""Pre-installing an operating system is a big investment," says
Kenyon. "It is a multi-million dollar investment to fully certify
and take the next step to pre-install." And while it is Kenyon's
job to make that sales pitch to the IT vendors of the world, he
offers no estimate for when this might actually happen.
"The Long-Term Support releases of Ubuntu, which have five years
of support on the server and three on the desktop, have a long
enough lifespan to make the investment in certification and
pre-installation worthwhile - particularly if vendors want to use
Ubuntu to deliver cheap laptop and server appliances."