“Linux has reached a different plateau. It’s become the
good-enough network-services operating system. Its NFS
implementation is most definitely not state-of-the-art. Its math
libraries lag woefully behind those of DEC Unix. Its
multi-processor support pales in comparison to Solaris. However,
few of us care. It’s stable. It’s good enough to run Apache, Samba,
GNU utilities, and all the other network services needed by small
businesses and small-ish departments in big businesses. Plus, it
runs on hardware we’ve all got lying around in closets….”
“At the same time, open-source developers are working to
make Linux a contender in the desktop arena. To do so, it’ll have
to show itself to be good-enough in those seven key areas where
Windows has successfully muddled through:
- Price…
- Speed…
- Stability…
- Availability…
- Ease of use…
- Hardware support…
- Breadth of software titles…”