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Rick Moen Debunks Gartner Myths
An anonymous reader sent us a bit where Rick Moen speaks about the recent Linux Myths thing
that has raise MS once again to the top of everyone's "People We Love" list. Its a good summary piece that pretty much explains how valid the Gartner Report was.
How's that for logic?
Gartner's credibility will suffer quite a great deal because of this. But, I know that Ellen was completely ignorant of the Microsoft webletter, and I don't buy the insinuation that Ellen was Microsoft's lacky on this one. I know Ellen, and she's a good journalist. No, I didn't like this story, but it's one bad story out of a few thousand.
Now, if you want to make conjectures about whether Gartner wrote this report so that Microsoft would purchase the rights to reprint it, go ahead. It's just conjecture. But the deal is, an independent reseach company cannot afford to have conjecture of this sort floating around.
Gartner, it sucks to be you.
Cheers,
Travis
Erm, TCO/year? Annual costs wouldn't include the initial costs, only the ongoing costs (which your estimate shows are higher for Linux). Your number for applications also look a bit dodgy.
Even if your numbers were correct, all you'd have proved is that Linux doesn't begin to cost more per user than NT until the second year, where as UNIX costs more from the start. You're still suggesting Linux costs more in the long run.
In any case, the comparison is pointless. You can't just assume Linux would have the same TCO as Solaris, so Microsoft's claim is as useless as yours.
So the bottom line is that Microsoft wrote that report itself? _Very_ cute. Even cuter that Microsoft in addition to writing the report funded that bit of Gartner to host it. yaaaaah! fnord!
OS/2 was controlled by IBM, who manifestly did not have the stomach for the fight at the time.
We manifestly do.
Also, we know we're going to win.
--
Xenu loves you!
I personally (still) don't think rebutting Gartner/whoever's "report" is a particularly good use of valuable time, but -- for those who care about such things -- Paul Ferris has bothered, and did an excellent job: http://linuxtoday.com/stories/10912.html
More than that, much of the target audience is not really competant to asses the arguments. To a huge proportion of people out there the entire discussion is basically meaningless - they don't understand any of the technical terms being thrown about.
If there are people who happen to believe what's said or don't see the other side mentioned at all then that's a plus for them, but the main thing is creating doubt in the minds of the general audience. To these people the very existance of a discussion is cause for concern.
Maybe so. but it's a twisted double standard that has people comparing w2k to linux 1.2. You should judge software on the basis of it's latest release.. not previous mistakes. And you shouldn't compare Real Software with Vaporware (ie: comparing linux 2.2 to w2k). If you'd like to see an example of this, flip over to ZDNet and look up whatever Berst Alert is up on the page right now.
It is a logical error at best, and FUD at worst to misrepresent things like that. The current crop of gnu software is solid and dependable. Some of it is also cryptic - but that's a gripe you can take up with the UN*X Philosophy in general, not just rms and his merry men.
--
Looks like others can't figure out myths either. I keep my desktop machines up all the time. Crashes happen, but 24 to 48 hours??? Ya gots to be a moron if ya can't figure out how to get that kinda up time. My personal machine gets about 4 or 5 weeks before rebooting, and thats because I reconfigure stuff for one of my personal webservers...yeah yeah, I can reconfig my linux server with out powering down as well.
Servers on the other hand are usually up for a few months at a time. I was sad when my MO Jukebox / SQL Server machine died in april...its been up since replacing the HD April 19th. The problem is that most M$ servers are run by secretaries and others that think having a MCSE means they know shit. Remember ya'll, once ya make linux easy enough for the general public to handle, these are going to be the same people that admin these boxes as well and yer gonna find ya have a whole slew of problems ya never knew existed...
clif
...to learn that Microsoft just might be generating "independent" support by throwing money around? It's already been proven that they hired people to write "independent" letters to the editors of various newspapers right? We know their history.
They have no credibility as a company in my (and many other's) eyes. If you are an IT manager and you are taking these "independent" test results and opinions without a healthy portion of MSSalt.exe, then you need to seriously pull your head out of the sand.
Microsoft is afraid for it's life. Of course it's going to panic. However it's interesting to note that instead of being driven to improve their products and compete with Linux's strengths, they feel their only recourse is to attack and mislead.
This is the sign of a company that can no longer "innovate" or improve their products to compete. They will be gone in a matter of years, since there is bound to be a better product someday (perhaps Linux, or something else down the line), that no amount of attacking, misleading, or "indepentent columns" can silence.
No company stays on top forever, and Microsoft has shown that it is past it's innovating stage, and well into it's "trying to hold it's lead with only slander" stage. It's only a matter of time.
Finkployd
Microsoft has enough money that it's difficult to trust anything that anyone says in their favor without confirming it yourself. If Mindcraft says that Microsoft is superior, you are forced to wonder whether Mindcraft is for sale. If Gartner says that Microsoft is superior, you have to wonder whether Gartner is for sale. When Sen. Gorton tries to cut the DoJ anti-trust budget, you have to wonder whether Sen. Gorton is for sale.
Actually it does (or rather, it could have done that, had Linus accepted an implementation done by Riccardo Facchetti something like 1.5 years ago).
Maybe that patch is still floating around...
Today on the Windows 2000 Professional front/contents page there's this link and byline:
Oops. Gartner's Migration Model Flawed
Market Bulletin: We think our friends at the Gartner Group used a flawed model for a recent prediction about migration costs to Windows 2000. Here's why.
This is the same bogus big-developer-to-big-IT-clearinghouse dialectic; I've also noticed this last year.
4 months a record? Are you kidding?
I think it was Alan Cox who had posted something showing the uptime of one of his machines at 180 days. The problem was the uptime counter had already wrapped. That happens every 497 days. So this machine had been up about 22 months.
I just recently sent him mail about the linux portaloo being stuck and not presenting any new articles. He replied "that's what happens when the clock rolls over after 497 days". So this means the man has had at least two different machines stay up for over 497 days. That's over 16 months!
I myself had a machine at my office stay up for over 325 days. It came down (hard) when the water from hurricane Floyd started rolling into the computer room. This machine is our news server. Came right back up after an fsck.
> an effort by Gartner to allow venders to present their editorials within the Gartner web site, clearly suggesting to the inattentive that the point of view is that of an independent research organization.
Hey, Gartner guys -- anyone reading this? I want a Linux webletter area where I can publish my own spin on your reports, and leave readers with the impression that it's your spin.
How much is this going to cost me?
Please reply promptly.
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
> ... with the increasing popularity of the Internet as an information source, I think it's tactics are finally being exposed for what they are.
MS is hosed if they can't muzzle the internet.
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
> To a huge proportion of people out there the entire discussion is basically meaningless - they don't understand any of the technical terms being thrown about.
But that works on both sides of the argument. Now they're hearing through the media that "Those übergeeks that amuse themselves by writing operating systems in their spare time think Windows sux." They might not understand "context switching", but they think they understand "egghead".
And they'll remember what those "eggheads" have been saying next time they lose their work under Windows.
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
> My point is this: debunking a claim, amongst a group of people who already know how crappy the claim is, is sort of pointless
/. as one of their sources. What journalist would have been able to get a clear view of the problems with the Mindcraft and ZD "NT vs. Linux Shootouts", if not for sites where thousands of technically competent geeks pooled their expertise in picking the "studies" to pieces?
Ah, don't forget that other news outlets have started keeping an eye on
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
> You can't even write a bad review of a linux distro because you will have tons of zealots picking it apart
Kinda like not being able to write a scathing review of Windows because you will have tons of ad money take itself elsewhere, eh?
Doesn't that make Micorsoft "look rabid and zealous" ?
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
>
The one in the easter egg?
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
> we can revise this to "what's good for Microsoft is good for the world."
No, cheap, reliable computing power is good for the world. What's good for Micorsoft is good for Bill Gates.
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
The author mentions "expired" webletters that reappeared later. Has he published his before/after analysis yet?
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
> Microsoft is not a competitive threat to Linux
Not a competitive threat in the sense you offer, but still a threat. If Linux were not devouring the server market right now, WNT probably would be. And with enough of the the server market cornered, MS could E&E the standard network protocols to the point that you couldn't put Linux on the net without violating some patent. Then Linux would probably starve -- not just the newly IPO'd Linux companies, but also the grassroots movement that started it. It would be extremely tough to keep it alive by means of a worldwide network of BBS's and swapped floppies.
So in a very important sense, MS is a direct threat to Linux. Linux can survive and thrive on it's own terms without the Linux companies, but it might not survive at all if the net falls into hostile hands.
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
Stop the zealotry and start to look at things with a *calm* and objective eye.
Let me understand this now. Gartner writes a report critical of Linux, Microsoft pays bux (how many unknown) and distributes the report.
Now, suppose Gartner writes a report critical of Win2k (bloated unstable pig-dog of unknown compatability quality and buginess but fact it is largest number of code lines ever attempted in an OS doesn't bode wll unlikely to be installed by anyone sane until at least SP2 is out project being led by PHB who says his number one job is to ship the product). Is anyone in the free software community likely to have the bux to pay for this? No, if they have money they are spending it on stuff like making the code better.
If you are Gartner you don't have to be all that smart to realize where you are most likely to get a renumeration for your efforts. Heck, we don't even know if there was collusion before the article was written, i.e. some MS flack calls up Gartner - hey Joe - do you have anything critical of Linux we could buy? Joe, realizing this is an opportunity to make his sales target says, sure, I think we have something - might take a day or three to find it in our files. We'll send it over, and put it on your tab.
bullshit
redhat is a commercial company. Their ultimate goal is to sell as many copies of linux as possible and to sell as many support contracts as possible.
It is only a matter of time before somebody figures out that you sell more if you do marketing. Spreading FUD is a good strategy, MS is the living proof of that.
So far Red Hat does not seem to attack its real competition (other linux distributions). In an expanding market like Linux, MS is not a threat but only a source for new customers.
Jilles
I reboot once every 4 weeks or so. Usually the reason is to prevent it gets unstable, not because it actually becomes unstable. I have not seen any blue screen yet, but then I don't do any serious c/c++ developing on the machine (only java). I don't think it has crashed a single time since I have the machine on my desk (about a year now).
I always read about people having to reboot NT every hour or so and blue screens stopping by every few seconds. If the above article was fud then what are these stories? Sure NT is not perfect, I wouldn't want to run it as a server environment for instance, but for the average desk user its not that bad.
Jilles
My point is this: debunking a claim, amongst a group of people who already know how crappy the claim is, is sort of pointless. It just shows how easy we are to piss off. What you're really doing is arguing with someone who isn't there anymore. Write a letter, make a phone call, but these "debunks" are preaching to the choir.
-----------
"You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."
Well, I agree with the MS bashing. I view it as hypocritical. When I got a bit out of my mind, and asked why on SVLUG, along the attacks and such, I did get one (well, also Rick's first was good.. 2nd a bit brutal :^). I can't find the message, of course... :-) To sum it up in a far worse way than it was said, MS's web server never stops cranking out the FUD. The web page doesn't get tired, it just keeps going on and on. Because Microsoft is such a big entity, the Linux community (as of yet) can't just have a page do the same fashoin to counter MS's. So.. screaming and shouting and the rest of it are needed to counter. Until Microsoft stops, the Linux community can't... (of course, one can always say the Linux community started it.. but in return, MS started it by making poor software and doing various unethical business practices)
Now it's just a bunch of zealots trying to dominate the world and following some stupid dictator. I'd rather work with FreeBSD.
heh. well, I started thinking the same thing a while back. Which is basicly why I lost it a bit... BSD in general, seems calmer and more orionted towards coding and progress, while Linux/GPL seems bent on good code, but more importantly to get a real fat ego boost. The latter can over shadow the former.. I emphasized the seem because it may be judging the Linux community harshly. The BSD community doesn't generally scream and shout, while at least some of the Linux community does. That may be the wrong impression... Rick's good responce on that part...
But just remember... Rick's reply was not meant as an article, or some Slashdot post, or anything else. I was quite surprised ot see it on Slashdot... It was just a reply off the thread in SVLUG... nothing more. It wasn't an article, it wasn't meant to be anything I think that Rick expected so much responce from.
"Open Source?" - Press any key to continue
Aw chucks, so much for that Linux then.
I also heard it can't work with burned CPUs and crashed harddisks. And it won't display things on monitors with broken glass! What sort of shit is this?
-
Come now, you're all getting out of whack for nothing. Rick Moen's argument is that the little text at the bottom of the report states that Microsoft published the material. That doesn't mean that Microsoft wrote it (or paid for it) - in fact, it specifically says the content is provided by and copyright Gartner Group.
I know we all love big conspiracies by evil companies, but not EVERYTHING is a conspiracy. Is it not possible that some (possibly clueless, but let's not get into that) person at Gartner wrote up the thing completely independently, and Microsoft said "hey that's good, we'll publish it in our section of the web site?" Rather than bashing the article based on its delivery, how about CONTENT.
The Linux advocates (for lack of a better name) are quick to scrutinize anything coming out of Redmond in great detail. How come they don't apply the same attention and scrutiny to anything pro-Linux or anit-M$? Everyone knows there's FUD on both sides.
I'm certainly no fan of M$, but there's no need to invent evil deeds for them! They do more than enough factually.
Sponge
I quote from the small-type at the bottom of the Microsoft Web Letter in question:
'Microsoft Web Letter is published by Microsoft.'
This is really quite easy to understand. For example, The Times is published by News International. News International also publish The Sunday Times, News of the World, and The Sun. That's not too heady a concept, is it? The content of most newspapers, newsletters and journals are partially or entirely created by outside contributors. There are many outside contributors to The Times (and indeed to
Why, then, the apparent puzzlement? I quote:
'So, we're to believe that:
-- Gartner Group wrote it all, despite what the small-type notice
(quoted earlier) says in direct contradiction.'
When one has learned to read, there is no contradiction.
Another source of confusion seems to concern the idea of sponsorship. I quote from Gartner Group's rebuttal:
'According to Gartner's Australian vice-president
of marketing, John Barrow, Gartner sold that
research to Microsoft which it used for a
"Webletter", which is sponsored by Microsoft but
hosted on the Gartner site.'
This tells us that Microsoft Web Letter is sponsored by Microsoft (not an amazing revelation, considering that it is a Microsoft publication), and that the issue reporting the research results favorable to Microsoft was hosted on the Gartner site (again, not amazing considering that Gartner conducted the research, and also obvious from the URL).
Why the puzzlement? My final quote:
'So, we're to believe that:
-- Microsoft "sponsors" this "site", and paid unspecified fees to
Gartner Group related to the content, but in no way did Microsoft
fund the study.'
Fees are not mentioned anywhere, so if one chooses to believe that "unspecified fees" were involved, the evidence should first be presented. Failing that (the presentation of evidence), yes, one is to believe that in "no way" did Microsoft fund the study.
Neopets - the best free game on the Int
wanted to, and since gravity can't argue back, you aren't likely to get much of a fight doing so."
Gravity is constantly arguing back as it pulls you down as hard as it can. They're called facts, any semi-literate linux user isn't getting 'pissed off' as much as she is trying to point out the massive errors of this latest Dixonesque prediction. Having seen more of these than we care for does lead to the typical debunking session, but mostly to show the uninitiated the crystal ball that is history.
I don't feel like I'm necessarily preaching to the choir as much as informing each other for our mutual benefit. Think of it more like bible study than anything else. *wink*
I can already picture the conversation with the brain-donor you get when you call Gartner or Microsoft. You really think they want to have an intelligent discussion defending their work with you?
"The Gartner group is very serious and reliable."
Hahaha... this should be moderated up as funny because he must have been joking... right?
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
Seriously, this whole thing with any company able to get away with thinking they're the center of the universe gets to me. It happens in this small town I live in with the radio stations and theatre companies, it happens nation-wide with corporations like Microsoft constantly giving themselves pats on the back. :)
Someone once said 'It is better go on foot than ride in a carriage under false pretenses'. Microsoft is riding in a carriage not their own, and any company doing this will ultimately loose the respect they may have held and whither away to oblivion.
Microsoft says that they're better, but where did these Linux users come from? I would be willing to guess that at least 33% of the people who use Linux come from a Microsoft OS background. Why? Because they were sick of not knowing what was going on in their system, sick of the OS behaving like a bad employee on the verge of being fired, and sick of being told by Microsoft that they were using the best software anyone in the world had to offer, when deep down they knew something had to be better.
And so, having finished that rant, I'll go eat some soggy cheerios, so I can be annoyed enough to post on something else I hate
Target Practice
There's a 68.71% chance you're right.
From the most recent osOpinion
A aronFransen1.html
http://www.osopinion.com/Opinions/AaronFransen/
As long as I've been in the "PC" business there has been a sort of ideological/$$$$ warfare between those on top (as they see it) and those up and coming. Disinformation is a very powerful weapon in those wars and in lieu of conventional weapons it is a marketing departments 'nuke'. If a commercial software vendor's product can not stand on its own merits/features against a similar free product what does that say for the vendors' work?
Si vis pacem, para bellum! For evil to succeed good men need only do nothing!
One is moved to ask, in a spirit of genuine concern: Doesn't incest on this scale tend to lead to problems like webbed fingers in future generations?
Ah, webbed fingers aren't necessarily caused by incest AFAIK. Lots of people have webbed fingers and toes, and they don't all have circus jobs either. So regardless if the point of the artical was factually correct or not, it isn't right to stereotype people who are different from you. As Linux users (a minority, but growing fast) we should be fully aware of such issues.
Lets celebrate diversity for the more aquaticly gifted amoung us!
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
[Cross-posting from the SVLUG mailing list]
Quoting Aaron Lehmann (aaronl@vitelus.com):
> Nice commentary, Rick. Turns out you made Slashdot with this.
I noticed. Wow. (I did not post it there, only here on the SVLUG list.)
It was never intended as a serious-minded analysis: I didn't think the "report" merited one. To the contrary, I was just having fun with some of the delicious absurdities to be found in it, in Gartner Group's hilariously cozy relationship with Microsoft (and perhaps anyone else whose cash is green enough), and in Gartner Australia's "explanation".
I'm sure the latter was truthful, if you squint at it the right way: I'm certain that Microsoft Corporation's ongoing series of cheques for sundry services and accomodations did not specify (outright) that they were to fund a report that just by amazing coicidence parrots Microsoft's exact party line about Linux, in fine detail.
So, I'm sure the apparent incestuousness of all this is mere coincidence, and nothing the least bit improper or damaging to Gartner Group's reputation for independence.
[cough]
Anyhow, the point wasn't to "debunk" Gartner's Linux piece du jour, but rather to mock it. It's not important, just amusing. I'm far more concerned about poor Hemos and his ruined house, poor guy.
Reading your post, it seems to me that you misunderstand the reference you quoted. Freeware/shareware has nothing to do with the previous mistakes of GNU/OpenSource/"Free Software"(as defined by RMS)
Perhaps you're not familiar with it, but in the DOS/Windoze world, there is tons of software available gratis(free), frequently with a rarely obeyed stipulation that if you like it and use it you should pay for it, which is almost always closed source. I do believe that this is what the previous poster was referring to. Freeware and shareware tend to combine all the disadvantages of proprietary/closed source software with all the disadvantages of GNU/OpenSource software. You don't get the source, so you can't fix it yourself, but there is no support, and since the people who write it barely make any money off it anyway, they don't spend much time fixing it. Some of it still manages to be pretty good, but a lot of it is crap. (hence the "spotty quality" comment)
P.S. Personally, I think we should avoid the confusing terms "open source" (which only implies that the source is open, not that you can get the source for free even necessarily) and "free software"(which sounds more like gratis than libre in english). My current favorite term is "free source", which can be interpreted correctly with both interpretations of "free", but doen't *necessarily* imply that as a product it's free. (Hell, they can sell bottled water;) I do have to wonder though if a term like "liberated software" or something like that would be good, avoiding the gratis interpretation. However, I'm rambling, so I'll shut up now
--LeBleu
If you're reading this you're part of the mass hallucination that is Kevin the Blue.
> also heard it can't work with burned CPUs and crashed harddisks. And it won't display things on monitors with broken glass!
Since society seems to accept vapourware as standard practice in the industry, I suggest that we start promising these things for the 3.0 kernel.
Indeed, we should promise to eliminate the need for memory and disks altogether, by putting everything on a RAM disk in virtual memory, and then moving the swap file to the RAM disk. (Too late for a patent: I think they already do this to make infinite memory available in the OS's Moebiux and Klinix.)
--
It's October 6th. Where's W2K? Over the horizon again, eh?
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
This is the same group of 'consultants' that has done a number of reports on user productivity and cost of ownership funded by Apple in order to show Windows to be inferior.
These outfits have zero credibility. They are not independent, they always write what the client wants to hear in hopes of getting more work of the same nature in the future,
AP - 10/16/1999 Microsoft Purchases ALL Public Broadcasting Stations.
Microsoft has reported today that they have just closed a deal to purchase every Public Broadcasting Station in the free world for an undisclosed amount of money. Bill Gates speaking via video conference had this to say: "We are very exicted to announce this bold move into world of non-profit organizations. I have always been more interested in helping people than making money and I feel this will finally prove this to everyone. Americans have always said that they want more access to quality shows on TV and now we can offer help to them by providing the shows that they want to see!"
PBS will now be known as MSPBS and will be run by the former CEOs of Mindcraft and the Gartner Group. Some of the new shows to debut this winter will be:
Cooking with Bill: Watch Bill Gates make food with recipies stored on Win98.
Wild Kingdom : See young people survive in the jungle with nothing but their Windows CE devices.
Financial News Nightly: See how all of the terrrific innovations by Microsoft causes their stock to raise on a daily basis.
In an unrelated announcement Microsoft has changed the name of their new OS from Win2000 to Bob2000. Bill Gates was quoted as saying: "We really feel the name change will help our customers be more productive."
I agree with witz. If you take a careful look at the actual Gartner Group report here, you'll see that this report isn't really "anti-Linux propaganda." They simply believe that Linux won't replace Windows as the most-used desktop OS in the land (at least by 2004 the way that Linux is currently going).
IMHO, and this is not intended as a flame, this whole tempest-in-a-teapot was blown up by ComputerWorld journalist Ellen Cresswell. She says that Gartner "painted an unflattering picture of Linux" in their report when the actual report isn't really that critical on Linux, It simply raises issues that have been discussed on Slashdot as real live problems with Linux. But Cresswell blew up this report as Gartner's "slam" on Linux when the report wasn't any such thing. Let's not let Cresswell benefit from a useless and pointless flamewar between Gartner and the Linux community.
And even though Gartner obviously has substantial reservations about the success of Linux in the mainstream (if you thought the desktop OS report was bad, check this Gartner server-oriented Linux report out), we shouldn't flame them. Instead we should prove them wrong, right?
So let's prove them wrong!
Rob Thornton
Deep in the ocean are treasures beyond compare; but if you seek safety, it is on the shore.
People just haven't realized yet that none of these "objective" tech review groups have any reason to be truly objective. They claim objectivity, but there is no one holding them to it. The average PHB doesn't investigate the findings, and the money goes to whoever can consistently provide the best combination of perceived integrity and customer butt-kissing.
. ..........Linux
For example, in Microsoft's Linux Myths page, one of the key points is lower TCO. The study they quote to back this up was paid for by Microsoft and Compaq, and is seriously funny if you actually add up the numbers. The study is actually a comparison of NT TCO with Solaris/SPARC TCO, so since they use this "study" in an argument against Linux, I thought it would be appropriate to look at the numbers as they would appear in a Linux environment.
First of all, on every line, they compare the TCO of 30 NT servers to 38 Unix servers. Why? They don't say. In the absence of convincing evidence that 30 NT servers will do the job of 38 Unix servers, let's make this a server-to-server comparison and use numbers for 30 Unix servers instead. Let's assume the hardware costs are the same between NT and Linux, since they will both run on Intel hardware. That saves us big bucks over the Sparc hardware quoted in the study.
Now, for additional software, they include databases, development tools, apps, and utilities. Top quality Linux apps, dev tools, and utilities are free, but I could see paying money for Oracle or something on big boxes (no disrespect to MySql intended), so we'll include their figures for database expenditures, minus 21% to account for 30 servers instead of 38.
The initial purchase price and application prices I list below are double what are shown on the "TCO Summary" table on their web page. For some reason their summary figures are exactly half of the totals in their detail reports, and I couldn't determine why, so I went with the detail report. All the other summary figures on their page match their detail reports exactly.
All the support etc... stuff will probably be about the same between Solaris and Linux, so I just took those numbers right off their page.
............................................NT.
Hardware+OS.....$684,980......$530,400
Applications...........$49,510.........$32,307
Support, etc..........$867,740...$1,035,496
TCO/Year.........$1,602,230...$1,598,203
So, even in their own study, Microsoft couldn't beat Linux in TCO. What Microsoft paid for was for BRG research to arrange the data in a way that complimented NT, even if they had to "fudge" the data. Imagine what the numbers would look like in a study the FSF paid for!
______________________________________________
Auditing and dentistry are excellent career choices for people who don't
Auditing and dentistry are excellent career choices for people who don't like other people but aren't coordinated enough
Mindcraft, Gartner and any other company that bases its business on its rep with the business community need to learn right now that you can't fool 100,000 pairs of eyeballs, no matter how hard you try to distract them, nor can you outshout 100,000 angry mouths yelling against you. They simply can't afford to pull this "We do a report for you that says exactly what you want it to say and you pays us" crap (which is exactly what they both did, its just that Mindcraft got paid before and Gartner got paid after).
The 100,000 brains out there are ripping this report to shreads, and 100,000 coworkers are talking about how the Gartner Group sold out to Microsoft. Gartner is, in a word, fucked; any second-year advertising major can tell you that word-of-mouth is the most incredibly powerful force for or against a company that exists.
Gartner made the mistake of letting MS use them to use a tactic that's out of date in the information age. The only question is how many more generals out there have yet to realize that their tactics are out of date, and how many more companies will have their reputation destroyed before this is over.
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Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
I admit I didn't bother to plow through all the links to the original /. post, but since this has turned into "All The President's Men", let's take a closer look at the conspiracy theory:
So, we're to believe that:
-- Gartner Group wrote it all, despite what the small-type notice (quoted earlier) says in direct contradiction.
Maybe I'm confused, but isn't all of this (the URL and the notice) pertaining to the "Webletter", not the original report?
-- We're to understand that a set of URLs on www.gartner.com are "the Microsoft site".
It's ComputerWorld that used those words, not Gartner. Not that they're necessarily wrong.
-- Microsoft "sponsors" this "site", and paid unspecified fees to Gartner Group related to the content, but in no way did Microsoft fund the study.
Again, I don't think this "site" or "content" is the "study".
In any case, I think people are missing the biggest offender here -- ComputerWorld, which took a report criticizing Linux as a business desktop and turned that into "A damning report from Gartner has all but put the kiss of death on Linux."
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Hasn't anybody told Microsoft yet that Linux itself is a myth? It really doesn't exist.. we're just trying to get your goat. I mean... system uptime measured in years? High performance out of desktop computers? You'd have to be pretty gullible to believe all that. And to top it off, an operating system that doubles in functionality while increasing it's speed by a similar amount at every major release? Absolutely unbelieveable! Programmers who devote their free time to giving away their code? I can barely contain myself.. I really must go...
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giving a rule of thumb purchase price + (1) * (2) / (3) lifetime cost. Perhaps other
All brand and no beef makes for very skimpy meal.
LL
How so much misinformation can lead to so much knee-jerk reactivity.
Gartner writes reports for companies on a subscription basis. IE PAID. The company I work for, for example, pays Gartner for consulting and reports. The "webletter" on the Gartner site is a paid Microsoft publication of the original Gartner report, it is NOT the actual Gartner report. MS did not pay Gartner to trash Linux, they paid Gartner for the ability to post the Gartner report on Linux on their site.
If you people would actually READ the report, instead of that idiotic summation by IDG and the Microsoft produced webletter, you'd realize that it isn't that big of a rip on Linux. It simply criticizes the *current* state of Linux as a viable desktop solution. It applauds what Linux is doing in other areas.
Sheesh. Stop the zealotry and start to look at things with a *calm* and objective eye.
Sidestepping the matter of ComputerWorld putting its own spin on the report, what is the credibility of Gartner, Giga, etc. in the IT industry? The second question is who is their target audience?
These analysis groups have a deservedly bad reputation among IS/IT staff for the same reason that the national news reports lack accuracy when one is personally familiar with the event: the author is too far from the subject matter to do it justice and the readership doesn't demand more. Ask anyone who does the "heavy lifting" in an IT shop about one of these reports. If they are more than vaguely knowledgeable about the subject they can pick the report apart. Now try the same thing with upper management. Funny how the response is different.
These groups make their living producing, despite their claims, shallow analysis for a readership that needs information quickly so that they can become "instant experts" before the next meeting. Depth is not necessary, technical accuracy obfuscates, just get the gist and make it readable. The topic of the week is always on the horizon and this must be put into the readership's hands fast. Odds are good that the information will be lost or forgotten (for a chuckle, go back and read last year's reports and predictions).
I know I've said it before, but these companies have a track record for post-prediction and a habit of ignoring their misses that makes psychics look good. Worse, I personally know a few people who work for these companies and I can only say that I was glad to see such people leave.