Linux, Lindows, Mandrake, Red Hat, open source, free software .. . whats this world coming to? Much of the popular press, as wellas a large segment of the hacker community, constantly encouragesus to get rid of our proven, paid-for, and expensive software andget on the Linux bandwagon. (When I use the term hacker, I amreferring to the computer geeks who work with computer software forthe pure love of codethe elegance of the best solution to theproblem. A hacker understands a system, not just how to use it.)Never mind that we currently have working systems powered bymainstream UNIX or some version of Windows. We all have been dupedby the evil empire, and until we embrace some open source softwareand move all our systems to Linux, we are doomed to the sixthcircle of Hell (thats the one populated with the heretics fordisavowing the Truth of Linux). Are we really that ignorant? Are wereally that resistant to change? Lets take a look at some of themyth and hyperbole surrounding this whole mess.

Web Servers

The word on the street consistently has been that Apache serversown the Web server market. In fact, the well-known Netcraft WebSurvey (www.netcraft.com/survey/)bears this out. The most recent results from Netcraft show ApacheWeb servers dominating the field with a full 66.42 percent of allactive servers. Microsoft IIS is a distant second with 24.79percent of the field. That leaves about nine percent for everyoneelse. If you are running IIS, these statistics are enough to makeyou question your sanity. Apache is the Web server of choice forall varieties of UNIX. That means we have a mix of Apache Webservers running on commercial UNIX systems as well as Apacherunning on a free distribution of Linux.

Lets take another look at the statistics. Port80 Software(www.port80software.com/servermask/top1000Webservers/)conducted its own survey of Fortune 1000 companies to see just whatthey were using for Web servers. (OK, Port80 does produce softwarefor Microsoft IIS. That means it has an interest in promoting theresults of the survey; it doesnt mean the survey itself is flawed.)This survey shows a much different picture. According to Port80,among the top 1,000 U.S. companies, 54.1 percent are runningMicrosoft IIS, 21.0 percent Netscape Enterprise, and 17.6 percentApache, with 7.3 percent left for the others to fight over.

Since these two sources showed such significant differences, Idecided to conduct my own survey. First, I went to NationalUnderwriters online list of life and health companies (www.nationalunderwriter.com/links/lifelist.htm)and randomly selected 52 carriers from the list. I say randomly,but I did make certain I included all firms on that list that arewell-known throughout the industry. I went to the public Web sitesof these firms and examined the HTTP headers to determine whichserver was being used. My results are as follows:

Interesting. My little survey is not all that different from thePort80 results. I suspect that since the Netcraft survey takes inall active Web servers, it includes a lot of small business andpersonal sites, which probably are much more likely to be runningfree software. If you own a small business and all your Web site isdoing is providing some basic information such as hours ofoperation and a nice little map, why not get a free distribution ofLinux and another free distribution of Apache and throw up somestatic HTML. I also suspect a lot of hosting companies are runningsome flavor of Linux/Unix and Apache. That would serve to inflatethe numbers, too. Whatever the reasons behind these disproportions,there is a strong indication a substantial portion of major U.S.business (including insurance companies) rely on Microsoft Webservers.

What Constitutes anEvil Empire?

Maybe the answer to that question depends on who your employeris. If you work for Scott McNealy (CEO of Sun Microsystems), itsobviously Microsoft. If you work for Microsoft, it is a JanetReno-run Justice Department. If you are a poor, out-of-work hacker,it is any software company that dares to charge for its goods. Thefact of the matter is powerful, successful companies always areperceived as bad. Today that means Microsoft is the one tohate.

When the first PCs were being produced, IBM was the bad guyitalready controlled the mainframe and mini markets, and next it wasgoing to control the desktop market (although at that time, no onehad any idea what the desktop market really was). Remember thatwhen the government forced the breakup of AT&T in 1982, theJustice Department immediately dropped its long-running antitrustcase against IBM. (It makes you question the actual motives behindantitrust suits.) When Bill Gates forced IBMs hand in onlylicensing IBM an operating system for its personal computers, heopened the door to real competition in the PC arena. If he had soldIBM the rights to DOS, IBM would have controlled that marketplaceand probably would have maintained unreasonably high prices for theproduct as well as the subsequent service contracts (and we allmight be using OS2!). Seriously, Gates foresight not only allowedMicrosoft to become a very successful enterprise, it also allowedaffordable PCs to become available to the masses. Those sameaffordable PCs allowed all the hackers out there the opportunity tolearn and hone their skills. Just look at the example set by AppleComputerit never became ubiquitous because it wouldnt license itsOS.

In my world, Wintel programmers get along with UNIX programmers(hey, C is Cright?), and we all get along with the Mac users downin art and composition. Its just these Linux and open source guysthat are so critical. Dan Bricklin started a movement years agowhen he gave away VisiCalc, and things have never been thesame.

Open Source

January 16, 2003MandrakeSoft, the financially strapped creatorof the Mandrake version of Linux, said Wednesday it filed for theFrench equivalent of bankruptcy protection from creditors.

This news tidbit struck home. In preparation for writing thispiece on the UNIX/ Linux/Windows/Open Source debate, I installed acurrent version of Mandrake on a two-year-old 750 MHz PIII machinethat had been running Windows 2000. More on that little experimentlater. Mandrake has become one of the best-known Linuximplementations around. I recently was discussing operating systemswith a friend who is stuck in an OS/2 time warp. He mentioned hehad just bought a PC from Wal-Mart that came preloaded withMandrake V. 7. (Now that sounds mainstream to me.)

The pro-Linux press predictably reacted to the Man-drake newswith an attitude. Even in the worst-case scenario (they say), whichwould mean Mandrake closes its doors, the software will continue tolive because it is open source. Let me explain (or try to). Assumeyou have invested in a Mandrake release of Linux for your 3,000desktops. And then assume the company from which you purchased thissoftware and support (MandrakeSoft) goes out of business. Dontpanicbecause the Linux community will rise up and provide ongoingsupport, updates, patches, and fixes for this software that someonetook from the public domain, modified, and sold for a profit. OK, Isee how this works now.

Excuse my cynicism. Open source is cool and fun and has led towonderful developments in the software community. The problem is Iwork for an organization that requires me to provide operationalsoftware solutions 24/7. Shrink-wrap software is generallyreliable, although we know it isnt perfect. I dont have the time,the staff, or the desire to get into the source code of anoperating system running a live e-commerce server to try to trackdown a problem. If a real problem arises with a critical piece ofsoftware, I want to be able to hold a vendor responsible forgetting that problem resolved. It would not be acceptable to postmy problem to a message board and hope some altruistic genius willcome along and rescue me.

I am well aware of the other arguments about using Wintelsoftwarethat its buggy and not secure. And that may be so, but ithas been my experience that properly securing and hardening Webboxes and keeping your patches, hot fixes, and service packs up todate generally will keep your systems up and running (our Webservers were running just fine during the recent slammer attackonlything was you couldnt get to them because other infected serverswere taking all the bandwidth).

More Bickering

If a piece of software is free or low cost, it would appear itwould be less expensive to maintain and operate that bit ofsoftware than something from, say, Microsoft. Thus the cognoscentipostulate that since it is much less expensive to acquire a LinuxOS and an Apache Web server and an Office clone, then it followsthat total cost of ownership (TCO) of these products will be lessthan using their Microsoft counterparts. Makes sense to me. Well,it didnt make sense to Microsoft, so it hired IDC to write a whitepaper comparing TCO for five common corporate workloads for Linuxand Microsoft systems. The resultshold your breatha Windows 2000environment had cost savings of 11 to 22 percent over a five-yearperiod. Sounds like FUD to me (FUD stands for Fear, Uncertainty,Doubt, and is a marketing technique used when a competitor launchesa product that is possibly both better than yours and costsless).

I am not going to bother analyzing this bit of marketing flufffrom Microsoft, but I will provide a brief synopsis. The five areaschosen for comparison were networking, file serving, printerserving, Web serving, and security. The TCO for Windows 2000 wasless in all scenarios except the Web. The major expense leading toa higher TCO for Linux systems is manpowerthere arent enoughskilled Linux administrators and programmers around right now, andthere are swarms of Microsoft technicians. Hence, there is asteeper learning curve for the Linux product line. Thosedifferences disappear when looking at Web servers because therealready is a large installed base of UNIX/Apache servers.

Mandrake

I mentioned above installing a Mandrake release for some quickcomparisons. The computer in question is a two-year-old laptop withthe specifications mentioned previously. I did two clean Mandrakeinstallations and two clean Windows 2000 installations. I didntprovide any manufacturers drivers or updates. I simply let bothoperating systems install themselves and let them make hardware andconfiguration choices when necessary. Both installs went smoothly,and I had fully operational systems when done. The network card wasdetected, and I was able to access the local network and theInternet immediately. One big difference was the default Mandrakesetup left me with a fully operational suite of Office applications(Word Processor, Spreadsheet, and Presentation Software). I had toinstall Office 2000 to achieve the same functionality withMicrosoft. Total cost: Mandrake under $100 with support; Windows2000 plus Office, $700-plus. (OK, if you buy a new box from amanufacturer, you really dont pay that much for Win2K, but thatswhat you pay for a shrink-wrap.)

I had some minor problems configuring some of the Mandrakedesktop simply because it was new to me. I was unable to get any ofthe included media software to play a DVD under Mandrake, but, hey,this is a business computerI shouldnt be watching Office Space atwork, anyway.

All in all, I was very impressed with the ease of installationand use of the Mandrake desktop. I am puzzled, howeverwhat I endedup with was Windows running on Linux. I hate to think the future ofLinux is just a cheap Windows substitute. One of the attractions ofoperating systems such as Linux is they are not Windows. They dontcome with dozens of annoying and unnecessary wizards to do yourwork for you. There is something really weird about the geekoperating system of choice trying to pass itself off as a differentWindows clone.

Where Do You Go from Here?

It really is just smoke and mirrors right now. If you run aMicrosoft shop or if you use a Solaris 9 system, you probably willbe well served to stay where you are. Thats good advice for today.However, if Microsoft continues to pursue draconian licensing andupgrading policies, then your hand may be forced. I never wouldadvocate using a truly free version of any bit of software in thecorporate worldbut there are inexpensive commercial Linuxdistributions available. Red Hat is targeting the corporate worldand is making some inroads. One of the major insurance carriers Itested in my little survey was running Apache on a Red Hatdistribution. Red Hat Linux with Star Office certainly is a viablealternative to Microsoft. Linux will continue to invade thecorporate IT environment, but I hope not just as a Windows clone.Use Linux for those applications for which it is best suited. Atthis time, that means rock-solid, secure Web servers. Microsoftstill owns the end user, meaning that the average office worker iscomfortable with the usual office suite of products. Neverunderestimate the resistance to change. And that resistance willmean less productivity. Our job as technology leaders in the worldof business is not always to provide the most elegant solution eventhough that is what our gut is telling us. We must provide the mostefficient solutions for our employers at this time while keeping acautious eye on the future. As for me, I use Linux at home for fun.I run Windows software for productivity.