I was wondering what we can do as Linux users? Do we sit on the
sidelines and do nothing?
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>
> A story from www.theregister.co.uk:
>
> (http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/19662.html)
>
> No one's using Linux, claims Microsoft
> By Andrew Orlowski in San Francisco
> Posted: 13/06/2001 at 11:21 GMT
>
> Gartner Dataquest has pegged the proportion of Linux servers
> shipped in the United States at 8.6 per cent.
>
> Gartner analyst Jeffery Hewitt claims that this figure - which
>includes
> 'white box' shipments, but excludes server appliances such as
>Sun's
> Cobalt range - is dramatically lower than the 20 per cent plus
>cited
> by arch rivals IDC. Of that 8.6 per cent, eight per cent is
>attributed to
> Red Hat and 0.6 per cent to other distros.
>
> The survey is dated May 30, but was made public yesterday.
>
> We don't usually hear about analyst surveys from vendors in
>advance
> of publication. But yesterday a note dropped in from Microsoft's
>PR
> company, Waggener Edstrom.
>
> "8.6 per cent is... certainly in line with what we are hearing
>from our
> customers and partners," wrote a friendly Wagg-Ed flak.
>
> Now there's some dispute over what a 'shipment' actually
>involves,
> as NewsForge's Rob 'roblimo' Miller points out in this analysis.
>And
> he has a very good point: for example, Gartner pegs Linux
> shipments in the supercomputer space as 'zero' this year. In fact
> Linux is well established on commodity parallel clusters at many
> scientific sites. Many of these were assembled in-house, so a
> shipment clearly doesn't correlate to a working installation.
>
> However, Microsoft's pre-emptive strike may be tactical. Hewitt
> actually predicts that volume shipments of Linux - even using
> Gartner's contested definition of 'shipment' and 'server' - will
> mushroom in the next four years.
>
> Total worldwide Linux deployment will quadruple from 2.4 million
>to
> 9.1 million, predicts Gartner, with explosive growth in the
> supercomputer area: up from that dubious 'zero' this year to over
> 5000 by 2005. In the $25,000 to $100,000 range - the low-end
> company workhorse - Linux shipments will increase ninefold. In
>the
> sub-$5000 space, Linux will grow over six fold.
>
> So this may be a case of the Beast getting its retaliation in
>first.
>
> Might be interesting to know :-)
> Paul
