Study: Linux sales down, but not out

CNET News.com ^ | August 6, 2002, 4:40 PM PT | Stephen Shankland

[Bush2000]

Study: Linux sales down, but not out

Linux sales lost some ground to Windows last year, but are expected to climb in coming years as distributors of the alternative operating system create new revenue streams.

According to market research firm IDC, Linux sales declined nearly 5 percent in 2001 to $80 million, but are expected to grow to a $280 million market in 2006.

Meanwhile, Windows sales climbed 11 percent to more than $10 billion last year, according to IDC analyst Al Gillen.

"The Linux operating system market, from a revenue perspective, accounts for one half of 1 percent of the total operating system revenue each year, or roughly two days' worth of Microsoft's operating system revenue," Gillen said. "On the second day of January, Microsoft had generated more operating system revenue than the Linux community (will for the entire year)."

IDC based its projection of $280 million in sales within four years on efforts by Red Hat, SuSE and others to wring more money from Linux, in part by making it more difficult for users to obtain the software for free, Gillen said. "What we're expecting the revenue to come from is the fact that the Linux vendors are moving toward a model where they're trying to drive revenue per server," Gillen said.

For example, Red Hat doesn't offer downloads with which others can easily create installation CDs for its high-end Advanced Server edition. And while the software may be installed on multiple computers--unlike Windows--Red Hat charges per server for subscriptions to the Red Hat Network for online services.

While experts still can assemble the required Linux components for free and create the same package that companies sell, customers will be leery of using that sort of customized software, Gillen said.

Linux, a clone of the venerable Unix operating system, began 11 years ago as the programming project of Linus Torvalds, but now it is collectively developed by hundreds of programmers across the globe. Linux has gained real-world credentials, most prominently as a central part of IBM's strategy to compete with Sun Microsystems and Microsoft.

Linux is an open-source project, meaning that it's free to share, change or distribute its underlying programming instructions, called source code. In contrast, tight controls govern who may see and change the source code of operating systems such as Sun's Solaris and Microsoft's Windows.

During the dot-com mania, Linux was one of the hot trends that captured investor attention. The first Linux company to hold an initial public offering, Red Hat has solidified its role as the dominant Linux specialist.

Red Hat garnered nearly three-quarters of the revenue in 2001, Gillen said. "The rest of the players are bit players. Most of what's left is held by SuSE. Everyone else is in the low single digits or smaller," he said.

Linux is best suited for use in servers, the higher-end computers that often run 24 hours a day handling tasks such as corporate e-mail. Most Linux revenue came from this market, Gillen said.

IDC declined to release the numbers of copies of Linux that were sold, but said the number stayed about level from 2000 to 2001. The number of copies that sold for "client" computers such as desktops and workstations, however, increased nearly 50 percent over 2000, in particular in Asia and Latin America, Gillen said.

Another ally and supporter of the Linux movement is Intel, which is using Linux to help drive adoption of its Pentium, Xeon and new Itanium family processors into servers. The vast majority of Linux is used on Intel processors, Gillen said.

[Bush2000]

Who *buys* Linux, anyway?

[Tennessee_Bob]

So sales are down on a free software package??

[Abcdefg]

I downloaded it for free and burned the CD on my Windows machine. My NIC and Soundcard are not supported yet, so I haven't tried it out.

[mykej]

Nobody "buys" linux. Many people buy support for linux. Red Hat's per server license is for support, not for the operating system itself. (Note, RH may include commercial software in some bundles that requires a license fee, but never for the OS itself.)

The only reason to buy support is a) it is going on a mission critical system that can have 0 down time or b) you feel more comfortable if you have somebody to yell at.

Most enterprise level software generates much more profit on support, for those two reasons, than they do on license fees.

[Wisconsin]

We run a total of 14 copies of Linux. We paid for one ---and that really was because we needed it on dvd and did not have a dvd recorder.

We do subscribe on two to a support network.

[blackfarm]

I bought a Insider ASubscription to lindowsOS for 2 years for 99 dollars. Its a great Little distro. Xandros due out in September will be worth paying for as well.

[Abcdefg]

0 down time huh?

[mykej]

"0 down time huh?"

Realistically, no. Not even 5 9's. I don't believe bitty boxes really get there yet.

You will have significantly less downtime with linux than windows though. Anything you have to reboot every few days is *not* a server OS.

[Abcdefg]

I agree. At the company I workd for, our department used some DEC Alpha servers running UNIX and I don't remember one of them ever needing a reboot other than a planned one.

[Clive]

Just curious.

What NIC and what soundcard are you using?

Rather difficult these days to find a NIC that does not have a module or a soundcard that won't run under either an alsa module or an ossfree module.

Let me know so that I can warn my friends not to buy them.

[Abcdefg]

Linksys 100TX and Soundblaster Audigy

[mykej]

Tulip chipset on the NIC, it works.

[Abcdefg]

thanks, the cable modem connection was a big issue.

Any info on the Audigy? I downloaded RH 7.3

[Clive]

The linksys LNE100TX uses module tulip.

The Audigy card uses module emu10k1

Your linux distribution should have this module in both ossfree and alsa versions.

From a root command prompt, run "slocate -u" to update your locate database, then run "locate tulip" to find the ethernet card module and "locate emu10k1" to find the sound modules.

Install the modules manually using modprobe.

In fact, sndconfig ought to install the sound modules for you if you have a reasonably current distribution of linux.




If not, get it from opensource.creative.com

[Abcdefg]

I'm green as grass with Linux. You have been a great help, thanks.

[Clive]

Sort of screwed up the reply

opensource.creative.com is for the ossfree emu10k1 module.

Get the most recent version of alsa, which includes the alsa emu10k1 module, from sourceforge, but I suggest you use the ossfree version.



None of this should be necessary as your distribution disks should have the necessary modules unless you have a very old version of linux.

[Clive]

My replies jumped your reply 13.

RedHat 7.3 is reasonalbly equivalent to my Mandrake 8.2 so it will have the modules for both the NIC and the soundcard and it has probably put them into your modules directories.

[The Duke]

I set up a new Mandrake Linux server at the office last month...what a dream machine! Almost a gig of memory -1.7Ghz processor running Postgres, MySQL, Apache, Tomcat, PHP and CVS - more SCSI and IDE disk capacity than should be legal on any one box - and local and offshore developers writing code on the machine almost around the clock.

This stands in stark contrast to the WIN2K server with Microsoft SQL server that I had to shut down a couple of months ago - simply because it was a money pit. Linux "sales" might be sluggish - but of course those comparisons are simply "apples and oranges".

(Our new workstations are also now being installed with Linux)

[bat-boy]

Every few days? Man that'd be great! I run WIN98 2nd Ed and it locks up in less than 24hrs. I hate it!

I've heard that you can actually run windows on top of Linux and if it locks up, you can close it like a program and then reopen it. Although if you're running Linux, I can't see why you'd want to run windows also.

[Tribune7]

ping