What is this Microsoft-Linux study I am hearing about?

[K.Mandla]

I had a conversation with our head techie in the office today. It came about because he gave me an old Microsoft wireless card that I use to surf the Internet on an old laptop, a Presario 1020, with Slackware 10.2. He found it hilarious that it was in use at all, let alone the irony of using Linux with a Microsoft product.

When the conversation shifted, he started talking about "independent" research that showed the average sysadmin taking seven times as long to accomplish the same task in Linux as in Microsoft.

I'll repeat that: According to him and the "independent" study -- I'm stressing the word "independent" here, because he did -- it takes seven times to do many of the system chores in Linux as in Windows.

Now I'm not a systems administrator. I'm not even a techie. I'm just a hobbyist, and I'm very new to Linux. But add to that the fact that this man has been working with computers for as long as I've been alive. He's very knowledgable, to say the least, and so I would expect him to know his stuff. But I also don't know what "tasks" would be included, or what kind of hardware or networks were "tested."

In short, it smelled like a mixture of BS and FUD to me.

But rather than dismiss it out of hand, I thought I'd at least ask if anyone had heard of such a study, and if I could read it for myself. I've gone to Google, but as you might imagine, I can hardly refine my keywords enough to come up with something fruitful.

And so, for the mean time, I remain extremely suspicious. Please set me straight, if you can.

[weasel fierce]

I heard that you can get hairy palms from... er... nevermind.

[mstlyevil]

I had a conversation with our head techie in the office today. It came about because he gave me an old Microsoft wireless card that I use to surf the Internet on an old laptop, a Presario 1020, with Slackware 10.2. He found it hilarious that it was in use at all, let alone the irony of using Linux with a Microsoft product.

When the conversation shifted, he started talking about "independent" research that showed the average sysadmin taking seven times as long to accomplish the same task in Linux as in Microsoft.

I'll repeat that: According to him and the "independent" study -- I'm stressing the word "independent" here, because he did -- it takes seven times to do many of the system chores in Linux as in Windows.

Now I'm not a systems administrator. I'm not even a techie. I'm just a hobbyist, and I'm very new to Linux. But add to that the fact that this man has been working with computers for as long as I've been alive. He's very knowledgable, to say the least, and so I would expect him to know his stuff. But I also don't know what "tasks" would be included, or what kind of hardware or networks were "tested."

In short, it smelled like a mixture of BS and FUD to me.

But rather than dismiss it out of hand, I thought I'd at least ask if anyone had heard of such a study, and if I could read it for myself. I've gone to Google, but as you might imagine, I can hardly refine my keywords enough to come up with something fruitful.

And so, for the mean time, I remain extremely suspicious. Please set me straight, if you can.

It was probally an indepenent study fully funded by Microsoft. I have a question for you to ask this MS techie. Ask him how much actual experience he has with using Linux as a sys admin or using Linux at all. MS fanboys love to quote the "independent studies" but have never actually used Linux themselves. The fact of the matter is a good sys admin in Linux using the command line can get far more work done than a MS sys admin using the GUI. (Very few Windows sys admins actually use the command line.)

[rfruth]

It does depend on who you ask when but I've not of a 7:1 ratio, if fact this sounds like a typical Microsoft approach to me (ask him or her why the next ver of Word will embrace XML) ....

[YourSurrogateGod]

Here's a study that you can shoot back at him with.

In a new survey of I.T. organizations, respondents claim that recent developments in Linux have eased management complexity and lowered the price associated with running the operating system and its related software.

The results contradict some Microsoft claims that Linux's total cost of ownership is higher than Windows.

The report was sponsored by Open Source Development Labs and member company Levanta, and undertaken by Enterprise Management Associates.

In the survey, the majority of respondents noted that they spent less effort in managing and supporting Linux than they spent on Windows. Over half said that they could diagnose and repair problems in Linux environments in less than 30 minutes.

-snip-

http://www.newsfactor.com/story.xhtml?story_id=41648

I will say this. The learning curve with Linux based operating systems is to be expected to be higher than Windows. Now, some Linux based operating systems have higher learning curves than others (Ubuntu, imo, is quite low.) Also, there is frustration that many new users encounter with a lack of drivers for their hardware. This creates a perception even the most basic tasks are a pain in the **** with Linux.

Also, your friend seems to be a Windows power user (as aysiu describes here (http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=58017).) As a result, he pumps his position/ego of being an expert in Windows so that it may not be threatened by someone that has a much different view on computers. He wouldn't want to have his ego popped by someone that said that Windows is in some shape inferior, thereby invalidating his self-created superiority. But, if that's not it and he actually believes this from Microsoft, then to be blunt, he's very gullible.

[DigitalDuality]

Well i sysadmin windows systems as it stands right now...

and all i can tell you is if a linux sys admin takes 7 times longer than his windows counter part.. he needs to be fired.

It might take 7 times long for a windows trained guy to do the same task in linux if he/she has a passing familiarity with the product. Bottom line here is familiarity.

You should shoot back at him that linux servers aren't made for johny come lately's that need pretty menu's and wizards that are comparable to MS Office's "how to make a contemporary fax letter" as they're not bloated down with eye candy, but are built to perform a function or series of functions and that's it. Thereby utilizing the hardware to optimal performance levels.

And if someone is familiar with a command line, the task can be done in about the same amount of time. :\ that's my take on it anyways.

Oh, and umm never think any study independent or not, doesn't have a fan boy (on one side or the other) skewing results. While high levels of objectivity can be obtained, there's no such thing as a 100% objective study without any sort of bias or motive what so ever.

[YourSurrogateGod]

It does depend on who you ask when but I've not of a 7:1 ratio, if fact this sounds like a typical Microsoft approach to me (ask him or her why the next ver of Word will embrace XML) ....
Bingo.

What tasks specifically is this study talking about that take 7 times longer? I can open a folder with a graphical display just as fast in Ubuntu as I can in XP.

[papangul]

In short, it smelled like a mixture of BS and FUD to me.
He is just worried that linux may stop the hefty commission he is receiving from MS!

[BoyOfDestiny]

Or just visit

http://www.linuxtoday.com/

The MS ads are hilarious. Also, how can people call a study independent when MS funds it... Oh well...

[K.Mandla]

Well that's good. It's nice to know that my BS-o-meter isn't out of calibration.

I suspected, even as he was talking about it, that it was either Microsoft propaganda or his relative (stressing relative) inexperience with Linux. We do have a Red Hat server somewhere in the back rooms, but it's used for a relatively lightweight task (I think does some photo management), and it never needs work, so nobody seems to know anything about it. Perhaps if it broke more often ... well, never mind.

Just for the record, my tech guru is not a jerk, so please don't hate him. He does ride the line of being an MS fanboy, but I think a lot of that is from years and years of experience, all the way back to early versions of DOS. And I think a large part of it is the typical familiarity-with-Microsoft versus the-newness-of-Linux issue Aysiu talked about that in a thread (http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=120582) from about a month ago. That fits him to a T.

So I can understand his willingness to buy into the MS company line. It's just interesting to hear the same overinflated facts repeated back to me, now that I have some experience with both sides of the issue. Cheers and thanks. :)

[Sslaxx]

Or just visit

http://www.linuxtoday.com/

The MS ads are hilarious. Also, how can people call a study independent when MS funds it... Oh well...
I remember when that used to be semi-decent. Same thing's happened with LinuxForums.org too - very sad, really. Dunno how many more sell-outs there are.

[Alpha_toxic]

I have a friend (my ex-roommate and ex-classmate and currently a student-mate), who happens to be a linux and windows admin. He maintains several local servers, mostly game servers. I should say that it did took him more time to initialy set up the linux servers, but after that they have 3-4y uptime (only stopped to change to a newer ver of CS or sth), while the windows ones need constant maintainance. One more thing is that we no longer live where the servers are (we went to university 600-700km away), if sth happens he can remotely repair the linux ones, but recently he was complaining that there are things that he cannot do remotely on win.
So the balance is: perhaps twice longer to set up the linux 3-4y ago (although I'm sure that if he had to do it now it would be much faster). Then the linux gets a a bit of maintainance once or twice a year, while win needs constant care. Overal linux servers are taking far far less of his time.

[phen]

i think you're sysadmin is talking about microsoft's "get the facts" campaign.

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem/facts/default.mspx

They are totally independent, just take a look at the url... haha. lately, there turned up a contradictory study, that says that linux administration takes less time than windows, sponsored from OSDL (open source developement labs). funny, eh?

To get the real picture, you have to read all these studies by yourself, compare them and interpret them by yourself. Or at least read news-sites you can trust. I've read about microsofts' facts campaign, that the studies were very subjective.

securing a system is a big part of computer administration, and the complexity of the topic makes two systems hard to compare. For example: MS claimed that windows sever is more secure than linux, because they have less unpatched bugs and had to send less bugfixes in a given period of time. you think: wow, ok, windows is more secure. WRONG! you have to compare: how critical are the patches, what happens if the bugs are exploited, how long took it ms/redhat/... to fix the bug, and so on and on..

ms likes to skip all questions that make them look bad!

in my company, the windows systems need patches around once a week, while the sun stations and linux grids weren't shut down for looong loong time (years!). don't know about the actual administration time...