| LinuxWorld: less fun, more biz |
Aug. 11, 2006
 Opinion -- What are you going to find, if you're determined enough to make your way through airport security over the next few days to get to the August LinuxWorld in San Francisco?
As Peter Galli reports at eWEEK.com, the most popular buzz-word is going to be virtualization. That's no great surprise. This spring, at the Boston LinuxWorld, virtualization was hotter than football practice on a Texas high school field.
Beneath all the hype and techno jargon, it's really pretty easy to see why businesses want it: They want to get the most use out of today's high-powered, multi-cored computers. Take it one more step, and it all boils down to people wanting to pay the least amount possible for their enterprise computing power.
It looks to me like they'll get it. That's the good news. The bad news is that I'm not sure any of the companies that are selling virtualization solutions, like SWSoft, VMWare, and XenSource, are going to survive providing it.
Everyone, including Microsoft, is giving virtualization programs away. Microsoft can afford to give it away. The other companies can't.
It doesn't help the smaller virtualization companies that several of Linux's core developers, like Andrew Morton and Greg Kroah-Hartman, want the most important of the Linux virtualization companies, XenSource and VMware, to work together on a common interface.
Again, this makes perfect sense for users and Linux developers, but it's going over like a lead balloon at the virtualization circles. This LinuxWorld will see a lot of speeches about virtualization, but the real future of Linux virtualization may be settled over dinners as the Linux virtualization specialists try to find a solution that works for both them and the broader Linux community and businesses.
I'm also struck, as I look at LinuxWorld, at what a "vertical" show it's becoming. LinuxWorld hasn't been a show about Linux per se for quite some time now. Everyone who comes to LinuxWorld now already "gets" it.
The question people want answered now, at LinuxWorld, isn't: "What's Linux good for?" Or even: "What Linux distribution will work for me?" It's: "What Linux-based solution will address my network storage needs?" Or: "How do I optimize my LAMP stack?"
You can see it in the LinuxWorld keynotes. For example, the keynote that an outsider might think sounds the most like what they'd expect from a Linux show is probably Lawrence Lessig's "Free Culture: What We Need From You," on the parallels between free software and free culture. Its techie, its counterculture, its Linux. Right?
Wrong. I think it's likely to be the most interesting keynote, but the keynote that's most in tune with what most of the attendees will be at the show for is Guru Vasudeva's "How Nationwide Saved Millions and Simplified its IT Environment."
No, it's not sexy, but it speaks to the heart of what's really driving Linux, and all of IT for that matter: the bottom line. It's CFOs, not CIOs or -- the very idea! -- CTOs, who are driving technology in business, these days.
The good news here, is that Linux has become so accepted that CFOs are more than willing to give Linux a try. The bad news for bad-boy Linux fans, is that Linux is no longer a revolution -- it's the establishment.
The only place where Microsoft is really still the IT establishment is on the desktop. But that's changing, too.
It's not just that Microsoft is fumbling Vista more than a third-string halfback against the Chicago Bears' defense. This summer, we've seen not just good Linux desktops arrive, but great Linux desktops.
Look at them: Novell's SLED (SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop) 10 is a no-holds-barred business replacement for XP. I think Ubuntu 6.06 is a great distribution. And, I'm far from the only who thinks it's a touch-down of a distro. MEPIS' Ubuntu-based Linux is also mighty fine.
You want more? The Linux desktop distributors have given us more. There's Xandros 4, which any home user could use to replace Windows 98 or ME. The just-released Freespire is also a great distribution. And, for better or worse, it incorporates almost all available Linux-usable proprietary programs and drivers.
Too much trouble to switch from Windows to Linux? Versora, with its latest version of Progression Desktop is ready to help both individuals and companies migrate from one to the other and lose nothing but high prices and security woes along the way.
Want to know more, you can ask me, and some of the top Linux desktop players, your questions at LinuxWorld's "The state of Linux on the Desktop" panel on August 15th at 11:30 AM.
I hope to see you then.
Travel safely.
-- Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols
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