Hard-hitting IT columnist Simon Moores gives his personal take on
the hot issue of the day.Linux again. And, once more, its time has
come. For me, Linux has always had a certain Life of Brian appeal.
While sitting around the dinner table with Sun Microsystems the
other evening, I wondered how much longer it will take before we
stop talking about "distributions" - ours, theirs or Red Hat's or
IBM's - and start talking about solutions, allowing the subject of
the operating system to fade into a state of transparency.
For Sun, Linux is small and fast and ideal "for the edge of the
enterprise", whatever that means to you. Asked whether Linux could
ever evolve to a point to compete with Solaris, Sun thinks not and
imagines a cosy type of co-existence into the foreseeable
future.
Now in many ways, this makes sense. Big boxes and equally big
enterprise applications require a pumped-up version of Unix. Sun
has this already in the shape of Solaris, so why expand Linux any
further? Do a deal with Red Hat, which they have done with Sun's
own Linux 5.0 (AKA Red Hat 7.0), and you have a solution that runs
neatly across a range of different processors, including those from
Intel.
But I have a nagging concern that won't go away. IBM believes, with
equal fervour, that Linux can be big, very big and scalable indeed
and so you have two of the largest players who appear unable to
agree on what Linux will look like two or three years from
now.
For many people and, particularly, those who vaguely resemble
ZZ-Top fans, this isn't a problem, as Linux will continue to grow
and evolve with Zen-like indifference to the forces around it.
However, if you happen to be a government like Germany's or,
indeed, China's, and you would like a compelling and cheaper
alternative to someone else's operating system, then a rough
consensus over the future of Linux is attractive and reduces any
potential risks involved in migrating from Windows.
To my mind, Linux needs to become almost invisible. When you buy a
PC or a Macintosh, do you really worry too much over the operating
system, or is it the features or the solutions that really count in
the end?
Sun and IBM and all the other Linux evangelists need to sit down
and ask themselves how they would sell Linux, not to a man with a
leather jacket, a pony-tail and a beard, but to an attractive
20-something woman with a Renault Clio. This is, of course, an
exaggerated analogy, but I firmly believe that for Linux to
succeed, something radical needs to be done with both the message
and the marketing.
Linux needs to be something more than a "Not Microsoft" vote for
the IT director and it needs to be able to attract the small
businessman too, who will always be vaguely distrustful of anything
that has an "X" in it.
For Linux to progress as a really viable Windows rival it needs
rather more than financial muscle and IBM and Sun declaring that it
tastes like chocolate and cures cancer.
Instead, Linux needs some kind of reinvention as the processor
equivalent of Viagra, perhaps, but certainly something with more
imagination than the dull Calvinism that surrounds it today.
So once again, Sun and IBM, Linux has great promise but it needs
imagination and a place in the popular consciousness as much as it
needs market share and investment.
Shooting anyone seen with a beard and a pony-tail might be a good
first step. If it worked for Lenin, it might for Linux too!
What's your view?
Is it time for a clean-shaven Linux?
Tell us in an e-mail >>CW360.com reserves
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ZentelligenceSetting the world to rights with the collected thoughts and
opinions of the futurist writer, broadcaster and Computer Weekly
columnist Simon Moores.