Please stop stalking me, bro.
... in html...
U J: www.cyber.com.au/cyber/about/linux_vs_windows_tco_ comparison.pdf+linux_vs_windows_tco_comparison.pdf &hl=en&client=firefox-a
http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:YQZRl1WHkt
-- Computers are not intelligent. They just think they are.
Agreed, partial studies make the product look bad to you and me. The difference with Open Source is that we can look inside and see what it really is, and if we don't, someone else will and cannot be forbidden to tell us all about it. Besides, for $0.00 you can just try it and see.
So, we can find out what the product is really like and ignore fluffy "studies". Meanwhile, however, the decisions are often made by people who believe in "studies", so having some that promote what you already know by more reliable means couldn't hurt when you are looking for management buy-in.
If you have a good manager, your professional opinion should be enough. If you have the other sort, and you need Linux, to be allowed to do what you know is right will require a pro-Linux snowjob just as heavy as the anti-Linux snowjob coming from elsewhere. You don't have to believe either one as long as the decision is correct. That's a rotten way to have to do business, I know.
Master Fnog: 'Very well. But I have the will of the warrior, so the battle is already over, the winner? Me!'
What about lost productivity when users have to start using unfriendly linux applications?
In the Netherlands the departments and several cities want to make a deal with Microsoft for 245.000 desktops for about 147 million euro for the next 5 years, while parliament has approved a bill to use open source as much as possible. Opposition to this deal is beginning to grow.
Just change their job description under them, like it says {in very tiny print} in your company handbook that you reserve the right to do ..... Learning how to use and admin a Linux system most certainly comes under the heading of "perform any other duties assigned to you by your manager". Then you aren't, strictly speaking, making them redundant -- and so don't need to provide a severance package. If they don't walk out of their own free will {which would negate any obligation on your part to provide anything more than a reference} but stay on and do particularly badly, then you can put them on verbal warning {then written warning, then final written warning} for incompetence. If it goes all the way to dismissal, you don't even need to provide them with a reference. At least, not one that will stand in their favour with future employers .....
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
"The big advantages with Windows infrastructure are the tools for managing lots of machines (eg: Group Policy) and the ease of integration."
As found recently by our Department of Work and Pensions?
They managed 80 000 workstations, removing them all from access to their servers, in a way not simply reversible.
Convenience is good, but so is robustness. linux may currently err on the side of robustness, or more precisely I think has had robustness engineered to a more advnaced state than convenience by now. I suspect it is easier to add convenience to robustness than to add robustness to convenience.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4044085.stm
Step One:
Introduce OSS packages, one at a time. You can start with putting numerous, scary articles on the desk of the PHB -- one article a day, for a week or two -- which point out one of the main reasons for the rapid move toward Firefox. Next, introduce GanttProject, or some such FREE tool. When the time is right, introduce OpenOffice.org -- as a way to easily create PDF files, for example.
All these run on Windows. Just keep picking other packages which will run as well on Windows as they do on Linux. Introduce these products covertly, as well, one employee at a time. Get some of the early-adopters to help spread the news about the benefits of these "new tools" and help with training.
Step Two:
Move as many servers and services as you can to Linux. Use the best anti-virus, anti-spam software available, for example.
Step Three:
Brag about how much money and time you're saving the company, every chance you get. Make your message so sugarcoated, the PHB and gang get sick of hearing it. But realize: Money talks.
Then, really turn up the heat...
Step Three:
Start dropping articles on the PHB's desktop which address:
* BSA Audit issues
* Bruce Perens' short take on why OSS "makes sense" (he's a terrific writer!)
* Security - spyware, loss of productivity, etc.
Step Four:
Write a proposal. Do your homework. Make real sense of the numbers. Put them in simple terms. Show that migration to an OSS desktop will be painless because everyone's already using so many OSS tools.
Most importantly: Make sure your conclusions are about "risk reduction". Saving money is important, but reducing business risk is king.
If OSS is going to beat the crap out of the competition, it has to show how much business risk it can save -- as well as money. It has to show how much of a risk to business Microsoft and other closed headaches are to one's business success.
In fact, TCO isn't where it's at, folks. Screw "savings". Business value (what the developers/integrators and manufacturing people bring to the market) and business risk. Those are the real material of business.
Bottom line: TCO, "savings" and "free" need to take a back seat to productivity and risk reduction.
It might be %37 cheaper, it might be %80 cheaper, or it might be %1 cheaper--but we're pretty sure it's cheaper."
Anyone else read this as "It might be percent 37 cheaper, it might be percent 80 cheaper, or it might be percent 1 cheaper--but we're pretty sure it's cheaper"?
as opposed to the comparision of w2k3 on an ordinary server against Linux on a Z series mainframe??? Microsoft got slammed for that one in the UK
Then don't the authors of this study deserve a bit of slamming?
woohoo!
:) -- akin to the well-known image of the suggestion box attached to the top of a shredder...
This is *exactly* the mortar I need to crack these Microsoft zombies in the provincial government. I've sent numerous emails around, particularly to the director of I.T. and, lately, to the Executive Team's shiny new "idea box", the latter of which responded and are seriously reviewing it... proving once again if you just get the right idea to the right person...
Though when they announced the idea box, I immediately sent my email which subsequently bounced
Use Groupwise on novell servers. Install windows groupwise clients.
Get rid of ms office and install OO on windows desktops.
use NDS with windows client for your directory.
Install ifolder on windows desktops and instruct users to put all their documents in their ifolder.
Once the users are comfortable with groupwise, ifolder, and OO switch them over to linux running the same apps.
Smart and painless. The idea is to keep them on windows on the desktop until the end.
Note that products like NDS and groupwise are not open source, they are proprietary novell products.
evil is as evil does
I trust a TCO study as much as I trust a car salesman. There are lies, damn lies, and TCO studies :) That goes for any TCO, regardless of whether it's pushing Linux or Windows or something else.
Any idiot (like myself) can fumble through doing this stuff on Windows.
I left windows 4 years ago because quite frankly, Linux was easier to use.
As far as computers go, I know some things, but I don't know other things. All I know is that hard drives come in different sizes. I never understood the other numbers they throw at you. I believe that's a good thing. I subscribe to the Einstein school of philosophy - keep things as simple as possible.
My company "awarded" me with a Windows laptop. I can't figure the thing out. Just yesterday I was browsing and the thing turned off. There was a flash of a blue screen. Yes, I believe this is the latest version of XP, with all the patches. I don't personally do the patches - the laptop is remotely administered. I still have problems with various things that are easy in Linux. (I had to install GViM and Mozilla and Open Office to get working applications. Word crashes too often for my tastes. No, I do not turn off my laptop at night. Am I supposed to do that? Why can't I leave my work unsaved and open over the weekend? It works in Linux? I've had my browser open for the past three months without a problem on Linux!)
Even then, I can't figure out how to get IM working properly. In the end, I just turned it off. It still comes on once in a while. I thought windows was supposed to be easy? Why is something simple like disabling IM so difficult?
The thing boots up and tells me I have to install an update. Only I don't have administrator privileges. Do I want to install it anyway? How should I know? It doesn't matter either way. If I press any button, it says "Can't install". This is easier?
Every once in a while, the thing gets in a weird state. I have to run a specific command to get IVPN working from the console. So I hit "Run..." and then type in "cmd" but nothing happens this time. What's wrong? Why isn't IE coming up? Maybe I can see the processes: CTRL-ALT-DEL. Why is that window coming up? Mozilla is still working, so my computer isn't toast... I thought this was supposed to be easier!
The radical sect of Islam would either see you dead or "reverted" to Islam.
These types of reports come out all the time on this topic and others. Whoever pays or commissions them always wins. People take the same set of facts and spin them to fit their agenda. It's like a really good debater can take any side of an argument and do well.
I read these things then check the background of the of the author and the source of the article. After that decide how much of the report is credible.
"Begin Sarcasm Type=Extreme "
AHA!! I note that even an Open Source Company ADMITS that it takes 3 times as much money for consultants to support Linux as Windows. This "proves" that Linux is trouble prone!
"End Sarcasm "
I wonder how long it will be before the above version of the study appears on M$ 'Get the facts' page. After all if they can pervert PJ's (now terminated) involvement in OSRM, they can put spin on anything.
I expect there will be a breaking point in the next few years - maybe Longhorn will be it. It will take another 5-10 years, but MS will slowly stop selling new stuff and start foundering as everyone moves to open source.
Another ten years, half their "warchest", and three presidents later, they will rise from their ashes like a phoenix, actually innovating and producing worthwhile stuff.
It seems to be a cycle with companies like that - their hubris gets the best of them, but since they have the money to wait out the dark times, they emerge as a large company with large resources *and* a belated sense of ethics (if only to keep their customers happy)
Last post!
Did you try Google's "HTML"-lized version?
but *nix is not as great when you have machines that are only occasionally connected to the network (travelling laptops).
So, a well designed Debian network would have the workstations managed one way (remote mount of one thing all the way up to LTSP) and laptops managed a different way.
Fortunately, the modular nature of Debian allows for very small update packages.
For more information, see the section on TCO in "Why OSS/FS? Look at the Numbers!". Basically, TCO is very sensistive to the specific environment and requirements. It's clear, though, that there are many cases where OSS/FS does have a lower TCO.
- David A. Wheeler (see my Secure Programming HOWTO)
Novell-Suse
OR
Redhat
Inquiring investors want to know!
Now I'm the grandest Tiger in the Jungle!
It's two years old, but interestingly, the TCO advantage of Mac OS X over Windows is... 36%! perhaps this magic 36% is some sort of universal "Windows lameness" constant that these studies are revealing...
Mac OS X Gartner study (via archintosh)
Open Office sucks.
Pot. Kettle. Black.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I'm a former employee of Cybersource, as well as the person who was tasked with creating the first draft copy of this TCO (a much earlier version back in 2002?).
While Cybersource is a firm that promotes and specialises in Open Source, a vast amount of the work their consultants undertake is on propietry systems, whether that be Microsoft, Sun or other *nix based systems. The TCO is in no way biased, because as we all know, fudged results always get found out and that would do nothing but damage their business.
Because Cybersource work so much with Linux transitions however, they have seen the actual results for themselves (and their business relies on this to be true http://www.cybersource.com.au/services/cybersource _open_source_strategic_planning_services.html ). Of course they're going to release a TCO if over a decade in the industry has shown them the benefits.
I won't bother going any further, because unlike many other /.'ers, I really don't care much for flames.
SH
Note: The above are my personal views and opinions, and are in no way an official representation on behalf of Cybersource.
Yes, but you do have to figure in the cost of the second monitor and bandwidth that is keeping his right hand busy...
It is also recommended you don't put him in a cubicle...
http://members.iinet.net.au/~cybersrc/linux_vs_win dows_tco_comparison.pdf
And would you believe it, we didn't feel the slashdot effect. We were already at meltdown from all the news sites that published it *on time*.
cheers!
There are 10 kinds of people; those who know ternary, those who don't, and those now hunting for a dictionary.
Well, it seems upgrade do cause problems.
Documented, even.
60,000 computers.
At once.
Well, I'm sure Windows doesn't really need a modern package management system. Nope. Not at all.
60,000 computers. Wiped out with one upgrade.
We use Dell computers, Windows XP and Office 2003.
Our servers are Windows 2003 and we use Exchange 2003.
I control what devices connect to our network.
No one has local admin rights, and IT staff don't have domain admin rights.
Patches are applied when needed.
AV is updated every hour.
Mail is scanned by numerous filters.
I use debian at home, and have a few debian boxes at work for IT use.
IT came in under budget again (2nd year) and I got a bonus and a rise.
Why would I *want* to switch ?
To prove a point ?
A badly run linux site will fail just like a badly run windows site.
There are many linux people who do not know how to use windows or to admin windows properly.
Put me infront of an unfamilier OS and watch me stuff it up.
I already have to put up with "Daaarling, I'm on the train." while on the Eurostar. ;)
Now it will be "Daaarling, I'm on the plane."
Not much difference, but just as annoying.
It'll be just like the 80's when mobile phones were new and people had to call and say "Hey, you'll never guess where I'm calling you from!"
RebateFX.com - Spread rebates for Forex traders
my vision for a soft migration would install linux and vmware on each and every desktop, keep the existing m$ installation but run it inside a virtual machine. that way, every user can continue to work with his well-known office applications, but now, the windows desktop is just one window among others. and linux is just a click away...
and think about the benefits that virtual machines offer: take a snapshot of the virtual harddisk, then let users install whatever they want (within reason). caught a malware? just revert back to the snapshot. this can be as fast as a single click.
Don't you mean 'infinity' rather than 'by quite a margin' - if it's really 'free' that is?
@peetm
I have customers that would love to be able to leave MS behind for good. But there always seams to be one key thing stopping them. Being small companies (no more than 15 to 20 seats) nearly all they do their own accounting and I am yet to find any linux-based and readily available professional, multi-user accounting packages of the calibure of MYOB. Now I know that MYOB is not the best out there, but speaking from personal experience... even a monkey with no accounting knowledge can use it to keep accurate books without stuffing things up.
Enlighten me please if there is something out there.
Karma? Hey I just call it as I see it.
I don't disagree with what you are saying about what the company does. BUT... There is no way you can convince me that the report is not biased. It has to be biased based on the facts alone. There is no way that any company who expects to survive until the next year is going to release any report that states that the work they do is pointless. In this case, migrating people to Linux or Open Source. If the 'study' found the facts to be in MS's favor do you think they would be published? Not if the CEO wants to be employed very long. It simply is not going to happen. Therefore the report is biased on a high level at the least. The other type of bias, that I feel, is involved in this 'study' is the purposeful disinclusion of numbers that should be included, such as the cost of the migration itself, (what is a company going to charge for the migration?). The second, and very large, cost is going to be retraining of the staff that supports the installation. The company that is migrating is assumed to have a staff that is at least semiknowledgable about their current installation. They will have to learn the 'new' stuff somewhere and at someone's expense. The other cost is that of subsequent software installations. What is the extra cost of trying to get the high level specialized package you need to work in your new environment? Will it even work at all? Is there a substitute that I am forced to use with a new middleware layer to interpret it into my new environment, (likely not). These are costs that have all been convieniently left out of the 'study'. Am I going to have to hire two more people because the ones I have are now tied up trying to figure out if new things are going to work right? There are so many variables that it is not acceptable in the board room or in a VP's office to present and use a study done by a firm such as Cybersource as justification. YOu would be fired or laughed out of a job. If not, then I would be concerned as to whether the company you work for is going to be around very long, because the decision making process is obviously broken.
I've used "apt-get update" and I've used "apt-get upgrade". Many times.
But I've never used "rm -rf".
You are still talking about patching, right?
Here, let me refresh your memory on what you were talking about: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=132574&cid=11
I still think that natural selection acting upon companies is less potent than you imply. Internal mechanisms can only go so far in fixing human flaws, and the marketplace determines the distribution of the managment workforce to a very much greater extent than its membership.
I agree that internal mechanisms will help make a company more sucessful regardless of management, but a successful company tends to make more profit per head; this means that they will be underrepresented in terms of workforce for their market penetration, so that good practice is not strongly selected for. Rather, satisficing is selected for, as that is the behaviour that distinguishes survival from outright failure.
Internal mechanisms are in any case interpretted by current management. The management workforce is not a fast-changing pool, and it is being renewed by those that poor companies promote as much as it is by good ones.
I agree that companies do slowly learn as entities, but satisficing behaviour makes learning a slow process.
Wikileaks, no DNS
That's where I come in. For a mere $600, I will sell you a typewriter. The TCO is guaranteed to be less than that of Linux or Windows.
You'll save tons of money! Buy a typewriter from me!
What's that you say? TCO isn't all that matters anymore? There's a benefit component there as well? I'm shocked!
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent
No. Even if an open source solution was completely free (which is absurd - you have all kinds of startup costs in training, etc) it would be cheaper by the TCO of the proprietary solution.
What a long, strange trip it's been.