Gartner sounds desktop Linux warning
Summary: It may well cost more to migrate to Linux than you're likely to ever save in system TCO, according to the analyst firm
Linux is still up to five years away from mainstream use in enterprise IT infrastructures, despite the progress made in the commercialisation of the platform, according to analyst Gartner.
Gartner's latest Linux 'hype cycle' report shows that open source is halfway to maturity but warns the biggest test will be whether it can demonstrate the necessary performance and security to function as a data centre server for mission-critical applications.
Leading-edge businesses are generally still in the early stages of Linux deployments but Gartner expects increased commercialisation and improved storage and systems management for the operating system by the end of 2005, with Linux being used primarily for IBM WebSphere and infrastructure applications on mainframes and Web services on blades and racks.
On the desktop, Linux is having a tougher time. Gartner claims the operating system is reaching the point where the costs of migration may exceed the cost benefits in a phase characterised by over-enthusiasm and unrealistic projections which lead to more failures than successes.
The Gartner report highlights the diversity across the open source movement with some markets, such as blade and clustered servers, predicted to be quite advanced while others will fall behind because of the lack of richness in manageability and availability.
The report chimes with the results of ZDNet UK sister site silicon.com's own CIO Jury verdict on open source by some of the UK's leading heads of IT. The survey found that many have now re-evaluated their position on open source after initial enthusiasm two years ago because of concerns over the total cost of ownership and migration.
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Talkback
Has anyone at Gartner actually used Linux on their own desktop/laptop?
The problem for a major organisation is user acceptance and training, as opposed to whether the product is capable of being used as a desktop. It is more likely down to two major concerns on changing:
1) Users who have learnt enough about Windows to be able to open Outlook and Word getting scared when faced with something new.
2) Windows Power Users frightened of loosing their cachet when switching to Linux and having to learn the "power tips" that make them feel superior to their collegues over again.
Application wise, there is little difference in functionality under Linux for the average user. It can just "look" more frightening, because it isn't what they are used to.
I find Linux much quicker and easier to use, but if a user is reticent about changing or scared of the change, they can make it uneconomical for a business to change.
I've seen this before. At the end of the 80's, one client switched from DisplayWrite IV to WordPerfect 5.1, a newer and superior product at the time, but many of the users who had grown up on DW4 were scared of loosing their "power user" status and tried to hold back the switch by causing problems, others couldn't cope with the paradigm shift to proportional fonts. Secretaries, who really should have known better, were still using spaces to align tables and complaining that the columns wouldn't line up! (Having taken typewriting at college, I learnt about tabs on manual typewriters, so I would assume somebody who has actually studied for secreterial skills including typing would know how to use tabs.)
We had hundreds of extra calls in the first couple of months. We also had a couple of Wallyesque users who, after having attended a course and having had personal instruction on converting documents after that, still couldn't get converted documents to print, because the paper size was wrong, we'd get 2-3 calls a day from one user who just couldn't "remember" that she needed to make a small adjustment to her documents the first time she used them. She thought that if she complained enough we would allow her to go back to DW4
At the end of the quarter, the finance director of the client queried the increase in the number of calls (and hence the bill), we pointed out that over 50% of the increase was down to one user, his PA! Funnily enough, after that, we didn't have any more calls from her...
I mean, just how "Windows user interface compatible" are various Windows products themselves? Heck, one uses File, Close and the other File, Exit even! And that's just a very easy example.
Basicly what an OS needs to do is to work and not crash while staying secure, centrally managed and not costing an arm and a leg. And be able to display icons people can click on to start the programs they're supposed to use to do their work with. People can do that on PC's, Apple's, PDA's, touch screens, watches, phones and what not. But not on Linux?
Then people need to be able to do basic stuff like editing documents, spreadsheets, databases and such. Print files, mail text, etc, etc. They can do that via web portals, enterprise wide applications like some ERP, custom made programs, PDA's, at home and what not. But not on Linux?
Sure, there are specialized workers who need specialized workstations. CAD people and programmers for example. And people in certain places that just want to protect their status. But those people do not represent the real majority. But it seems they do.
As for Linux servers. Thousands and thousands and thousands out there already. DNS servers, print servers, mail servers, firewall servers, Samba servers, game servers, web servers, management servers, monitoring servers, scanning servers, auditing servers, authenticating servers, database servers and then some.
In short. There's a Linux "warning" alright. It's there, it's growing, it's not going away and if we would unplug all Linux servers in the world right now life as you know it will be very different. But as long as people choose to mostly listen to the people they've listened to for years they're not going to notice it and thus running the real life risk of missing the boat. Because changes are that the people you're listening to, as yourself, think they don't have Linux servers running in their company network (maybe some not so important ones) but they would be wrong. There are plenty of networks out there with Linux servers in them running critical business processes but the brass don't know about them or seriously underestimating them. Now why is that?