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Linux rollout in trouble because of budgetary concerns. How can that be -- it's free, right?!

If this was on Fark it would have an image next to it:

First Massachusetts and now Munich? Germany's "Computerwoche" is reporting that Munich's move to 14,000 Linux desktops is in trouble because of budgetary concerns and "technical issues," making the publication wonder whether the city will ever be able to complete its migration to the open-source phenomenon. Hey, no one ever said migrating to Linux was going to be easy.

[From the always interesting WinInfo.]

Posted: Jan 16 2004, 08:49 PM by jeffreykey | with 6 comment(s)
Filed under: ,

Comments

SBC said:

yup.. there's a reasoning behind it - see my posting at Userland: http://radio.weblogs.com/0112769/2004/01/14.html#a316
# January 18, 2004 8:44 PM

Jeff Key said:

That was a tongue-in-cheek title. :) The cost of licenses are almost always a fraction of the cost of a solution. As you mention in your post, those implementing the solution are certainly not free. While some folks are doing Big Corporations a favor by writing free software, I haven't heard of anyone doing implementations or customization at no cost.
# January 18, 2004 9:31 PM

SBC said:

the sad truth is that contractors/developers in the "Open Source"/Java world charge more per hour than their MS counterparts! Yet the continue to moan & groan about M$..
# January 18, 2004 10:10 PM

Jeff Key said:

True. I think as .NET and competent MSFT solution providers gain ground in the enterprise we'll see things even out. MSFT has always had the "anyone can develop MSFT technology" stigma attached to them, but just look at the countless failed Java projects, which are generally in the millions of dollars. You can fail on any platform. It's not about the platform as much as it is time to market and overall cost, both of which are generally in MSFT's favor. The anti-MSFT press certainly doesn't help in this matter, but it does appear that some are lightening up a bit.
# January 18, 2004 10:58 PM

SBC said:

very true.. there's a lot of 'sweeping under the carpet' in the J2EE world. Most of those enterprise projects are in 'mega-bucks' range so any failure is usually huge (in terms of costs). They have to fess up sooner than later..
# January 19, 2004 6:01 PM

af said:

The real question is thr long time budgeting needed, not only the installation part.
# February 15, 2004 1:08 PM