__/ [B Gruff] on Monday 13 February 2006 20:16 \__
> Perhaps some of you more-knowledgable guys could give this a coat of
> looking-over for me? On first sight, I get the impression that it might
> become the definitive answer to "Get The Facts"!
>
> http://www.levanta.com/linuxstudy/EMA_Levanta-Linux_RR.pdf
>
> The "Exec Summary" reads:-
>
> EMA analyzed the cost factors cited in previous studies and found the
> following results:
>
> ? Provisioning ? 75% of administrators using sophisticated tools can
> provision a system in less than 1 hour; one third can provision a system in
> less than 30 minutes.
If it's a batch job, i.e. setting up a dozen machines in parallel, you could
talk about 2 hours per dozen.
> ? Patch management ? most Linux administrators spend less than 5 minutes
> per server per week on patch management. Sophisticated management tools
> reduce this effort even further.
YaST in SuSE can be set up to manage patches autonomously. I don't know about
other distribution. This doesn't need any knowledge of cron jobs. It's in
the YaST Online Update (YOU) GUI.
> ? Configuration management ? supporting multiple versions of a given
> distribution has no discernible impact on Linux management. In some cases,
> respondents actually had more versions of Windows than Linux.
Interesting.
> ? Reliability ? most respondents reported 99.99% or higher availability for
> their Linux systems. A significant number (17%) report no downtime at all.
Ubuntu 4, as of this moment:
02:42:58 up 125 days, 18:33, 7 users, load average: 0.00, 0.01, 0.00
SuSE 9.3:
3:06am up 72 days 9:20, 7 users, load average: 0.08, 0.12, 0.08
This might be even higher for Web/mail servers where the tasks undertaken are
predictable, uniform and the applications well-tested.
> ? Problem resolution ? in over 60% of cases, when problems occur in Linux
> environments they are diagnosed and repaired in less than 30 minutes, over
> 8 times faster than industry average.
Linux speaks out loud. When problems arise, it is apparent what they are.
> ? Management and support ? 88% of enterprises with Linux and Windows spend
> less effort managing Linux; 97% believe it is, at worst, the same for both
> systems. Respondents with sophisticated management tools all report Linux
> management is the same or easier than Windows management.
Admin-side continues to be further simplified using GUI's and a variety of
front-ends like command-line/text-mode YaST, as well as cPanel, to name just
a few example.
> ? Storage management ? enterprises with sophisticated management tools did
> not find any significant difference in storage management effort or
> utilization for either Windows or Linux.
Filesystem maintenance ought to become a factor though. This includes the
issue of filesystem fragility and inconsistencies, which need attention.
A guy from the machine room spoke about Vista yesterday. He mentined how
considerably the SAN would slow down under that new beast. It indexes
people's files in the background, so he needs new hardware.
> ? Resource costs ? most administrators, for either Linux or Windows, earn
> under $60k. Salaries for combined Linux/Windows administrators are only
> marginally higher than for Linux-only administrators. Linux skills are
> readily available.
This should not surprise you. Linux-only administrators have less work to do
(glimpse at this report wholly), so fewer administrators are necessary and,
consequently, the market may be saturated with the appropriate skill.
Windows is troubled enough as to justify the employment of an army of
booters, defragers and AV 'experts'.
> ? Consulting and training costs ? 79% of enterprises spent nothing on Linux
> consulting, and 63% spent nothing on training. Only 4% spent over $10K on
> consulting or training.
>
> In addition, this research found the following in areas not adequately
> addressed in previous studies:
>
> ? Acquisition costs ? for similar environments, Linux acquisition costs can
> be almost $60,000 less per server than Windows in software costs alone.
> Windows also incurs higher hardware costs.
That's one of the most obvious points, but the numbers are worth quoting and
forwarding to the IT managers.
> ? Productivity ? Linux tends to be more productive, as Linux administrators
> tend to manage more servers than Windows administrators, and Linux systems
> tend to handle greater workloads than Windows systems.
>
> ? Security Management ? 75% of Linux administrators spend less than 10
> minutes per server per week managing security. With sophisticated
> management tools, this goes up to over 85%.
>
> ? Virus and Spyware Management ? 95% of Linux administrators with
> sophisticated tools spend less than 10 minutes per server per week managing
> viruses and spyware. Respondents strongly endorsed Linux as inherently less
> vulnerable. No administrator reported spending more time on Linux than
> Windows.
Are you suggesting that Microsoft-funded benchmarks are an utter lie?
Roy
--
Roy S. Schestowitz | "No, I didn't buy that from eBay"
http://Schestowitz.com | SuSE Linux | PGP-Key: 0x74572E8E
2:40am up 27 days 21:41, 13 users, load average: 0.28, 0.36, 0.50
http://iuron.com - next generation of search paradigms
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