Linux adoption

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Linux adoption refers to the uptake of the Linux operating system by homes, organisations and governments. Linux migration refers to the change over to Linux from other operating systems.

Contents

[edit] History

  • 1983 (September): GNU project was announced publicly
  • 1991 (September): first version of the Linux kernel was released to the Internet
  • 1999: Linux is the most popular Internet serving OS, counted by domain name, with 28.5% of market (Zoebelein)
  • 2001: Linux in use by 35.5% of Japanese corporations (Impress Corporation)
  • 2001 (second quarter): Linux server unit shipments at 15% annual growth rate IDC
  • 2002 (July): Linux and Microsoft (Windows XP and CE combined) have 30% share each in terms of developer use for future embedded projects (EDC).
  • 2002: 25% of servers and 2.8% of desktop computers running Linux (IDC)
  • 2002: Linux in use by 64.3% of Japanese corporations
  • 2002 (October): 59% of developers expect to write Linux applications in the next year (EDC)
  • 2004 (second quarter): Linux server unit shipments at 40% annual growth rate (IDC)
  • 2004: Linux shipped on approximately 50% of the worldwide server blade units, and 20% of all rack-optimized servers. (IDC [1])
  • 2004: Linux deployments in retail increased 34 percent over 2003 (IHL)
  • 2004 (February): 1.1 million developers in North America working on F/OSS projects[citation needed]

As an indicator of the increasing interest in Linux, it can be observed from Linux distribution tracking site Distro Watch that page views of each of their pages regarding specific Linux distributions has increased significantly over the period 2002-2006. In 2002, the most popular distribution page on the site received 274 hits per day, 704 in 2003, 1202 in 2004, 1503 in 2005 and 2705 in April 2006, an average increase of 77% per year.

[edit] Power users

The high level of access granted to Linux's internals has led to Linux users traditionally tending to be more technically-inclined than users of Microsoft Windows and Mac OS. Linux's roots in the Unix operating system mean that in addition to graphical configuration tools and control panels available for many system settings and services, it is often either easier or necessary to use plain-text configuration files to configure the OS. While user access to these files and utilities is controlled by the system administrator, and in theory the user does not need to worry about them, in practice the administrator and user are often the same person on a desktop system.

[edit] Government

As local governments come under pressure from institutions such as the World Trade Organization and the International Intellectual Property Alliance, some have turned to open source software as an affordable, legal alternative to both pirated material and expensive computer products from Microsoft, Apple and the like.

The spread of free software affords some leverage for these countries when companies from the developed world bid for government contracts (since a low-cost option exists), while furnishing an alternative path to development for countries like India and Pakistan that have many citizens skilled in computer applications but cannot afford technological investment at "First World" prices.

In the preamble to the bill, the Peruvian government stressed that the choice was made to ensure that key pillars of democracy were safeguarded: "The basic principles which inspire the Bill are linked to the basic guarantees of a state of law."
  • In January 2006, Venezuelan open source law goes into effect, mandating a two year transition to open source in all public agencies. [7]
  • In April 2006, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration announced that it had completed a migration to Red Hat Enterprise Linux in one third of the scheduled time and saved 15 million dollars.[8]
  • The government of Pakistan established a Technology Resource Mobilization Unit in 2002 to enable groups of professionals to exchange views and coordinate activities in their sectors and to educate users about free software alternatives. GNU/Linux is an option for poor countries with little revenue available for public investment; Pakistan is employing open source software in public schools and colleges, and hopes to run all government services on GNU/Linux eventually.
  • The Ministry of Defense in Singapore began switching its computers from Microsoft to free software in 2004, while South Korea, China and Japan agreed to cooperate in creating new Linux-based programs.

[edit] School and education

  • The Children's Machine (previously called the $100 laptop), is an inexpensive laptop running Linux, which will be distributed to millions of children as part of the One Laptop Per Child project, especially in developing countries.
  • Macedonia deployed 5,000 Linux desktops running Ubuntu across all 468 public schools and 182 computer labs (December 2005) [9]
  • Italian schools in Bolzano have switched to a custom distribution of Linux (FUSS Soledad GNU/Linux), which will be used by the 16,000 students in the area when they return on 12 September 2005. [10]
  • Brazil has around 20,000 Linux desktops running in elementary and secondary public schools.
  • The Netherlands has an initiative called "Open Source en standaarden in het onderwijs", in English "Open source and standards in education". [11]
  • Government officials of Kerala, India announced they will use only free software, running on the GNU/Linux platform, for computer education, starting with the 2,650 government and government-aided high schools. [12]
  • 22,000 students in the U.S. state of Indiana were using Linux as of 2006[13]

Linux is often used in technical disciplines at universities and research centres. This is due to several factors, including that Linux is available free of charge and includes a large body of free/open source software. To some extent, technical competence of computer science and software engineering academics is also a contributor, as is stability, maintainability, and upgradability. IBM ran an advertising campaign entitled "Linux is Education" featuring a young boy who was supposed to be "Linux".

[edit] Embedded systems

  • Sony's PlayStation 3 comes with a hard disk (20GB or 60GB) with Linux designed to be installed easily on the system. Due to the large penetration of the PlayStation platform, (200 million units worldwide in 10 years) Linux will have a great penetration possibility with PS3. [14]

[edit] Business

Linux is also used in some corporate environments as the desktop platform for its employees, with commercially available solutions including Red Hat Enterprise Linux, SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop, and Linspire.

[edit] Motivations

The primary driving forces behind Linux adoption can be summarized as:

  • Security
  • Reputation
  • Technological one-upmanship

Other reasons cited are:

  • Open source - it is visible what is being done with data, how the program works, and that it does what it is said to do.
  • Lack of vendor lock-in - data can usually be ported more easily because there is often less incentive to make this difficult than with proprietary software.
  • Long term usability (reduction in duplication and/or built in obsolescence) - open source software packaged with Linux usually lasts longer because repeated rollouts and "must have" updates are not part of the marketing model.
  • Low cost - most of the popular Linux distributions are available as a free download over the Internet, while Windows, depending on version and how it is purchased, costs between $199 and $299 per seat. The MacOS costs $129 per seat, or $199 the family pack (5 licenses), and runs only on Apple hardware.
  • Core packages run across more platforms, and are often more standards compliant and interoperable. Major proprietary software tends to be compliant with, and interoperable with, its own manufacturer's software only, and is often hard to port to other platforms or systems.
  • At a professional level, Linux is configurable and robust.
  • Many of its core services, including expandability, and functions such as clustering, stability, and supercomputer-creation, are easier with Linux than many alternative common systems.
  • Upgrades are issued and problems fixed more quickly.
  • Other factors include the large number of languages Linux's interfaces are available in, the flexibility to customise it to local needs, and high quality remote management.

Companies are engaging in Linux adoption and F/OSS because:

  • it is the dominant trend in software production
  • to cause market disruption
  • customers are demanding it, and
  • to move the value-adding to different areas.

The use of Linux on desktop PCs in corporations is being driven by employees requesting it, and by corporations seeing competitors successfully deploying Linux. [19]

In government, self-determination and vendor independence are valued, as well as the local software industry development that may surround the adoption of Linux.

In the developing world, recent WTO agreements have encouraged organizations to look to Linux as an alternative to using copyright-infringing software.

(For more details see Peruvian congress letter to Microsoft detailing the advantages it sees in Linux that influenced its 2005 Linux adoption decision)

[edit] Criticism

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Linux has been widely criticised for its lack of end-user focus and user-friendliness, as open source software developers tend to work towards their own and more expert needs over those of novice users.

Other barriers to widespread adoption of Linux include:

  • Perception of Linux as an immature technology, especially on the desktop - though it has been longer established in professional use and has had more development than most other major operating systems currently in use.[citation needed]
  • Unpredictable development schedule: many open source projects have a "when it's done" attitude to releases; however, many major projects and distributions have now moved to regular schedules, such as GNOME and Ubuntu which both operate a semiannual release schedule; meanwhile Microsoft has shown unpredictable development schedules and setbacks in of many operating system releases, including Windows Vista.
  • Technical issues such as missing device drivers and difficulty of installation - much of which has fixed over the last decade and the problem is steadily going away, though some problems still persist due to periodical lack of corporate support.[citation needed]
  • Legal scares such as the SCO cases - though legal scares for an operating system are not uncommon, such as the Microsoft Anti-Trust trial and subsequent conviction.
  • Vendor lock-in by competition preventing migration to Linux
  • Marketing campaigns such as Microsoft's Get the Facts effort, the statements and information of which are not subject to reliability, truthfulness, or bias checking (Often nicknamed the Fear, uncertainty and doubt campaigns){
  • Agreement by government to make use of Microsoft Windows official policy in return for increased public donations by Microsoft - though some states have begun to use Linux on their public school computers, such as Hawaii
  • Poor documentation, though the man pages are an unknown feature in other major operating systems

[edit] Advocacy

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

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