An interesting discussion in Linux Blogs

Posted March 30th, 2009 by j00p34

Thanks to Mike Dailey a very interesting discussion has been sparked on Linux and open source in the enterprise. For anybody wanting to follow the entire discussion here's how it goes.

It started here:

http://www.handlewithlinux.com/10-things-to-tell-your-boss-why-migrate-t...

Mike Dailey responded on his blog with this article:

http://daileymuse.com/2009/03/think-before-you-speak-migrating-the-enter...

While I was working on my response:

http://www.handlewithlinux.com/migrating-the-enterprise-to-linux-10-thin...

Hans Bezemer wrote his response on his blog:

http://thebeezspeaks.blogspot.com/2009/03/beware-of-so-called-linux-prop...

with talkbacks here:

http://www.linuxtoday.com/infrastructure/2009032900535OPCYOO#talkback_area

Followed by this response by Mike:

http://daileymuse.com/2009/03/the-death-of-the-linux-debate-a-eulogy/

with talkbacks here:

http://www.linuxtoday.com/infrastructure/2009033000635OPCY#talkback_area

on which Hans responded with:

http://thebeezspeaks.blogspot.com/2009/03/introducing-pointy-haired-boss...

And then John Buswell stepped in with this response:

http://www.o3magazine.com/0/7.html

I want to encourage everybody to join in on the discussion, but remember these people are not enemies. So keep it on the level of argument.

It's a very interesting discussion and I must say the points brought up by John are of great value.

Update:

Mike has written yet another follow up to this debate, a rather positive one I might say:

http://daileymuse.com/2009/03/what-have-you-done-for-linux-today/

Thank you Mike, Hans and John for the very interesting articles.

update:

A small summary as promised can be found here

An interesting discussion in Linux Blogs

Anonymous 3 years 7 weeks 3 days 4 hours ago

> "I want to encourage everybody to join in on the discussion"

Good lord, what FOR? Yay! Let's have another poo-fight with the flaming howler monkeys! What fun! And it accomplishes so much, too!

I already dealt with debates like these here. Mike sounds like a blend of #2 and #3. I wrote this post and "The Six Kinds of Anti-FOSS Trolls" specifically to close the coffin lid on these mummies once and for all.

Just one example from Mike:

"If a user has to go to a command prompt for anything, youâ€™ve lost them."

...tells any rational being that they are dealing with a bigot. The above quoted sentence is the exact same thing as saying "Gay marriage is wrong because everybody wants somebody of the opposite sex and everybody wants to have babies."

No, no, no. I'm done being dragged into these. You have fun, run along now!

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not nice

admin 3 years 7 weeks 3 days 3 hours ago

While I must say your articles are amusing, I have to say I don't think you have read the whole discussion.
You don't have to, I agree Mikes articles are not consistent everywhere. That was the problem me and Hans had with it in the start too. It did end in an intelligent debate though, and if you read carefully you'll notice Mike is not an Anti-Foss Troll or anything, he just has to learn how to express himself a little more careful.
It's understandable if someone searches for a way to show different viewing points, this was in my opinion more an attempt to do so. I think we are all in this world to learn from each other. The follow ups on this article provide a very nice twist, it ended well. And I don't think it deserves a response like this.

j00p34

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Great interaction

Anonymous 3 years 7 weeks 3 days 9 hours ago

Thanks for the posts. I have followed all of the links and was impressed with the debate.

The reality is that it would often be nice to change from MS but many organisations are already "locked in" by one or two critical closed source programs that they are generally happy with. The effort and risk of changing from these programs sometimes outweighs the cost associated with changing.

It is therefore quite feasible that many of the other programs utilised by the organisations can be converted to FOSS programs while they continue to utilise these "critical" applications.

I agree with the general sentiment that both Linux and Windows need to be accepted and used according to the needs of the various organisations.