No... The long term costs are quite high as well. The hospital would have to hire new programmers to create and maintain the software that would need to be created from the ground up, unless some of the venders would agree to port their software over to Linux. For what it's worth, they already have a number of Linux servers, as well as VMS, AIX, WinNT, Win2000, and 18 NetWare servers. Some of the cross platform software that they use in many cases is custom written, and I've been informed that the vender will not port it to Linux. It is simply not feasable for the hospital to move to Linux, especilly because a) they are a not-for-profit organization who can't hire the development and support staff that would be needed for the conversion, and b) they are part of a medical group that has specific standards, that requires members to run certain apps on certain operating systems: This is not open to negotiation..
See this article from CIO Magazine:
How to run a Microsoft-free shop
I am familiar with the article. It also mentions that the comparison network ran standard office automation and simple accounting applications, and nothing else...
Mark
The point is simply this: in many cases, people can save money and hassle by migrating off proprietary solutions. Obviously, there are special cases where nothing but a particular vendor solution will do. But, these cases are the minority.
I was speaking of migrating some of the Windows servers, whic could save money, depending on the comparative cost of maintaining the custom apps. Think macro view, not micro.
It's easy to naysay, but that is how organizations get themselves locked into a particular vendor's solutions. When that vendor makes decisions that negatively affect the future of those solutions, the customer is helpless. It makes sense to plan ahead for flexibility.