kishor bhagwat wrote
also..we're hearing all this talk of Linux vs MS for donkey's (y)ears..are we adding anything new here I've been working with corporates large and small for some years now, and I've observed that:
- those who dont have the money, install pirated software
-so there goes ur "free os" argument.
The Pirated OS people are using is not *FREE*. It's illegal. Notify M$ and they get caught. This is particularly true for corporates as compared to home users.
- those who have the money and have critical apps go for
Solaris or AIX or HP-UX - and since these OS companies are anyways giving the hardware, the OS goes virtually free with it - so there goes ur money argument again.
No it doesn't. Probably they are at the mercy of the properietary vendor who sells them the software. Most (*not all*) get looted in the name of service. With Linux if they are unsatisfied with one vendor they can move onto another as the source code is available and there are no major copyright/NDA issues involved. What about those companies which have the skills and not the money. They pirate or suffer in silence. They lose anyways. :(
The OS comes *virtually free* as people pay through their nose for the Hardware.
As for the "you-can-play-with-the-source-code" argument - who the heck wants to play around with the source code when ur running SAP on that box and its being used 24x7 ??
It is not just a question of playing around with the software, it's also about maintainence. Imagine a scenario in which you need desperate help for a printer driver (remember RMS :)) ) and you don't have the source code. You wait till the concerned service person becomes free or agrees to come over to solve the problem. Meanwhile you have lost lots of your business and your customers have ditched you. With linux you can always get some local hacker to help you or mail on this mailing list to get help. Can we say the same for HP-UX/Solaris/XYZ Corp.??
I've seen Linux mainly in development, email and web servers - show me some front-office/back-office banking apps on linux please.
There are lots of them. I myself have installed a front-office/ backoffice user base of 300 people recently. They are all using it happily and compliment us on the increase in their productivity, thanks to GNU/Linux and FS/OSS. Linux dominates in the above mentioned fields (devel/mail/etc) and it is in these fields that it is most visble.
You might give n number of reasons for Linux, but please remember that the sys admin and IT Managers have a career and their children to think of - Solaris backed by Sun's service contract and replacement SLA's are essential for them to save their backsides.Who wants to be an adventurist in such a situation? very few...
Haven't you read the disclaimers?? And if their service is so prompt why are people starting to prefer linux?? I agree the linux service segment in this country is weak but it is picking up slowly but surely hence BILLY boys visit to India
I might be sounding pessimistic here, but thats not the point. A good product by itself does not make a good investment - there are a lot of intangible factors there!
Totally agreed. Hence Fortune500 companies also are moving to Linux. China has moved to RedFlag Linux. China Lags behind India only in the IT field. And my fear is we will lose out if we don't act fast.
regds, kishor
---> Vinayak Hegde