For counter arguments there's some fascinating stuff at http://limuxwatch.blogspot.co.uk/ although it hasn't been updated for a while, so maybe they've finally succeeded?
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"Linux switch saved city millions and reduced user complaints"
71–80 of 141 posts
Re: "Linux switch saved city millions and reduced user complaints"
#72For counter arguments there's some fascinating stuff at http://limuxwatch.blogspot.co.uk/ although it hasn't been updated for a while, so maybe they've finally succeeded?
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Re: "Linux switch saved city millions and reduced user complaints"
#73Doubtlessly, this successful migration to desktop Linux must have been very difficult, costly, and disruptive. The upfront costs of migration surely exceed what it would have cost the city to stay on Windows for one or two more waves of upgrades. The important question is: were these upfront costs & multi-year effort worth it? The data presented in the article provides compelling evidence that the answer is yes -- i.…
Maybe I read the article wrong, but my spidey sense went off when reading the article. They're comparing the maximum_complaints_per_month quantity before and after switch. i.e., the peak value of complaints_per_month. Not average or annual. I agree with your other points. FTA: The maximum number of complaints was 70 per month before the beginning of the switch to LiMux. After the number of LiMux workplaces increased…
Actually, that's a misinterpretation in the article. The original document mentions those figures, but in a different context: Those are the total number of complaints for limux workplaces in the beginning and in the end and it includes all kinds of errors - application errors, user errors, database and network connectivity so it's nothing but a rough upper bound. It's given as rough indicator that most problems have been solved.
Re: "Linux switch saved city millions and reduced user complaints"
#74Doubtlessly, this successful migration to desktop Linux must have been very difficult, costly, and disruptive. The upfront costs of migration surely exceed what it would have cost the city to stay on Windows for one or two more waves of upgrades. The important question is: were these upfront costs & multi-year effort worth it? The data presented in the article provides compelling evidence that the answer is yes -- i.…
It's good for them that they haven't caught the "SharePoint" (and soon, InfoPath) wave yet cause if they do, the migration cost will rise quite significantly. Most offices these days do use SharePoint heavily and some of the BAs started their hands on InfoPath to make forms for data entry to SharePoint. To make matter worse (or sweeter, depending your POV), these whole thing can be acquired cheaper by using Office 36…
edwinnathaniel:
You're absolutely right about Microsoft Sharepoint (and InfoPath): it makes switching away from Windows much more painful and costly. FWIW, I have no doubt there are a lot of smart people at Microsoft thinking 24 hours a day about how to increase switching barriers for customers.
As to Microsoft's licensing discounts in key markets, they're not new. Ballmer traveled personally to meet with Munich's mayor and reportedly offered similarly crazy discounts to prevent them from switching to Linux. (See http://www.infoworld.com/t/platforms/microsofts-ballmer-figh... and http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http://www.heise.de/... for some details.)
Regardless, the important question (for budget-strapped cities and governments) remains the same: can they save a lot of money by switching to desktop Linux? If the savings claimed by Munich are accurate, the answer is a resounding yes.
Re: "Linux switch saved city millions and reduced user complaints"
#75Earlier quoted context omitted.
Frankly, I would say just the opposite. If your needs are minimal, go with windows. If you need more, linux is a good choice. You will never get a decent terminal in windows or good support for some programming languages (such as python). You are right with Excel although. However, much of the "power" of Excel is really just needed because people are overusing it. Stop making "databases" out of Excel sheets and imple…
I did state that Linux was appropriate for enthusiasts as well as those with minimal needs. The reason I feel Linux to be appropriate for novices with bare-minimal needs, is that when operating within very narrow constraints the most popular Linux distros are both efficient and safe. For basic functionality, the price can't be beat. However, hassles really do begin to manifest themselves once users begin to really en…
I think you'r missing out on another large group of users: Those in a large organization that need a defined set of features, often provided by a custom application under control of the given organization. Those users have well-defined requirements and do have an IT department backing them. Pretty much all of the administration falls into that category: They're not supposed to go wandering off changing config settings or downloading and installing software. They have a handfull of programs that they need, nowadays often server-based, and if those programs can be made to run on linux, they couldn't care less about the underlying OS.
Re: "Linux switch saved city millions and reduced user complaints"
#76"... and reduced user complaints" When I hear that metric I think of a homegrown app that was supposed to upload files from PeeCees to the company's mainframe. At the annual IT meeting ... "And since implementing change foo and bar in the system user complaints to the special helpdesk have declined 90% .." My boss stood up [1] "That's because the users got tired of calling and not having anything fixed. It's still br…
Your boss had a good point. At some point, users become savvy to the whole thing and stop complaining and start trying to fix it on their own. It starts with 'Bobby in accounting told me to X when Y happens' and snowballs from there. It's horrible on productivity and when IT finally does try to fix it, it's often much, much worse. (Though, when the user gets it right, IT doesn't have to fix it after all.) It's also h…
Or they will stop using the system altogether and that's when you start having these unofficial shadow systems spring up, developed by someone who read Access For Dummies in 7 Days, and next thing you know you've got 250,000 credit card numbers posted on pastebin.
Re: "Linux switch saved city millions and reduced user complaints"
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
Its not a standard Ubuntu. For example, they use KDE 3 :).
Well, they'll have to change that for 12.04 unless they compile their own!
Well, they do have an IT department with staff competent enough to make a linux migration. I guess they do have an appropriate rollout management to compile and deploy KDE without much hassle. I wouldn't worry about that.
Re: "Linux switch saved city millions and reduced user complaints"
#78"... and reduced user complaints" When I hear that metric I think of a homegrown app that was supposed to upload files from PeeCees to the company's mainframe. At the annual IT meeting ... "And since implementing change foo and bar in the system user complaints to the special helpdesk have declined 90% .." My boss stood up [1] "That's because the users got tired of calling and not having anything fixed. It's still br…
There is a correlated phenomenon that might be at work: many help desk calls are a result of what happens after a user tries to "fix it" themselves. Users may be sufficiently ignorant under Linux that they've reduced the number of steps they take "outside the box".
Re: "Linux switch saved city millions and reduced user complaints"
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
Frankly, I would say just the opposite. If your needs are minimal, go with windows. If you need more, linux is a good choice. You will never get a decent terminal in windows or good support for some programming languages (such as python). You are right with Excel although. However, much of the "power" of Excel is really just needed because people are overusing it. Stop making "databases" out of Excel sheets and imple…
I did state that Linux was appropriate for enthusiasts as well as those with minimal needs. The reason I feel Linux to be appropriate for novices with bare-minimal needs, is that when operating within very narrow constraints the most popular Linux distros are both efficient and safe. For basic functionality, the price can't be beat. However, hassles really do begin to manifest themselves once users begin to really en…
You got downvoted because you included some traditional anti-Linux troll subjects with nothing to support those points.
> However, hassles really do begin to manifest themselves once users begin to really engage their PC in any number of ways. The vast majority of PC users fall into this category. In other words, they have non-minimal needs but are neither enthusiasts nor developers or otherwise employed in IT full time.
The vast majority of PC users do not fall into your category. They will be people who need to read email, do a little bit of simple web-browsing, create and open simple office documents (the vast majority of which would be fine with Libre-Office) and maybe run some awful accounts / stock / ordering software.
> WiFi, external displays, software limitations (e.g. video editing) are only a small number of issues that can and will manifest themselves. For the vast majority of PC users, this constitutes an unacceptable hassle.
WIFI is fixed in Linux and has been for a while, you don't want to run wifi in a business, and if you are using it anyway you'd have it set up by IT.
I'm not sure what you mean by external displays. If you mean dual monitors than very few people need two monitors, and those that do would have them set up by IT, and they'd work with whatever software being used. If you mean projectors then I have no idea what the Linux situation is. I accept it might be a problem, but that's a problem faced by a very small number of people.
A tiny number of people need to edit video. In the context of a local authority we can say that almost no one will be editing video.
OS X, in the context of local governments trying to save money, is - and I say this as politely as I can - a stupid suggestion. The hardware is much more expensive, is a lot more desirable to thieves, it has similar (or worse) dual monitor problems as you suggest above, it has similar (or worse) lack of software as you suggest above.
Re: "Linux switch saved city millions and reduced user complaints"
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
I did state that Linux was appropriate for enthusiasts as well as those with minimal needs. The reason I feel Linux to be appropriate for novices with bare-minimal needs, is that when operating within very narrow constraints the most popular Linux distros are both efficient and safe. For basic functionality, the price can't be beat. However, hassles really do begin to manifest themselves once users begin to really en…
FYI, I upvoted even though I disagree with much of what you've put. A number of these issues that you mention are only present with a lack of planning. If you go out and buy a computer with the intention of running Linux on it, you plan and you pick a computer with good compatibility. With each release of popular distros such as Ubuntu, compatibility improves massively. My Dad's laptop used to have issues with WiFi a…
attempting to run Linux on a device that was not designed specifically for it.
Couldn't have put it better. Those who complain about how linux doesn't "just work" often overlook this point.
Personally though, I don't think Canonical coming up with their own computer isn't really going to help; I wish that there were a hardware vendor that designed really beautiful computers so that I could run linux on it (Currently, the best design is by Apple)