Linux vs Windows - Conquering a Windows Based World

If you’re in China you can buy Dell Dimension C51-n computer with Athlon64 for around $600. Covered by Phil Hochmuth at Network World.

“Dell appears to be trying to upstage China-based Lenovo, the former PC/laptop division of IBM, which was sold off in 2004. Lenovo currently offers no low-cost Linux machines in China ”

Straight from DELL March 28 2007.

Dell says we hear you!

Our first step in this effort is offering Linux pre-installed on select desktop and notebook systems. We will provide an update in the coming weeks that includes detailed information on which systems we will offer, our testing and certification efforts, and the Linux distribution(s) that will be available. The countdown begins today.

This could be the tipping point. Expect a flurry of press from Redmond to counter this.

PSA Peugeot Citroen which is a leading car manufacturer in Europe has contracted Ericom to install up to 20,000 computers with Novell Suse Linux and their Power Term application.  Covered at www.earthtimes.org.

“When engaging with PSA Peugeot Citroen to establish SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop as their next-generation desktop platform, we found that Ericom’s PowerTerm has been a critical component of the overall solution,” said Roger Levy, Novell vice president and general manager of Open Platform Solutions. 

Open source alternatives to Microsoft Exchange servers now pose a bigger threat than IBM Lotus Notes/Domino, according to survey conducted by the Yankee group that will be published in April 2007.

 ”In an ominous portent for Microsoft, 23% of the survey respondents indicated they intend to migrate away from Exchange Server and switch to an alternative Linux or open source Email and messaging distribution platform over the next 12 to 18 months. The users attributed their decision to their belief that Linux Email and messaging packages are cheaper and easier to manage than Exchange,” according to study author and Yankee analyst Laura DiDio.”

Why?

• Cost
• Complexity
• Difficulty in maintaining and managing Exchange

This is  covered by Mary Jo Foley at ZDNET blogs.

The Linux smart phone market on China has more than doubled since last year according to the CCID Consultling Company. Symbian has 63% followed by Linux at 30% . Covered at www.linuxdevices.com

“Overall Chinese smartphone revenues for 2006 came in at RMB40 billion (approx. $5.1 billion) — more than double 2005”

Oracle is starting to win Linux support contracts according to Larry Ellison, with Yahoo being their biggest to date. They have already signed a number of other contracts, some over half million dollars. Covered over at http://news.zdnet.co.uk. Redhat and Oracle who were once partners have taken different paths and are now beginning to compete with each other.

“It’s no surprise that computing technology companies would be eager to sell to Yahoo, which said it has hundreds of thousands of servers to power its business. And while it’s unclear how broadly Yahoo will use Oracle’s Linux, it is notable that Oracle has secured a high-profile customer, an important milestone.”

Open source software is becoming more accepted in the US government because of the backing from well respected vendors, such as IBM, Novell, Sun, and Unisys as reported at www.fcw.com

“When we see big-name vendors and large systems integrators offering and supporting open systems when historically they made their money from proprietary systems, we have to take notice,” said Charles Riechers, principal deputy assistant secretary for acquisition at the Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force

Mercian, a UK security label printing company, is migrating to open source because of reliability and upgrade cost concerns with Microsoft. What is unique and interesting about this migration is that they are keeping a blog about all the issues, concerns and snags that they are encountering during the switch.

Covered by a press release from Mercian.

“Mercian… undertook a detailed cost benefit analysis of its existing IT infrastructure before taking the strategic decision to migrate to the open source model. Major historical weakness in the existing systems such as damage to mission critical servers from viruses, uncontrollable system changes, security threats and difficult and expensive upgrade paths made the migration decision comparatively easy.”

HSBC, a bank based in Britain that has 9,500 offices, 284,00 employees, and 125 million customers in 76 countries, is standardizing on a single Linux Distribution, Suse Linux.  HSBC believes that it will reduce its total cost of  ownsership.

“The HSBC move is a direct result of the technical cooperation agreement penned between Microsoft and Novell in November 2006. As part of the agreement, the two companies committed to make their products work better together, to jointly build, market and support new solutions to improve interoperability, and to deliver new virtualization capabilities. “

Covered over at www.eweek.com