The Linux Uprising (BusinessWeek) [LWN.net]

Funny

Posted Feb 23, 2003 3:52 UTC (Sun) by ncm (subscriber, #165) [Link]

It's funny that they got Bruce Perens to write a sidebar, but didn't bother to show him the main article before printing it. He would surely have pointed out the numerous howlers in it.

Who instituted a "ban on selling" GPLed software?
When did Stallman develop "a problem with people making money off [his] work--or making money [himself]"?
When did Intel start "making chips for Linux", and why didn't they bother to tell us?
Did IBM really "earmark $1 billion to retool its software and computers to run on Linux", or did they spend most of it on advertising? (I.e. Did those 250 engineers really clear $4M apiece?)
Does anybody know of a company that was made to "sign a license in which they promise to give away innovations they build on top of [Linux]"? Did Oracle sign it?

For all this, the bigger errors are in the omissions. They list three causes for Linux going mainstream -- continuing economic collapse, that mysterious new Intel chip, and Microsoft's rapacity -- and completely miss that it has been following the standard exponential adoption curve for years, based on worldwide bottom-up deployment, in all industries, with beneficiary CIOs only lately becoming aware of it. They entirely miss the simple and sound economic motivation for free-software development, in favor of hippy-dippy counterculture fantasy.

And GNU/Linux is back to being an "upstart operating system" again. Sigh.

Funny

Posted Feb 23, 2003 15:23 UTC (Sun) by Peter (guest, #1127) [Link]

Your points are as good as usual, Mr. Myers. (:

When did Intel start "making chips for Linux", and why didn't they bother to tell us?

Best theories for now are ItaniumN and StrongARM/XScale. Of course there are the small matters of Win64 and WinCE, but whatever.

Did IBM really "earmark $1 billion to retool its software and computers to run on Linux", or did they spend most of it on advertising?

Well, as for that, I imagine that besides their sidewalk-chalk crews, they probably spent a good deal of money tooling up their services offerings. Sure, lots of college sophomores with half a shelf of O'Reilly books think they can, singlehandedly, be all the Linux support your company will ever need ... but that's just bluster and overconfidence, and any real support contract requires a lot of investment in expert manpower.

They list three causes for Linux going mainstream -- continuing economic collapse, that mysterious new Intel chip, and Microsoft's rapacity -- and completely miss that it has been following the standard exponential adoption curve for years, based on worldwide bottom-up deployment, in all industries, with beneficiary CIOs only lately becoming aware of it.

I personally have trouble figuring out the deal about the "economic hard times" argument. Sure, if your budget has been slashed, you try harder to save money, but who out there would argue that it's only wise to make fiscally responsible decisions when times are bad? If you're doing a cost/benefit analysis for how to spend money on a new deployment, why should the overall IT budget change the equation?

Funny

Posted Mar 3, 2003 0:26 UTC (Mon) by stock (guest, #5849) [Link]

> Well, as for that, I imagine that besides their sidewalk-chalk crews, they probably spent a good deal of money tooling up their services offerings. Sure, lots of college sophomores with half a shelf of O'Reilly books think they can, singlehandedly, be all the Linux support your company will ever need ... but that's just bluster and overconfidence, and any real support contract requires a lot of investment in expert manpower.

Well now, thats exactly what is so interesting about the Linux thing. It seems that all the knowledge you need for maintaining and supporting your Linux servers and possible workstations is out there on the Internet and in books from e.g. O'Reilly & Associates, Inc. For the first time in computer industry its full power back to the end customer. Remember the customer? Yes the one who in the end has paid all IT related bills.

> I personally have trouble figuring out the deal about the "economic hard times" argument. Sure, if your budget has been slashed, you try harder to save money, but who out there would argue that it's only wise to make fiscally responsible decisions when times are bad? If you're doing a cost/benefit analysis for how to spend money on a new deployment, why should the overall IT budget change the equation?

If the new deployment mainly involves new IT software? And of course the IT part in the equation has become fatter and fatter in the past few years. Its rather funny to see that software has become so expensive and hardware like Dell/HP servers so relatively cheap. And thats a rather stupid situation as one can easily copy software, but copying a server is impossible. I think its indeed Microsoft who has steered us in that direction. But its a stupid situation.

One should never takes your eyes from the costs of the materalization of a copy of a object. If the object is a cdrom the costs are neglegible like 30 cents, if the object is a 5 year old refurbished Compaq Alpha DS20 server its still $10.000,= . Now with linux available today we are finally back to the sane situation where the factual materalization costs are valid again.

Robert

Funny

Posted Mar 3, 2003 3:46 UTC (Mon) by Peter (guest, #1127) [Link]

Well now, thats exactly what is so interesting about the Linux thing. It seems that all the knowledge you need for maintaining and supporting your Linux servers and possible workstations is out there on the Internet and in books from e.g. O'Reilly & Associates, Inc.

True, very true. But still, there is a world of difference between information being available - and of course open source is the great equaliser in that regard - and your support staff being competent to find it and actually fix customer problems.

Take me, for example. I'm confident in my own ability to set up Linux boxes, set up mail routing, debug network configurations. However, if someone needed me to fix a kernel bug ("this server keeps oopsing and locking up"), I would most likely be in well over my head. Basically I'd be reduced to loading / unloading modules, and emailing oops traces to linux-kernel. Yet that is the sort of thing customers will expect from IBM when they're paying them the big bucks. And you can't ramp up for that sort of support in real time.

The Linux Uprising (BusinessWeek)

Posted Feb 23, 2003 21:40 UTC (Sun) by simon_kitching (guest, #4874) [Link]

> First, credit the rotten economy. Corporations under intense
> pressure to reduce their computing bills began casting about
> for low-cost alternatives

Does anyone else see "standard practice" for management here?

I've worked for many companies in the last few years (contracting). Managers at all levels have fought tooth-and-nail against the concept of Linux whenever it has been raised, with the most potent argument being "no-one else is doing it, why should we take a risk?". The vast majority of early Linux use, in my experience, was driven by the developers/sysadmins not management.

Now that it has proved itself despite opposition, business magazines claim "good management" is responsible for recognising its potential.

Sigh.

The Linux Uprising [(BusinessWeek) X file]

Posted Feb 24, 2003 0:01 UTC (Mon) by mmarq (guest, #2332) [Link]

What a piece of garbish this article(not the X file)!!!!!!

The only interesting thing more close of being accurate in this article, and considering as so often expressed that statistics can be worst than big lies, is perhaps that Microsoft women comment made in the last LinuxWorld :

<"It's all Big Business now. Linux has been taken over by the suits,">

What ever the reasons; economic, Microsoft GREED, the Intel Linux chip(where?i want to by one), """security(looking at the code helps)""", or others, the reality was a big window of opportunity for dedicated servers, cheap, secure and reliable, that MS couldnt predict nor IBM or HP or any other "suit". Better!!...excelent code and open source created it, i dare to say so!!!

IS THIS A KIND OF "microsoft sponsered article", BECAUSE " LINUX CAN BE ON THE ROAD TO BE TAKEN OVER BY THE SUITS" AND THE AUTHOR CONSIDER THAT THE LINUX COMMUNITY IS MADE OF PROGRAMMERS THAT ARE STUPID FOR THE MATTERS OF MARKET AND POLITICS SCHEMES, AND EASELY ENTERTAINED...OR DID HE WANTED TO HELP WITHOUT LOOSING HIS JOB??????

< The computer realm may never be the same. Imagine the havoc in the energy business if some newcomer started giving away gasoline>
... if the arabs start to give oil away, and i'm allowed by law to make it in my backyard, why not?... i'll be selling small, secure and portable refinerys...

<Practically every tech company is being forced to figure out how to take advantage of Linux--or to avoid being swept aside by it >
...if this is true why am i still waiting, FOR MORE THAN 1 YEAR, for a kernel version that allows me to use the AC97 sound functionality of my VIA boards?...and why there have been for more than 1 year a DRM(direct rendering management) driver structure with the same 7 or 8 drivers?...the list could be enormous!...

<This stuff is shaking up the balance of power in the computer industry. It poses the biggest threat to Microsoft's hegemony since the Netscape browser in 1995>
...wiht 90% desktop and 60% server, i cannot see how can this be true,... the problem, i think, is that His Gatness Greed:-(the real brain behind it) likes to act so very much preemptively steping on any possible competition, and that created a swirl ..."they" are making TV documentarys that hurts the heart and soul of every IT professional wiht the title "FROM GUTENBERG TO BILL GATES", as if no one knows that MS build his empire by chiting, deceiving, squaching the competition, and walking away from the courts of law with a smile.( A TIME WHEN IBM,HP, DEC, SGI...WHERE AT SLEEP)

The real true about "freedom in code", in my opinion, is not if it is open source or not, although being open source helps a lot, but "how and who" controls what you can do with it...

ALTHOUGH I'M NOT SAYING IT'S GOING TO HAPPEN, i belive there is the real danger that, when the 5 years time court order "watch what they are doing" end, and that will be in a flash, MS has the muscle to "Palladium" look a platform away from everyboby else!!!!!!!!- " YOU CAN COUNT ON IT, FOR SOMETHING SIMILAR"

Meanning:- Linux with possibly overall better software, but with awkward driver model and without a hardware interface platform defined, cannot possibly counter this and will be left with no place to run!!!!!.... but worst, much worst

IBM, HP, and the other "suits", only have to make sure linux runs on them platforms now, to inherit the dreams and figths of worldwide programmers in worth of billions and billions of dollars...this business is sure a "no brainer".- "AND NO ONE CAN REALLY BLAME THEM".

I'm not really on a cruzade here, and a hate of being anfair, but i cannot understand WHY DONT IBM, HP, SUN GET TOGHETHER, AND WITH A WORLDWIDE COMMUNITY SUPPORT DEFINE A NEW "UNIX LIKE" HARDWARE PLATFORM THAT KICKS THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF MICROSOFT, - they can build on I2O an or other open technology and have a great chance of sucess now - BUT INSTEAD, THEY ARE THE ONES THAT MORE COMPLEIN THAT LINUX IS NOT READY FOR THE DESKTOP, WHEN THEY HAVE CONTROL OVER HARDWARE PRODUCTION, WICH LINUX BY ITSELF HAS NONE.

The Linux Uprising [(BusinessWeek) X file]

Posted Feb 24, 2003 4:56 UTC (Mon) by proski (subscriber, #104) [Link]

...if this is true why am i still waiting, FOR MORE THAN 1 YEAR, for a kernel version that allows me to use the AC97 sound functionality of my VIA boards?

ALSA supports sound on VIA motherboards (both 686 and 8233 chipsets). There is also a driver in the 2.4.20 kernel. If neither supports your motherboard, there is another reason - sound is not essential for servers. Most businesses use Linux on servers or on desktops with very limited functionality.

Linux workstations use better hardware. In particular, the soundcard would be at least Creative Sound Blaster Live, or a professional card with RCA or Toslink connectors, supported by ALSA or 4Front's non-free OSS.

FUD, spin & misinformation

Posted Feb 24, 2003 9:20 UTC (Mon) by beejaybee (guest, #1581) [Link]

"Second, Intel Corp., the dominant maker of processors for PCs, loosened its tight links with Microsoft and started making chips for Linux."

Crap. linux wouldn't exist at all if hardware to run it on didn't exist. This is why we need to be worried, or at least very cagey, about "security" hardware built into forthcoming CPUs/chipsets - Intel is leading the way here (though perhaps Microsoft is dragging Intel by the nose).

"The third ingredient was widespread resentment of Microsoft and fear that the company was on the verge of gaining a stranglehold on corporate customers."

Only widespread resentment? I would have thought this was near universal, at any rate on the shop floor. I don't have much recent experience of the "higher" reaches of corporate management, but it's probably still easier to sell snake oil to a corporate VP than a shop floor supervisor. Similarly, lack of a real understanding of what's going on makes it easier to mislead VPs through misinformation manifested as "spin" or plain old-fashioned FUD.

"Verge of gaining a stranglehold"? Like it or not, Windows _has_ a stranglehold on corporate customers, to the extent that (their voice boxes being crushed by fear of legal action enforcing Microsoft's draconian EULAs) they can no longer even scream.