The fear war against Linux

The security angle comes down to "security through obscurity" or full disclosure.

I have a big beef with both and prefer "responsible disclosure".

But that's just one angle of that article.

Let me explain SOME of the issues in your questions (there are literally thousands of answers to your questions though..)



Well.. Yes and no. The CFO in most any company will love Linux. They'd have to, it's free (or dirt cheap if you want to use the corporatized add-ons..). From a bottom line aspect Linux is a major savings compared to paying for upgrades on your Microsoft OSs every few years.

From an end user aspect it hasn't flown because most people have become accustomed to the Windows environment and know how to operate within it.

For the IT department, there are some valid uses. Linux runs fast on small servers for a lot of purposes. In most companies the Department heads are willing to pay for software that they can see and that they understand. Sales and marketing will pay millions for a customer relationship management program but they won't pony up a penny for Doman Name Servers because they don't ever see and benefit to them (you have to have them to function though!). IT departments are nortorious for being the last to get any money to buy infrastructure (but companies will throw money at them to buy everyone flat screen monitors!) so Linux has been a remedy they've used when they can.



If the knowledge of Linux was as widespread as it is for Windows more companies would move to it IMO. But companies also don't want to have to pay to train every single employee on a different operating system so right now it doesn't make financial sense for most companies to move to Linux. You also run into issue of long term viability. Is linux here to stay or just another OS fad? Companies want to buy and stick with something. They don't want to do wholsale swaps of everything every few years. A company that makes widgets wants to concerntrate all their energy on widget making, not software training.



To some extent they are. If you look at the marketplace what is there for an alternative to Micorosoft's OS's for the average user? The Mac hasn't gained or lost appreciable market share in decades so it's pretty much stagnent. MS's competitor for a while was IBM's OS2 but that died a quiet death (with MS's help!) and Linux came onto the scene. I really think MS sees Linux in the same light they saw OS2. They play ot off as a non-issue and then do what they can behind the scenes to create problems between their OSs and their competitors or to incite unrest in the competitors user base.

But the whole issue is one of finance. MS lives off of the money they make selling software licenses. How can they not be concerned about an upstart competitor that people can get for free? When you go into the store and see Windows XP Professional upgrade at $189 or Linux at $19.95 you have to have a reason to shell out the $189. Would you be afraid of a competeing product that sold for 90% less than your own?

I forgot to note that I generally think Microsoft vs Linux on a server level.

Microsoft Will Steeply Discount Or Give Away Products To Fight Linux, Report Says

Microsoft Licenses Unix IP From SCO

Think about that as a way to undermine UNIX
LINUS - sneaky.............

Re: The fear war against Linux

SCO, a company who holds the copyright to AT&T's original Unix code and who used to sell a Linux distribution until last week, is claiming that the Linux developers have stolen trade secrets from them. Their case doesn't hold water for a number of reasons. Here are the three most important ones as I see them: 1) SCO has knowingly published these "trade secrets" on their own website for the whole world to download, for years. 2) The offending code -- a port of Linux to the IA64, a new Intel processor -- was co-developed by programmers at Intel and Hewlett-Packard, who are likely to have much better expertise than SCO. 3) The patents to the original Unix system have long expired. A similar claim (by Novell) against a similar operating system (BSD) has been tested in trial and lost as early as 1993. SCO isn't on record as having developed any significant new intellectual property to steal since then. Bruce Perens, a leading Open-Source developer and advocate, spends most of the article debunking SCO's non-case. For a longer, but possibly easier to understand debunking effort, read the Open Source Initiative's position paper


Only insofar as they are in the business of selling software licences. Selling software licenses is a loosing proposition if you compete with open-source programs, which often provide the same quality as proprietary softare for free. The largest such seller of software licences is Microsoft, and this gives it a strong incentive to join in with SCO's current smear campaign against Linux.


Insofar as they are buyers, not sellers of software licenses, yes -- provided that other things are equal. Trouble is, they are not. Mostly that's because Microsoft has a quasi-monopoly on office applications, and it uses this monopoly as a barrier for customers to exit its operating system business. So switching to Linux affects businesses in two different ways with opposite signs, and the sum of these effects can be either positive or negative.


Yes. Nothing else explains why Steve Ballmer, Microsofts CEO, is on record as calling it "a cancer". For details, check Google.


Contrary to what Craven seems to imply here, security has nothing to do with it at all. Note that no word derived from "secure" is ever mentioned in the entire article.

-- Thomas

Gimme a break. Microsoft afraid of Linux? That's like asking if Lions are afraid of steak! The only reason Linux still exists is so Microsoft won't look to shabby when they go into court to defend themselves against monopolistic practices! Otherwise MS would have devoured Linux long ago.

on the desktop, microsoft has nothing to worry about. but on the servers, linux is major competition.

the problem with linux is that it's a mess. linux fans call it freedom of choice. there are hundreds of different distributions all packaged differently. there are 2 major competing user interfaces for linux and dozens of smaller ones. you can't just double-click to install a program. different distributions have different ways to install programs. so a program may come in a few different versions for the different distributions. since the linux community prides itself on this "freedom of choice" it isn't likely to change. it's a shame because linux really is a great operating system.

Isn't Microsoft a major investor/stockholder in SCO?
I always thought it was to hedge their bets -- if UNIX ever dominated Windows, then Microsoft would own that product too.


Now it seems like SCO is just an agent in Microsoft's war against Linux. Whatever trouble they can stir up is good for their corporate parent.

microsoft once had its own unix distribution called xenix which it gave to sco in exchange for stock.