“A number of cost studies have been published. In addition to
their biases and their other flaws, they generally evaluate
replacing both servers and desktops with Linux. There is no
question that Linux is successful in the server market, where
almost any fair analysis concludes it will save money. This article
focuses exclusively on the desktop side of the equation, since for
a decision maker, these can easily be separated into separate
business decisions.“A different way of framing the question will help get at this.
Say a smart company makes the decision to save a lot of money by
moving all its servers to Linux. Many have begun doing so. And of
course you don’t have to change operating systems to save money on
applications. The press is full of reports of people dumping
Internet Explorer for Firefox. Switching from Office to OpenOffice
for all but the most demanding users is a smart move with a high
payoff…”