Linux, Inc.

An anonymous reader sends in a link to Businessweek talking about the business of Linux, and the increasing threat to Microsoft's operating system monopoly.

Comments

Wonder why they left out....

[GillBates0]

The software is making its way into everything from Motorola (MOT ) cell phones and Mitsubishi robots to eBay (EBAY ) servers and the NASA supercomputers that run space-shuttle simulations.

Google. That would've helped to shake up the PHBs a little more effectively, given this is BusinessWeek.

You know...

[BJZQ8]

You know something must be up if BillG himself is shuffling off to South America to persuade the government to lose interest in open software...

Unfortunately true....

[GillBates0]

but with his wild long hair and odd behavior, he doesn't fit in with the suit-and-tie crowd. During speaking engagements, Stallman often adopts the persona of "St. IGNUcius," donning a robe and a halo made of a computer disk.

Having RMS walk in in his St. Ignucius getup is enough to make anybody lose their lunch...not just the suit and tie crowd.

Re:It's not the business model...

[KiltedKnight]

Buying decisions are made by suits, though. Most CIO's are former CFO's working towards becoming COO's. They don't give two shits about what "hackers" like.

Unfortunately, they tend to do this on the golf course with their other CEO, CIO, CFO, and CTO buddies, instead of asking the people who have to actually support the applications and systems. They want all the stuff that looks flashy, etc. The techies, unfortunately, then have to figure out ways to make the stuff work.

Many years ago, I went to a company where they wanted to have several applications talk to each other. Two of them ran on Solaris, two of them ran on Windows. One used Oracle as the back-end, another used DBASE. How did they come up with the combination of COTS stuff? They asked the users to pick which software package they wanted for which particular function. The problem is, nobody ever really evaluated what could be done with each of them. It turned out that one of the Windows apps couldn't be made to talk with anything else because of the memory control module. The database stuff it used wanted to do its own memory allocation, and it interfered with the TCP/IP sockets library's ability to do its necessary memory allocation. I didn't last long there, because I basically made my opinions known and they didn't want to hear that they made some really bad decisions.

When going for my RHCE, the instructor was telling us that RedHat basically came into existence because for Linux to be a viable business solution, companies wanted to be able to point fingers at someone to say, "You... FIX THIS!" They didn't want to file bug reports and wait for someone to get around to it. They wanted someone to be there at their beck-and-call, providing the necessary support. This kind of thinking is what actually helped Linux become a viable business solution.

Re:Linux Desktop Thoughts...

[stratjakt]

What's stopping someone from writing an entire environment like OS X from the ground up, around and on top of Linux, and creating an OS X like environment that is as complete and modern as either OS X or Windows?

Nothing at all. Get started, I wish you luck on that.

IMO, something as polished as OSX or Windows can only be created in a corporate setting. There are too many egos wanting different things, it'd be impossible to get a team of 100 coders to all agree to work towards the same set of goals. One guy wants X, another wants Y.

There comes a point when you need someone to say "we're going with X, like it or find another job."

There's more than enough talent to get the job done, but not nearly enough leadership, or talented people who are willing to volunteer their time to take orders to create something - even if it's not exactly what they want to create.