Linux And the Enterprise Environment

aword writes "Computerworld cites that private financial services sector have moved to Linux more than any other sector. This too is mostly on the server side only. Enterprisewide linux deployments for desktop users have been few and far between. From the article." From the article: "On the server side, perhaps no single industry has tested Linux's enterprise mettle more than the financial services sector. Companies were facing mounting pressure to cut costs at the turn of the millennium. The Internet bubble was about to burst. Prices were fluctuating wildly. Order volume and data traffic were spiking in the wake of the electronic trading boom. Revenue was not."

Comments

Makes sense

[Work Account]

The coders and engineers working for finance (Wall St. especially) are some of the best in the world and the best salaries in the world.

They obv. know what they're doing and have chosen Lunix.

Re:Makes sense

[The_Quinn]

...have chosen Lunix.

Is this that the mythical version of Linux that runs the moon?

Re:Makes sense

[blue_teeth]

Think Enterprise Computing when you hear SAP. SAP AG are gung-ho on Linux and open source database MySQL MaxDB. SAP have committed themselves on Linux (with pride..that's what their site says). I've worked on SAP on traditional Unices and also on Linux. Many IT Managers (worth their salt) are adopting SAP on Linux. Works like a charm on Mission Critical ERP environment.

www.sap.com/linux

Cheers
BT

Re:Makes sense

[buro9]

Not a loose set of assumptions or generlisation at all.

The majority of those I know working at financial institutions in the city of London and Canary Wharf work with VB6, with means Windows.

I've seen a little of what they do when I get sent client site, and it's not pretty at all.

There may be a few people in there that are as brilliant as you suggest, but I would say that it is more likely that Linux has been chosen as a cheap alternative to some of the UNIX distros and that this is mostly a licensing saving rather than a conscious choice by developers to have Linux.

Don't underestimate the power of a CTO who is fearful of losing his job (they all are) to make decisions to save money... be that a switch to Linux or to outsource your job.

Re:Makes sense

[ergo98]

The coders and engineers working for finance (Wall St. especially) are some of the best in the world and the best salaries in the world.

Bwahahahahahahahaha.

I worked in IT for a large bank (it's a really Royal Canada Bank) here in Canada for a while, and let me say that it was largely the dregs of the industry (yeah I know - I was there too. I took the job for very specific needs at a specific period of time, which it served admirably). A bunch of bottom-feeder career IT people willing to suck on whatever is stuffed in their mouth to keep working for the same corporation for the rest of their life (which is just sad). Mega projects that were just so poorly thought out and ridiculously executed that it was hard to get up in the morning, knowing that you're just pissing in the wind (which was true). The CEO recently, from the comfort of his mega (and clearly undeserved) pay and exclusive clubs, dictated a large push to hire primarily recent immigrants, undoubtedly because they know they can pay far less.

You would see things like moronic geography majors, with little or no real technical knowledge, being titled "Senior Systems Architects", and a database group without the slightest clue about the systems they were supposedly maintaining. Desktop systems would have "Domain\Domain Users" as administrators. It really was laughable. Systems decisions were made by groups of fly-by middle managers, of which there were farrrrr too many, largely a group of clueless ass-munchers.

Of course there were exceptions, and there were several very bright people, but I'm talking generalities. Generalities is that finance is the VB slingers of the IT world, not the cutting edge. For the cutting edge the finance industry calls in consultants, or buys off the shelf. If the finance industry embraced Linux, I would guarantee that it was because the VP of salary suckage golfed with the VP of Consultants Co, and hired his buddy on to migrate their systems.

Re:Makes sense

[Pollardito]

still it's interesting to see that "one company made the transition from embedded system to desktop operating system." back-to-back articles marveling that Linux is making up ground on a front, with each implying that it had previously only been strong on another front (with one article's front contradicting the other)

Re:Makes sense

[st1d]

Um, just so you know, Unix doesn't have "distros". They are a direct result of the Linux/GPL/FOSS situation. Unix, in it's heyday, was worse than MS in licensing terms, and the idea of a "distro" would have given Unix execs aneurysms. Some speculate that the only reason FreeBSD and it's kin exist was simply because they allowed Unix companies to "steal back" future innovations, via the BSD license.

Re:Makes sense

[Anonymous Coward]

Almost exactly my experience.

I can say Spain is more of that.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Commodity HW, customizable code - win/win

[rkhalloran]

The techs can look over the code, tweak where needed, and run it on commodity hardware at a big upfront savings. The *ix heritage means they're already well up on running the OS and can port over their apps with little effort. What's not to like?

Re:Commodity HW, customizable code - win/win

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

...run it on commodity hardware...

My guess is that serious financial is not done on run-of-the-mill "commodity" hardware.

Re:Commodity HW, customizable code - win/win

[rwade]

I bet that the poster's idea is that one can run mission critical financial software on commodity hardware with Linux.

Re:Commodity HW, customizable code - win/win

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

I bet that the poster's idea is that one can run mission critical financial software on commodity hardware with Linux.

One can do many things. Some of them are not recommended. Like running "mission critical" applications on commodity hardware. Not a good idea, and any serious financial house probably doesn't. I don't think I would want to run my investments through a company that runs "mission critical" applications on vanilla boxes. Just not a well thought out idea.

Re:Commodity HW, customizable code - win/win

[NutscrapeSucks]

My guess is that serious financial is not done on run-of-the-mill "commodity" hardware.

Well, it might be better stuff from HP, Dell, or IBM, but don't kid yourself, it's still commodity hardware.

Re:Commodity HW, customizable code - win/win

[Master of Transhuman]

Then it isn't done on Windows either. And never will be.

But the fact of the matter is that "non-commodity" hardware is being replaced every day in corporations by commodity hardware and, as long as the SYSTEM design is right, companies see two to ten times better performance at one-half to one-tenth the cost.

By system design, I mean you ALLOW for the lessened reliability of commodity hardware by appropriate failover and backup design. Since the commodity hardware is still much less in cost than proprietary stuff, there's room for ensuring reliability and still saving money.

Re:Commodity HW, customizable code - win/win

[ImaLamer]

You're also leaving out that with free/open code you don't have to worry about products reaching "end of life" cycles or that once your are locked in, you're locked in.

I'd imagine they would like to use anything that they can support if the rest of the world dies...

Re:Commodity HW, customizable code - win/win

[mcrbids]

My guess is that serious financial is not done on run-of-the-mill "commodity" hardware.

My guess is that the guidlines for what YOU call "commodity" hardware is quite different than what serious financial calls "commodity" hardware.

What THEY call commodity hardware, you'd call "OMFG s0 1ee7 m3g4 S3RV3R!", you know, the kind that runs $25,000. (instead of $250,000)

Re:Commodity HW, customizable code - win/win

[Anonymous Coward]

What THEY call commodity hardware, you'd call "OMFG s0 1ee7 m3g4 S3RV3R!", you know, the kind that runs $25,000. (instead of $250,000)

That's kind of a SHITHEADED thing to say since you don't even know me. And, since you seem to speak "leet" and I do not, well, that says it all. Go back to masturbating with your sister.

Re:Commodity HW, customizable code - win/win

[mcrbids]

I meant "you" in the condescending, general sense. Not "you" in the "so lame and insecure you'd resort to namecalling" sense. Take it personally, why don't ye?

All I was pointing out is that "commodity" can mean different things. I remember pointing this out to a friend of mine who was upset that a company had spent $10,000 on some software with a free, open solution available.

I indicated to him that $10,000 really wasn't that much when you consider the size of the company (hundreds of staff) and compared it to a coke. Do you drive across town to the megamart to buy your sodas in 24-packs at $0.12 per can, or do you pay $.65 for the same thing at a convenience store 2 blocks away?

Soda pop is a (small-time) commodity. When the organization is bigger, the scope of "commodity" grows, also.

PS: People see in others what they see in themselves - keep that in mind next time you see your sister.

Re:Commodity HW, customizable code - win/win

[fm6]

Why not? Because it "might break"? All hardware breaks. If you can't afford downtime, you just build enough redundancy into your system to allow for for it. You can do that with a little expensive hardware or a lot of cheap hardware. Either way, you allow for Murphy's Law -- you don't waste a lot of money trying to repeal it.

Great...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, running COBOL applications on Linux... at least they didn't try to convert to EMACS

_
Bring it back!

Re:Great...

[Master of Transhuman]

You mean this?

Government will be slow

[Anonymous Coward]

Government will be the slowest to adopt. They have huge budgets and no accountability. (dislosure: I work for a non-US government research lab where OSS is becoming quite common but not among the clerical and support stagg)

Re:Government will be slow

[hungrygrue]

Wow, now that is creative hiring! What do the support stag's do, exactly?

Re:Government will be slow

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

1. The Air Force, at least, has "standardized" all non-scientific work on Windows (yes, I work for the USAF). I think that the "Government Sector" is more or less in Redmonds pocket, the boys from Washington State wield a lot of power with the boys in D.C.

2. What do the support stag's do, exactly? They "service" the colonels...

Re:Government will be slow

[st1d]

You didn't get the memo? US governmental branches that don't show an increase in necessary funding will lose the potential for that funding in the future. Therefore, by using "gg" in place of "ff", certain divisions of the government have secured a 7% increase in funding for next year. :)

Line of least resistance

[Donny Smith]

I'd say it's rather the fact that it's easier to use Linux to replace those UNIX in such uniform environments - clients are mostly browsers or terminals, clients don't need any special features (as long as they can connect), and servers/apps were UNIX-based anyway, so it really is easy to switch and doesn't matter to the IT guys - as long as it is cheap, it works, and can do what they want, they don't care what it is.

If Websphere, Weblogic, Oracle and DB2 supported BSD, it could have as well been BSD. I don't think they're Linux funs or anything like that. Business as usual.

Re:Line of least resistance

[dballanc]

As a "Joe Geek", I usually recommend Linux for servers because the cost saved in software can be put somewhere it really counts - the server hardware. Most of my clients are small 5-25 station networks. The saved cost of Windows server licenses allows me to bid better hardware, and backup systems. Businesses don't really care about spending money, so long as it's in the budget.

Re:Line of least resistance

[st1d]

My guess is that the deciding factor was momentum. The BSDs are terrific OSs, but they aren't typically seen as driving innovation in the same way as Linux. Not that that's bad, because Linux isn't nearly as reliable as most flavors of BSD. Still, if it were my job, I'd put my money on the one that appeared to have the strongest development support, on both OS and applications levels. That makes Linux the choice, by default.

Re:Line of least resistance

[Anonymous Coward]

"BSDs are terrific OSs, but they aren't typically seen as driving innovation in the same way as Linux."

When I hear about "driving innovation" as it applies to any UNIX variant, all that comes to mind is new ways to cut bell-bottom pants and long sideburns. We're talking 70's design here: innovation has nothing to do with it.

Not just *nix moving

[WindBourne]

I had a friend that was at the chicago stock exchange 5-7 years ago. At that time, he helped move them from VMS to Windows. It turned out that they were having all sort of issues and outlandish costs. So they switched up to Linux. Apparently, it was a bit of work, but their costs have gone below what the VMS was costing them (not to mention what Windows was).

Interestingly, he moved to a software company that owns a big chunk of the futures industry. Up till recently, they have been doing windows, but are now quietly working on Linux products for the trader desktop. Apparently, they have customers insisting on it.

Not suprising...

[MosesJones]

The finance industry does the most of EVERYTHING in the IT industry. The most Linux, the most Windows, the most COBOL etc... what the IT sector in finance REALLY excels at however is doing "cool stuff" with new technology....

When Linux really gets big is when those with more concerns buy into it... people in Manufacturing for instance, or in supply chains. Paid less, but normally with a better understanding of what it takes to build a system that lasts 20 years.

Linux is definately making it in those sectors, and that is better news IMO than the Finance sector.

Isn't that obvious?

[mpontes]

In the private sector, ever cent counts. I mean, we're talking about financial services, these people can do the math about the costs. If I worked for a company and had the option of save the company thousands of dollars in software and licenses, that's what I would do, switch to Free alternatives when possible and make my boss happy.

Re:Isn't that obvious?

[CaymanIslandCarpedie]

In financial services actually there isn't really an "every cent counts" mentality when it comes to IT. I cannot say I have an unlimited budget, but cost is VERY low on the priority list. The PTB, don't really care about a few hundred thousand (or even million) here and there. It often isn't blinked at spending tens of thousands to just setup an environment to demo some software. When looking at software, we've gone with 500k systems over almost identical systems 80k systems just for some tiny piece of functionality which we didn't even use for over a year.

IT budgets don't tend to be too tight in wall street shops (as they are seen as key areas for competitive advantage). Its functionaliy and stability that rules. Price is considered, but it trails very distant. Stability/security is why Linux does so well in these environments, not price. Now all that said, MS systsems also are growing pretty well in such environments. Linux is killing Unix in these areas. We used to be a huge IBM Unix shop, but much of that is now Linux. This is where "crital" systems sit. MS Exchange, AD, ect are also getting pretty big. Traditionaly most shops were Notes shops, but because of interagration abilities with document management, fax server, etc, etc third-party software MS often ends up running these systems which aren't so critical because of the extra functionality they offer. I don't think most of those MS systems would be chosen often on thier own, but integration with quality 3rd party apps usually gives them the win in these areas.

Re:Isn't that obvious?

[jurt1235]

The important point which you make here is I think that they can do the math about TCO. They apparently came to the conclusion that Linux is the best option for them.

Can't we use this as real life TCO study?

Re:Isn't that obvious?

[Anonymous Coward]

I work for a private company in the financial arena (mortgages) and we definitely have a tight budget. All of our servers run linux to keep the costs down. I guess it depends on the size of the company and stuff like that (around 120 employees).

Re:Isn't that obvious?

[Master of Transhuman]

"I don't think most of those MS systems would be chosen often on thier own, but integration with quality 3rd party apps usually gives them the win in these areas."

Exactly why I say open source needs to start producing more enterprise class applications. When Linux and open source can handle most enterprise applications, Linux will bury Windows in the enterprise.

The frameworks are there in open source, and a lot of companies are building enterprise class apps using these frameworks, but there's still a ways to go before open source enterprise class apps are readily available to any corporation without in-house development. When that happens, corporations will switch to open source and Linux much more quickly.

Basic Linux Geek Misunderstanding...

[Saeed al-Sahaf]

It's not surprising that Linux is only making inroads in the server market; it is simply not user friendly in the way that most computer users define that concept. In addition, most of the Linux applications out there, regardless of what all the tech-savvy geeks here say, are difficult for most computer users to install. The Linux community's resistance to GUI installers and GUIs in general is also a major block. The Linux market share will grow beyond server when Linux geeks start to understand that not everyone wants to know the details of how a computer and OS work.

Re:Basic Linux Geek Misunderstanding...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not surprising that Linux is only making inroads in the server market; it is simply not user friendly in the way that most computer users define that concept.

Nonsense. The average 'user' will report no difference between Windows and Mandrake running KDE, except that suddenly their computer is more
responsive and doesn't crash as often.

In addition, most of the Linux applications out there, regardless of what all the tech-savvy geeks here say, are difficult for most computer users to install.

Yes, that is true, thank God.

Re:Basic Linux Geek Misunderstanding...

[iabervon]

Desktop users are very resistant to any change in their systems at all. In the server market, the underlying system can change significantly while nobody outside of the support staff particularly notices, so it's possible for them to just switch to whatever platform makes them most comfortable. On the desktop, the main thing preventing Linux adoption is really inertia; if GUI installers were such a big deal Windows XP would have displaced Windows 2K by now. As it is, the main thing driving XP growth is shipments of new machines that users can't get old versions of Windows on.

Linux will grow into the desktop space when Novell or IBM or Red Hat really decided to tackle that market segment, which will probably only happen when there's not enough room for growth in the server segments. Linux geeks only have reason to care about what they themselves use, and what their families (and other people who want computer help) use.

Re:Basic Linux Geek Misunderstanding...

[l3v1]

when Linux geeks start to understand that not everyone wants to know the details of how a computer and OS work

And so they are most welcome to stay on Windows and forget saying sh*t about Linuxes.

Re:Basic Linux Geek Misunderstanding...

[duffahtolla]

This is not true where I work.

I work for a broker/dealer. We have been phasing out Solaris and Windows servers over the years and replacing them with FreeBSD/OpenBSD, since the owners are both cheap and comfortable with Open Source.

Ever since the crash, users personal desires have taken a backseat to Cost. This even includes mandating Open Office as a substitute for MS Office whenever possible.

However, the client machines will stay with windows. The problem is not GUI installers or friendly menus. It is rather that we are stuck using the software that the clearing firms dictate.

BearStearns and Fidelity both use browser based applications to access their systems. But their use of applets that require MS Java, ties us down to IE on a Windows platform. Worse for me, some of the functions require administrator privilage.

Till they make their systems accessable from generic browsers, we will continue to use IE on Windows. We have no choice.

Re:Basic Linux Geek Misunderstanding...

[Master of Transhuman]

"Ever since the crash, users personal desires have taken a backseat to Cost. This even includes mandating Open Office as a substitute for MS Office whenever possible."

Exactly my point. CORPORATE users will use whatever the corporation tells them to. And this will be Linux when the below comment is true.

"However, the client machines will stay with windows. The problem is not GUI installers or friendly menus. It is rather that we are stuck using the software that the clearing firms dictate."

My other main point. Linux will dominate the corporation when most enterprise apps are available in open source and/or on Linux. Right now, that isn't true. But it will be. The frameworks are there, it just needs more open source developers working on enterprise class apps in all vertical industries.

Linux usability is quite good enough (that is, it's as crappy as Windows) for most users, once they HAVE to switch. So it's irrelevant to Linux adoption. The ONLY thing holding back Linux adoption is manpower and economics in the corporation vis a vis enterprise applications.

Re:Basic Linux Geek Misunderstanding...

[fa2k]

Home users might want to do all kinds of crazy things with their computers, and customize them. This can be difficult with Linux. In the enterprise one doesn't have this problem because (1) the admins are probably Ghosting (or similar) the hard drives anyway, eliminating the install -- and (2) the user operate on a predefined, fixed set of apps (not always), which limits the installation and configuration. The It guys can even tune these apps to be more user-friendly. The optimistic outlook (for OSS): 'power users' will be trained in Linux instead of windows, and might use that at home.

Re:Basic Linux Geek Misunderstanding...

[unoengborg]

I wouldn't say that Linux is difficult to install, at least not in an enterprise environment.

In less time than it takes to install one instance of windows XP, a Linux admin would be able to set up an install server that detects network cards with unknown MAC addresses and installs Linux and whatever other software needed on them fully automatic. If he uses Red Hat, he will even have GUIs to help him do that.

In other words, when you get a new employee give him a new computer, tell him to plug it in in his room, and have a coffy break. This offcourse requires that the computer is set to boot over the network, but if you are a large company you seldom have any problems order such things from the maufactuerer.

Besides, it matters little if Linux is harder to install for non tech savy users, than starting a preinstalled windows box. In most businesses non tech savy users don't install software, and if they did, it would be just as difficult for them to install word or whatever software they need on top of a preinstalled windows box as it would be to install Linux+software. That's why sysadmins usually do this for them.

To them Linux poses no problem, even if they don't use automated techniques as I described, a GNU/Linux is usually much faster to perform than windows+software. Once installed it is also much easier to support the user remotely, e.g. by screen sharing or just by being able to log in to the users computer and do diagnostics.

Re:Basic Linux Geek Misunderstanding...

[ceejayoz]

Then don't complain when said users pronounce Linux not ready for their desktops.

Re:Basic Linux Geek Misunderstanding...

[st1d]

>> Home users might want to do all kinds of crazy things with their computers, and customize them. This can be difficult with Linux.

You're kidding right? Linux (as evidenced by the
"scary" number of distros out there) is prime grounds for customization, from cutesy themes to automation projects. Microsoft and Apple have panicked and sued people for doing some of the things that have become commonplace on Linux systems.

Re:Basic Linux Geek Misunderstanding...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not surprising that Linux is only making inroads in the server market; it is simply not user friendly in the way that most computer users define that concept.

I am surprised there isn't more use of Linux on the desktop in some of these businesses. There are a lot of businesses (in my area, anyway) using PCs running Windows -- which are running nothing more than a terminal emulator. Replacing Windows with Linux on these systems would not make them any less user-friendly, but it would be cheaper. The same argument could be made for web-based business apps (unless they use ActiveX or some other Microsoft junk).

In addition, most of the Linux applications out there, regardless of what all the tech-savvy geeks here say, are difficult for most computer users to install.

I presume these companies have someone -- either on-staff or an outside consultant -- to take care of the computers, and perform whatever software installation is necessary.

The Linux market share will grow beyond server when Linux geeks start to understand that not everyone wants to know the details of how a computer and OS work.

I agree with this for the case of Linux on home PCs.

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[Tezkah]

Before you start complaining here about anything, maybe you should have asked yourself, what do I want to be doing with my computer? I only boot Windows to play a few games I like. Everything else I do under Linux - with absolutely no problems. I can log into my router - with konqueror or firefox - play video and music files without skipping, and use all of my nVidia graphics card's available resolution (well, not quite all, but monitor won't support the max the card will).

If your DSL connection is running into your router, there's no reason for your provider to have stated that 'linux is not supported'.

And I hate to break this to you also, but I've owned a couple machines (with nothing wierd in them) that only Linux would install and boot up. My parents' last computer wouldn't run Win95, 98, or NT. But Mandrake 6.1 installed onto it fine, found all the hardware (including the unusual printer they have), and ran fine. (It was a 400Mhz K6-II with 256M RAM.)

I've set up Linux for a bunch of 'real average Jane' students, and they don't even notice a difference. After getting one set up with Mandrake, Firefox, and GAIM, her roommate came in and asked "oh, is that a new version of AIM?" not "what happened to windows?".

My roommate MS work centered around using Linux machines with video capture cards, so I don't know what you were trying to do that you couldn't. the All In Wonder cards from ATI are pretty popular, and have extensive driver support.

So, I'm calling complete bull on you. I'm not an ultra fanatical linux geek, either. I just use it, and it works. It takes no longer to boot than XP, and has far more useful application to me (lack of viruses, ease of ssh access to other machines, higher granular control over individual resources) than Windows ever has.

RealTime systems

[lightyear4]

I imagine realtime, up-to-the-second updates of servers are important in the finance world. I suppose stock exchanges and such have a lot to deal with given the volume and speed of the markets. That said, do such OSes as RTlinux or QNX have any place here?

Re:RealTime systems

[malraid]

I don't think so. RT OSs are targeted at "phisical" enviroments, primarly industrial control or such. Financial services rely mostly on distributed trasactions (a la JTA) or huge single image servers (mainframes running cobol apps) with terminal connections

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[Anonymous Coward]

Hmm...

New slashdot ID, one post history..

adds up to:

troll!

Why not OpenBsd ?

[zymano]

OpenBsd rivals OpenVms in security.

Any kernel like linux that includes drivers is going to cause stability problems.

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[Anonymous Coward]

These are all hardware problems. Blame the manufactureres of said hardware for offering NO SUPPORT for Linux. If MS had to reverse engineer most drivers like linux coders do, you'd get the same problems.

Keeping hardware closed is just plain wrong. Of course, if you're the kind of consumer that buys just about anything without asking questions and be just happy about throwing your money away, go with Windows, better yet, buy a Mac.

I'm willing to jump hurdles to be part of the revolution. I sacrifice my time and effort to make sure that the good guy wins.

I dont force you into thinking or even agreeing with me, not flaming you either. I'm answering your final statement:
"Why on earth ANYONE would use Linux for a home system is a mystery."

hope it makes you think a bit

True Story

[rwade]

Some might suggest that Windows' dominating success in the consumer market flies in the face of the ideal of excellence via consumer.

However, such an analogy does not apply to Linux. Windows' major shortcoming has always been -- though it has been almost irrelevant, for consumers, with the advent of XP -- its instability, a problem that most admit is not a character of Linux.

Unfortunately, there is some truth, though, to what Steve Balmer says regarding the true cost of Linux. That's not to say that Linux is simply inadequate period; it may, however, be unsuitable to some situations.

Too much of a coincidence...

[Jerry]

This is one of many *recent* articles with the same theme: Linux has/is making headway in the server room but it hasn't broken out into the desktop...

That Linux is now a major player in the server room has been OLD news for two or three years. What these articles imply is that Linux hasn't/won't make the leap onto the corporate desktop. Just like the arguments several years ago against Linux being a major player in the server room, these articles under estimate the effect of uncounted, free downloads, and the fact that a single copy can be used on many PCs. The Linux desktops where I work have not been included on anyone's count, and I doubt if our circumstance is not unusual. They also over estimate the need for "paid support".

TCO Linux versus Microsoft

[rolfwind]

If financial institution think it's a better solution, sortof cut MS's TCO argument down..... these are the guys that should know best (should and do being two different things).

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[Anonymous Coward]

Why blame the hardware? If linux was as far advanced as you are all stating then they would have some advocacy on the inside that would solve these problems. I understand that linux isn't for everyone, and frankly I don't think it ever will be.

Right now the only implementation of unix that is ready to go for your regular tom, dick and jane users is OS X. Until linux can get itself into a form like that, your general users won't be able to do a god damn thing in it.

Not Seeing It

[Comatose51]

I'm definitely not seeing it at my company, which is a hedge fund. Maybe it's because I work at a hedge fund that things and the rules are different than the rest of the financial market. But the key issue for us isn't cost. It is reliability. We cannot tolerate downtime at all. The more data we can get continuously, the better we are. Linux is reliable and so is Windows if you have good administrators.

What's pegging us to Windows are our desktops. Until Excel or an equivalent like Excel runs on Linux, this won't happen. Does Bloomberg run on Linux? Until then, the desktops will stay Windows. So this leads to the servers staying Windows. From our experience, Windows plays better with Windows. MS products don't like to play nice with other companies' products. So our domain controllers, etc. are all Windows. I have to admit, our AD works fine and so do most of our Windows servers. Windows XP on our workstation leaves much room for improvement but Linux isn't an alternative on the desktops. It's not Linux itself but third party software that's making us stay on Windows XP.

I've been trying to push Linux since I started and haven't made too much progress and I can understand why. Windows works for us. Why undertake the risk of a major overhaul, especially when we know Microsoft products don't like to play nice with non-MS products? We have the money to stay with MS. However, I am happy to say that open source software is making progress. We're in the process of switching to Cacti to monitor our servers. Firefox has caught on with some of our uses and traders (they love tabbed browsing). I've seen a trader reading a book on R (OSS stats software)

Re:Not Seeing It

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Why undertake the risk of a major overhaul, especially when we know Microsoft products don't like to play nice with non-MS products? We have the money to stay with MS.

Don't worry, hedge funds are probably going to implode in the next year or two and then, if you still have a job, they will be seriously interested in what you have to say about getting the MS vampire off their neck.

Re:Not Seeing It

[div_2n]

Until Excel or an equivalent like Excel runs on Linux

That's been a reality for a long time now.

www.codeweavers.com

Re:Not Seeing It

[Master of Transhuman]

Another post that agrees with my main point: until Linux has enterprise class applications that work together, its adoption by corporations will be slowed. It will happen, since the frameworks are there to build enterprise class apps. It just needs more open source developers to build the apps.

In other words, somebody needs to build an app that Bloomberg will use rather than use Windows.

Somebody needs to build plugins for OpenOffice's spreadsheet that does what Excel plugins do.

Once that is done, Linux will bury Windows.

This isn't a problem, it's a huge opportunity for open source developers to make money developing and supporting the enterprise via open source.

Re:Not Seeing It

[Xugumad]

Have you thought of using Mac desktops with Linux? It's what we do at work, and it works well for us. One of the things I particularly like about using Linux on servers, is that if something breaks, we can always work out what it is. For example, if an application doesn't seem to be doing what we expect, we can open up the source, and figure out why, it's always a matter of time. Even ended up going through the kernel source once (although that turned out to be faulty memory). Can't do that with Windows!

However, for actually getting work done, and particularly for systems that don't need all the power (and complexity) of Linux, we find OS X is great.

Re:Not Seeing It

[Anonymous Coward]

OpenOffice includes a spreadsheet that reads and writes all versions of Excel spreadsheets, and is almost hot-key identical. OO runs on both WinXX and on Linux.

So, what "until" were you waiting for?

Re:Not Seeing It

[Anonymous Coward]

your right we'll never get excel of the desktop.
there are hundreds of thousands of in house and 3rd party apps, plug ins and data feeds running inside that.
its our bread and butter.
yes there is open office, heck i use it at home.
but there is _no way_ it will run the old cruddy macro's out there in use.
what the heck its only a few hundred $$ per year per desktop for ms + excel. most traders have 2-6 desktops anyway. one per app, and a backup in case it crashes.
risk/reward. you wanna risk your job to save a company $500 per desktop per year. when trades worth $50m are done through it every day. .....?

Re:Not Seeing It

[Comatose51]

Yes! That right now, in my mind at least, is the most viable alternative. Bringing that up would be a little tough though. OSX desktop and Linux servers would be a dream for me but that's a major, major change.

Re:Not Seeing It

[mpcooke3]

I think by and large they are talking about financial systems not back office stuff like domain controllers.

Re:Not Seeing It

[IamTheRealMike]

What's the point of migrating from Windows to OS X? They simply aren't different enough to justify the cost, given that economically they're identical. Unless you really believe that MS is "pure evil" and Apple are saints, there's no evidence that a dominant Apple would be better than a dominant Microsoft.

Re:Not Seeing It

[IceAgeComing]

If you're going to guarantee format compatibility, you have to run Excel itself. Anything else is a gamble. That said, Wine apparently runs versions of Excel (perhaps the latest, too).

Drugs are bad, mmmkay...

[JamesP]

You are really on crack, man!

Or maybe you are (ahem) disinformed. RTOS are for meeting "deadlines" like 1ms (one thousanth of a second) and shorter.

That is, industrial robots, embedded systems (like telephone centrals, mobile stations, etc), avionics, etc

Curses! Foiled again!

[mendaliv]

There goes all my plans of exploiting their MS-based "solutions" to engage in stock manipulation and diversion of corporate funds!

Re:Consumers Key

[tempest69]

The success of linux in any market is almost entirely based on it's suitability. Even as much as I like linux, I wouldn't dream of trying to load RedHat on my parents PC. Linux will manage to gain footholds in areas where it is a suitable technology.

However a large userbase ala windows will provide a larger developer base, and allow for more applications in a given area.

Windows has managed to be a monster in the desktop side, but that are a joke in the supercomputing arena. Their clustering systems while complete just arent utilized by a signifigant percentage of supercomputers.

Storm

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[kevcol]

Ha!

I knew I'd read this somewhere before!

Almost Forgot

[Comatose51]

I know about Open Office and have plans to test it out. However, there are a number of Excel plugins that we use so any Excel replacement must also work with those.

Startups?

[caluml]

What is the best way to start up a company that sells Linux support, etc to companies? Any ideas?

Re:Startups?

[rylin]

Get your linux license framed and mounted on the wall so potential customers can see you're not a thief.

It's also the hardware companies

[Work Account]

Aside from SUN, who have lost most of their relevance anyway, all the other hardware companies enjoy "giving away" free software products and charging for hardware and extended tier support. Many companies even pay their own guys to add features and stability via code submission to various Open Source apps. I'm thinking Red Hat, HP, Intel, etc.

It's also applicable to those one-man companies and consultants out there. I know one guy who often gives a quote for Windows and quote for a Linux system based on requirements given to them. So someone wants a dedicated server, and Joe Geek gives them a quote for $2,500 in hardware + $1,800 in software for the Windows system, then a quote of $2,500 for hardware and $0 for software for the Linux system.

Guess which one the client usually goes with.

Re:It's also the hardware companies

[NutscrapeSucks]

In the financial market, companies spend big money for Linux support -- usually more than Windows' licensing costs. In either case, they're running software that costs $10K+ per server, so the OS cost is immaterial.

The move to Linux is finance was driven by cheaper hardware, not freebie versions of Linux. Despite your little fairytale about "Joe Geek", Linux is doing phenomonal in the cost-insensitive Enterprise market, but Windows still rules the tight-wallet SMB space.

Re:It's also the hardware companies

[Master of Transhuman]

Unfortunately, I'd have to guess the client goes with Windows most of the time, because most people are idiots. At the very least, most of them have never heard of Linux. Of course, if you just tell the client you can do it for less without specifying the OS, this would work.

I'd certainly hope the client was smart enough to go with Linux (that's the sort of client I want), but I have no confidence.

But I've read plenty of stories like this, where a Windows VAR quotes X thousands and a Linux VAR quotes X thousands LESS. It's easy to do with Linux. One Linux guy quoted twenty grand against a Windows guy who quoted sixty grand. Not hard for a client to make that choice.

Linux and the Enterprise

[hawkeye_82]

Hah. I knew they used Linux on USS Enterprise. It was just too cool to be anything else.

Oh wait. You mean that enterprise....

Re:Linux and the Enterprise

[Fortran IV]

Yes, but in the 23rd century be sure to avoid Red Shirt Linux. It's marketed for security applications, but it's prone to fatal errors, especially under hostile conditions.

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[rolfwind]

While I switched people over to Linux with the same experience, the non-complainers tend to be newbs or people who really only do webbrowsing/IM or another set of limited functions.

I've run into problems with more advanced people who could and should be able to figure out Linux on their own but don't bother and start complaining when they can't install certain software they are used to on Windows and yet don't want to learn the *nix equivalent.

It's just that I've been hearing too many glowing switch-over stories lately and to be sure, with distros like Ubuntu, linux is easier than ever. But again, in my experience and as counter-intuitive as it seems, the total newbs to computers are easier to nab than the people who've been doing Windows for a few years.

Linux font rendering sucks

[bokel]

As a programmer, i'd really like to switch to an open source environment. As a strategy to switch, I tried to use a two screen, two computer setup using synergy (synergy2.sourceforge.net), Ubuntu and my old WinXP2. Synergy worked great and gave me the perfect illusion of a two screen computer. But font rendering on linux sucked. Even after installing some msfonts, the fonts on linux looked so different, that my eyes and my brain tilted and gave me a major headache. I'm not sure about the reason. Maybe some patents are in the way of perfect text on linux. If anybody knows, how i can come around this limitation of linux, i'd be more than happy to know. Cheers, Ralf.

Re:Linux font rendering sucks

[HermanAB]

Another time traveller?

Linux fonts have been fixed many years ago. You should at least install a new version of Linux before complaining about it.

Re:Linux font rendering sucks

[bokel]

Hm, doesn't ubuntu include the latest developments in font rendering technology? Could the difference in quality stem from the fact that the system have two different graphic cards? (monitors are the same)

Re:Linux font rendering sucks

[st1d]

I defer to HermanAB, with one exception. Personally, I think Linux fonts are much nicer than those available for Windows. Although the Windows fonts have seniority, and therefore have garnered a certain following and acceptance as "normal", the fonts available for Linux do not seem to suffer the same problems when it comes to alterations and conversions to other media.

Naturally, that's a matter of personal preference, but the various reports and ad fluff we'd provided have received less complaints in the last couple years, since the drive to produce better fonts on FOSS systems. (Linux and many of the BSDs that share the ability to use Linux-originated font systems.)

point partially conceded was Re:Commodity HW

[rkhalloran]

The financial market had been a huge buyer of Sun and IBM midrange equipment. While I don't see some brokerage going out and buying a pallet of white box systems at the local flea market, the cost of even high-end x86 equipment is markedly lower than what they've been accustomed to.

DebConf5 Videos concering this

[emj]

There was a nice talk about this at Debconf last week in Finland. About writing enterprise ready software , it was one of the SkoleLinux developers (pere). And even though School != enterprise there are some valid point about how to make thing work for large organizations.

Great talks.

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[saleenS281]

Funny, I currently support an office FULL of 400mhz k6-II's with 128-384mb of ram, and they all run flawlessly. I call bullshit.

Re:Why not OpenBsd ?

[BomberMonkey]

OpenVMS works on computers the size of gymnasiums. OpenBSD doesn't even officially have SMP support yet. That's why.

And actually, I'm pretty sure that OpenVMS is still more secure than OpenBSD. To the best of my knowledge, OpenBSD's strong points are preventing incidents and logging them, but OpenVMS has a lot more mature stuff for forensics and recovery, as well as more active security countermeasures. It's a weird OS.

Still Possibly Lower Costs with Same Reliability

[rwade]

If they can keep the same statistical level of reliability by running a pair of Dell Deminsions running Linux and at a lower cost, would you pass the company on your search for investment managers?

What if they charged you 6 bucks a trade instead of 7?

If Linux enables you do do this, to save money by taking advantage of the current weak computer prices while maintaining a quality setup, why the heck not?

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[saleenS281]

**running win2k

IT costs to become important as competition mounts

[rwade]

There is a marked strengthening in competition -- weakening in price -- in the financial services industry, especially in trading where fidelity and prudential want priority trades for a penny a share or less.

The money spent to lower these prices isn't going to come out of the human resources end, because how are you going to execute increasing trading volume with appropriate speed? Where is it going to come from, buying cheaper chairs?

There is plenty of evidence to suggest that IT budgets on Wall Street will suffer as a result of competition within the industry.

As a (Linux) server admin I think I can help out..

[msimm]

Linux is good on the server. No doubt.

But most users don't need or want a server on their desktop.

Until a Linux distro strips the Linux server off the Linux desktop we will continue to have a geeks system being touted as desktop ready. Which is ridiculous.

There are a lot of other step, but none of it can really be taken seriously until companies/foundations really decide what kind of operating system it is they are working on.

You can't be everything to everyone.

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[Anonymous Coward]

i feel sorry for you. what a shitty job you have.
us here at slashdot will fully understand if you kill yourself.

Instanet

[Thanatopsis]

Back when I worked for VA I remember going to Linux World in New York and just replaced their entire back trading network from VAX to a huge commodity cluster running Linux. That was back when VA still sold hardware and VA sold them the cluster. Linux isn't being installed on the desktops at these firms, but huge linux clusters to facilitate and speed trading.

Re:Consumers Key

[Master of Transhuman]

The ONLY thing preventing Linux from "consuming" the consumers market is education.

Most people simply have never heard of Linux or even the concept of a free operating system.

They use the OS that came with their computer; they learned the OS that came with their FIRST computer or their first corporate job.

That simple.

Once somebody either makes a Linux distro that is IDENTICAL to Windows (unlikely, although Xandros gets close) OR figures out how to make Linux a household word AND figures out how to make it EASY to learn Linux for the average user, Linux will bury Windows on the desktop for home users.

For corporate users, it will be much easier since a corporate worker will use what the corporation tells them to use. And as I've said before, the ONLY thing holding back Linux in corporations is the lack of enterprise class applications (other than the big ones like SAP and Oracle) and the perceived cost of "training" (in quotes because corporations NEVER do any real training.)

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[Anonymous Coward]

i blame the hardware because it's the one thing out of control for open source. If you ewant to support hardware, you have to have the documentation, otherwise it's reverse engineering, which is long and frustrating, and hard, and illegal.

so unless ATI and creative and etc gives some open source drivers, the hardware WILL fail under linux.

OSX runs on apple hardware, so they dont have that problem. They can concentrate on making theGUI pretty and spiffy, and unload loads of cash into brainwashing publicity.

Linux runs on a lot of old junk hardware. Now if customer pressure would make manufacturers move, we'd be in another ballpark

Re:Why not OpenBsd ?

[ocelotbob]

Two different types of security here. The first is code security - minimizing overflows and code auditing. OpenBSD excells there; it's perfect for set and forget applications. The other type of security has to deal with things like auditing and access control lists, which is something that OpenBSD doesn't have, but is available to Linux in the form of the NSA-spearheaded SELinux project. Additionally, Linux can provide many of the code-based security capabilities OpenBSD provides through the grsecurity system. Thus, for this purpose, OpenBSD is much less secure in the long run.

Makes financial sense

[HangingChad]

I use Linux as my primary OS because I like it AND it makes good financial sense. If Linux were evenly priced with Windows I'd still choose it for certain applications. Especially anywhere the ability to modify the software for mission tasks was essential.

It's not so much about money as control. That's really the thing I like best about Linux and OSS, I can control what my machine does down to a very granular level. I like that. Many people don't and that's fine. Use Windows or get a Mac.

And a Linux environment is soooo much faster. I'm always amazed how slow Windows machines are. Every time I have to go in to the client shop to do something it's like trying to run in mud. Wait and wait for it to boot up, login, wait and wait some more for five bazillion background processes to load, oh I get to do some work now, woooweee. Wait for the development environment to load. Zzzzzzzzzzz.

Re:Makes financial sense

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd like to point out that if you use a default installation of, say, fedora, you will experience the same slowness.

The speediness of his Linux installation is likely caused by his expert configuration, much like my own.

-- A happy Crux user.

Re:Makes financial sense

[saleenS281]

It's sad that you are such an expert in linux, but can't figure out how to disable shit you don't need in windows. Let's start with the easiest, right click my computer: Properties.

Advanced tab, Performance: Settings button.
Click Adjust for best performance.

If it's still slow perhaps you should try something faster than a p200 with 128mb of ram because anything much quicker than that has been more than fast enough in my experience.

then again, the windows machines you use probably aren't really slow at all, you just feel the need to hop on the slashdot bandwagon where XP requires a minimum of 3ghz P4 with 2gb of ram and it still BSOD's every 30 minutes *right*

Re:Makes financial sense

[st1d]

It's sad that you are such an expert in MS Windows, but don't know anything about the rest of the IT multiverse. Let's start with the easiest, click on "control panel" in your Linux GUI.

Disable the tremendous amount of eyecandy available for your system, as per your taste.

If it's slower, even on your p200 with 128mb ram, disable a few unneeded kernel modules. If that's not enough, pop into kernel configuration, and alter the kernel as needed. This is a little more complicated, but pretty easy, especially in light of the modern tools available for doing so. At least when you make the changes, you understand what you are changing, as compared to altering obscure registry settings in windows, handed down from the Redmond priesthood and it's third party bishops.

Then again, the Linux machines you use probably aren't slow at all, you just have more powerful applications and flexiblity at your fingertips than most of the MS Windows users on the Slashdot MS bandwagon. :)

Possible RTOS applications _ON_ Wall Street

[Anonymous Coward]

And what if all the Wall Street traders are robots?

Re:Possible RTOS applications _ON_ Wall Street

[Anonymous Coward]

The revolution has begun. Don't tell anybody.

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[xMilkmanDanx]

I haven't been here that long (yeah yeah, I must be new here) but I've seen this exact same post a couple times before. Standard troll and lots of people bite.

The original poster, if not a total liar, was a moron to switch 7 machines at once without a trial on one of them. I have a feeling, it's more of a BS troll than anything that someone (or several people) just won't let die.

It is absolutely priceless

[A beautiful mind]

if you reply to a troll with a dupe post and get modded up.

I've seen the GP troll and the Parent post already. Probably a quick search would turn the previous posts up quickly.

Re:It is absolutely priceless

[Anonymous Coward]

Dupe post!

http://politics.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=15445 5&cid=12952398

Imminent Death of Sun Microsystems

[reporter]

One of the principal markets of Sun Microsystems has been financial services. During the DotCom Boom, finance companies on Wall Street purchased billions of dollars of Sun equipment.

In the post-boom era, those same companies are now buying (mainly) x86 boxes and (secondarily) PowerPC servers running Linux. This phenomenon explains why Sun has failed to achieve profitability and revenue growth while both Dell and IBM have been doing well during the last 2 years of the economic recovery. IBM, especially, has been selling billions of dollars of Linux-powered boxes to finance companies.

In 2000 and 2001, folks from the marketing and tech-marketing departments at Sun would spend hours each day on writing condemnations of IBM in SlashDot forums. In particular, one of the Sun talking (actually, "condemnation") points is that IBM supports multiple operating systems (OSes) whereas Sun supports only a single unified OS across all Sun platforms. Now, Sun supports 3 OSes: Solaris, Linux, and (gasp!) Windows. My. My. The times have changed.

Now, where are these talking heads? They have been fired (or euphemistically, "laid off"), reprimanded, or demoted.

For whom does the bell toll? It tolls for Sun.

Re:Why not OpenBsd ?

[Byzantine]

Just for the record--though not entirely to the point, perhaps--one correction: OpenBSD supports SMP on i386 and amd64. Granted, it's only done so since 3.6. Supposedly work is ongoing to support SMP on SPARC and (I believe) PPC.

Ever tried Gnumeric?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a wonderful Excel clone...

Untill how many exploits ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Financial transactions usually also require security. I really wonder how many discovered exploits it will last. Remember 2.6.12 ? 3 releases in one week ?

Unless ofcourse they cover that part themselves. In that case I also hope they'll share their code, but I consider that highly unlikely.

So in the end... What benefit does the community have ?

Not without troubles though...

[Sparkle]

At this point the choices are RedHat Enterprise (RHEL) and SuSE (SLES). Both products are from fine companies, come with infrequent releases, semi-regular updates, and support just like the main line UNIX operating systems.

Customers tend toward the bright side, many with UNIX experience and some with Linux too. Expectation can be that we would see something that is supported as "enterprise" yet patched with lightning speed as many products you find in Open Source. Expectation that any and all hardware in the "enterprise" realm is well supported, tested, and works just as it expected be in (for example) a Sparc archictecture system.

Who knows what happy medium is? It is not reasonable for a vendor to provide enterprise class support for something that gets patched overnight on a regular basis. Yet some customers expect both.

Re:Not without troubles though...

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget Mandriva! Their merger and acquisition of user friendly linux companies bodes well for the future desktops put out by them. :)

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[KwKSilver]

Nice bug zapping.

Re:As a (Linux) server admin I think I can help ou

[Kjella]

Until a Linux distro strips the Linux server off the Linux desktop we will continue to have a geeks system being touted as desktop ready. Which is ridiculous.

I don't think it makes much sense to arbitrarily say one can't be the other. If I only install client apps, it's a desktop. If I install server apps, it's a server. If I install both, then it's a geek's machine. My dad is busily playing games (card/tile games mostly), surfing the web and checking email (webmail) from my linux machine. That's what he does from the Windows machine too. It is no more or less a desktop if it is running a bunch of daemons he never sees or knows about.

I'll give you that there are a lot of things about the linux desktop I would like to improve. But removing the linux server won't do anything to change that. Gnome/KDE live in a completely different world than Apache etc. already. The only ones who haven't chosen a "camp" are most of the distros, and it would make no sense. Sure, they could split themselves in half and call themselves "Foobar desktop" and "Foobar server", but the difference wouldn't be bigger than today where you pick one of two icons in the installer. Everybody that is actually writing the software know which side they belong to already.

Kjella

Sleep needed thank you

[Anonymous Coward]

Linux And the Enterprise Environment
On July 24th, 2005 with 99 comments
aword writes "Computerworld cites that private financial services sector have moved to Linux more than any other sector. This too is mostly on the dark side...

as i work in the financial industry and use linux

[Anonymous Coward]

seems i can't resist the opportunity to add my 0.02$

3-4 years back i ran a technical program within a division of a major bank to look at bringing in linux. now i work on a program trading system that runs 80% on a linux derivative, so i guess it passed :-)

but why did we do this, what was driving reason.
to my mind it was all about costs, and flexible capacity. sure sun had the compute power, but it was real expensive. $500k plus for a big un 24 cpus.

we were looking at a way to buy in cheap commodity boxes from dell, ibm, whoever.
linux just happened to be the most logical OS to run on this cheap hardware. That and all the solaris trained admin's didn't hate it cause its fundamentally very similar to what they were used to. (and the developers of course)

of course we looked at solaris x86 ( lacking hardware support), bsd (lacking software support).

windows - of course, microsoft were crawling around everywhere trying for a major opening in the server space. (but the porting costs were massive and the reliablity, well err not quite what was required.)

if Sun/Fuji had made sparc hardware cheap enough and powerfull enough to compete with what you can buy off the shell in terms of X86 hardware then Linux would never of got a look in.
why? porting costs, support costs (more OS's, more vendors, more hardware)

controversial as it might sound here on slashdot, we didn't do it from the love of it, we did it cause the propriatory hardware cost way tooo much and linux was best OS to run on the cheap hardware.
yes we could afford it, but after y2k costs had to be controlled and this was one way to do it, after all everyone in the industry was looking at this, problem, its a pretty competative world out there and we hate to be make less $$ on our cut than the competitors.

coward.

Re:Consumers Key

[st1d]

Now, I'm 180 degrees from you on this point. I think Linux is perfect for "parents" (i.e., those who could care less about computing, and just want to use them. For instance, my mom is terrified anytime she uses my dad's computer to check her email, to the point that she's phoned me about some otherwise straightforward items, but when she's using her own system (an old system with Mepis), she's much more relaxed about it. Yes, part of this is that if she messes up dad's computer, she'll have to listen to him, but mostly, she knows she can explore and do things with Linux, and as a normal user, cannot mess up the system too badly.

More importantly, the Linux system has a ton of software, whereas my dad's has a minimal amount (MS Office, Act!, a couple super cheesy things, etc.) In essense, she can "play" with things on the Linux system that she would never be able to afford on a MS OS.

So, despite the fact that Linux is more difficult to understand fully (it's a much larger and varied system), for those who barely understand the concept of "copy/paste", Linux is a lot more interesting and comforting. After three years, my mom's almost annoying when she brags about how her system isn't taken down when her friend's get infected.

That's just my experience, though.

Re:Why not OpenBsd ?

[strider44]

Yeah we don't need drivers. We don't need access to the video card or the motherboard or the network card (not that you'll ever need that in a server). It'll cause stability problems.

Re:I tried this this weekend....

[st1d]

>>Right now the only implementation of unix that is ready to go for your regular tom, dick and jane users is OS X. Until linux can get itself into a form like that, your general users won't be able to do a god damn thing in it.

You might be right, but that means little, as the idea is to advance the systems, not copy somebody else's ideas. Besides, what's the fun in imitating? The advantage Linux has is that some groups ("distros") can imitate, while others can advance.

Lumping all of these together is ignorance, not as bad, but comparable with, 1930's genetic superiority.

In other words, wake up folks! :)

Maybe other industries will follow suit?

[Money for Nothin']

After all, the armies of economists and financial gurus employed in the financial sector whose job it is to try to figure out how to more-cheaply run their companies can't be *totally* wrong... :-)

But consider the reality..

[msimm]

Linux distribution cost time and money to produce.

They also exert *some* influence on the software projects they choose to include or to fund.

Ok so far?

Linux projects choose to include and fund...

1) A complete CLI environment, that means supporting, bug-hunt/fixing, managing and updating as necessary.

2) A complete IOS. This is related to the other, but distinct enough.

3) A mind-blowing number for possible configurations of webserver. That includes support, updates and management for the oodles of wonderful Linux ready server packages.

4) A graphics ready workstation. X! X apps, games, gui configuration utilities. All sorts of stuff.

5) Of course we've moved WAY beyond CDE and its clumsy ilk! So we need what? At least two COMPLETE UI's subsystems? Gawd, and then we'd better throw in a bunch of applications designed specifically around Gnome or KDE to really complicate things!

There was a time when Linux distro's really needed to justify their lack of commercial software buy adding HEAPs of OSS ware.

Of course that time has past.

As a Linux user what I'd like to see is a Linux distro that can seriously focus on whatever its primary objective it.

I want my server to be solid, if it has a GUI I'd like to to be solely focused on the task I've installed the system to complete.

Likewise, if I'm going to install a desktop distro on my wifes machine it sure as hell had better know what it is supposed to do, and do it reliably. Right now there is no such distro. My wife did use Linux, for about 3 years. But its still a patchwork system. Distro's aren't designed to be GUI only and things regularly creep up that require you have a much more through understanding of the system internals then is really acceptable in this day and age. Its 2005.

My work predicates I will always have the need to use a hybrid desktop/CLI/IOS operating system and for that I'm very thankful to have Linux to use. But I have no doubt that there will always be a Gentoo or Debian thats ready to suite my needs.

What I take issue with is distro's/fan bois touting Linux as the mature desktop operating system, it so clearly isn't. Its adequate. No more. And for most of use who have been using it over the years that seems like leaps and bounds. But its still got a ways to go before we are really doing anyone any favors by pretending its really for the masses.

Re:But consider the reality..

[Anonymous Coward]

Strange, a mostly reasonable post, thanks for bring the S/N ratio up a bit.

What I take issue with is distro's/fan bois touting Linux as the mature desktop operating system, it so clearly isn't. Its adequate. No more. And for most of use who have been using it over the years that seems like leaps and bounds. But its still got a ways to go before we are really doing anyone any favors by pretending its really for the masses.

"It's adequate." Thanks, that just about sums up the problems I have with modern WIMP (GUI-ish) systems. Haven't tried OS X in a while, last time I saw one at a university lab the interface was essentially a prettified version of KDE or Gnome. Click there for a list of installed apps, click there to fire up a typical-looking word processor or web browser, etc. On the surface, all systems are useable (except Windows XP + IE + spyware and all the popup boxes). For that matter, my Slackware-based CLI laptop is just as useable (Alt-F12 is background music via mpg321, Alt-F1 is emacs, Alt-F8 is terminal emulator, 'chvt 13' is X11 and Mozilla for when I need it).

I'm getting very ready for the next paradigm shift. Either a cell phone that is a video recorder, MP3 player, net-enabled email/web machine with VR glasses to see things with, or a house computer that runs via voice commands and manages the entire household ('You're almost out of eggs, should I order more?') and can put any web page, TV broadcast, or phone call on any monitor.

Desktop challenges & education

[rshimizu12]

Linux is very close to becoming mainstream desktop OS. Linux is still lacking a bit in the help, install and education areas..... Linux still needs a better help system. No users consumer user wants to click on a menu item and end up at a command prompt with the man pages for help. Linux also needs a easier install. It would be most helpful if there was knoppix type of boot for the other distros. Linux also needs a better books that are more suited for learning and classroom curriculm. The Oreilly books are helpful, but they are more suited to people that already know Linux.

Re:Desktop challenges & education

[scum-e-bag]

Linux also needs a easier install.

ubuntulinux.org is damn easy to install... it's easier than XP. Occasionally there are hardware problems, such things as printers and winmodems, but mostly its just a case of booting from the install CD

I really hate it

[floydman]

when ppl espically reviewrs claim that businesses migrate to Linux to cut down costs.
I do not belive this is true.
I have seen lots of businesses where financing IT was not an issue of money (within reasonable limits ofcorse), and they just migrate to Linux for the speed, or the stability, and in some cases belive it or not, because some apps will run better on Linux than any other platform.

Claiming that Linux is cheaper is a myth, it is NOT cheaper, where I work we spend millions of $'s on Linux clusters, support from RH, Novell, IBM. So linux is not cheaper, it is simply a BETTER option.....at least most of the cases.
Besides, which idiot will risk his business going down for an IT mistake just beucase it is cheaper..

Re:Consumers Key

[poofyhairguy82]

So, despite the fact that Linux is more difficult to understand fully (it's a much larger and varied system), for those who barely understand the concept of "copy/paste", Linux is a lot more interesting and comforting. After three years, my mom's almost annoying when she brags about how her system isn't taken down when her friend's get infected.

As far as switching people over to Linux, to me the best candidates are those at the very top and at the very bottom of the computer user spectrum.

Its great for those that think that "computers are magical boxes" and who can't install Windows software. These people just want a web browser, an email program and some office software. Desktop Linux works great for them because they won't have to fight viruses and spyware -a battle they would lose in Windowsland (this assumes they buy a PC with Linspire or someone sets up Linux for them). Its also great for super nerds that want a Unix at home.

All of the people in the middle (gamers, people big into webcam chatting, people with lots of third party peripherals, etc.) are usually not happy with Linux. Basically if you can can keep spyware off your machine but touching the registry scares you, then Linux is probably not ready for your desktop. Its been ready for mine for more than a year.

Real life linux deployment - no one knows about

[Anonymous Coward]

My last company was a large market data vendor. Back in days 1995, we convinced the management to use linux for *faster* and *reliable* operation and we were *saved* by linux many times. Sun/Solaris and some other OS we had all folded in the new Linux infrastructure.

But, we were afraid of marketplace not accepting Linux, so, we did not tell *anyone*.

We deployed over 2000 Linux servers by 1999 all over the world.

We were the people in financial community who were helping linux gain in the backend replacing MSFT and SUNW. It was hell convincing people and took us over 5 years to convert most of the systems.

Sorry, I do not believe this

[einar2]

Working as an architect for one of the biggest banks of Switzerland I can say that we do not embrace Linux. Yes, every two years we are looking into the market and make a new positioning of Linux but so far we could not come up with a business case for the introduction of Linux.
Technically, this is /. after all, we speak about replacing the Unix servers with Linux. The desktop was never even considered. All the software we developed inhouse is J2EE based so it would be easy to change.
The main obstacle, beside the lack of a financial benefit ;-), is the lack of monitoring software. The products we set as our standard solutions are not available on Linux.
Sorry, statements claiming the financial industry is heading towards Linux are wishfull thinking. Ok, everybody has a linux server somewhere (well our whole trading platform runs on Linux) but that is nothing towards "embracing" Linux.