The Long Road to the 'Open' Desktop

Saturday, April 05, 2008

Last month, PCQuest published a survey that showed increasing Linux and other FOSS (free and open source software) penetration in Indian companies. Nearly half the CIOs from 75 companies surveyed were using open source apps such as email.

And a quarter of the respondents said they were using Linux on the desktop. These ranged from giants like SBI, ECIL or NIC, and midsize companies such as MindTree Consulting and Dena Bank, to smaller ones.

Why? Of the 21 CIOs who said they used Linux desktops, only 10 cited price as the top reason. Another 10 said it was because of free access to source code.

All this does not, of course, translate into a high penetration of Linux on the desktop, across the board. We don't have data on this, but I would put the Linux numbers at less than 5 percent of India's installed base of PCs.

Clearly, server side applications such as email solutions (43%), and databases (30%) and Internet gateways (27%) have led business usage of open source software (including Linux). Software such as Apache webserver and email servers are popular, because of their robustness and low cost.

Prasanto K Roy, president, ICT Publishing Group, CyberMedia

But Linux is quite viable and practical on the desktop. In fact, it's ideal for low-speced, entry-level hardware (including mobile devices) as long as you don't overload it with graphics.

Two factors are driving Linux on the business desktop. One is the CIOs' positive experience with Linux on the server side, which makes them very open to considering it as a desktop OS. In
organizations where a standardized application will be used, and users have very little interaction with software beyond that application-the desktop OS does not matter to the end user, and is defined and driven by the 'IT shop' (the CIO and his or her organization).

The second factor is that many vendors are shipping Linux with desktops and portables, especially low-cost entry-level models. These include HP, IBM, HCL, and others (a notable gap is Dell). For instance, the recent HCL and Asus sub-Rs 20k laptops.

Microsoft claims many such PCs end up with users who then 'copy Windows' onto them, replacing Linux. But new users with no prior experience of Windows, from consumers to SME users, are indeed using these systems.

Of those CIO respondents who use Linux on the desktop, over 35% said they had a problem with its interoperability with other platforms, and 33% had an issue with support. These remain
issues-perception or reality-in the way of wider open source adoption on the desktop.

But I believe the real reason that Linux on the desktop is nearly invisible is because of the one big difference between the desktop and the server: Desktop usage is overwhelmingly defined and driven by user experience and comfort, and most users are simply used to Windows and other Microsoft software such as Word and PowerPoint, even when there are practical alternatives available such as Linux Desktop or Open Office. Server platform selection can be more clinical and practical, without worrying about user experience or retraining.

The platform on which Linux is making quicker inroads is the mobile. Key players driving this include Motorola (despite being part of the Symbian alliance) to Google (its Android platform, due later this year, is Linux-based) and even the hard-wired-to-Symbian Nokia (with its Internet tablet) and others. As Android comes in, and Microsoft, BlackBerry, Apple and Symbian try to protect their turf, the mobile is where the open-source-versus-proprietary platform war will really be fought this year.

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