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10 Years of Pushing For Linux — and Giving Up
boyko.at.netqos writes "Jim Sampson at Network Performance Daily writes about his attempts over a decade to get Linux working in a business/enterprise environment, but each time, he says, something critical just didn't work, and eventually, he just gave up. The article caps with his attempts to use Ubuntu Edgy Eft — only to find a bug that still prevented him from doing work." Quoting: "For the next ten years, I would go off and on back to this thought: I wanted to support the Open Source community, and to use Linux, but every time, the reality was that Linux just was not ready... Over the last six years, I've tried periodically to get Linux working in the enterprise, thinking, logically, that things must have improved. But every time, something — sometimes something very basic — prevented me from doing what I needed to do in Linux."
Your frustrations aren't unique.
In fact, I've experienced them both at home and at work with Linux.
But I would like to point out that some of the problems you faced (like integration with MS Exchange server) are simply Microsoft not wanting to release/support/adapt to standards. I know you're not directly blaming the Linux community for your (and the seemingly global) failure in adopting it but what is putting a real big halt on it in the corporate environment is companies working against it. Maybe this will change but I highly doubt it.
The shortcomings that Linux suffers are a result of poor design. Poor design of third party devices, software & services. If all the wireless card manufacturers got together and agreed on a interoperable adapter interface to their cards, it would mean that the OS developers would just need to write one other side for ever driver of every wireless card to work. The problem is that if they opened this up, they perceive their competitors would grow stronger by seeing their research. I suppose something could be said about this hampering innovation or removing the option to continually change chipsets in the search for the cheaper/better hardware, I don't know enough about wireless cards. But one would think everyone could agree on some interface to use. This is apparently a good design practice but poor business move.
I reiterate that you are not alone in your frustration. You didn't fail to adopt Linux, Linux didn't fail to meet your needs, it was the entire community and their business practices that failed you.
My work here is dung.
They always fail to mention that Management refuses to let the project actually work by letting go of exchange servers and this uncanny belief that you HAVE TO HAVE ACTIVE DIRECTORY OR WE WILL ALL DIE! Truth is that active directory is overrated and better solutions exist for linux, Exchange is not any better than other solutions, etc....
Many companies were able to switch when they got buy in and support from management to do so. You HAVE To replace your infrastructure and backend way before you replace the fontend. Then you can slowly change what people see and touch. It's a lot of work to pry microsoft from your server rooms.
The best solution is to not let it in to begin with or not allow it to touch anything new.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
From the "article":
I hate to use such strong language, but this guy is a total retard.
How is this news, exactly? This is like me taking a fine American car to UK and complaining that the car sucks because I have to drive on the other side of the road!
Well the thing you should look back and realize. The Open Source Community rather quickly got SMB support in its file systems, and that was closed like Exchange was. The only different is that OSS Developers (Many who are in colleges) realize the demand for needed to connect to windows networking. But being that most colleges don't use exchange especially for students the amount of work done to make Linux work with exchange is pathetic at best. Having people use the web interface, or a terminal service is stupid and most and requires more horse power then currently, and they get a worse experience.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
I suppose that all IT departments at companies that run Windows are just sitting on their thumbs, doing nothing, then?!
There is no silver bullet. Running a Microsoft OS (or even an Apple OS) doesn't magically make everything work. There will still be things that don't work right - it'll just be different things.
Your computer is a tool. If it doesn't do what you need, then fine; get a different tool. But for many businesses, the appropriate tool *is* linux, and it does the job well. Please don't presume to be the voice of everyman.
Insisting on "correct" English is like saying that there is only one, definitive recipe for chili.
Linux does NOT "just stink". This article and your comment do nothing to demonstrate that.
The entire original article could be summed up in one phrase: "imperfect Microsoft emulation". This isn't just a "Linux" issue. It's a problem for ANYONE that wants to use something else, even on Windows.
This "microsoft or nothing" mentality is what really alienated me from Windows.
I should be able to run the word processor of my choice and the email client of my choice REGARDLESS OF PLATFORM.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Dumb. Bordering on flamebait.
/. are getting tired. I liked it when articles were on something resembling reporting, and not random people complaining and submitters/editors going "hey, that's about Linux, and we have a couple wacky category icons with penguins..."
Wherever the author says "business/enterprise/IT environment", he forgets a critical proper noun: he means "Microsoft-centric business/enterprise/IT environment".
Author Gripe #1: Ancient (1998) StarOffice sucked at Word/PowerPoint files.
Author Gripe #2: In 2004, nothing played with Exchange, and "you can't function" without Exchange.
Author Gripe #3: In 2006, one version of Evolution on one distro didn't have a "subscribe" button for Exchange Server public folders.
Author Solution: Give up on Linux.
Okay... Note that none of the above have much to do with Linux. And I don't mean to be a "omg it's userspace, not the kernel" zealotroll, but really. His gripes are in two apps. The last gripe is particularly weak; I'm not knowledgeable if the problem is fixed in Evolution (or if it's even a bug), but what is potentially "there are missing buttons" does not "Linux unprepared for the enterprise environment!!!" make.
On an unrelated note (and I don't mean this as ad hominim or anything, just curious), is this site anything more than a NetQoS company blog? These kinds of posts hitting
In other words: "I blame Linux, because the company I work for is too lazy, or too stubborn, or just plain too stupid to use standard-compliant software , instead of being a Microsoft-only shop". Yeah, right. Microsoft Excel and Power Point and Word run into all kind of problems when you try to use their files under Open Office. That's not a surprise, it's a Microsoft policy and it is exactly designed to lock the competition (Linux or others) out. And, guess what? It works!
A little bit like the poor South Koreans that used Windows for everything and are now stuck with a new OS (Microsoft Vista) that is incompatible with the ActiveX encryption utilities that are used by... well, 90%+ of the population.
What this article reveals (beyond the obvious FUD) is precisely that Linux is not the problem: Microsoft is the problem, as well as its closed standards and its closed filed formats . End of story.
The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
Open source operating system has problems inter-operating with closed, constantly changing, standards-free, and hostile proprietary system.
Alert the blogosphere!
I mean, I feel for the guy trying to get Linux to work in a Microsoft-only environment, but this isn't exactly surprising, at all. Hell, Microsoft has problems getting their own software (Entourage in Office Mac) working with Exchange. The answer is to never use Exchange in the first place. If you're already locked into Exchange and its feature set as a driving force within your business, you're going to have to suck up and deal, or go through the pain of a switchover to something that's reasonably open. I've got the same problem with a client which is a marketing department of a large Netware based company, and the marketing people all use Macs exclusively, and the Novell Mac client is too buggy to use, forcing them to install VirtualPC on their machines so they can to basic e-mail and scheduling stuff. Costly, you bet, especially in my time because of how buggy it all is, and the idiotic design flaws of their network, but they can't just switch over because they're locked in to Netware after years of use, and they're paying for that shortsighted decision. However, it's still cheaper than dealing with the upheaval of switching from Netware to something reasonable.
I *thought* the great strength of OSS was the ability of the community of users to contribute directly to its development either by direct development or by conversing with the developers. When some says "Linux would work for me/my company IF..." the development community really needs to sit up and pay attention if they want to continue to grow their userbase and be taken seriously.
All too often the reaction to just such a statement is...well, what the parent says. "It can't/won't be done, you need to just use what we/they give you, you're doing it wrong." The response of the user raising the issue is almost always to drop Linux and return to Windows, which does what they need without the hoops of Terminal Services and incomplete WINE compatibility.
You want more people using Linux? Listen when they ask for something.
120 characters for a sig? That's bloody useless.
When you've got a vendor who actively works to prevent you from interoperating with a different vendor, who is "at fault" here? Everything that you're bitching about not working was reverse engineered, from scratch, at an enormous cost in resources and ingenuity. The fact that it works at all is a massive testament to the power of the open source development model. It could be seamless. It could work much better than Windows works with itself. But there is active, continuing work done by Microsoft to prevent it.
So don't pull your snout out of the MS trough and gasp out between stuffing your face with proprietary, locked in interfaces that "Linux isn't ready". Linux is *perfectly* ready. You're the one who isn't ready, and your Microsoft owners won't let you be.
Over the last year I've been moving between Windows, OS X on a Powerbook, and a relatively recent SUSE install on a PC.
The truth is that each of them has shortcomings. The good news I guess is that most of these are irritating, not fatal.
Windows IMHO is not a long term option because of the creeping DRM and the obsessive control of the computing environment that MS seems to want. Frankly I have this horrible feeling that Vista will open a can of worms that will never end.
OS X just has too many irritating or dumb features, or lack thereof, that drive me around the bend. I'm not talking about things that are different from Windows, I'm talking about boneheaded design and UI mistakes that no-one in Mac land seems to be willing to admit are a problem.
Linux, well at this point for me it works 90% out of the box, much better than a few years ago, but that last 10% can be a nightmare. As always with Linux, if it works it's lovely, but if it doesn't you're off into that hell of MAN pages and web forums, filled with half answers, slightly incorrect assumptions, and Linux arrogance.
I'm weary of tinkering with computers. I just want to turn it on and have it do what I want easily and without irritation. And I want to be able to TURN OFF "features" that annoy me.
No OS does that yet.
Three Squirrels
With all these tech companies supposedly "selling" Linux solutions, the time has never been better to offer an Evolution client for Linux, Windows, and Mac that works with a feature-rich server on the order of Exchange Server. Yet there has been (to my knowledge) no real effort to improve the groupware solutions beyound straight-up LDAP, SMTP, IMAP, and NNTP. Those are great technologies, but they're not particularly good at providing a cohesive groupware solution. At least, not without some sort of design for how they could be used to provide the missing functionality. (Calendaring is perhaps the least addressed of the missing features.)
If such a server were developed, Linux would have a much better chance in Corporate America. Especially if the said server could keep ahead of Microsoft rather than behind them. Witness Firefox as an example. Microsoft slacked on IE (as they're prone to do when they have an uncontested lead) and paid the price by being surpassed. Exchange hasn't changed to any appreciable degree for a long time now, so the opportunity exists. Strike while the iron is hot.
But then again, what do I know? I'm just another developer in this crazy corporate world.
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
This article is not about integrating Linux into a business environment, it's about integrating with a MICROSOFT environment. Of COURSE you are going to have trouble integrating with a Microsoft environment because Microsoft has gone to extraordinary lengths to make that very very difficult (hence the reason they are in trouble with the EU.)
If you structure your IT to not be Microsoft centric, then Linux, Mac's, and Windows can all work together. If you design your entire infrastructure around Microsoft technologies, then good fracking luck.
I just put the following comment on the actual article, which I'll show below, but I missed adding in the professional Exchange replacements, about which you are extremely correct.
I have to agree with some of the other comments I've seen - your expectations are all wrong.
You're defining "Enterprise" as "work seamlessly in an all-Microsoft shop" and those aren't necessarily the same thing.
You also seem to be defining a good Linux experience as doing exactly what you were totally happy about in Windows but without paying.
If what you're looking for is a computer whose function is to attach to a Microsoft domain server and a Microsoft Exchange server and use all the newest Microsoft technologies relatively seamlessly, you should just install Windows. If you're happy with Windows, you should install Windows. Heck, even Microsoft Entourage for OS X can't talk to Exchange right most of the time, and MS MAKES that.
If you're talking about a transition, you're doing it backwards; put Linux on the servers first, where no non-techs have to get used to using it, where you have a greater guarantee of a limited application set, and where Linux has more experience. Also where Windows charges you more in licensing fees for fewer benefits. Samba is great.
THEN start rolling it out on desktops, starting with the thinnest ones, and using your choice of Linux-style or Windows style methods based on the situation.
But if you really want to talk fairly about Linux in Enterprise you need to talk about legitimately comparing a Linux environment with a Windows one.
You need to talk about better natural security and less time trying to clean up stupid-user infections. You need to talk about the ease of remotely configuring, updating, and reinstalling large numbers of machines. You need to talk about running remote applications via X being free. You need to talk about the registry mostly being replaced with a large number of text files you can easily and remotely overwrite and a total lack of DLL-hell, meaning you almost never HAVE to totally reinstall a machine - and if you do, you never have to open a control panel on any client machine ever to set a single setting unless you want to. A seamless ability to use any convenient desktop in the office.
Certainly there's add-on Windows enterprise software to do many of these things that Linux does naturally. And I'd point out that OS X does most of them too and has a more user friendly desktop. Some studies show substantially lower costs in terms of administrators with Linux - if the administrators know Linux.
But if all you want is a Windows machine, USE a Windows machine. Saving $129 is not, alone, a sound rationale for using Linux in a professional environment where all you seem to want is Windows.
Arete
Looking for freelance Actionscript (Flash/Flex) or ColdFusion work and/or freelance developers. Email me, put Slashdot
I'm not even going to bother reading the whole piece. I don't have to - the quoted material gives the game away.
This is the SAME CRAP EVERY Windows shill writes on every Web site and in every article on the subject:
"Gee, I really LOVE Linux and OSS, BUT..."
It's bullshit. That type of sentence is a DEAD GIVEAWAY that this guy is a paid shill for Microsoft. Period.
If you want to integrate with Microsoft Exchange, you're an idiot in the first place.
There is nothing from Exchange either that most companies need or can't be found in other mail/groupware clients.
The article is the same bullshit we've seen from every other article from shills.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!