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The FAA Saves $15 Million by Migrating to Linux
Neopallium writes "Red Hat has announced that the U.S. Department of Transportation's Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) saved the federal government more than $15 million in datacenter operating and upgrading costs by migrating to Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The FAA executed a major systems migration to Red Hat Enterprise Linux in one-third of the original scheduled time and with 30 percent more operational efficiency than the previous system."
Disclaimer: I love Linux (and Un*x), and I hope someday Linux (and Un*x) becomes a majority player in the computing world. But, ...
The article paints a rosy success story, but consider the source. This is a Red Hat press release. While it all may be completely true with no misdirection, I put little stock in self-congratulation, especially after an amazing experience with a similar Microsoft claim.
I worked for a major Telcom years ago and we merged with a smaller firm... Shortly after the merger, Microsoft put a full page ad in Time magazine describing an enourmous success story of how our new company now comprised of two previous companies combined the two companies' IT systems and integrated them seamlessly with Micosoft's then new .NET
platform.
This would have been an amazing success story except for the fact that:
For those who doubt, I can provide the digital photograph of the ad, I was so amazed I actually took a picture of it (I will have to dig it out, but I know I have it.)
I know many would not be surprised by a bogus claim from a Microsoft, but I don't trust that any company providing a press release to be providing real news (or trustworthy, or balanced, etc.).
This whole "press release" presented as "news" would be more honest if they placed the disclaimer information up front. (If you don't read all the way to the VERY LAST LINE of the article, you won't know the source is Red Hat.
This is good, maybe it might prevent a future upgrade of the flight control systems to Windows -- Talk about a Blue Screen of Death!
ebob9
"The FAA's successful and impressive migration truly exemplifies the value, performance and security
of Red Hat Enterprise Linux,"
All the stories talks about is how they came in under budget. Another reason for saving 15 million
could be that someone simply budgeted too much money. Much like when your wife spends $200 on a pocket
book that normally cost $250, and then she tells you that she saved $50!.
D*mn women.. oh wait.. what was I talking about again?
"Linux is so stable and reliable that the FAA uses it. If you need a reminder who the FAA is: they keep the planes from falling out of the sky."
What OS did they migrate from? NetWare? SCO? FreeBSD? Windows 98? TFA says nothing about their previous platform.
The Cheese Stands Alone.
Hmmm...apparently it was slashdotted even before I can read it.
talk about efficiency!
anyone have the google cache version handy?
..not a surprise that they'd move to Linux, given their recent bad experience with Windows.
"With sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine. However, this is not necessarily a good idea...."
RFC 1925
It is not clear if they got $15m in savings by moving from Windows, another flavor of *nix, or some old paper based system. It would really help if the article had some more substantive detail. BTW, I'm personally $7m better off than I would be if I'd have bought myself a Bombadier jet. Now, if I could just find that $7m I'd be able to do something fun with it.
Umm...you didn't read TFA, did you? This is a Unix->Linus transition. Microsoft wasn't involved in the case at all.
2. noone in our IT knew of this stunning success effort
3. our "integrated" systems weren't
The real question here, at least to me: Was Microsoft ever punished by your company for running this false ad?
Or did Microsoft pay for the privilege by giving you discounted software or something else of value. Something else, besides a nice lunch for the VP of MIS, I mean.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Did you RTFA? Windows/MS isn't even mentioned. They switched from Unix (vendor unspecified) although your first point could be valid if MS was competing against RH/Linux to replace the Unix system.
"Look Lois, the two symbols of the Republican Party: an elephant, and a fat white guy who is threatened by change."
By migrating from a costly UNIX platform to Red Hat Enterprise Linux on its workstations, servers and at the hub site, the FAA was able to eliminate costs and ineffective systems, while creating a scalable architecture that met their high-demand environment today and for the future.
Quite possibly this is from IBM (Aix) to IBM (Redhat). More likely is that it is another kick in the crotch for Sun.
Rod Taylor
I think that puts it into perspective quite clearly. This was just a conversion from say... Solaris over to Linux. It's not an agency convinced that Linux was better than Windows and then converted over to Linux. Making a really big deal out of this is like saying that it's bold step for environmentalism to replace a hybrid civic with a Prius instead of a 250mi/gal future version of the smartcar.
From red hats site
Benefits By migrating from a costly UNIX platform to Red Hat Enterprise Linux on their workstations, servers, and at the Volpe Center, the FAA was able to eliminate costs and ineffective systems while creating a scalable architecture that met their high-demand environment.
Not so impressive after all.
1. Not at all.
2. Not at all.
If you'd RTFA (actually, a marketing press release), you'd see that Microsoft was mentioned -zero- times because the migration was from "a costly UNIX platform".
C'mon kids, let's put some more effort into the trolls, at least.
I remember sometime back in the nineties, a government report was released detailing how secure the governments systems were from cyberterrorism. The only department that was secure was the FAA, because "their systems were so antiquated, they could not be accessed with modern equipment."
:)
Maybe they are finally getting something going?
"All great wisdom is contained in .signature files"
"So, airlines are going bankrupt all over the place, ticket sales are down, and we're still in no position to catch terrorists."
"That sounds bad."
"But there is good news."
"What's that?"
"I just saved a bunch of money on datacenter operating and upgrading costs by switching to Linux."
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
http://www.gcn.com/online/vol1_no1/34950-1.html
Did Lockheed Martin's takeover of FAA operations centers have anything to do with this switch?
Yes, you can do this, it's actually firly common:
http://www.itworld.com/Comp/1369/LWD000606S390/
I thought the problem was old, tube-based hardware in the TRACONS and elsewhere always going blinky. Software would be the least of their worries.
Give a man a fish and you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish, and he'll say "WHERE'S MY FISH, YOU IDIOT?"
Poor Linus, he must be working his fingers to the bone providing all the services that Unix computers were providing beforehand!
I hope Linus isn't free-as-in-beer.
So, pick one: Solaris, HPUX or AIX.
;-)
It's pretty well known amongst the compugeek-pilot community that the FAA had a boatload of stuff running on some pretty old RS6000 iron, with quite a bit of it still running on AIX 3.2.5 which was end-of-lifed by IBM like sometime last century.
So, from your three guesses... I'd have to say that the first two don't count
This is mostly for their "business" systems, not the national airspace operations (the flightplan and radar systems) which are being migrated to a Linux-compatible realtime operating system.
For all of those who are curious as to what was there before. I worked on this project and was incharge of automating the installation process on the integration side and was part of the integration team for this project. The old system were old HP C360's running HPUX 10.20. The whole TFMI system has been ported and updated since the early 90's. Before they were running on the 360s the system was running on Apollo's before. Of course this refresh was way cheaper in '05 than the earlier refresh because in the '98 refresh they had to swap out thinnet for CAT 5. And if you ever seen some of the cable trays at some of these TRACONS on Towers.... some aren't pretty, espically at BWI. Since the CAT 5 was in place it was as simple as swapping out the machines and putting in the new routers when we got on site. And yes for a govement project this went realitivly smoothly. Once I set up the kickstart server and scripted the install for the ETMS software, intergrating the HP XW8000 workstations was as easy as just hitting F12, so even our warehouse logistic's person could integrate the machines.
Let's say you're this telco giant. Microsoft releases the ad (with approval from the telco's PR people, of course). Now, are you going to admit to your shareholders that the ad was, in fact, not true at all? No.
Microsoft was never punished because the telco couldn't admit that it wasn't true.
Behold the glorious bragging rights
Did the air traffic control center really have a "Microsoft server crash"?
Submitted by doc on Wed, 09/22/2004 - 19:02.
On Tuesday, September 14, something went wrong at the FAA's regional center that controls high altitude air traffic over Southern California and much of the southwest U.S. Two days later, this Associated Press story (carried here on MSNBC) summarized the problem in its opening sentence: "Failure to perform a routine maintenance check caused the shutdown of an air traffic communications system serving a large swath of the West, resulting in several close calls in the skies, the FAA and a union official said Wednesday." That same day, the Los Angeles Times ran a story titled "Human Factors Silenced Airports". Then, on September 21, TechWorld ran a story titled "Microsoft server crash nearly causes 800-plane pile-up: Failure to restart system caused data overload". It begins, "A major breakdown in Southern California's air traffic control system last week was partly due to a 'design anomaly' in the way Microsoft Windows servers were integrated into the system, according to a report in the Los Angeles Times. Here's what the Times story said....
Officials from Professional Airways Systems Specialists, the union that represents FAA technicians, acknowledged Wednesday that an improperly trained employee failed to reset the Palmdale radio system.
But they said the quirk in the system, known as Voice Switching and Control System, is a "design anomaly" that should have been corrected after it was discovered last year in Atlanta.
As originally designed, the VSCS system used computers that ran on an operating system known as Unix, said Ray Baggett, vice president for the union's western region.
The VSCS system was built for the FAA by Harris Corp. of Melbourne, Fla., at a cost of more than $1.5 billion.
When the system was upgraded about a year ago, the original computers were replaced by Dell computers using Microsoft software. Baggett said the Microsoft software contained an internal clock designed to shut the system down after 49.7 days to prevent it from becoming overloaded with data.
Software analysts say a shutdown mechanism is preferable to allowing an overloaded system to keep running and potentially give controllers wrong information about flights.
Richard Riggs, an advisor to the technicians union, said the FAA had been planning to fix the program for some time. "They should have done it before they fielded the system," he said.
To prevent a reoccurrence of the problem before the software glitch is fixed, Laura Brown, an FAA spokeswoman, said the agency plans to install a system that would issue a warning well before shutdown.
Martin, the chief FAA spokesman in Washington, said the failure was not an indication of the reliability of the radio communications system itself, which he described as "nearly perfect."
The FAA has a long history IT disasters, dating back to the early 1980's. Whatever happened to the Advanced Automation System,
a =25163,00.asp
originally contracted to IBM and EDS in 1981 and still not deployed? Taxpayers have spent about $40 billion on that one, with still
very little to show for it.
A brief history of FAA competence. Not the best source, but then the government isn't good about revealing its failures.
http://www.baselinemag.com/print_article2/0,1217,
Or keeping with "redhat compatibility" so people don't freak out, CentOS.
Well that rules out a migration from Solaris since RedHat would have had no problem naming Sun as the vendor they replaced.
HP-UX they might be a bit quiet about since their close to HP and definately if it was AIX RedHat wouldn't want to antagonize IBM.
It looks like it was HP-UX ased on this snippet from http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:9WrQ3EspDRwJ:w ww.academy.faa.gov/ama200/S20Catalog.doc+faa+%22tr affic+flow+management+infrastructure%22+ibm&hl=en& gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1
It always makes me laugh when people say they upgraded a system for less money and more power. Every time I upgrade my computer it's cheaper and I get a lot more power. That's just the way computers work.Open Source Java DAO Generator
This is one system used for flow management (planning of routes and clearances but not actually Air Traffic Control)
TMS was hosted on Apollos using Sys5
ETMS migrated to Sun/Solaris
TFM-I upgrade replaced ETMS
You'll be pleased to know that the Air Traffic Control radar systems dont use Windows either.
There has been a seemingly inexplicable decrease in plane collisions across North America...
I know, I know, it is the FAA, not air traffic controllers. Cut me some slack, it's Thursday afternoon.
They use a little-known distro called Bernoullix.
Nothing to do with the L-M contract which is flight service stations and not Flow control (where the Linux boxes will be used).
Considering that Federal Government pisses away $15 million every two hours in Iraq, it hardly makes a dent.
The Article is biased by the use of the word "migrating". Given all of the illegal immigration news in the US, the term was used to slant the article towards Microsoft by the use of the derogatory term "migrate" in reference to Linux. But, more correct term should be "upgrading". To be fair.
In other news, Microsoft and Sun announced the joint purchase of a former Soviet manufacturer of ground-to-air missiles...
So far many/most large to-Linux migrations have been from some Unix-like or big-iron OS. Very few have been from-Microsoft.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Did they? If they used fedora core they could have saved a lot more money. (or any FREE linux distro)
How much did redhat charge them in licensing cost?
MidnightBSD: The BSD for Everyone
No. That's not a quote, that's a verbal blowjob, and straight out of the press release.
Come on, use your fricking brain. He uses the phrase "Red Hat Enterprise Linux" more than once in the so-called quote. I've been working with Redhat for a long time, and I've never heard anyone who knew their ass from a hole in the ground use the phrase "Enterprise Linux". You either say Redhat or Redhat Advanced Server depending on what you're actually using, or, if you don't know enough to even say that, you just say "Red Hat" or "Red Hat Linux". It's like saying "Microsoft Windows Server Product", pure marketdroid bullshit.
People who believe everything they read make my teeth hurt.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
I didn't realize that the 2.6 kernel ran on vaccuum tubes! Suppose they just compiled it all "-O2 -march=eniac"
-=JML=-
In my opinion, press relesaes are worthless. They are put together by marketing and PR people. They can not be trusted (both the people and the press releases). I don't care how great a company is or how otherwise respectable they are. Marketing, PR, and advertising people are dishonest by default (with exceptions, I'm sure). What is sad is that press releases have become news in and of themselves. Far too many supposed news sources just pass the releases on as news rather than critically examining them.
The only exceptions I can think of to the "don't trust press releases" rule are cases where there is nobody stands to profit from the news or there are no specific claims made beyond mundane facts such as a product launch.
-matthew
"THERE IS NO JUSTICE, THERE IS ONLY ME." -Death
And who would support it? There is nothing wrong with paying for Open Source Software. There is nothing wrong with paying for support. The FAA got a good OS that meets their needs and they paid Red Hat for access to their experts. Red Hat gets money to pay people that work on open source software.
It is a win all the way around.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
lower costs? more efficiency? my government? guess the world's ending tomorrow!!
My problem? I was perfectly gruntled, until some numbnuts came by and dissed me.
According to her, the migration from was from Unix to Linux. The assumption (or wish?) would have been that the migration was away from Microsoft. In the absense of any such information, I asked.
That said, it's still not a migration from Unix to Microsoft, but still...
It just stroke me. What about an ad campaign with the theme:
...
"I just saved a bunch of dollars by switching to Linux!"
Those RS6000's are getting upgraded to pSeries AIX boxen (at least in the ARTCCs). The D-positions already have.
In the future, I would want to not be isolated from my friends in the Space Station.
Yeah, I'm trolling. But admit it, when you read "migrating to Red Hat Enterprise Linux" in the summary, you too thought: "from Windows". In fact, FAA switched from the "proprietory Unix platform"...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Now how much could we save by switching the Iraq war to Linux?
You just need to install the bsodsim package; that'll take care of it.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Red Hat is not an OS at all.
Red Hat is one distribution of Linux. I have used CentOS which is based on Red Hat enterprise. While I am no fan of RPM, yum is just about as easy to use as apt-get. I have not found it clumsy, fragile, or unfriendly to use. I actually find it a much better system for servers than SuSE which I do find fragile and clumsy.
What would you say is better? Slackware? Debian? Ubuntu? Suse? Gentoo? Or one of the BSDs?
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
It's times like these that I wish /. had a "Dumbass" moderation, among other possibilities.
Back in 1992 I got a tour of the Atlas Computing Centre in the UK (I was doing a particle physics course at nearby RAL). We got to touch the Cray. Ooh geek heaven. Anyway, in the foyer was part of one of their first computers, the Atlas 1. It looked like a modular synth, all cables and patch leads. The guide then told us there were only three of these left - this one here, one behind glass in the Science Museum in London, and one other... ...currently doing Air Traffic Control for Heathrow Airport. He wasn't joking.
Who got the facts NOW!??
You ain't got no facts, Bill! We got the facts!
I hate to sound like a Microsoft rep, but what about TCO? The FAA better have linux experts working for them if they deployed linux. Considering what they do, I sure as hell don't want any crashes or security problems!
Yes, linux based systems can have security holes like any other OS. My concern is how much redhat charges for a license. Its often more expensive than buying Windows if you don't need a lot of CALs.
And no I'm not a big Microsoft nut, I have 1 machine of 7 in my home with windows. Everything else is some form of BSD or solaris. (OSX, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, MidnightBSD)
MidnightBSD: The BSD for Everyone
MS is probably completely aware of this and simply asks any companies that merge that use MS products if they can publish such a statement. Its in both companies best interest. I doubt if MS paid for it as it just reinforces (im sure) what the telco itself was saying. The merger went smoothly.
Define better.
From my perspective: A BSD is easier to upgrade, easier to install software on, and has a more friendly community. That would make it better to me than a linux distro. Another thing I like about BSDs is the API doesn't change as much and time doesn't go backwards. (see linux 2.6.16 changelog)
For desktops, Redhat, Fedora, Ubuntu or Suse are probably good choices (well ubuntu has that broken dhcp client...). Gentoo would be good if you wanted something very custom I suppose. Someone in my operating systems class created a project to netboot and drop a customized stage 3 install down to clients.
Again, my original objection was cost of licensing. I'm sure they got a deal though.
You brought up package management. I think that is one of the biggest defining issues of modern unix like systems now. Most people seem to love their os based on how they install software. Sounds silly, but think of the redhat vs gentoo vs debian/ubuntu comments on slashdot all the time. Then you get into bsds with pkgsrc vs portsnap/portupgrade. I hate to say this but I think Windows and FreeBSD are better than most other operating systems on this front. I can mostly remove or add software using one mechanism. (add/remove programs or pkg_delete) apt-get i believe works ok for this as well. Look at other oses like mac os x where you can't remove apps. Sure they may have a proprietary uninstalled as part of the installer which you must find to remove it or you can drag to trash and leave a shit load of shared libraries and pref files all over your disk. Most other software installs leave crap on your drive. No one will ever solve this problem.
MidnightBSD: The BSD for Everyone
My read on the story is that Linux on x86 replaced expensive proprietary unix systems.
"By migrating from a costly UNIX platform to Red Hat Enterprise Linux on its workstations, servers and at the hub site,"
How exactly is this being read as a blow to microsoft? Linux is killing off the Unix market.
Sir, I think it's time for you to switch to decaf. Also, you might consider putting in less brandy.
Nothing interesting to say...MUST...NOT...REPLY...ohtheheckwithit.
Well actually installing software is one of the most common admin task that you do with any OS. Once you get the OS installed it should almost become invisible to the user. At that point it is all about the applications. Frankly if you really notice the OS it is usually a problem.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
This is a Unix-> Linus transition.
:)
I just had this vision of Linus running around an air traffic control tower guiding 10 planes down at once with a megaphone
OTOH, it does seem distressingly easy to write code that will run only on Linux.
I've done the compile-from-source thing A LOT. After dealing with the mess that tends to occur from this, I'll spend much more time finding a binary package than it would have taken to build from source.
A government agency delivering a project on time and under budget? Nah, gotta be a fake.
"Microsoft was never punished because the telco couldn't admit that it wasn't true".
Very good point, and one worth remembering. (Although how could Microsoft have been punished for being "economical with the truth", when it was never punished after being found guilty of serious crimes?)
Back around 1991, a salesman told me he could make no headway selling software development tools against IBM. Seems the IBM salesmen had got this huge insurance company to issue a press release quoting its managing director as saying it was committed to IBM's AD/Cycle. Although there was no sign of AD/Cycle ever materializing, and the insurance company's software continued to be written by an army of COBOL programmers with notepads, there was no way it would ever admit that AD/Cycle was not working for it. Until IBM formally withdrew the AD/Cycle program, all the companies that had been suckered into issuing those press releases were effectively locked out of buying tools from anyone else. Neat.
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
"I hate to sound like a Microsoft rep, but what about TCO? The FAA better have linux experts working for them if they deployed linux. Considering what they do, I sure as hell don't want any crashes or security problems!"
Ummm... Wouldn't they also need Windows experts working for them if they used Windows? That is why the went with Linux. They where replacing Unix systems so I would guess they already had Unix experts in house.
From a TCO point of view in a server environment where you already have Unix in house Linux looks like it should be a clear winner.
You did get my thinking about support. For this type of system support will be vital. Here Linux really has the edge over Microsoft! With Microsoft you only have a single source for support Microsoft. With Linux you have at least three major companies that offer support for it. Novell, RedHat, and IBM. While RedHat is the new kid on the block, Novell and IBM have a long track record with federal contracts.
If you have an old unix system in place and you want to replace it Linux makes a LOT more sense than Windows.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
I guess I'm having trouble seeing where linux saves money over solaris or *BSD. Support might be an issue with BSD. Everyone discusses "old UNIX systems". Linux is just a clone of UNIX. I guess I don't get the hype. Its probably the bad experiences I've had with Linux.
MidnightBSD: The BSD for Everyone
Not in the land of government contracts, sir. It seems obvious to you and me, but to a typical bureaucrat running such a project, this is BIG NEWS!
I can explanate how to administrate your network. You must configurate and segmentate it, so it can computate.
The cost savings over old Unix systems is the ability to use just about any X86 hardware. I don't know how Red Hat support costs are compared to Sun Solaris support is but it should be less since there is competition.
The other downside to BSD in this situation may also be hardware support. How is BSD with SMP and NUMA? Also is BSD certified to work with Oracle or DB2? I have looked at FreeBSD but it didn't give me enough of an advantage over Linux to be worth migrating. Your experience may be different. But that is why options are good. I can remember when the only realy choice for the average PC user was MS-DOS. All the other options where too expensive or not very useful. Now we have lots of options.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
FreeBSD and DragonflyBSD have decent SMP support. NetBSD and OpenBSD both use kernels with Giant locks still as did FreeBSD 4.x and lower. DragonFlyBSD uses message passing.
As for oracle and DB2, there is no certification. Supposedly you can get Oracle 8 and 9 to run on FreeBSD using linux "emulation" on i386. I've never gotten past the installer. I've never tried DB2, but may with IBM releasing the free low end version this year.
I don't consider BSD to be good at database server hosting unless you like MySQL or Postgresql. MySQL performance is often faster in Linux or Solaris, although there is a lot of work on tuning FreeBSD to fix the problems.
I know FreeBSD has been tested with 6 and 8 way x86 SMP boxes and works with an 11 cpu sun sparc server. Driver support is competative with FreeBSD if you like intel hardware as intel donates code. 6.1 release canidate is much faster than any other release i've tried since I migrated from 4.x.
BSD is only useful if you plan to go all open source.
MidnightBSD: The BSD for Everyone
Clumsy, fragile and unfriendly? Have you really used it? It's the best Linux out there. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery - look at all the clones it has!
While I do like Postgres I don't think that it is equal to DB2 or Oracle for super high end applications. It is good enough for 90% of what SQL databases are used for there is still those last 10% of applications. DragonFlyBSD isn't really mature enough for mission critical applications yet. While Mat Dillon is a very good programmer and yes I used DICE way back when somethings can only come with time.
See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.