Slashdot Mirror
A Look at Windows Server Outselling Linux
THG writes "CoolTechZone.com has an interesting look at Linux's position in the market now that Microsoft has sold more Windows Server software than Linux. From the article: "The most important reason that Windows based servers are doing so well could be that programmers find it extremely easy to work on .Net and other related technologies (seamless integration). Plus, you have hassle free and rapid support from Microsoft, which is a comforting feature for corporate customers. When Windows Live comes in, we will see further integration between the server and online technical support areas, thereby making the troubleshooting process easier for in-house administrators and reducing overhead costs for the company."
Have you hugged your penguin today?
I know this audience is largely anti-Microsoft. However, all of my service tickets with Microsoft (regarding server support) were resolved quickly. The Product Support Engineers kept me apprised with daily updates. One time, one of the Product Support Engineers took 2 days to get back to me.
In my career, I've experienced poorer support with other software vendors.
Then again, the company I work for is a Microsoft Partner. That could make a difference.
Absolutely right, and to attempt to gauge Linux's success or popularity by sales is completely futile. As a matter of fact, the article recognizes all of this.
First, the study says that Windows based Servers accounted for 37 percent in revenue. Now traditionally, Windows based systems are more expensive than Linux based systems, so even if vendors sold lesser number of Windows systems, the price difference could ensure that Windows sales revenue was higher. This implies that, in terms of pure numbers, Linux could very well have outsold Windows.
Furthermore the article says that Linux servers account for 31.7% as opposed to Windows' 37%. To paint this as anything other than a success for Linux (which is either free, as in the case of the parent, or likely cheaper than the Windows alternative) is a little strange.
Personally I'm not seeing the point of posting this blog entry but learning those numbers was a little interesting I guess.
audioLibre - freedom of music
If you buy a blade server without OS specified It comes with something called "No Operating System Microsoft Configuration [Included in Price]" and is counted as Windwos servers
Look for yourselves Dell Bladeserver"
Help fight continental drift.
It's bullshit. Nobody is shocked that Windows outsells Linux. Windows Server has ALWAYS outsold Linux. Linux outselling Windows would be NEWS.
And Linux doesn't account for 31% of total server revenue.. It accounts for fucking 12% of server revenue.
http://www.tgdaily.com/2005/11/23/server_sales_q3
The only news is that NEW linux sales (as in more sold this quarter then previous) rose 34+ percent, or something like this.
This has been 12 straight quarters which new server sales for Linux growth has risen double digits. There have been quarters were Linux growth has been 54% NEW sales over the previous quarter's sales. Linux is increasing it's precense in the datacenter and in the server room like a fucking rocket. Always has been, but until recently Linux has been a very small fish in a big pond. Now it's the second most common OS that your going to see anywere.
The news this guy is refering to is that Windows outsold UNIX, not Linux. Linux is recorded in a seperate catagory..
This isn't due to anything wonderfull Windows does. The main reason you'd want to run Windows Server is that you run Windows Desktop because Microsoft's products don't integrate with jack shit. But everybody runs Windows desktop and windows desktop only works well with windows server unless you have a mixed enviroment then you use Linux as glue between MS stuff and everything else.
The main reason that Unix servers sales have flagged is because Linux, not Windows. Linux is MUCH cheaper to use then Unix.
Hell in this quarter alone Sun has dropped from 7+ % of sales to under 5% and that's due to Linux. Most of Oracle licenses and such that are sold are sold to be run on Linux.
However that has had the side effect of making Windows the largest market in terms of sales..
Which is still bullshit because if you take Unix and Linux together, which you should since they are mostly compatable and run all the same software, then Windows server is still the minority and always has been.
Windows is like decaf - it tastes like the real thing, but it won't get you through the day.
What the hell kind of ignorant, 6th grade, piss-ant research article is this?
Of course, this comes from the same man (Varun Dubey) who said:
"XP is such a joy when it comes to simply connecting a device and watching the pretty little bubble detecting it and saying "its installed and ready for use" makes the slightly high price absolutely worth it. In Linux, you have to recompile a kernel if you want to so much as change your modem! Give me a break guys, Linux is light years behind Windows XP and I am sure it will be further back biting the dust when Longhorn (now Vista) comes out."
Dumbass.
Maybe you should look at
H at+profit,+revenue/2100-7344_3-5178057.htmle _red_hat_profit_for_bcg.aspx3 69,00.html
http://news.com.com/Subscription+boom+boosts+Red+
http://www.signal42.com/soaring_linux_sales_doubl
http://www.wired.com/news/infostructure/0,1377,62
then. Apparently some people are making money from it.
Yes. "TCO" has been around forever. Mac zealots regularly rolled out the "MacOS has better TCO than Windows" arguments back in the early (and mid, and late) 90s (in reference to a single TCO comparison of MacOS 7.x and Windows 3.0, IIRC).
"TCO" is a pretty well known term in a business environment (which is probably why so few people on Slashdot have heard of it outside Linux-Windows fluff articles).
Well, this is a fun article to pick apart and see why people are jumping to all the wrong conclusions....
:-)
First, the article makes the mistake in merely comparing Windows and Linux. In omitting any analysis in what is going on with UNIX, MacOS X (yeah, I know it has a UNIX-like kernel but much of the rest of the setup is almost but not quite entirely unlike UNIX), any context to these numbers is omitted. What is happening, however, is that three trends are occuring which are noteworthy:
1) Proprietary UNIX's market share is shrinking.
2) Windows and Linux are gaining market share in terms of absolute deployments on the server side.
3) *Some* of these deployments are counted in the sale of new servers. but not all.
Even so, Linux's marketshare is still up, as is Windows. These are the only two OS's to have been significantly gaining marketshare in server market (well, maybe MacOS, but it is hard not to gain from about 0% a few years ago). I would argue that WIndows is gaining because it is familiar, and Linux is gaining because it is like that it is replacing. Both operating systems claim to be easier to administrate than proprietary UNIX (I certainly think Linux is, but I think that non-trivial tasks in Windows are actually harder than with proprietary UNIX).
Now, something seems fishy to me about this study in another way. In the 2000 IDC study (iirc) NT4 and 2000 accounted for about 37% of the market share by volume. Linux was much lower than that. If the IDC is correct and Windows market share has indeed been growing from 2000 to 2002 (when I stopped reading the study) then either they have slipped in market share, Linux sells for more, Gartner is underestimating Windows' market share, or the IDC is overestimating the market share of WIndows. Perhaps even some combination of the above explenations.
Now... I used to work at Microsoft's PSS. I can tell you their support is nothing to write home about. They aren't someone you call because you need expert advice. If you are reasonably knowledgable, you call them for a second opinion. If you are a novice you call them for mentoring. But you can get braindead answers occasionally from them. I remember being on the phone with a customer and conferencing someone in from the SQL Server support team who said that it was not possible to set a value to NULL once it had been set to another value. Somehow I don't think that this was right but I have not had a chance to test it. Then there are the issues where the technicians advocate best practices whithout understanding *why* they are best practices. And this was all before so much of it was sent to India
Finally the idea that an ad-supported Windows would be the end of Linux is laughable. I think that this would be the beginning of the end of Windows, not of Linux. Hmm... 2 free products. One is adware the other is not. Which should I choose?
In short this article makes mistakes such as:
1) assuming that market share by revenue has any reasonable correlation to actual deployments.
2) refusing to take into account the broader market trends that form the context of this study.
This article smacks of MS shilling.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
TCO is pretty much bullshit because most businesses don't even keep track of the expenses on their servers. All they do is depreciate what they can and that's the extent of it.
I once asked a CIO if I should keep track of what the software we installed on a server costs and whether we should balance that against the monetary benefits of the said software and he just looked at me like I was nuts. Apparently you are not allowed to actually keep track of TCO, you are just supposed to read about it in gartner reports.
evil is as evil does
TCO in relation to servers probably did not exist before servers.
TCO is widely taught in sales courses as a marketing tool used by people whose solution is too expensive to justify the additional cost. Its in the same boat with "Yes we are the most expensive, its cos we are the best".
The whole point of getting an MBA is so you know to use these things on the competition, and not have them used on yourself. Of course, if you got your MBA from one of those places offering them for $5 on the internet, you might not have to do any actual learning.
Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
I have been purchasing OS-less HP Proliant servers in the UK for around two years through the regular end-user sales channels. They end up running CentOS as mail, intranet and database servers.
AT&ROFLMAO