Posted on 10/15/2010 7:46:47 AM PDT by ShadowAce
Big business loves Linux for servers and they seem to like it more than you might expect for the desktop. That said, enterprises still have some concerns about Linux. Here's the top five as picked by people who responded to The Linux Foundation's recent corporate and government end-user survey: "Linux Adoption Trends: A Survey of Enterprise End Users."
Before diving into these problems, I'd like to point out something. These are the opinions of business people who, for the most part, are already Linux users. Questions like, whether KDE or GNOME is the better desktop interface or just how cool Ubuntu 10.10 is, matter a whole lot less to them then do to Linux fans or programmers. Instead, they care about how they can use Linux to advance their work. They don't love Linux for its own sake. They love it because of what it can do for them. So, let's get on with their list of concerns in the order they gave them in importance.
1. Drivers
Yes, its 2010 and almost any device you can name inside or outside a computer has a Linux driver, but 39.4% of business users still have concerns about Linux drivers. Sigh.
Greg Kroah-Hartman's, a Linux kernel developer and a Novell engineer, Linux Driver Project (LDP), has been creating Linux drivers for years for anything that any vendor brought to the project that needed one made for it for years now. Kroah-Hartman and his crew of open-source developers charge nothing to create Linux hardware drivers. Despite that, a handful of companies still won't release Linux drives. Other companies, like Wi-Fi chip vendor Broadcom, that have been slow to release Linux drivers has recently taken to making them. So what's the real problem?
(Excerpt) Read more at blogs.computerworld.com ...
Linux is a fun OS for a hobbyist. Windows 7 Professional 64 bit is the best OS for real work.
Hmm.. I guess my full-time job as a Linux Admin for a major IB is just a hobby?
Stuxnet certainly thinks so.
Nonsense! With Windows you are always plagued with viruses and you always have to worry about if the update from Microsoft will cost you a couple days work. For peace of mind you are better off running linux. The less contact with Microsoft you have the smoother things will be.
#6 The Linux user base who still haven’t worked out that harangues and insults aren’t the best way forward in convincing the rest of the world to switch their OS.
I met Linus online in the early 90's and saw that he was on to something. After a few years we ported our databases we were running on SCO to Linux. I've had some linux machines with uptimes of almost 2 years and they would have had longer uptimes except we had to move them. And this was 5+ years ago. Those systems used numerous SCSI drives and were under constant load.
Today I have numerous Linux servers with databases running on Linux that average 28 record changes a second 24/7 on databases that have 100's of millions of working parts. Besides Linux I have Windows based servers that we mainly use for web services. While these systems are much more stable than ever I'd never consider using any Windows product to run our databases on.
In 10+ years I have never had a server fail due to the Linux OS. Not once. Linux has been very very good to me both technically and financially.
I had no idea until I read your post I was a "hobbyist".
yeah. But you can say the same thing about the user base of any platform. See post #2 here for an example.
typo. Sorry.
heh--of course you are--just like Oak Ridge National Labs.
In my (limited) experience, the biggest problem Linux has to overcome is the ease with which new software can be added. I’ve been very pleased with how well plug-and-play works even on older hardware running the CD-ROM based trial distributions, but feel like I’m wandering around blind through obscure directories trying to figure out how to unzip and install something I’ve downloaded. I have found some to be better than others in this regard. Also have run into the lack of drivers, as noted. The other big reason I stay with Windows is the ability to find virtually any kind of utility as freeware, easily installed when needed.
But I really do like Linux!
Perhaps but the present market share is the major issue i.e. many Linux users seem quite upset that they haven’t vanquished Microsoft.
Firefox gained converts by a) not being an MS product b) performing better and c) being open source AND being user friendly with a developer community that didn’t look down its nose at new arrivals.
The template is there waiting.
Personally, I couldn't care less about market share--in any product I buy. I buy for quality.
Quality is, I admit, largely in the eye of the consumer. It depends on what you're gonna do with the product. In the case of a computer OS, Linux works better for me than Windows does.
One of the problems I keep seeing people have is making changes to the system. Great strides have been made the last few years in making setup a snap, but package/installer management is still very hit-or-miss.
Most folk aren't going to have a lot of desire to grep through man pages chock full of some programmers favorite Lingua Obscura or l33t sp3@k.
Works for me though. ;-)
Oh, wow, an anti-Linux troll-style comment. Haven't seen one of them for a while.
Almost makes me nostalgic for Golden Eagle... almost. :)
LOL! Kept things interesting, didn't he?
My toaster haz dem.
Yep.
These days, most of the heavy-duty trolling is on the Apple threads rather than Linux, and some days I yearn for GE's style. He could be boring and single-track negative, but rarely was he overtly obnoxious. The stuff on the Apple threads has too often gotten downright ugly and highly inappropriate for FR.
By comparison, calling Linux a hobbyist OS is so mild I almost overlooked it! :)
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