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Users Reject MS Independent Study Claims
PenguinCandidate writes "End users from various corners of the Web have whole-heartedly rejected Microsoft's claims that an independent TCO comparison between Linux and Windows would be something akin to the second coming. Said one senior Linux architect: 'With Linux and open source, it is possible to arrive in a position where the organization has increased control over its situation [and reduced] its long-term costs. That's a highly desirable outcome and I doubt we'll ever see a Microsoft-funded study which will come to that conclusion.'"
wow a linux architect disagrees.....imagine that
./ ?
How about some REAL news
There is nothing new here. The article says that MS studies is bullshit, and that Linux-vendors funded might be bullshit too... This is the only thing close to a neutral study I've seen about Linux and Windows, and that is about security, not TCO. TCO is not easy to measure.
There's also the excellent report on Total Cost of 0wnership, which concludes that it's less work to 0wn a windows-based computer. Mac scores good on the scale of 0wnership.
Assembling etherkillers for fun an profit
Who cares? Groklaw had some information to post on this topic as well, Microsoft wanted to do a report together with OSDL, but OSDL decided against it as they would feel that it would be unfair.
cat
You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time.
Abraham Lincoln, (attributed)
16th president of US (1809 - 1865)
Suppose Microsoft demonstrates with a (real) independant study that Windows is, say, 30% less expensive than any other OS. Is it really all that counts? What if 5 years from now Microsoft pulls another one of its format-change trick and my company can't read the documents it produced 5 years ago reliably?
I'd say having control of your software, giving you better control over the data that is produced and a fighting chance against malware, as opposed to being enslaved to a software manufacturer, benevolent as it might appear to be, is a big part of the decision too. The problem can't be presented simply as a pure immediate or mid-term savings proposition. Possible loss of data, loss of services, and loss of business due to them are a big part of the equation, but of course it's not as easy to sell as "look, this costs less".
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
Sounds like they made the right decision. The article makes the great point that it's the definitions that make all the difference. It sounds very balanced. It just seems so natural that Open Source is the way to go. As with art and culture, many creative people would have you believe that everything new is created from nothing but their own creative spirit. However, it's possible to trace the historical influences on the evolution of arts and culture. Everything created is based on thousands of years of art and culture that belong to all of humanity. Even new scientific and technological developments are based on the entire history of human scientific knowledge that provides the foundation for new knowledge to be added to. And isn't that what Open Source is all about?
Abstinence is a government conspiracy. www.SafeSexZone.co
A topic like this will never be resolved to anyone's satisfaction. The simple fact of the matter is that many huge corporations are using linux corporate wide, and many users on this blog use linux daily with an incredibly low TCO, and a huge satisfaction factor. :-)
That's all that matters.
Ignore Alien Orders
Microsoft created the term 'TCO' in the first place, IIRC. To me, its all BS. Sure, 7-11 may have found it moderately preferable to stay with Windows than to retrain staff, but that doesn't give any indication to the qualitive improvements in the standard of work, nor does it factor in long-term benefits that open source development models tend to provide. The parent also raised a fantastic point about vendor lock-in; if you use windows, Microsoft effectively owns your software.
These studies are targetting corporate I.T. decision-makers, not home users like yourself. An I.T. department is likely to have the luxury of planning for the hardware that will be deployed in the future, and can thus make hardware incompatibilities a minimal concern.
Your claim of 800 hours is also completely off base from a corporate perspective. By setting a few GUI preferences, you could make it look and feel close enough to Windows that the majority of the Win32 workforce wouldn't care. The real work is done by the I.T. department, which probably already has significant in-house Linux muscle.
I won't even get into the benefits of improved manageability/lower licensing...
End users from various corners of the Web have whole-heartedly rejected Microsoft's claims that an independent TCO comparison between Linux and Windows would be something akin to the second coming.
What is that sentence supposed to mean? Microsoft doesn't think an independent TCO comparison is likely? And that end-users think it is?
I can't believe anybody actually read that sentence between the fingers hitting the keyboard and it appearing on the front page of Slashdot.
Of course it's targeted at managers, these are the only kind of people that can be convinced that somethinge essential free cost more then something what you have to buy.
And don't come with the training bs, training is a mandatory if it is buy-ware or not.You can be cheap and not train your personal or expect they train them self, but don't whine when they make un-educated decissions like not preferring open source when its a viable candidate.
The reason there's a high cost of migration off Microsoft systems is because Microsoft intentionally planned it that way. The "embrace and extend" strategy and many similar practices have been found in law to be designed for the purpose of making migration expensive.
If I were running a fair and objective TCO comparison, I would seek to measure the cost of migration both on and off each platform. Ideally, this would track costs not just once, but over several cycles. Since computing infrastructure is constantly evolving, a realistic TCO analysis has to deal with this scenario.
Parity: What to do when the weekend comes.
TCO will never be anything but a meaningless statistic. That's like trying to budget your personal expenses a year at a time. Situations arise that will always make TCO an insufficient benchmark.
...which i think to be the most important rebuttal is this; linsucks is free if your time costs nothing so hows that downtime due to spyware and virus attacks ? seriously, once you know the OS anyway, it takes less time. the only time they are on about is the time it takes to learn a new skill. after that i qould think it would take far less time to admin a linux system. urpmi, apt-get anyone?
just once, it would be good to see a single MS TCO study include the costs of virus, worms, etc.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
"...but then what about the time it takes to learn Linux?"
So what?
What about the time one needed to get to know windows?
It just depends on what you feed you kids.
And M$ is not slacking to that regard.
Name one independent observer that could conduct a TCO study that everyone on both sides would trust, regardless of the outcome.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
I would assume the story would be somewhat different, however, for someone with more specific (i.e., vendor-locked) needs than file, web, DB, or mail servers. Maybe some more experienced techs out there could chime in on that.
How this compares to Windows seems hard to quantify. A "properly configured" Windows server, while not quite as stable in certain situations as a "properly configured" Linux server, comes pretty close.
Frankly, I think it really just boils down to what the clients' needs are. Linux works better in some situations, Windows in others, etc.
For instance, one customer had SQL server go offline, taking down one of their primary applications, after the last round of security patches. I tell them to test the patches, but they don't want to spend the money. Go figure. Instead they pay me money to come in a fix what stops working. Every time there's a security patch update, I know I'm going to be busy.
For the Linux/MySQL installs I have to keep a book of SOP's next to the server because it's so seldom that anything goes wrong. If I don't make notes how to do stuff, I have to learn all over again the next time.
So, yeah, if you don't make notes then OSS does take more time because you forget what you did last year when X happened. And that information probably won't be on a tech support site somewhere.
With MSFT it seems like you're dorking with your servers all the time. I work on Windows and Linux servers and my opinion is that the Linux servers are more reliable and cost less to operate. That's hard to quantify but every time I see a MSFT TCO study I keep wondering how they get the numbers to come out in their favor.
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
You are missing the point. The "Get the Facts" campaign is aimed at corporates, not Mom & Pop. In a company like the one I work for (15,000+ desks) all installation is done by a contractor and maintenance by the IT Dept. The PCs (Windows) are absolutely locked down. The 15,000 users don't need to be taught RPM or APT.
... in Windows"? LOL! The people working around me know no more about Windows than how to switch on, type a memo or e-mail and then click the "Save" "Print" or "Send" button. Most would not know how to begin installing software, hardware or setting up a network. They would barely notice if they were in Word or Open Office.
800 hours to learn Linux "to be equally skilled as
As for Mom & Pop, they would be just as fine with pre-installed Linspire. But most will stick with Windows because they (incredibly maybe) think it's cuddly, and they love that nice Mr Gates who has given so much to charity - isn't he a self made man who we would all like to be? Anyway, won't Linux break their PC? - there is a sticker on it that says it's desinged for Windows XP. Windows will always have a place at the bottom end of the OS market.
But some things never change. I could not get linux to recoginze my sound card. I was told to get some second program to do it, but it was a hassel. Windows works out of the box.
Or so you think. If Linux were more widely supported, companies would provide drivers for both Windows and Linux on the CD. I must add that I have had to manually install drivers off the CD for most sound cards (among other things) I've dealt with in the last several years. It did not work out of the box.
Is it easier to install the drivers in Windows? At this time, yes, but were they made available on the CD in, say, and RPM and DEB format or something, it would not be anywhere near as difficult.
Windows works out of the box.
My experience has been, Windows works out of the box -- sometimes. When it doesn't work out of the box, good luck getting it to work, ever. Linux works -- all the time -- just maybe not out of the box. And Mac works out of the box, every time.
Say what you will about the reasons, but I have three Linux boxes, one of which dual-boots XP, and Gentoo has been more compatible than XP. I have one Powerbook, and I haven't had a compatibility issue yet. In fact, it had all the Unix tools I needed out of the box -- vim, ssh, mysql, postfix, and so on -- and there were good, working versions of Flash, Java, and Shockwave, worked out of the box in Safari and Firefox.
Oh -- and I'll name one MAJOR compatibility issue with Windows. When I got my new monitor, I discovered it had a small builtin USB hub, so I plugged my keyboard and mouse into it, and ran another cable from it to the box on the floor. My BIOS recognized the keyboard out of the box, my Gentoo (being used to USB) recognized the keyboard and mouse on first boot, without any changes at all, but Windows XP Pro, despite the fact that I'd been on USB before (just not on USB on the monitor), would recognize neither keyboard nor mouse. I'm hoping that it'll start working after I reinstall later, but notice -- on Linux, I didn't have to reboot or reconfigure, but on XP (where stuff is supposed to work out of the box) I have to reinstall?
I believe it would take a new person to linux 800 hours to become aquianted with the new OS enough to be equally skilled as they would be in Windows.
Took my mom maybe one or two.
To a mom or pop who is 50 and just wants to send email, it is a waste
It is a waste to spend $100 on Windows, plus another $50-100 and a subscription fee for AntiVirus, plus some ungodly hourly rate ($50/hour, at least?) for someone to secure their box and teach them all the things that they shouldn't do, which will screw up their computer, plus however much it costs to recover from that.
Compare that to: install Linux once, don't teach them how to save an attachmend and then give it "chmod +x", give them Thunderbird, and you're done. To a mom or pop who is 50 and just wants to send email, it makes sense.
I am a CS student, and for me it actually makes less sense -- I need my windows for games, but Mom and Pop don't play games.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
Because people like you don't realize that something that's "free" can cost a small fortune? That the managers realize that they have to pay someone to install the free software, pay someone to manage and maintain the free software. Pay someone to use the free software.
And don't come with the training bs, training is a mandatory if it is buy-ware or not.
Great. Except that I can easily find people with the skills on the Windows side, finding linux skills can be much harder (too many morons who think they understand but don't). And finding the training can be difficult again, especially since there are multiple distributions with different ways of doing the same thing. Take a look at something that should be easy, setting up a secure central authentication scheme. Building a Windows AD system is fairly simple. Even earning my RHCE I still don't know how to do this in Linux (NIS, what they did teach, is not secure by a long shot).
I am a fan of open source (I do have an RHCE), but also know Windows (I also have an MSCE). I use Linux where appropriate, and I use Windows where appropriate. The TCO arguement depends a LOT on what you are trying to accomplish and how you structure your environment, but arguing that Linux MUST be cheaper because the OS license is free but the Windows license is $700 won't stand up for long.
You are in a maze of twisted little posts, all alike.
'If someone is new to linux, they might get the software for free, but then what about the time it takes to learn Linux?'
Well, here's a personal study from my PC experience.
I used to use DR-DOS and GEM but moved to Microsoft DOS and Windows when Windows 3 came out, I then moved to windows 3.11 when that came out (TCO was a ligit copy of MS-DOS, and a pirate copy of Windows) it didn't take too long to pick up windows (or DOS) but it took years of fiddling to get the best performance out of it.
After that I moved to Windows 95 and started writing Windows applications and continued writing DOS applications. Windows 95 didn't cost me anything either, except for the guilt of using pirated software.
After that I moved to Windows NT at work and Windows 98 was just being released. After trying someone is new to linux, they might get the software for free, but then what about the time it takes to learn Linux?g to get Windows 98 to work on the office network we decided not to bother with it and keep most of the clients running Windows 95, it was about this time that I discovered Linux and installed it on my home PC.
Since then I have never run Windows on my local machine, have all the software I want and run no pirated software. Since my switch my TCO is now far less than if I were running Windows I've never had a viruses or Trojans to clean up, I'm still running the same brand software as in 1998 and my administration times on Linux are a fraction of what they would be on Windows, especially if something starts playing up(from experience of working mainly with windows at work for most of my professional carear)
It took me quite a while to pickup Linux in the early days, mainly the time it took to work out how to read man pages properly but once started everything fitted into place nicely, it took less time to learn Windows but years to find out exactly how it worked and how to work with it.
The only TCO type problems I have with Linux are:
1: A new KDE always screws up my settings when I install a new version.
2: Sometimes it takes a while to find a working driver (including fixing them)
3: Good well polished software can be hard to come by (but then again a lot of companies use bispoke solutions so it doesn't matter too much, and they can get the source to the unpolished software and make it a little more usable)
For the record I have never formatted a HDD to re-install Windows, I usually install another version of windows and copy everything that's needed (license keys, settings etc...) from the defunct Windows registry. I have had to do a couple of complete reinstalls of Linux but my current setup has been going for about 5 years (across different Linux vendors!).
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Skilled *nix admin (IE: certs, trained, 5 years experience, related degree) goes for $50k+ a year arround here.
Skilled Windows admin (IE: certs, trained, 5 years experience, related degree) can be had for under $40k a year.
Coughing up a one time $3k license for a server is a drop in the bucket when compared to $10k salary, taxes, and benis to be paid yearly.
-Rick
"Most people in the U.S. wouldn't know they live in a tyrannical state if it walked up and grabbed their junk." - MyFirs
Microsoft is still hard at work trying to create that perception:s /casestudies/CaseStudy.aspx?CaseStudyID=17131
http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/fact
As a personal user - I can testify quite the opposite - if I include not just the OS, but all the programs I use.
Before leaving the Windows world, I used the following programs because I couldn't find a free one to get work done. I'll list the price I remember paying:
WsFtp (~40)
PhotoImpact(80)
Quicken (30)
Spybot - Detect and Destroy (free, donated $15)
MS Access - (300 ?, needed a DB program)
MS Visual Basic ($99, not full version which costs as much as $699 IIRC)
Tiny Firewall (was free when I used it, it seems to be $49 now)
Cost I had to pay: $550 (Not including donation)
Now with Linux, I use:
gFtp (free)
Gimp (free)
GnuCash (free)
No need for Spyware detectors (had 3 free ones on Windows) nor for Virus detector which is also free on linux (ClamAV) - could get free one on Windows (AVG)
Program using either KDE IDE or GCC.
Don't need a DB program now but plenty of free ones out there.
Have a firewall - just don't remember the name now:)
With OS - All free.
I know there are some free solutions on Windows - but the Windows environment has a lot more shareware and promotes pay-for software while Linux gives you a lot more tools off the bat to get what you need done.
I appreciate that alot.
Microsoft's efforts in these studies is obviously part of their marketing efforts. Microsoft's strongest suit is marketing, not technology development. After all, look at how many companies they've purchased vs. original technologies which have been developed in-house.
I will qualify my question with this: I like Linux, but I make my bread & butter off of Windows - like it or not, it's easier to find income [here] with Windows. n.b. I said easier. I didn't say the work was better.
Now:
If Windows is such a great product, why is Microsoft plucking out their own short hairs (one-by-one) in frustration because they cannot convince tens of thousands (hundreds of?) of corporate licenses to move from Windows 2000 when it went out of service on June 30 '05; well-covered by the media, no less? It would seem businesses|corporations are well aware the various flavors of 2K are (relatively speaking) arguably the most stable of Microsoft's O/S products. Office 2000 and Visual Studio 6.0 dovetail quite well with 2K, creating a very cozy ménage à trois.
The TCO certain is dropping over time. No need to upgrade software, no need to purchase an assload of new hardware to support upgraded software. Microsoft may have to break one of their "rules" re: backward compatibility. It's been said IE 7.0 won't work on pre-XP systems, although I don't think that's going to make corporate accounts give a rat's posterior because there are some fine, decaf browsers which work quite well and don't make anyone miss IE at all.
As I said, MS could easily prove TCO of Windows is low(er), but to do so would admit loudly businesses don't want to budge. So the question remains: how do they motivate the 2K users to pry open their accounts payable budget and upgrade? Until they answer that, it doesn't matter what they say about TCO.
This is a very surprising result. I fully expected Linux enthusiasts to grudgingly admit that MS TCO is way better. In particular, people who have their own box at home and update and recompile their kernels every weekend generally have a good understanding of what it means to run an IT department for a 40000 member organization, don't they?
Microsoft has shown themselves to be manipulative and tricky SOBs in the past. There was nothing to be gained by getting involved with them on this issue or any other issue. The "Get the Facts" campaign is a transparent ploy. When MS is ready to really advance the state of computer tech they know how to contribute. In the mean time don't feed the troll.
Setup one team with Windows, and another with Linux, and see how they do over a few months.
Each week a new peripherial or application has to be installed.
The buzz with end users this week is that Open Source Development Labs (OSDL) chose wisely when it rejected an allegedly independent comparison of Linux and Windows. Unless there was a second page in that (Linux web site hosted) article that I missed, that is the ONLY time end users are ever mentioned, and the rest of the article is quotes from several Linux technicians/developers, one independant developer, and a very brief appearance by an MS person. Where the heck did all these end users come from? Unless I'm missing something huge (like that aforementioned second page), this article is no better supported by evidence than MS' anti-Linux press releases.
You have tried to support your argument with faulty reasoning! Go directly to jail; do not pass Go, do not collect $200!
It all depends. If someone knows windows, has used windows for a long time, then windows might be cheaper. The person pays the hundred bucks or so for the OS and they are done.
Agreed, it all depends on how you want to spin the baseline assumptions before you start measuring. Naturally if you are going to exclude the biggest of the one-time costs for one OS (mastering the learning curve) but include it for the other, then you've introduced a serious bias. In the situation you describe, you aren't measuring the costs of the systems, you are estimating projected costs after adjustment for costs that have already been paid and shouldn't have to be paid again. That isn't a good basis for strategizing; that is something you do after you've decided your strategy and need to decide on the tactical details involved in implementing your decision.
As has been said before, this whole "total cost of ownership" concept is so dependent on the underlying definitions that it can be skewed any which way you want.
I've gone ahead and quantified a realistic cost of deployment of a stable Windows-based environment. For 10 users you are looking at price tag of $7500 or so, including everything from server, firewall and a decent switch to all the Microsoft server application software licenses, but excluding desktops.
By stable I mean one that is impervious to most common attacks:
1. MAC lockdown at switch level - bring in a foreign laptop, and it will be on an entirely different VLAN firewalled off with Internet access and without corporate resources access.
2. Desktop lockdown to require non-admin rights to get work done, standardized. No admin rights == no unauthorized apps, no malware. I actually have a GPO in place that makes admin rights worse than non-admin rights, so you have to modify the GPO to override that.
3. Fault-tolerant servers that reduce the need for expertise in the domain.
This makes the TCO pretty low, but the initial investment is fairly significant. Notice that most of the requirements echo what we take for granted in the Linux world.
Can I deploy a functionally identical solution on Linux that I can on a Microsoft platform? Yes I can, provided that there is application software in a comparable price range.
For instance, Scalix can compete with Exchange fairly well, though pricing for Scalix is almost identical. Actually, I can probably beat it with Exchange pricing if I go with Open License model.
As long as Microsoft licenses its software perpetually, there is little threat of the doomsday document scenario. If, however, they switch to subscription-based model, we'll see TCO in Linux become substantially more attractive.
Given about 2-3 months of R&D investment, I am pretty sure I could offer a Linux-based solution at a similar price point.
Leonid S. Knyshov
Find me on Quora
To be a "cracker" requires a lot of skills that average folks don't possess. You have to be super type-A for one thing. You must be able to memorize every step you've taken so you can backtrack and put things back if need be. I think that certain types of habitual liars could make good crackers. The kinds who can have multiple threads of lies among multiple people and actually be able to keep the story straight. Hackers? Totally different. You still need abilities that most people don't have a large part of those abilties being deductive logic and curiosity about how things work. Too many people don't care how things work, they just want to use them. Those people can never and will never be hackers.
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
TCO has nothing to do with Linux...
Control has everything to do with it...
I let nobody tell me how to do my business, not Bill, not Steve, nobody!!!
The fucking arrogance these people have in thinking that they can...
I strongly suggest that slashdot readers RTFA before posting your bashing a certain Redmond company. First of all, the study in question (from what i could glean from the article) was this...
Subject: A microsoft house.
Object: Study the differences in TCO of the company staying with microsoft versus the company moving to linux and open source.
Period: Approximately 3 years.
The study found that the TCO of staying with microsoft was considerably lower than the TCO of moving to open source. The findings of the study are true; though they can be presented deceptively. Due to the short period of the study, as mentioned in the article, microsoft can "...emphasize the cost of migration and associated training costs..." If the period was longer (say 10 to 15 years), the TCO would definitely be lower for linux and open source products.
Does this mean that the study is invalid ot that it should be thrown out? I don't think. For companies with a steady income but small savings, companies who depend on rapid application development, or small businesses with proportionally small IT departments, this study is very valid. It would hurt any company to lose a couple months or fall behind on their development for a year. For the types of companies i have just mentioned, the effect of losing time can be much more disastrous. I am sure that there is anecdotal evidence that shows a company in one of those situations can do it, but i believe many companies would be disinclined to take the risk. For companies with larger bank accounts or with the flexibility to not release any code for an extended period of time, the findings of this study could more readily be ignored.
Through the article, there was one bit of good advice about such studies repeated by those from both microsoft and linux houses: "... no research that has been funded by Microsoft, a Linux vendor or otherwise should be taken seriously."
Can you run a server in which the only money you put into it is the cost of the hardware and the electricity to run it? No.
Wait, what about Open Source or Free Software or those of us who don't think there's a difference between the two? What about it, it's free!
Yes, it is free, but there still needs to be someone to maintain the server. There is nothing autonomous about any server I've ever seen in my entire life in the entire world. Someone has to maintain the server, plain and simple. Are there people out there who are well versed in Unix/Linux that can maintain a server with absolutely no software costs? Yes. Do they work for free? Not usually.
When taking into consideration TCO for the company just big enough to want to do their server stuffs in-house, but not big enough to hire a full fledged IT department ... Microsoft wins. Hands down it wins. Why? Because people know it, there are a thousand MCSE's with books and phone support contracts out there who can be replaced within 4 hours by calling one of a hundred temp services.
Can you do that with linux? No you can not. Why? Because MCSE's are a dime a dozen, there is nothing really special about an MCSE anymore, hell a teenager could get one. It's a certification, but it's also a "pass" that you are capable of usually making sure that a server and the network its attached to "work" and if you don't, you can be replaced.
You want to know what is complete malarky all around as far as TCO? The fact that most businesses don't want to deal with operation, they consult it out. Just like companies don't like to clean their toliets, they don't like to maintain their servers either.
You know why? Because they know that they can for a fixed fee have a server and someone to bitch at whenever they please. And these consulting companies aren't making money from selling software licenses, they're making money from retainers and service contracts. The service contracts that when averaged out equal the cost of about one or two full time employees, but when you consult you get a whole TEAM.
So the server software doesn't matter, in fact in most instances its moot.
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
The parent is correct. Total cost of ownership is a nebulous issue. It is different for each company. If you only have MCSE's on staff, with no desire to learn anything else, and who have a difficult time with more technical aspects of Microsoft's products, coupled with a user base that occasionally has a difficult time getting the toast into the toaster, Linux is not for them (and never will be). If you have skilled Linux admins and developers on staff, and a tech-savvy workforce, Linux is a dream come true. It also depends on exactly what the company is doing with it's technology, it's current hardware and software condition, past licencing, the current cost of electricity, the products they sell and whether the technology is used in the manufacture/enhancement of those products, and about 1 billion other variables (all of them independent, and then also the point of view of the CXO, their tech-savvy-ness, and (to a certain degree), the assertions, aspirations, and skill of the Microsoft sales people trying to give them facts. The entire process is subjective, and widely open to interpretation (even miniscule parts of the debate are open to wide swings of opinion and point of view)
This is the only thing close to a neutral study I've seen about Linux and Windows, and that is about security, not TCO.
:-) In other words it costs less to 0wnz a Windows box....
W1nd0wz h45 4 L0\/\/3R 7073L C057 0f 0\/\/N3R5H1P than Linux. See, it's a security thing
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Linux doesn't give you anything; it is just a kernel. Linux Distributions, on the other hand, give you tons of shit. Granted the Windows world (mostly) revolves around money, but it's counter-productive to complain that Windows doesn't come with good apps. If Microsoft included their apps, everybody would complain about monopoly issues; if Microsoft included competitor's apps (LOL), other competitors would complain about being left out (i.e. including QuickTime but not Real, Norton but not McAfee, etc).
"However, Fitzback said a completely independent comparison between the two platforms could be possible, and the OSDL should probably conduct such a study if possible, but once again he conceded that the results could still be suspect."
How the hell can a Linux proponet such as OSDL conduct "a ompletely independent comparison between the two platforms"? What an idiot.
Vote for Pedro
The problem is that for a long time, somewhere, it was hammered into people's heads that "TCO is important". That's a pretty simple, important concept. The idea is that the vendor can hide costs, and that the customer's up-front cost may be less than what they will actually wind up paying.
However, the entire concept of having a bloody vendor doing a TCO study and presenting you with the results is absurd -- it's the vendor presenting you with *another* set of up-front costs. Who is to say that they don't have *more* hidden costs? Unless they are providing you with a guarantee that you will not have to pay a single cent above the TCO that they are claiming, that they will pay every cent in your related costs above claimed TCO, a vendor-supplied TCO is simply meaningless.
The concept of TCO is important. The idea of slapping an absolute value for TCO on product packaging is quite silly.
I think that there's one pretty simple argument in favor of Linux. Any time a vendor provides any possibility of lock-in, be it user familiarity with their software, format incompatibility with thier software, whatever, there is a cost to migrate. At some point, if they are doing a good job of running their business, they will wind up extracting from you $COST_OF_MIGRATION - 1. That's an ideal case, but that's the way it is. Look at software packages from people like IBM, Novell, and so forth. They *will* get more expensive, have expensive things to interface their software and so forth, and the further on in the lifecycle the software is (the more entrenched their remaining customers are and the harder it is to move away from the product) the more expensive the prices. IBM makes a tremendous amount of money from simply providing compatibility with their old systems -- IBM's systems are *not* cheap. Look at SCO if you want to see an even more towards-the-end-of-the-life example.
Now, Microsoft has a great deal of lock-in potential. They provide the primary application suite, have a number of closed formats and protocols, the operating system, and the server-side apps to interface with the application suite. Now, if you go with Microsoft, you are gambling that either (a) someone will come along and reduce cost of migration to a nominal amount (not that likely, especially when it is in Microsoft's interests not to allow this), or (b) that Microsoft will screw up extracting money from their locked-in customers at some point in the future (which seems unlikely, because Microsoft has done a pretty decent and aggressive job of being a business thus far).
Now, I expect Red Hat to do the same damn thing at Microsoft at some point in the future, someday. The point is that it's not very hard to transition from Red Hat to something else if necessary, be it as simple as to White Box Linux or even more extreme (SuSE, Debian, etc). At least in the current state of things, it is extremely difficult for a Linux vendor to achieve any significant degree of lock-in. Start worrying if a vendor starts shipping non-open-source GUI apps (build user familiarity with them, making it harder to switch away), servers (closed protocols, leveraging incompatibility), or so forth. Aside from TrollTech, though, I've seen few attempts to "get a lock" on the Linux distro world, and it looks like there will be a multi-vendor environment for a long time to come. Seems like a pretty attractive option.
Any program relying on (nontrivial) preemptive multithreading will be buggy.
I believe it would take a new person to linux 800 hours to become aquianted with the new OS enough to be equally skilled as they would be in Windows. That is about 20 weeks or so of playing with the OS full time. Or for a casual user, a year of messing around with Linux on saturdays.
You are suggesting that it would take 4 months of general productivity use to become fluent in the new system or that it would cause 4 months of lost productivity? These are very different fiscally.....
Secondly, I guess it depends on how familiar one is with the operating system. For a complete newbie, it really doesn't matter what they are running. They won't be familliar with it anyway. For an intermediate user who is intimidated by Linux, it may take that much time to become familiar and comfortable, but it will not cost nearly that much in terms of productivity. Maybe a couple of hours of training (at most) and a couple of hours in lost productivity (at most). The rest is simply a psychological cost.
It is not "How much is 800 hours of your time worth?" but rather "How much is it worth to you to feel off-balance for a couple of months at most?"
Secondly, you have another issue. If you pay for your software, this costs money. If you get your software free of charge (and open source) then you can take some of that money and pay for better hardware. So the "It doesn't detect my soundcard" while a concern is not a TCO point. The cost of all the software you probably use on your system on a daily basis is probably in excess of $1000 if you bought it all retail. I am assuming Office Professional, Windows XP Home, and then at least a few other games and goodies.
Finally regarding time. My Linux-using customers almost never have to deal with viruses or adware/spyware. My windows users do. This incurrs substantial productivity costs. In the long run, I think you will spend more than 800 hours battling spyware. And this is 800 hours of *lost productivity* that you would not have with Linux. So how much is 800 hours of your time worth?
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Incidentally, the first Linux I used, Mandrake 8.1, did a better job of detecting my hardware than XP. In fact it worked "out of the box" which XP did not, as I had to install sound and video drivers, and later a driver for my modem as MS's kept crashing my box. Debian just works, Mandrake just works. SuSE just works. Mepis just works. Ubuntu just works. Puppy just works. XP just flopped, so I dumped it and got serious about Linux.
As a home user, the real deal for me is not cost. I have spent more money on various Linux distros than on MS. It's about having a say in what goes on my box and what stays. Have another look at the MS EULA. Use MS and they have the last word: they can delete and add software, delete and add files, and for any reason whatsoever. Beyond that, they can share that right to anyone they want to. Click "I agree" to the MS EULA and it become MS's computer. Screw that. YMMV.
If you want your life to be different, live it differently.
this TCO thingie comparison only works when you have hundreds of employees;dozens of systems; and server rather than peer to peer networks
But for all of those SMEs with 5 or less people, if one of them knows Linux (and lets face it, it's not like any of the major distribs advertise, so most new users have to come from word of mouth), training time is minimised since at least 1/5 of your workforce is already competent...
So the question is - you could have a Linux based computer for £500 or a Windows box for over a grand and a half. (identical hardware, I've just done this comparison for two businesses)
IF the installer is even a bit savvy, and tweaks the desktop settings right, the other 4 users need barely know they've changed systems.
instead of TCO calculate the expected cost, ie the probabilty weighted averages, of buying a system and then migrating to another system, including all document translation, data conversion, etc.
This will explain to PHB's "why" they're better off with Linux. because the migration cost are negligible when all the data formats are universal, certainly less than ms's inflated exit barrier.
---|]Q *bling*
Twice a day installations/designs would make for a more intersting comparison. Compare document import/export between applications/OS. Compare OS+browser renderings of moderately complex CSS based webpages. How often will MS be shown to be the odd man out?
There is no right to feel safe thru security vaudeville at the expense of everyone's freedom, privacy and tax money.
but on XP (where stuff is supposed to work out of the box) I have to reinstall?
Nope, no need to reinstall, but I'll admit I always found that to be a bit problematic. You gotta login first before it detects/installs your new devices - which you happen to need to login in the first place.
Enabling DOS USB support may help (if the BIOS has the option - it's common nowadays), but I wish we wouldn't have to do that (then reboot and go disable it again). It has been a common enough occurence for me to always connect using ps/2 ports instead (using the green adapters) as that always works.
I doubt Vista will adress that either. There's so many small issues like that i wish they'd take care of instead of adding more eye candy, but with every new version of windows I'm disappointed.
How about having the option of inverting the mouse buttons PER DEVICE? Right now you can swap the mouse buttons, but only for all devices. That's quite annoying when left & right handers share the same PC. Instead I had to resort to physically swapping the buttons (hardwired backwards). Even the 3rd party drivers are no help (logitech and others). Again, I doubt we'll ever see a fix for that - although I'm sure lots more eyecandy is coming down the road...
The day they fix all these small issues - even if they don't introduce all kinds of new technologies and pretty things - then they'll finally have a OS that "just works" and that I actually WANT to buy.
///<sig
Maybe we could get a competor company to do a TCO, that is not biased. E.g Apple or Sun or IBM
"I'm going to f***ing bury that guy, I have done it before, and I will do it again. I'm going to f***ing kill Google"
Sure it's perhaps the most popular web server for major sites. But the number of non web-servers on the internet vastly outnumbers the number of webservers.
And besides, servers are likely to be set up with the main user not running as administrator. It's tough to get traction on those systems. Better to attack loosely administered user systems, regardless of OS.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
MAC lockdown? Hostile GPO? FT server ... at $7500/10 seats? The clincher was your tagline: "Affordable fault-tolerant solutions for small business". Let me guess... you work with several loan companies in order to get competitive rates for your customers to afford your hourly rates/maintenance costs.
I don't think so. This is exactly why I dislike consultants and security freaks. All of that is totally unnecessary for small businesses. The more people like you pimp security and paranoia-based solutions, the more justification it gives to Microshaft to improve DRM and other needless security/marketing devices. NO thanks.
They have some pretty good products, with some pretty good features. Yet 90% of their customer base know about only 10% of features, and buy their products not because they get better (and they do), but because Microsoft rams them down their throats.
They need to rip off Apple marketing. Those fellas know what they're doing. I'm convinced, if Microsoft outsourced marketing to Apple, they'd boost their revenues at least 30% and grow a huge, rabid fanbase in a matter of 2 years.
Not only are the users clued up, but so are the developers. Quite honestly, almost all, if not all Linux distros are superior to Windows for security. If the day comes that Windows is more secured then Linux (i.e. far less bugs and comes secured out of the box), then Linux will have issues.
With that said, I noticed in my logs today that somebody was making a concerted effort to kill my home server and 5 other servers that a company that I help with owns. In a 5 hour period, there were no less than 20,000 attempts, mostly aimed at root via sshd (which was shut down ages ago). Most of the systems( there were 20) that were coming at these boxes were Windows, but 3 of them appear to be macs. I thought that was interesting.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I would think a truly independant study would look at all the time required by end users to maintain their NTFS or FAT32 file systems, cache cleaning and defragging, Anti-Virus and Anti-Spyware updating and scanning, not to mention answering all those annoying and prolific dialogs that constantly get in your face, that consume otherwise productive time. Then there are all those oddities that Windows is so well known for.... How do Windows users get anything done? I guess these are not cost factors if you are only playing with your computer. What about down time when 3 workstations out of 10 suddenly got porn popups? Oh yeah, that isn't an OS problem, is it.
No admin rights == no unauthorized apps, no malware.
That's not true. Users can still install apps in their user space unless you mount their user space as noexec. So, what you've described is possible, but I disagree with you that it's something we take for granted in the Linux world.
*sigh* back to work...
I think the Total Value of Ownership tips the scale to one end more. Tack on reliability, open-formats, malware/viruses, spectrum of useful and competing tools, maintenance.
Linux in itself, independent of cost, is a much more valuable product that Windows in many ways.
"You do have good points" - by rolfwind (528248) on Saturday August 27, @09:00PM
Thanks man, they come from experience is all. I love this stuff (this field in general, and cars too... they're both the 'province of hackers' galore!)
Hacker imo, means someone who's into learning for the sake of bettering themselves & working with what they have (be it cars, computers, their homes even, etc./et all, anything that involved BOTH "art & science" (craftsmenship)) to make it better/faster/stronger & more efficient (if not more aesthetically pleasing to boot).
"I only listed that article to mention that MS is still working very hard to make it the perception that TCO of MS is lower than linux." - by rolfwind (528248) on Saturday August 27, @09:00PM
Got ya, & they do a decent job of it, citing successes experienced by their customer base such as the Radio Shack example you & I discussed here.
It just sometimes TRULY "boggles the mind" how 'jihad' Linux & UNIX folks can be when it comes to Microsoft imo... Linux, if anything, is going to be what ultimately "KILLS" Unix if anything does, not Microsoft.
(Easier turn-around learning curve for UNIX folks to Linux, & also more overall familiarity: IMO? Linux IS a "better UNIX" is all... a better knock-off & improvement, because this field is RAMPANT with "imitate & improve upon", constantly & I cite it in the URL's I put into this reply for you to reference with facts in those URL's of a far more detailed & technical nature).
Both sets of OS families (Microsoft's NT-based ones like 2000/XP/Server 2003 etc./et all &/or Linuxes) have been around for a decade++ now & are going strong... and, they tend to "rip off" & imitate the HELL out of one another, quite a lot:
E.G.=> Linux process scheduling methods are now VERY similar to NT-based OS' completion ports, & also threads being present @ the kernel level in Linux is a direct copy of what has always been there in NT-based OS (for SMP purposes mainly imo).
Here is more direct technical info. on that from me that I have posted here before in FAR greater technical detail if you are interested:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=155314&thresho ld=1&commentsort=0&tid=201&mode=thread&cid=1304523 3
Overall, on the subject of "Linux vs. Windows"?
My opinion is, that the "thinking of this century/decade" should be that INTEROPERABILITY is the keyword of the decade: making them work as seamlessly as possible together.
What MAY hurt Linux, imo, is what happened to UNIX: Too many 'fractured factions' & incompatibilities @ the binaries level on diff. versions of Linux...
Yes, this is WHY we are all not running a UNIX of somekind on today's PC's imo, but instead are mostly running Win32 based OS'.
UNIX vendors, early on, all got 'greedy' & wanted the 'whole ball of wax' & MS took advantage of it!
They did that by getting developers via providing an EXCELLENT & FLEXIBLE/POWERFUL/UBIQUITOUS API + development tools (from both Borland & MS mainly) that made QUICK RAD app development possible that are pretty cheap compared to say, the cost of UNIX mainframe/midrange apps & development tools is why... hardware improvements (and software ones in apps, OS & development tools as well) took it the rest of the way.
Bottom-line:
Get the developers and provide them MONETARY incentive?
You get apps... you get apps, & lots of them for a plethora of purposes??
You get users, and thus, sales.
The freeware model & OpenSource, technically, should have imo, knocked-the-chocolate outta MS @ least 5 years ago...
Now, I think the reason it hasn't is because the apps (or as many as there are for Win32 from commercialware to shareware, or
Let's see if I have this straight. The entire proposal is thrown out on the _assumption_ that MS will skew the tests. Okay, that's understandable. Yet, all we get is that from the so-called OSS representative. So much for transparency. Was there an NDA involved?
If the proposal was "MS will design, conduct, and report the tests," then yea, same old crap. But was it? I haven't heard. The article (OMFG, I read the article!) doesn't say.
To dismiss the competition based on what might happen (the bulk of the article) is also called FUD.
Why not use this against them? If MS can't agree on a set of criteria that (mostly) satisfies both sides, then say so, and point it out. If they do, well, fantastic! No more excuses from either side (haha - yea, right).
The most likely outcome would be what anybody with real experience with both platforms already knows: they both have their strengths and weaknesses. If representatives from the OSS and MS can't come to an agreement, that's fine.
But at least try.
Such a study is impossible.
How do you factor in the cost of freedom? For example, MS give-aways (like IE) are only free if you ignore the lock-in costs involved. That is why MS has turned a blind eye to the copyright infringement of MS Windows in third world nations (so-called "piracy"), because the rapid distribution of MS Windows through copyright infringement was destroying the freedom of those nations to switch to genuinely free alternatives - free as in liberating.
MS software is cheaper than free software only if you put no value on freedom (liberty).
I am anarch of all I survey.
I'm exactly the same... err, well, except my dad is a computer tech and my mom is stuck on games (pac-man and that sort of thing, not *real* games like Battlefield, GTA, etc ;) ).
I did manage to get one of my sisters to use linux, though, and so far she's had very few problems, all of which were with particular programs, not with the OS.
Early bird may get the worm.. but the second mouse gets the cheese.
Not really a fair comparison. Linux is 95% "particular programs" anyway.
Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
http://hackeron.dyndns.org/hackeron/index.php/Linu x_or_Windows_-_A_Practical_Comparison
Any criticism will be highly appreciated.
Lies pushed by the faggot zealot linsux community. Stop coding because you suck at it, and go back to taking it up the ass, because you're expert at that. Eat a dick, whorevalds
"""Because people like you don't realize that something that's "free" can cost a small fortune? That the managers realize that they have to pay someone to install the free software, pay someone to manage and maintain the free software. Pay someone to use the free software."""
Last time I checked, MS billed me for about $350 for a couple of support calls (which I didn't have to pay because it was a bug after all).
I'm bloody well payed for installing MS software at my work, there is no difference with open-source.
My co-workers get the same amount of money payed whether they are doing nothing with openoffice or nothing with MS-Office, there productivity for 99% of the time is the same.
You are using arguments that hold up for both side because in software, there is not much difference when the functionality is the same.
For all the other arguments you gave, have you ever wonderd that it is hard to find good personal, well it is not hard, you just have to pay for what you want, people want to get payed for there time.
Software doesn't want to get payed, the people who make it might, but they already have spend their time on it and perhaps have already been payed.
About setting up ADS, yeah well I bet that most of your AD can be read anonymous, even when it's not needed.
Maybe you forget that when getting training, you learn a basic skillset which you have to expand by yourself.
TCO is like a company logo, for most companies they are not the same.
Similar TCO battles, was recently lost on PABX vs VOIP turf -with VOIP is more cost effective for greenfields - but the PABX vendors can still show TCO...but the curve is razor sharp.
Forget what was. If you are an established concern, and your new competitors can undercut you because of a technological shift, the smart ones write off their losses, and start again.
It is not comforting when MS have a revenue model that bespeaks of double digit cost increases (sheer cost overheads is you are a customer).
Common in MS studies, is placing a value on these losses, conversion etc. Obviously, players like Google know better. It's nice new greenfields know the real score.
Of course, if we argue TCO with Windows, we've already lost. Free Software is about FREEDOM, not price. And that's the one thing Microsoft have NO argument against. I half-suspect that the whole Open Source movement is an attempt to get Linux people to forget about Free Software, too. The Halloween memo did mention that they had insiders in the Linux community, and the undermining of the Free Software label is the one thing I know of that's been so damaging to the cause of Software Freedom.
Think about it, the addiction is to the formats and protocols. If MS actually followed established protocols and standards, rather than "extending" them so they only work on MS, then all this talk about switching would be irrelevant -- you'd be able to use what ever app or operating system does the job.
Open formats and protocols give you a choice in vendors and in the use of your documents. Freedom
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
Prez Bush said it best when he said..
"You can fool me once, you can fool me tw.. you can't fool me!"
(you'd think his speach writers would have gotten the "You can fool me once, you can't fool me twice" bit right wouldn't you?)
Dez
http://www.blanchfield.com.au/blog/
--- Dez Blanchfield http://WebSearch.COM.AU "Will work for bandwidth.."
"End users from various corners of the Web..."
End users are idiots. Enuff said.
with Linux or OSS TCO is not the main driving factor, instead the focus is shifted at lock-in and interoperability (open formats/standards). For those things it is hard to put a price on them, and the costs mostly only come years and years after the product is in place.
Still those @#$!@$%& managers are only interested in the price-picture, and don't care about _anything_ else, or the fact that you will be the one dealing with all the misery/hell afterwards.
On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero.
In other news, dogs like to sniff around alot and lick themselves!
Notice _ALL_ of Micro$oft's studies include switching costs of going from Windows. It includes training time longer than say a Windows upgrade. It includes training time where there wouldn't be for M$ products.
Who doesn't know that? Yes if you want to bring new things into your organization, you're bound to have a switching costs. You have to look long-term and see whether the switching costs get compensated for, which I believe they do- in terms of lesser hardware needed to do the simplest task, fewer admins due to more automation, and lower software costs.
-M
when you see the word 'Linux', drink!
Users make their own decisions.
Honestly, having the main user non-priviledged just doesn't make sense for most people. Try using Mac OS X a while with the box popping up and asking for your root password all the time. That's not good either, and as soon as worm writers decide to take advantage of it, we'll see that it's a false sense of security.
Your principles are great, when there is an administrator-in house. Then only that person gets the privileges. And plenty of companies run their Windows systems the same way.
Home machines will be less secure, that's the way it is. People just aren't as careful as professional administrators.
http://lkml.org/lkml/2005/8/20/95
Isn't that Fifty Dickety-Two?
"I'm going to f***ing bury that guy, I have done it before, and I will do it again. I'm going to f***ing kill Google"
How 'bout coining Total Cost of Virus (Damages). I guess TCO has to do with that ... p^th3t1c. How 'bout TCL -- Total Cost of Licensing ... . How 'bout TCM Total Cost of Marketing -- guess micosoft must have this embedded somehows ...
So your TCO over that incident was just your time troubleshooting, just as it would have been for Linux. Quite compelling counter arguement.
I'm bloody well payed for installing MS software at my work,
I never said MS software magically installed itself. just that anyone who only looked at the acquisition price and thought that was the only consideration has a lot to learn.
You are using arguments that hold up for both side because in software, there is not much difference when the functionality is the same.
Really? So if I designed an OSS web server that required you to translate all the config statements into Sanscrit, there would not be much difference in the time and effort required to set it up? Level of effort to manage and maintain Postfix, Sendmail, Qmail, and Exchange are all about equal?
My point isn't that Linux is cheaper to operate than Windows, or that Windows is cheaper to operate than Linux. Its that Acquisition cost is far from the only cost involved. The original claim was along the lines that "only a manager could think something that was free could cost more than something you paid for". I simply tried to point out that there are other costs involved, and that going to you boss with the claim that because you can download Linux for Free it will be cheaper is going to get you treated as as a dolt. If you don't understand what the real costs are, you'll never be able to convince anyone who is actually paying the bills to switch. Use of Linux is expanding at my company because I understand this.
My co-workers get the same amount of money payed whether they are doing nothing with openoffice or nothing with MS-Office, there productivity for 99% of the time is the same.
Then your company has problems much deeper than what OS they are using.
You are in a maze of twisted little posts, all alike.
I don't understand your arguments, are you just arguing to be right, no matter if it reflects current acceptable reality or not? Because your original arguments and the one you are using above do not complement each other, but if you want to say hey I'm right no matter what, well heads off then you are as right as you can be, well at least for your world.
However I do realise that there are other costs then license costs, but why don't you realize that these costs are independent of the platform?
And yes for equally trained people setting up an integrated (mail/web)environment in MS,Solaris, BSD or Linux is the same effort.
The fact that the costs exist are independant on the platform, however the amount of those costs are not. It willcost money to operate and manage a web server no matter what, true, but the amount of those costs will vary with the platform.
And yes for equally trained people setting up an integrated (mail/web)environment in MS,Solaris, BSD or Linux is the same effort.
No, I don't buy this. Maybe thats where we differ.
You are in a maze of twisted little posts, all alike.
Well then this indeed boils down to the difference in our view point, the stupid thing is that we could be both right, depending on the situation :-)