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A New Look at Linux vs. Windows TCO
An anonymous reader writes "Laura DiDio, research fellow at the Yankee Group, published a column this morning in which she discusses key findings from a new survey on the total cost of ownership of Windows vs. Linux. DiDio often is written off by the Linux camp as being pro-Microsoft, but she offers excellent, neutral advice for any IT department considering a fundamental systems switch: 'If you do not know what is on your network, if you cannot at least estimate the hourly, monthly or yearly cost of downtime, if you do not know how long it takes to recover from a security outage, if you cannot answer questions about the extent of your company's license compliance, then you cannot truly evaluate whether Linux, Windows or Unix is right for your business. Chances are, if you cannot answer most or all of those questions, it does not matter what operating system you have because ignorance of the core TCO tenets means that your business is not getting the most out of its networks.' "
"but she offers excellent, neutral advice"
The person who wrote this has not been reading her other work. Neutral isnt even on the map.
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DiDio often is written off by the Linux camp as being pro-Microsoft
Um, well, yes, with good reason. When someone performs public relations work for a large corporation on a long-term basis, one then needs to recognize that further publications by this person should be recognized to certainly be further public relations work for the same corporation. As a side note, one might also consider any TCO studies published by Red Hat Corporation to be somewhat biased.
100% correct.
Generally Windows servers need more attention.
100% back of the envelope, likely wishful thinking, unsubstantiated guess.
There were no real "key findings" in the article. Is it really worthy of Slashdot to mention a survey whose outcome was "well, it depends"? Never mind that, was it really worth writing the original article?
Either the author had nothing better to write about, or they felt like inflating their ego a little by assuming that people in business are pretty thick and need to be told the blindingly obvious.
Like car accidents, most hardware problems are due to driver error.
Criticism of a previous Didio study related to Linux TCO...
... does this sound professional to you?
Laura Didio whines that slashdot does not like her...
Quote from wikipedia by Didio: "The thing about Linux is, you can talk about a free, open operating system all you want, but you can't take that idea of free and open and put it into a capitalist system and maintain it as though it is some kind of hippie commune or ashram, because if you can do it like that, at that point I'm like, 'Pass the hookah please!'". And on another occasion she followed up: "I'm all for open source, and competition serves everyone's interest. But if Linux is really to take its place alongside Windows... then the vendors in this space cannot act like a bunch of hippies in a '60s commune or ashram. There really is no such thing as a free lunch."
Collection of Laura Didio quotes, compiled by Groklaw, on the subject of Didio insisting that she'd seen the linux-sco code comparison and it contained clearly copied code. This was posted, mind you, on the day that the judge ordered SCO to either provide the evidence linux contained copied sco code or drop those accusations from their lawsuit, and SCO resonded by dropping those accusations. In other words, the evidence never existed. There was never any copied code and SCO has as good as admitted so in court by their refusal to specify what the copied code was when the court ordered them to.
Laura Didio has made it clear she is not someone worth giving the slightest bit of attention or media press to. She has in the past shown a complete lack of any idea of rigor in compiling or presenting a study, as well as a willingness to both mislead and outright lie. This is not someone who knows how to do journalism, or how to do an informed study. This is someone who knows how to do one thing and one thing only, and that is shill for Microsoft when Microsoft pays them to. Right now she is shilling for Microsoft. Microsoft press releases released from Microsoft itself may occasionally contain good points or true statements, such as "Microsoft is a company located in Redmond". However, even when this is the case they don't get printed on the front page. Why should Microsoft press releases released through the front of Didio be treated any different?
For example: we have 3 servers (all Windows) in my company. Do we use them optimally? Probably, since we cannot replace them with any other software (to my great sorrow). Do we know how much each server costs us? No, and we will never be able to calculate that. Niether we care, as long as they do their job.
Why should I measure something which is hardly measurable just to be able to say that I use something in right way?
This is typical article where highly payed "analysts" try to spit obvious things in order to sound smart. As usual, they spit crap, but being so "well" informed about the subject, they even don't notice that.
No sig today.
Ms DiDio's report has been here since November 2004.
Has anyone succeeded in resolving their problem of which OS to use based on this insightful article?
I wasn't sure why Dido was reviewing linux...
I mean, she sings so well, why the sudden career change?
Sigs are for the weak.
Zotob Worm Hits CNN and Goes Global
Windows 2000 machines are infected. Linux and Unix aren't.
I clearly see what that woman means.
Seriously, anyone who doesn't even have a clue how much their systems are costing them are only ever going to make it worse - and more expensive - by randomly moving to another platform because someone's friend told them it was free. Anyone making such kneejerk reactions without the figures also has a high probability of being a moron that makes anything they touch turn to sh*t anyway, making it doubly worse.
In essence - if you don't even know what you're doing with what you have, don't make it worse by changing it to something else that's so different.
I don't know if MS should be pointing this out in their marketing though - one one hand it's inherently true and a great way for them to fight the leaks to OSS - but it's also pointing out to the majority of customers that they're stupid.
Regardless of what the original poster thought, she does not supply neutral advice. If anything, what I see here is an attempt to appear neutral, but throwing in veiled threats.
Windows commands 65 to 70 percent of the server operating system market, while the Linux share stands at 15 to 20 percent
What market? What segments? What percentage of computing power? When you say MS runs 65% of the market you imply (and this is where Laura also gets here reputation) that everything else is a marginalized entity.
The high-level findings show that there is no universal clear-cut TCO basis to compel the corporate masses to do a wholesale switch from Windows to Linux
Gee, one machine, operating system, language, et. el. does not meet all needs. And this was insight? To whom? If anything this should be more concerning to MS, but it is also a plug for MS (as the owners of the market). But she follows it up with:
The majority of wholesale defections to Linux continues to come at the expense of midrange Unix installations...
The we see her drive home the MS competes with its own products (because they are just so good you need not upgrade), while Linux competes with its poorly defined systems, lack of support and array of distributions.
But, contrary to what the headlines would have us believe, the biggest threat to Microsoft's continued dominance, at present, is not Linux. It is older versions of Windows. The biggest threat to Linux is not Microsoft, but rather integration and interoperability issues among the various Linux and open-source distributions and applications. The lack of enterprise-level application support and documentation for the aforementioned software packages also is an issue.
Sorry but this is typical DiDio, with some enhanced editing to ensure it give the appearance of being unbiased. But she hit all the MS talking points.
Ok, here's the back of my envelope:
1) Everywhere I've worked, the Windows admins outnumber the Unix admins, at least 2:1, per managed machine.
2) The Windows admins seem to work in a half-frenzied state, much of the time, while the Unix admins try to look busy, much of the time.
3) Windows admins are hard-working, loyal, dutiful, do-as-you-say-Sir types, whereas Unix admins are chronically lazy -- and lazy like a fox.
4) Windows admins are excellent at solving "hit the box with open hand, right here, and it will go" problems, or "magical" solutions, but are narrowly focused on the Windows world (there are so many incantations to learn, I guess), whereas Unix admins can typically solve most problems on Windows PCs and can also manage Cisco, Macintosh, Sun, IBM, DEC, BSD PC or Linux PC, etc. (i.e. platforms that usually "just work" and are designed well, not just marketed well)
Seeing that salaries, in most organizations, grossly outweigh hardware and software costs, per year, I think I can safely toss out nearly all TCO studies and just "hire smart". I'll let my people decide what works, not a TCO study, thank you.
I'm afraid this is incorrect - OS have acquisition costs and maintenance costs. The person who applies an OS patch most likely doesn't work for free.
One thing they teach you in Management 101 is that if you can't measure it you can't manage it. The argument that Linux acquisition costs less than Windows is essentially a moot point, since the biggest single cost in IT is personnel, not hardware or software.
Salarywise I think a good Windows admin should command about as much as a good Linux or Unix admin, unfortunately the majority of Windows admins I've seen can't even spell enterprise, much less act as part of one.
TCO is high because companies choose to trade skillz for salaries - and rather than hire a good Windows admin for $80-$80k a year or so, they go for the $45k inexperienced MCSE who's only demonstrated that he passes tests well. God help them when the $45k MCSE costs them a couple hundred thousand bucks in downtime because he couldn't figure out how to fix a problem.
Friend of mine works for a major processed food producer and told me yesterday that all their Windows 2000 machines and some of the older Windows XP machines got hammered by Zotob yesterday.
I told him that the patch to fix that vulnerability was released a week ago and there was an MS security bulletin on the thing - and that any admin worth paying knows that in this day and age, once the vulnerability is made public the worm won't be more than a couple days behind. Anyway, the company he works for apparently didn't think it was real important to patch the machines and Zotob took their entire production line down - costing them a couple million bucks, I guess.
First thing I'd do is ask the CIO why the machines weren't patched and then ask for his resignation - but I would give him the opportunity to fire a couple of middle managers berfore I kicked him out the door.
TCO? The main cost is and always will be good people.
we see things not as as they are, but as we are.
-- anais nin