The Aberdeen Group has issued a report on Big Blue and its Linux products and strategy today for the enterprise today. The report — An Assessment of IBM’s Enterprise Linux Strategy — says that the firm has so far spent billions in an attempt to lead the industry on Linux related technology. But it questions whether IBM will be able to sustain this strategy over a long period of time. Read the news report.
IBM’s Linux Enterprise Strategy Probably Unsustainable
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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Another (bullshit) report by The Aberdeen Group, who a few weeks ago, had a report saying that Linux and Open Source software was insecure and recommended Microsoft products.
>> ISVs have to decide on which of IBM’s Linux platforms to
>> port their applications. This report details why this is
>> easier said than done.
tar xzf application.tgz
./configure
make
make install
uff…this was really hard work.
I think not
MSFT must really be worried about IBM behind Linux if they have to resort to such measures.
Big Blue is huge! They have already had great success with Linux in major corporations.
As more apps come in, Linux will be a force for Winblows to recon with. Ain’t nothin’ MSFT can do ’bout it!
ciao
yc
(I didn’t read the report, just the blurb from the second link)
The telling point, I think, is the issue with the distributions, which is what (ideally) UnitedLinux is trying to address.
I would say that it may take a similar amount of effort to have an application support two different Linux distros as it would be to support it on, say, RedHat and Solaris.
While it’s “easy” for a single user to tweak and change their standard distro to work with a specific application, it is not really practical for an application vendor to REQUIRE those changes, particularly if they have the risk of breaking something else.
For an extreme contrived example, what if “Oracle for Linux” and “DB2 for Linux” had requirements that made the system unusable for the other program? By porting to the distro, rather than a series of scattered packages, this becomes less of an issue. ISVs don’t want to be in the “patch the distro until it work for me” business. They should be patching the application to work with the distro.
So the whole Linux consolidation thing is really an important issue to ISVs like IBM.
While I see certainly evidence of IBM helping Linux I don’t see any evidence for billions having been spent. At $100k per programmer year 1 billion = 10,000 programmer years. does anyone see that kind of output?
For example OS/2 2.0 total rewrite cost $43m. This was an entire OS+GUI+Apps suite sort of like Linux kernal, shells, GCC, KDE, KDE office.
Is it just me or does The Inquirer ( http://www.inquirer.net ) look exactly like The Register ( http://www.theregister.co.uk )? Hm…
Woops, I meant http://www.theinquirer.net .
When I think of these types of consultants who seem to have opinions on all things even though they they don’t make anything themselves, I am always reminded of the one useless person on STNG, the good counselor. Don’t know why, but I just can’t stand these “we know stuff but don’t need to to tell you how we know”. Almost as bad as the TV evangelists. Just what my gut tells me.
This article isn’t really worth reading. They don’t provide much justification for any of the claims made, let alone persuasive ones.
I don’t see the support issue of multiple Linux distros becoming a big problem in the long term future when it seems there is a lot of standardization (LSB, FHS) and consolidation going on (UnitedLinux.)
In fact, IBM and many others are predicting that Linux may well just become the next big hetergenuous environment and become THE Unix of the future. That can only create a tremendous impetus of convergence towards it and provide more confidence and incentives for people to move to it.
Doesn’t IBM sell a lot of desktop PCs bundled with Windows? Is IBM really putting all its weight behind Linux? You might argue about “enterprise”, “servers”, and so on; yet the question is still valid, I believe.
ibm is one of the only semi-impartial report writers on it competition, having a realistic view of the strongpoints and weakpoints of your compettion in all arenas is a honarable and effective method of gaining respect for your products. I work for IBM and its the only company ive ever worked with that admits its area for improvement so openly.
aberdeen sucks.
useless info about windows when i was a windows admin.
useless info about linux now that i’m a linux admin.
their info on companies, direction, markets…is even worse then that.
Aren’t there enough linux versions to come
by? Seems to be sufficient for IBM to tweak…
They always have their AIX unix to assist…
Seems to me that the hardware/software integration
is the most important aspect overlooked in this
discussion…
It is not uncommon for those market research groups to put their name on a paper/report that has been written by a client as long as money changes hands. It is quite possible that microsoft themselves wrote that.
moreover, if i had a dime for each time the abeerdeen group and others have been off….well i’d be very wealthy.
Linux is going to kick butt in the corporate sector because lots and lots of people are fed up with microsoft. Its really that simple. EVen if linux is less than perfect, it still won’t be MS which might be enough. PLus IBM’s backing of linux gives it instant credibility.
That B.S. piece is evidence that MS is scared silly about the threat of linux, and i love it.
Out of curiosity I ran Netcraft to see
the aberdeen Group used for their server:
http://uptime.netcraft.com/up/graph/?host=www.aberdeen.com
‘The site http://www.aberdeen.com
is running Microsoft-IIS/5.0 on Windows 2000″
Seems to speak for itself…
>>>>Is it just me or does The Inquirer ( http://www.inquirer.net ) look exactly like The Register ( http://www.theregister.co.uk )? Hm…
I think Mike Magee of the theinquirer.net used to be at theregister.co.uk ….but there was some kind of falling out.
i like mike’s humor, and he’s taken time to email me back on several occassions.
The amount that was so-called “given” was not cold hard cash, but actually, the value of things they were donating. For example, IBM could easily turn around and say that the JFS they donated was worth $100million.
As I have said previously, they’ve wasted alot theoretical money on very little. If they wanted to do something substantial, they should have got Lotus to port all their software to Linux. It would have been a darn site cheaper than the so-called $1billion they spent, and would have given better results.
Oh OK I get it. They are using “donations to Linux” to write down other assets and boost ROA, ROE for future years while making it look they are investing heavily in Linux.
I agree there are lots of things they could do. Heck there are terrific management tools in AIX that I bet wouldn’t take much work at all to port. Another thing that would be wonderful for Linux is to port/give PSF (sort of like CUPS but much better). I agree with you on the Lotus. I guess we will see.
The report that is referred to in the news article is not on the Aberdeen website. The information on the page “http://www.aberdeen.com/ab_company/hottopics/ibmlinux/default.htm“&… ” that is linked from this article is simply a series of bullet point teasers designed to make you want to buy the actual 32 page $500 report. I’m sure that the argument developed in the report, whilst likely biased, is a lot more sophisticated than simply shooting off about the problem of supporting multiple distributions. Although like all other OS News readers I have not read the report, I gather from the teasers that they are making an argument based on the diversity of existing deployments of IBM eServer computers – the the xSeries PC based servers,iSeries OS/400 servers, the pSeries RISC Unix machines, and the zSeries S/390 mainframes.
The thrust of the argument I would imagine goes something along these lines: There are a lot of different IBM server deployments using different hardware technologies. They run a variety of different ‘mission critical’ applications. No one wants to shake the boat by changing the software that these run, because breaking applications is a good way to lose money. Except IBM who is pushing Linux as a way to get all their platforms on to one OS. But that ain’t gonna make these different applications talk to each other. So, what’s IBM making all this blow-hard about Linux for anyway? The point is: whether or not you personally have problems with running different versions of Linux has absolutely nothing to do with what IBM’s enterprise server customers are having problems with, and it is this latter issue that the report undoubtedly addresses.
Sorry. That link got mangled. It should be the link “has included a report”:
http://www.aberdeen.com/ab_company/hottopics/ibmlinux/default.htm
Report is 41 pages and costs you $495 to read
It isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on.
Wait everyone, no need to read this report.
Intel PAID Aberdeen to write a scathing report reguarding the “PR Ratings” of AMD athlons, calling it Junk Science. Aberdeen admitted then, (a while ago, like 1 year ago,) that they are often paid for their reviewing.
They are paid to form opinions.
Ignore them–it’s an add for MSFT.
Man, if only they spent all the cash on OS/2.. I don’t see what all the Linux hype is to be honest, it’s probably just that.. hype… There are other GREAT *nix platform contenders out there like FreeBSD, NetBSD etc. that don’t have anywhere near such a restrictive license… I honestly find why people jump on the Linux bandwagon hard to stomach when I sit back and think about it.
Lone OSer,
I really don’t see your point.
Do you have a problem with the HYPE? or do you have a problem with the OS? Either way…why?
In fact…this article was NOT hype. It was a negative article trying to infer that companies will find it difficult being profitable by supporting linux.
So what’s your beef? You sound jaded or something has crawled up your ass.
I could name you the pros and cons of many fine platforms…mac,freebsd,windows,aix,linux…they all have their strong points and shortcomings.
but you sir, sound cranky, irratable, and proffering weird opinions without as much as a morsel of proof to back up your observations.
you make it sound like linux is a thorn in your side.
it makes your stomach hurt.
it think there is something wrong with you….maybe you need therapy.
or maybe it’s your msft stock that has plummeted in the last couple of years that really hurting your stomach.
or maybe you are a MSCD or something.
I support my friends who are microsoft cheerleaders…but none of them moan how linux makes their stomach hurt.
that’s just gay.
…really eats out of the hands of Bill Gates. Whoe the hell is stupid enogh to trust ANYTHING that comes from their direction? Unbiased my ass!
> There are other GREAT *nix platform contenders out there
> like FreeBSD, NetBSD etc. that don’t have anywhere near
> such a restrictive license…
For me as a user, the GPL has all the freedoms I could ever want. The only restriction it contains is that these freedoms cannot be taken away from me by someone else producing a proprietary version of the software. So this restriction is good for me as a user. And if I published my own open-source software (I will do so in the future, promised
), I’d publish it under the GPL because it makes sure I can still access my own code even if someone else has added something to it in the meantime. So for both the users and the OSS programmers the GPL restriction is a good thing. The only people loosing out with the GPL is those who want to live off other people’s work.
Plus, without the GPL there’d be a lot of forking of code for licensing reasons. Just look at what happened with Wine: as soon as it became commercially interesting, it got forked. Without the GPL protection, there’d be a dozen proprietary forks of Linux by now. And they’d become increasingly incompatible with each other, simply because in many situations it makes business sense for proprietary software vendors to make their products incompatible.
I’m convinced that one of the main reasons why Linux got most of the hype even at times where FreeBSD had more to offer technically (Linux is getting closer and has even surpassed FreeBSD in some respects by now) is the GPL.
“Just wait till IBM lands on Microsoft with both feet,” the Linux people say. Ain’t gonna happen…
While Microsoft execs were having a good time writing this “independent” report bashing their old partner/rival, IBM was getting the deal done to buy Rational.
>”Just wait till IBM lands on Microsoft with both feet,” the Linux people say. Ain’t gonna happen…
Well, I think it has already started: IBM is getting its sweet revenge.
Remember, M$ became ‘famous’ by cutting a fantastic deal with IBM in the ’80s for x86 PC. And then, in the ’90s, a new terrific deal was made for developping cooperatively and new OS (OS/2). But then, M$ decided it was ‘too smart for IBM’ and so decided to fly on its own and spit in IBM’s face. Big Blue was a bit ‘vision-less’ a that time and tought that M$ would die on its own after that. Time passed and M$ (with its ‘great marketing scheme’) is bigger than ever now. But the only flaw in its armor is OSS. Now Big Blue has regain its ‘vision’ and embrace OSS to get its ‘sweet revenge’. I love it!
anything that can’t love ya back. If you think IBM is doing anything out of the goodness of their hearts, rather than for that $ sign you love to misuse in your post – old, OLD, tired, TIRED cliche – you’ll be surprised…