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Vista Licensing Speeds Linux Move
Stephen Samuel writes "Australia's NSW Office of State Revenue is speeding it's transition to a Linux desktop due in part to a lackluster interest in Microsoft's attempt to lock them into the Software Assurance Program, reports LinuxWorld. The agency's CIO and manager of client services both confirmed they would start scoping for a move to a Linux desktop within six months. Manager Pravash Babhoota seemed satisfied with a Linux move in their back office, citing Linux costs as being just over 1/6 the projected cost of a Windows upgrade, while processing doubled."
Ballmer just striped his shorts.
Microsoft is a company hell-bent on self destruction.
I'm as tickled as the next Linux advocate to see a move to my favorite platform (Unix). But now some warning bells are going off in my head and I wonder if "we" are on a collision course with Vista, and Microsoft's thrust (innuendo intended) into Trusted Computing.
What are the possible ramifications, and can the Linux community proactively attenutate? I've read many articles, and many posts about Trusted Computing (this has to be one the more ironic names ever, I can almost hear the Microsoft-Intel juggernaut sniggering from here), but I've never felt completely comfortable with how all of the pieces fit together. Maybe it's time for yet another series of replies to re-educate me.
From past learning I understand TC won't stop Linux from working, and won't stop people from installing and using Linux, nor will it stop entire organizations from converting to Linux. But, what about the "Trusted" relationship to the Microsoft world? An entire organization running Linux would seem open to being completely shut out from a Microsoft shop.
Are there answers to this? Is a future Linux conversion vulnerable to what amounts to a technical shunning by the Microsoft universe? Not only do I need to know for myself, but for counseling others who are considering Linux.
Seems like Microsoft has done a wonderful job of convincing customers that buying Vista is pointless. It's bad enough that existing MS operating systems will likely have the same base functionality of Vista with lower hardware requirements(and possibly higher overall performance). Now this?
Seriously though, I wonder what Microsoft is thinking sometimes. It's like they're playing chicken against a cement wall with a tank.
I don't get it.
Sounds like a reasoned decision, and not a surprising one either. Time will tell what really happens when they switch from XP. I think that if you have your own in-house expertise, the TCO will be lower in whatever OS that knowledgebase is best versed in.
This group has time to ensure that they are versed in the Linux OS Desktop environment before they switch, so I'm betting that they have a smooth-ish transition.
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Call me sarcastic, but I can see the world not trusting MS systems in the future... if Vista performs as well as IE has, perhaps the divide will be a good thing in the eyes of those who have jumped off the MS ship before it sinks... Maybe that is harsh, but MS does seem to be working hard to make itself irrelevent in ways that will not be fully understood for years...
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From TFA: '"As soon as support ends for XP, we will look at moving to Linux [desktops]," Babhoota said'
Babhoota also says in the article that going from NT4 to XP was sensible because they waited long enough that prices dropped, and support increased. I don't see any difference in that case and the one I quoted above. Once XP support terminates, Vista's pricing will have decreased from initial launch, and it's support will obviously increase as well.
But hey, more migration to Linux makes me smile. 2006, the year of Linux on the desktop!!(??)
The great thing about governments is that they tend to make the law. Suppose Microsoft's attempts to lock people into their own software start to get in the way of governments using other software they believe to be better, whether in features, reliability, cost, or whatever; it doesn't really matter why. It's a pretty safe bet that the fairly direct result would be legislation making that sort of lock-in explicitly anti-competitive, followed quickly by a nasty lawsuit.
The one group in any country that Microsoft and their commercial partners can't afford to piss off is the government. Not only are they a major potential source of income in their own right, they are also a powerful ally (witness the DMCA in the US and similar legislation elsewhere). Oh, and they also have the last laugh -- always.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
"Babhoota said the agency had already successfully bedded down open source on its back-end, running its Oracle 9i and 10g core databases and assorted other transactional applications over Citrix on Dell-based clusters and had guarantees of open source support from key enterprise applications vendors."
What is open source about Oracle and Citrix? Sure you can run Oracle on an open OS, but that's not really an open solution. And Citrix?? How does that involve open source at all?
Maybe I am ignorant, but this makes no sense based on what I know about the products they list.
-Lod
You assume the public feel compelled to "trust" Microsoft. In fact, Microsoft has become the company that everyone loves to hate. They haven't released a major offering in years, and continue to depend upon new computer purchases as its main source of OS revenue (i.e. highly discounted). Meanwhile, you've got a public tired of the lock-in -- espeically when it serves no purpose other than to extract more of their hard-earned dollars. And I haven't even mentioned the lackluster attempts at beefing up security.
Meanwhile, Apple seems to be gaining market share -- based on what? A freakin' MP3 player! "Gee", folks wonder, "Are all Apple products this good?"
And last but not least, there's Microsoft's crown jewel -- Office. Who has $400 to spend on an office suite when Open Office is delivering the same value for FREE?
Which brings me back to the origainal point --- Microsoft wants us to trust them. What have they done to earn that trust?
if oly they'd donate 1% of the savings back to the projects they'd be doing themselves a majour favour and eveyone else too.
Your CPU is not doing anything else, at least do something.
So, the company agrees and begins to move forward. To my dismay, they put in Citrix, and proceed to replace workstations with Winterms! So, they spent a fortune replacing workstations, instead of just replacing the OS with Linux and featuring new workstations purchased without any OS.
Management types looked at the skyrocketed costs and went back to the original documentation. They actually tried to blame Linux for the costs. The board report reflected this, even though no Linux was installed. Once this was discovered, to save face, they started buying Linterms (still expensive, still replacing workstation, still with 3 year depreciation and replacement cycle).
So, I hear of companies complaining about Linux costs and have to take it with a grain of salt because I know that many people have their numbers inflated or do not really realize what they have. For example, a company buys a Linux box running Oracle for a 25-Windows-workstation network. They classify all the workstations and Oracle, the whole kit and kaboodle, as a Linux project. All associated expenses become Linux's fault, even though the Linux costs were low or none.
Click here or here.
Similarly the Massachusetts Technology Leadership Council on the OpenDocument format mentioned the "cost of a Windows upgrade" if they wanted to upgrade to the next Office version instead of using something that supported an open format. They said that:
Bold mine. I would like to point out for background info that they said they are running mostly Win2k and Office 2003, and that they wanted to state "vehemently" that they didn't want cost to be made into an issue.
Another nice feature of an enterprise Linux install is letting employees take home OS install CDs without even thinking about licensing. Sure, MS relies on piracy to spread Windows across org boundaries, jumping through homes to consolidate the installed base their monopoly leverages into proprietary lockin. But Linux can do that, too, without forcing committment to a vendor or requiring licensing overhead at all.
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make install -not war
Most US corporations have executive portfolios with M$ stock, and therefore resist anything that threatens their personal wealth. Unless Linux is less than 1/10 the TCO of Windows, it will take a generation before Windows is gone. Gone it will be, but how soon? I expect to be fighting for open source until the day I die. Governments flip/flop just like all politicians.
Software freedom...I love it!
another article saying that they aren't really switching to Linux because MS made them a sweet sweet sweet deal? So many stories of big corporations switching to linux ending up being schemes to get licensing deals from MS...
What? How is this insightful? You've said absolutely nothing useful.
TCO discussions, without context, are ridiculous. Pick an OS: Linux, Windows, *BSD, OSX, Solaris, etc... doesn't matter. It's all about the current infrastructure and intended uses.
Linux could be like a company without benefits as you suggest, in some scenarios... and in others it could be like Company B but with the cost of Company A. Or it could just be like Company B. It all depends.
The key is finding the right tool for the right purpose. AND you have to find the right people to use the tools.
Please don't make such blanket statements, it's people like you that try to force square pegs in round holes. Just relax, have an open mind, and I guarantee you your life will be much better (and profitable) in many respects.
Well, you have discovered the unholy alliance between Microsoft and the computer hardware vendors.
On one hand the major comp hardware vendors ship only Windows preinstalled with their retail computers (with some small "guaranteed to be failures" exceptions, such as linspire), and do not ship OSless computers for significant savings. On the other hand Microsoft ensures that their software is so bloated that people will require a new computer every couple of years.
This is, by the way, why the antitrust case against Microsoft fizzled out. In the begining, the big vendors were applying political pressure agains Microsoft, becaus ethey were affraid they were getting too powerful. But then their sales fizzled, so they quickly went on Microsoft's side and started begging them to release some new bloated software.
Bologna. Nonsense. Most people do not hate Microsoft. Many people that are tech savvy don't like Microsoft, and some of those actually hate Microsoft. But overall, these groups to not constitute "most people".
"Who are in control, they are not in control of anything - they don't even control themselves!" - Glen Beck
I, for one, welcome our new overlord Tux.
:)
Thank you Microsoft, as you push more and more customers away, hardware manufacturers will be providing more and more support for open-source driver development - unhindered by DRM, even!
I used to be a Microsoft fanatic. Hell, I used to WORK for Microsoft! While I was no stranger to Linux (I ran it back when it was just a floppy-based installation and if you wanted X you had to FTP and compile it yourself) my job obviously required the use of Windows (Duh, working for Satan, you have to use his OS). When I moved on during the dot-com boom thinking that other tech companies' stock options would fare better (STUPID decision on my part. I worked for two dot-coms who tanked) I quit running Linux for a while. It wasn't until Microsoft began to outright attack their own customers (Suing college students for reselling unopened software after Microsoft refused to honor their unconditional 30-day money-back guarantee, suing customers who resell used but retired software license, and hell, even suing customers when they choose competitors' products) that I began to look seriously at Linux again, and when I began testing various distros last year I was shocked awed at how much and how quickly is matured. I use Linux 99.9% of the time now. I only use Windows to pull photos off of my cellphone, and to play an occasional game of Return to Castle Wolfenstein.
I still consider Windows to be an excellent tool for most average users, but I have been moving more toward recommending Linux to non-gamers. OOo has matured, and while its file I/O still sucks, it is usable for 99% of users, and what's more, when they come home to {write term papers/draft business plans/write proposals/edit small flyers} Linux and OOo won't hinder them in the least, and most user-friendly commercial distros of Linux are under $100, and to get the equivalent amount and calibur of software for Windows would be anywhere from $20K on up.
Microsoft you're shooting yourselves in the foot, and with every suit you file against a customer choosing a competitor's product, you're gaining bad press and driving thousands more away. With every bit you tighten the noose on your licensing scheme, you're driving more and more schools, municipalities, and large corporations away from your product line entirely, from desktops to workstations to servers.
Keep it up, and you'll go the way of SCO in a few years.
I get very excited when I read these governmental switching stories. Governments are the only real business users that can effectively mandate file-formats and interoperability standards. Businesses will follow because they must.
Even in the US, I hear of companies switching whole departments over to OSS on Windows (namely openoffice). These are actually large companies switching over whole departments in regional offices.
I think that there is a network-effect of these early adopters. If there are enough of them that mandate that you have open-office installed, then (at some point near or just less than ~50%) there will be a sea-change of business that will switch over in one fell swoop. If it turns out that it is a business requirement that you use and have training for open-office, then people will wonder why they are voluntarily paying for Microsoft Office for no good reason. (Legacy docs in MSOffice is not a good enough reason to stay - support for these docs in OpenOffice will be demanded and feverishly worked on if enough enough businesses want it)
Once the slide starts, it will be a brutal few years for Microsoft Office.
TCO studies never capture the real costs of either a switch to Linux from Windows or a Windows upgrade. They invariably take the easy route, comparing only OS licensing costs, sysadmin/support salary, and training issues. They aren't "studies" in the academic sense, since the data they study are chosen to achieve a particular outcome.
In my practical experience as a Linux/Unix sysadmin and MCSE, the things they miss are:
Against all the benefits of not having to hassle with licensing there is a balance, the ability to point the finger of blame at a vendor. With free software, all the blame goes to the internal champion of the software, usually the sysadmin.
Raise your children as if you were teaching them to raise your grandchildren, because you are.
A huge amount is riding on Vista, not just for Microsoft but all through the IT industry right down to the little guy in China who helps make circuit boards. They all want a piece of what they hope will be frenzied upgrade action and plenty of businesses will suffer badly if they don't get it.
There will be huge pressure on Microsoft to make Vista work, if necessarily fairly brutally - stick with WinXP and find your security expectations downgraded, monthly updates increasingly scarecrow and difficulties soon arising accessing certain websites or playing certain media, etc, etc. We'll all be told that only Vista can guarantee proper security "for your own good" or whatever.
It's great to see Linux making inroads, but they are still fairly small and tentative. These guys, after all, are only scoping out Linux, not installing it. Linux still needs some big, influential and well-respected folks to get behind it of the kind Joe Sixpack will admire. Apple has Steve Jobs and the ipod, two items of superb natural showmanship anyone can relate to. What does Linux have? The Eric S. Raymond Opensaucemanship Memorial Lecture is no substitute. Dell will want a bit more excitement before they start shipping Linux boxes en masse.
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Are you serious? Moste people don't even know they're being locked in. Many wouldn't even care if the did know. Governments are known for their complete lack of any sense of reality, especially when it comes to technology. They are also hardly immune to the lure of money. I think the fact that most governments still run on Microsoft, and the underwhelming results of Microsoft being convicted aptly demonstrate that.
How you can ever hope to rely on governments to keep Microsoft in check is completely beyond me.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
Regardless of whether any given person hates Microsoft, or merely dislikes them, or doesn't even know that they exist (and think the Windows is "the computer" and IE "the Internet"), you would be rather hard pressed to find a person outside of Redmond that actually feels the warm fuzzies for Microsoft. And, judging from people like Mini-Microsoft, those people seem to grow fewer even inside Redmond.