IBM is to push its enterprise software running on Linux
as an alternative to Microsoft's soon-to-be discontinued Windows NT
operating system.
The programme, announced ahead of this week's LinuxWorld show in
New York, offers business partners free migration classes and some
discounts on software and services for users moving to IBM software
running on Linux.
Microsoft is discontinuing support and security patches for
Windows NT at the end of this year, requiring nearly two million
customers to develop a migration strategy, IBM said.
IBM's classes will be offered worldwide, and will cover
migration to IBM hardware and software for needs such as database
management, collaboration, security, systems and network
management, web and application serving and file and print
serving.
The company will also offer discounts on Lotus Domino running on
Linux for any IBM eServer, including its zSeries mainframe, to
customers moving from Windows programs such as Microsoft
Exchange.
Special programms are also being offered for migration from
Microsoft SQL Server to DB2 Universal Database on Linux and for
security and network management migrations.
Microsoft first announced that it was retiring Windows NT in
September 2001, in an effort to get users to adopt its Windows 2000
family of products. Support and security fixes are due to be
discontinued on 1 January next year, and online support will cease
31 December.
"Users are definitely looking at Linux to reduce their total
cost of ownership around Windows and at the same time IBM is savvy
to the fact that it can make extra money on pieces of software and
services," said James Governor, principal analyst with
RedMonk.
Linux has proven itself stable and less expensive than Windows
on the server side, and there is already great momentum for
customers to move to the platform.
"Linux is not hard to sell at the moment, and IBM has done a
great job at associating itself with Linux," Governor said.
However, Jean van Laarhoven, systems manager for part of
Amsterdam's city government and a Windows NT user, said that
despite Linux's purported benefits, he is sticking with
Microsoft.
"I don't trust the evolvement of Linux. It depends too much on
hobbyism," Van Laarhoven said. Besides, no one in his three-person
department knows about Unix or Linux systems.
Even though IBM is offering classes to help users migrate, for
the time being Van Laarhoven is not interested.
He is planning to migrate his department's eight servers from
Windows NT to Windows 2003 in June. The licences have already been
purchased and he estimated that the cost of the migration - mainly
for support - will be from €25,000 to €30,000.
"Linux on the server has really proved itself and most ISVs
[independent software vendors] are supporting Linux," Governor
said. "This is going to be a very challenging year for
Microsoft."
Scarlett Pruitt writes for IDG News Service