Slashdot Mirror
Windows Drives Company To OpenBSD
Barry Lyndon writes "Computerworld reports that the nightmare of windows is driving PriceWaterhouseCoopers, one of the world's largest accountancy and business consulting companies, to OpenBSD and open source in general." From the article: "'My predecessor spent too much [so] I was told not to spend any money.' When asked what argument he used to convince management to use an open source solution, Uemura said: 'They didn't have an argument because they said don't spend any money.' 'They trusted me,' he said. 'The whole office was relying on one domain controller which was dying.' Uemura said a lot of work was done 'behind the scenes'. 'My experience is that if something has to be done, just do it - don't ask! They will thank you later,' he said."
From TFA:
IT managers who want to deploy an open source solution but are worried about company politics should go ahead and do it without asking, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) Japan IT manager Mark Uemura.
That sounds like a FANTASTIC idea. Just come in one weekend and change the entire network over to BSD without running it by anyone. Why bother with the pesky work of drawing up a well-structured arguement for what you want, and then run it by the people who sign your check? That would be highly irrational IMO...Screw politics, they'll thank you when it's done - With a nice pink check.
'My experience is that if something has to be done, just do it - don't ask! They will thank you later,' he said." ------ Or later they'll fire your ass for thinking outside the box / not getting approval. It's really a question of if you want to cover your ass, or if you're sick of working your ass off. Yes, it all comes down to your ass, so you get to decide how you want it treated ;-)
Even if the software is free it seems to me that the most expensive thing is always the developers, training, implementation, etc.
Exactly... here's an easy way to largely eliminate Windows Server:
1) Build an open source LDAP directory controller that can be installed on any box (i.e. - Windows workstation, Linux, *BSD, et cetera)
2) Build management tools for that directory implementation
3) Finish it (i.e. - polish, usability, et cetera)
4) Give it away for free
Certainly, there's all this stuff in the open source world that can be duct taped together in order to create a substitute for some Microsoft products. But that's what it feels like when you use it - a bunch of cool stuff that's been duct taped together. I can't believe that OSS hasn't created a "plug n' chug" Active Directory replacement. Too bad Novell hasn't opened Netware complete with the integrated Windows client. You want to talk about polish? That's something to shoot for (heck, even Microsoft targetted Netware when they built Active Directory).
More
What does Linux has to do with this? He uses OpenBSD. If you read the article you would know that they still use Windows on their workstations so they can still use what ever tax software they used earlier.
The really fun part of this article is that they need to put an OpenBSD firewall in front of their checkpoint firewall to keep it safe.
And that's great! Since a financial company did it, large software houses can no longer say "Yes, it's free (as in beer) to use, but eventually you'll have to pay more to get competent Open-source techies and invest in more/different hardvare that if you just went with Our Solution(tm) all the way."
And that is how you gain mindshare - not by making a bunch of extremenly technical reports saying how it's better then everything else, but by hitting them on the wallet.
The downside is that because of using such "cheap" software, some other techies working for large software houses can get underpayed or sacked. We'll just have to see what the net balance gets to be.
-- Sig down
I recall a couple of similar situations where switching the server to and OS/OS was the best answer. The first time, it was a startup ISP (back when everyone dreamed of starting an ISP) who suffered the same problems as described in the article. The problems were limited to the mail server and it was simply unable to keep up with the load it was given. I took a machine of far more modest capacity, installed Slackware on it, set up mail, ported over the user list and it all became quiet almost suddenly.
Another case was when I took a job as SystemsAdmin for an ATM service company... similar situation except a bit worse... they had this bizarre mail server/proxy server thing running on a Win95 box. I almost wet my pants when I saw it. I built another handy-dandy linux box, updated everyone's proxy settings to "off" and set them up with NAT and everything was running smoothe as a baby's butt... again, almost completely sudden quiet. It was very rewarding.
These were all back-end systems that people don't see but use frequently. And only when the stuff you've got ain't workin' is when this sort of strategy (as described in the article) is a good idea. I think it would be a completely different story if they took something that worked and made this tremendous change... that'd be noticably stupid.
This is sooo Slashdot. The headlline says PriceWaterhouseCoopers is going open source, and then when you actually read the article it turns out to be some small office in PWC-Japan! I'm sorry, but PWC-Japan's IT manager a) isn't going to save any money in the end, and b) this isn't the start of a domino effect.
--Colin Jensen
colinandbethany.com
What Linux documentation? Half-written man pages with spelling and grammar mistakes that simply assume certain things about the system/user's knowledge?
:-)
I'll take the Free/OpenBSD docs any day.
I used to think Linux was cool -- then I turned 14.
You said a mouthful. My department is in currently fending off a company wide, IT imposed standard for computers. They're demanding we run critical 24/7-live multimedia apps on the same budget model desktop provided receptionists because "its the standard" and they get a good price in bulk. A 'well documented, carefully considered standard' can still be a cluster fuck. Two years ago the 'carefully considered standard' was a different manufacturer's model because the company bought advertising with us. I'm given the choice of rolling over and accepting almost certain disaster or protecting divisional business at personal risk to my career with the company. But there are always other companies.
Therefore I have been experimenting with other Alternatives, such as Apple's OSX Server. OSX to my surprise is an organized way of working with Unix. So in the past months i have been learning how to use OSX Server and have polished my skills into using it in "Hybrid" Environments, with the most excellent results.
One of my clients was a Windows Shop, It took me several months to convince them to change the server into OSX. The prerogative was simple: Apple offered us the perfect growing up environment for a company of 20 something employees that could get as big as 50 in the next couple of years. How? Well Apple's Xserve and Unlimited Lic. OSX was the key. When I presented them with both investing plan's, which consisted of a Dell Server and Windows, and an Xserve and OSX, it basically came down to a 17k dollar investment to do with the Dell, Windows and all its licencing, and 4 terminal stations. In comparison with the Apple Equipment, the Xserve (2.0Ghz PowerPC, 1gb ECC, 80gb sata hdd (expandable to 3 hdd in sata raid 0)) and OSX Unlimited + Apple Remote (Unlimited), It only went up to $11,075.00. When I presented them both quotes, and told them that with the mac we could have interoperability with Windows XP pc's accessing the server as well, better security, easier configuration and other options, the company decided to take the dive and went the Apple way. Recently they had 20 more employees added, in which this would have meant an increase in licencing of over $2000, the company kept hiring and keeps growing without any problems and the IT Structure is solid. For applications, we Use Quickbooks 2005 for Mac and Quickbooks 2005 for Windows XP, Office for Mac and Office XP for Windows (althought we are going to change to Open Office 2.0 in December 2005). The reason we have a couple windows machines, is for some industry specific applications that we cannot find on mac, so we use them on windows. Everything else is run on the macs with no problems.
I want to add that the Remote Desktop of Macs is an awesome tool. I can make OSX Deployments far more easier than it is in Windows Server Environment. The next client im going to work on this week, Im going to propose the same change, in a bigger scale... I know ill be successfull because the previous client is in love with his system at work.
Nom de dieu de putain de bordel de merde de saloperie de connard d encule de ta mere.
"Uemura said PWC chose OpenBSD, an operating system he is comfortable with..."
"My predecessor spent too much [so] I was told not to spend any money."
Seems to me the reasons they switched are spelled out pretty plainly in the article -- Uemura was a *nix person and OpenBSD was free. Yet somehow the abstract of the article claims PWC switched because "Windows was a nightmare".
Yes, there was mention in the article that their Windows servers were bouncing alot. But the main reason given for the switch was to "spend no money". I suspect if Uemura had not been a *nix type and instead was a good Windows admin he could have fixed the problem without spending any money by instead properly configuring and patching the Windows servers.
The more you regulate a company, the worse its products become.
Having just moved from a company running Novell backend and Windows on the desktop, I can say that Novell has some great products (eDirectory, Zen, etc). The biggest problem with Novell is their marketing. There is no clear, concise list of current versions and they also go to extremes with version naming confusion...
To be specific, their Open Server vs Suse Linux product line is fairly confusing. Their management tools are great (in some cases) and horrid in others...that and there are 3 different products to do management with. Which of the 18 different Linux offerings does what?
The other thing that irks me with their products is lack of 'proper' integration. We were are GroupWise shop and had to manage two sets of accounts for everyone, 1 for Windows authentication and a second for GW. There are password syncing options, but it's still a stupid maintenance headace.
Now, at first, I just thought I was an idiot, being relatively new to Novell land. I then discovered that our primary Novell dude had the same issues with them...
Novell makes some fantastic products and they do work well when you get the right stuff setup. They just really need to get their heads out of their asses with their horribly confusing product lines. Just think how deadly Novell's tech departments plus MS's marketing department would be!
My 2 cents.
-Ben
I don't anymore, unfortunately. But I'm on one of the craziest networks you can imagine right now: Windows, Unix, Linux, BSD, OSX, and OS 8-9, and I can drive hardware choice depending on the type of solutions I develop.
If you've got a choice, and someone asks for a product without telling you how to do it, do it the right way, and don't give them too much information.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
No Apologies needed, I think we are in agreement.
I am for, however, right sizing methods and methodology based on the needs, size and requirements of a particular enterprise or agency, etc.
A small few person firm that brings in an outside Nix consultant should at least have a phyiscal log book of changes, patch levels and the such and documentation of all programs running (e.g, name of program, vers., run time variables), and external (cdrom, floppy, etc.) copies of all critical configuration and setup files.
Really Large to Large companies need to have enough documentation to build the thing step by step and HR proceedures for evaluation the worker, and so forth..
http://www.hawknest.com/
One of the things I used to do is put together a nice solid system on a lan party box, then take it to the company I was trying to sell to, plug it in, and let it do it's stuff. Usually the sight of hardware that you can just plug in and have working in minutes was enough to cinch the sale.
I know a guy who developed this crazy thin client app/server setup, piped through pptp, that booted off a USB key. So he'd take it to a potential customer, jack it into one of their computers and it would hook into his servers, and download the whole system. Ran fast as hell. Pretty incredible. He'd jack it into an old system, and be zipping through heavy applications like Photoshop so quickly that the old graphics card couldn't keep up. Impressed the hell out of people.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
Take the place where I'm working for example. Medium sized company in Europe. Four countries and exspansion in more. After some bad moves two years ago by one of our operations the whole company got in trouble. Management decided to fire some 20%, vut back on outside consultants and retire everyone above 60. They also orchestrated a salary freeze and a max overtime cap. So we lost many of ur most experienced people from the downsizing or from people that decided to leave. In my office I'm the only IT guy left. The CEO told us in IT to cut back on new projects and frooze IT spending at x percant of turnover. Since most of our costs are locked in service contracts, licenses and scheduled hardware upgrades it's very hard to replace aging systems. We had some legacy systems that we just HAD to replace and that almost crushed our budget. So at one of our IT-guys meetings we just decided to stop renewing some MS products and went with Debian on some DNS, file and printer-servers.
Some six months later our local management found out that we had deviated from the "Microsoft-shop policy", but what could they do? They complained for a day or so before they realised that it was the only way we could stay withn the budget. In an environment where one can get fired for failing to stay within budget as well as failing to provide "service" to other units sometimes Linux is the only way.
Sorry for the bad English.
Allow me to give the other side:
I was an IT guy at a mid-size design agency some years ago. We were doing our own web-hosting on-site. One Friday evening, there was a fire, and our web-server, the back-up (which was on another floor in another part of the building, but ironically got damaged when the fire-department did their thing) and another file-server were demolished.
I came in on a Saturday and got everything working again using a spare personal machine and a copy of Linux.
On Monday, my boss called me into his office and congratulated me on getting everything back online. He asked me what I did, and I told him.
"Oh, that's not good. We're a 100% Microsoft shop. You can't install anything that isn't Microsoft."
"But I was the only person who came in to fix things over the weekend, I didn't have access to the software closet, and you weren't answering your pager. I did what I had to to get it working."
His response? "You don't have to get defensive. I'll just give you a verbal warning about going off the reservation, but next time I'll have to give you a written one."
See, here's the thing - sometimes you get a manager who is focused on the job getting done. Other times you get an asshole who would rather play politics than have stuff that works.
I wish I could say that I resigned right then and there, or at least slammed the door to his office, but I didn't. Job prospects in my area - especially for a job at the salary I was making - just weren't good. I didn't leave that job for 3 years, and when I did I had to pick up my wife and kids and relocate.
Don't start talking software with the bosses. You'll only make more problems for yourself. If you don't absolutely HAVE to justify it to someone, don't do it.
:-)
:-) )
Very nice choice of words. I like it.
Let me tell you a few interesting stories of Linux migrations I have done:
1) Consumer who lost her copy of Windows XP and also lost the certificate of authenticity. I offered to guarantee the migration labor and refund the charge if she decided to purchase a copy of XP. This was a consumer desktop migration and I have a very happy customer
2) Insurance agency's file and print server. Migrated from Windows 98 to Fedora Core 3. Had a number of issues, however, no more than with Windows 98. Turned out in both cases, the problem was that the software was sending *huge* print jobs (as in 10-20MB print jobs), Samba was double spooling them, etc. Switched Samba for CUPS as the network printing software, and this solved a bunch of problems (not all-- adding more RAM and hard drive space solved the rest
3) Book store with an internet cafe setup. Used Linux for a kiosk at first and later for the firewall/kiosk management system.
4) Migrated my parents' desktop from Windows 95 to Red Hat 6.1 back in the day.
So having established that all manner of systems often can be migrated to Linux, let me share my feedback with the parent poster's story.
In general managers think "Microsoft is the Gold Standard" and if something costs less it must not be as good. So you can't win on either the cost or quality arguments simply because it doesn't make sense to them. After all, how could Microsoft compete if better products were available for less? So you cannot fight them.
What one needs to do instead is get permission where appropriate for pilot projects, use Linux in contingency plans, etc. And use it everywhere you can outside of core production work. That way, when you have to swap file servers with Linux/Samba in an emergency, then you can show that yes it does work. Again when people say "we want to cut costs" move such services over to Linux when they are due to be replaced. Move slowly and carefully, and make sure that everything works properly. Basically if you are the admin, then it is your job to keep things working. If you use Linux where you need to, it is far easier to ask for forgiveness than get permission.
Then when the time comes, you can propose a Linux-based desktop solution if appropriate or make other bolder proposals.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
I cultivate this innocent look for when someone realizes that I moved a system over to a different platform. "Well, the old system broke, and this was the quickest way to get it up and running again, and well, everyone said it ran so nice, I just kept it." *puppy dog eyes* "Don't you like it?"
Muahahahaha.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
I cultivate this innocent look for when someone realizes that I moved a system over to a different platform. "Well, the old system broke, and this was the quickest way to get it up and running again, and well, everyone said it ran so nice, I just kept it." *puppy dog eyes* "Don't you like it?"
:-)
That is exactly why I usually write Linux into any disaster recovery plans I get a chance to. PHB's don't usually read them. And when something breaks and it is replaced temporarily with Linux, I am just following the plan (which is the right thing to do).
Now usually these temporary solutions have a tendency to turn into permanent solutions because the cost of migrating back is substantial, esp in a 24x7 environment. So again, same basic approach, except that I am usually able to get a little more of a paper trail to protect myself. The big payoff comes in the form of stability, and then nobody wants to change things back
Let me give you an example.
I have a customer who had a print server running Windows 98 that was locking up frequently. So I replaced it with Fedora Core 3, installed CUPS and Samba, and things seemed to go OK, except that the compatibility was such that the lockups were still occurring. After all, it is cheaper than replacing the system, which they could do whenever they wanted to anyway, and they pay me for unlimited tech support so they were not really out anything.
After some investigation, we determined that the cause of the problem appeared to be extremely large print jobs. So I turned off printing support in Samba, made everyone install the printers via IPP directly to CUPS, etc. Problem was reduced but not eliminated.
So, a second consultant tells them it must be Linux because nothing plays well with Windows. So we move the printer (for testing purposes) to an XP workstation and try that for a week. Now not only are print jobs locking up the queue (as they were on Linux), but now when that workstation is powered off, nobody can print. So we move it back.
In the end the problem was almost entirely solved by adding more RAM and hard drive space. We have had one print job lockup since, but only one (again a 4MB print job).
Now that these issues are resolved, we have implimented a Linux-based firewall solution because now things (almost always) just work even under the worst situations.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP