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Re: [News] Senior Managers a Barrier to Linux Adoption

BearItAll wrote:

> Not wanting to be anti-MS-IT-Staff, but I think everyone in this
> buisiness knows already that on average UNIX/Linux IT folk tend to be
> more switched on to IT tasks.

Whatever that means.


> But having said that I don't know of any UNIX/Linux IT person who
> doesn't
> get great pride out of the fact that they have very little or no down
> time.

If Linux email servers crash as often as Knode (email client), their uptime 
is horrendous.



> But it means I get to treat and diagnose any problem very early. That
> in
> turn has given me a down time record of 8 hours in 4 years and two
> lightening strikes account for most of that.

2 hours per year = 99.977% = approaching but not quite Ivy League

The two Windows file servers I use at a client (generically referred to as 
the J: drive and the S: drive) have been rock solid for the 7 years I've 
worked with them.  I know one was an NT server, the other Win2K.  I don't 
know the actual downtime, or if they're rebooted from time to time, but 
they're always running (except when one filled up and crashed - nobody got 
fired either, despite losing lots of data and spending days restoring and 
negatively impacting several hundred people.)


> Now, I do have to deal with quite a few Windows IT staff. Some are
> very clever, some are absolute crap. But there is one thing that they
> all have
> in common. They all wait for the problem/fault/errors to arise before
> they
> go looking for them.

Which has nothing to do with Windows.  This is where you go cola on us, and 
your post turns into a typical cola idiot rant.



> That to me is the main difference between the Windows IT mentallity
> and the UNIX/Linux mentality. It is also a major part of the reason
> why MS Win
> servers have such a bad reputation in the general office environment.

pfffttt!  MS sells more server units, at a greater cost per unit, than Linux 
could dream of.



> I have no doubt at all that many of the Windows server problems could
> be foreseen in the same way as Linux server problems, but they simply
> do not
> do it. Even as I lecture them to try to get them motivated into
> wanting fantastic uptime records, I know by the look they give that
> 'This is not the Windows way to do things'.

Now you're an IT psychic!  Hallelujah!



> Downtime costs money, Windows gets lots of down time, Linux gets very
> little, it doesn't get very little because our hardware is better, it
> gets very little because it attracts the sort of staff that are
> willing to put
> in the effort early in order to save them the sleepless nights at a
> later date.

More bullshit.  Work habits have nothing to do with an operating system. 
Either you're dedicated and conscientious or you're not.  You are.  I am. 
The Windows sysadmin I deal with regularly at one client is not: he 
maintains a few Win 2000/2003 Citrix servers for various apps I develop, and 
he's very lackadaisacal about doing anything on time, let alone ahead of 
time.



> Do you know any Windows IT people? Well ask them a question, ask them
> how confident they are that they can recover their full system from
> the backup. Offer them one hundred pounds to perform the full
> recovery 'now', so that
> they down't get a chance to doctor the backup, you want them to
> recover
> their normal daily backup tape. I bet you both socks they wont take
> that
> bet. I didn't offer £100 (I'm a poor IT person) but I have offered a
> slap
> up indian meal many times, but never had to buy it.
>
> How can they do that? What sort of mentality does it take for an IT
> person
> to sit there day after day, not knowing if their backup tapes can be
> used
> to bring the system and data back to how it was at the time of last
> nights backup? Could you live like that, I know I couldn't. I have
> had many a sleepless night over IT problems over the years, but I
> will never be caught without my safetynet, and I am certain that the
> vast majority of UNIX/Linux IT folk are the same.

I disagree with you - it's the rare person who has a full backup at the 
ready at all times.



> How about Budgets then.
>
> My budget here, when I arrived they had a massive IT budget, it was
> sort of assumed that IT costs a lot and there's no choice but to pay
> it. Within a
> year I had cut the IT budget to less than a quarter and improved
> uptime,

uh oh - there's another IT superman on cola!  (Rex Ballard is the first, of 
course.)




> and put in place a very secure set of safetynets which are tested
> regularly. I can sleep at night very well.

Try eating pepperoni pizza at 10pm...



> So this nonsense about Windows IT being cheaper than Linux IT, is
> pure crap. Yes the staff will cost more in salery, but the savings
> from uptime and hardware costs make it an excellent investment.

What's clear is the cost to migrate a company's IT operations (and I assume 
enduser apps) from Windows to Linux is more costly than upgrading them to a 
new version of Windows.  At least that's what the various TCO studies say. 
The Munich fiasco (6 years and counting to migrate 14000 desktops) seems to 
bear it out.



> But all of this uptime generates a problem unique to UNIX/Linux.
> There is a mentality in general management that if the servers and
> computers are not going wrong then the IT staff are not doing
> anything. They have an idea
> that we only work when they is a problem on the system.

You have an odd 'general management' at your company.



> I think I have convinced mine over many years, but I could understand
> if others around the world are having more trouble convincing their
> management that the fact that they have a lot of uptime is proof that
> the IT folk are doing their job, downtime is a failure of the IT
> task. This again comes
> from a Windows-like mentality, where the system goes down, the IT
> person
> turns up and fixes it, then they proclaim him/her a hero for fixing
> the system.

Blaming Windows for someone not being proactive?  How bogus.  You UNIX/Linux 
people really *are* maniacs.



> I tell them though that he/she isn't a hero, he/she
> failed to keep their network in proper working order, some problems
> are inevitable, but if you see your IT staff firefighting a lot, they
> are doing a crap job of looking after your system.

Only Unix/Linux heroes are real heroes.  You're a real hero, BareItAll.



> (I'm not very popular at IT staff parties).

Most Unix/Linux people aren't popular.  The scraggly beard, the pot belly, 
the wrinkled clothes, the awkward social skills, the frothing anti-MS 
hatred, the totally unjustified condescending attitude (which you displayed 
right on cue)...




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