Re: Linux at work (real world)

["Eric J. Ray" <ejray -at- raycomm -dot- com>]

On Mon, 19 Nov 2001 KMcLauchlan -at- chrysalis-its -dot- com wrote:
> A Friday-afternoon bull-session with our IT crew revealed
> that they are actively beginning to look into the possibility
> of getting Linux onto the corporate desktop. We're on NT, and

Check out:
http://www.linuxworld.com/site-stories/2001/1018.tco.html
It compares TCO for a UNIX-y solution and a Wintel solution,
and the results are interesting.

> Do ANY of you have experience with using Linux and these
> desktop apps in multi-person offices? Not just lone
> gun(wo)men, but some of you herd animals, too?
>
> Have they got usable tools for scheduling and planning
> by groups?
> I know I could use either of StarOffice or K-Office to
> write documents, create and publish spreadsheets, create
> presentations, create and manipulate vector or bitmap
> graphics, publish web-stuff, send, receive and manage
> e-mail, etc.  But, can an office full of MS-Office users
> find/view each other's calendars, schedule meetings
> (including booking the conference rooms and A/V equipment),
> plan (and SHARE the planning of) projects, if they switch
> to a Linux desktop?
>

There are a number of ways this can happen--using any
number of Web-based services (either hosted on the Internet
or on a private server on an intranet) would be a good
solution in any event for the groupware stuff.

For a Project equivalent, see
http://www.infoworld.com/testcenter/comparison/000131tcwproject.html

For a Web-based calendar solution, see
http://www.iplanet.com/products/iplanet_calendar/home_2_1_1j.html

There are several open-source/free solutions to both problems
as well.

It's just my geeky prejudice,
but _I_ see several advantages to _not_ wrapping all
office functionality into the same software package.
E.g., an office that uses the MS Outlook solution for
groupware would be hard pressed to change email client
without changing everything.


> I think we could demand that our people put up with quite
> a lot of one-time transition pain if:
>
> a) we could populate 80+ desktops for a few hundred,
>    or a few thousand dollars (total, not each)

It's possible for darn near free, except for time/effort
on the part of the IT staff. Add in the commercial
products above, and you're still at ~$50/desktop
total. (Keep in mind that the comparable Windows
products also cost money...)

> Is the productive Linux desktop still the province of
> the loner, or can some of you vouch for it in a group
> setting, now? (Please say yes!  :-)

A productive Unix desktop certainly is possible, even
in a group setting. I'm on Solaris, but Linux would
actually be easier in some ways.

>
> Naturally, as a person who might have some influence
> on which direction our company might take, I'd also
> appreciate your opinions on the preferred path from a
> tech-writer's perspective. If we were to pilot a
> desktop and a set of apps, which one should I plump
> for? And why?
>

Gnome and Star Office if you're shooting for
maximum capabilities and gee-whiz factor.
FVWM95 and Star Office to minimize transition pain
for users.
I'd vote for Linux Mandrake, but the distribution
isn't that significant, if there's an IT staff
around.

> Let's ignore my current use of FrameMaker as a
> consideration.  I'll just have to hope that the
> suite that would be best for the rest of the company
> would also be the best for their one-and-only
> tech-writer.

We don't do documentation production in StarOffice
(we use an SGML tool or Frame on Solaris), but
SO is amply capable for most needs, most of the
time. When it isn't, there are always other alternatives.
E.g., Dia is a pretty good Visio knockoff for quick
diagrams, and, as you'd expect, is free.

> I'm interested in first-hand (or whatever I can get)
> observations either from people who HAVE a working
> office of ten or more people who use Outlook-like
> features in Linux, or from an office where you're
> doing a trial with enough people to make a realistic
> assessment.

Unless you have loud/influential/disruptive people
who are wedded to particular software versions, it's
entirely possible to work productively without
Microsoft software. See:
http://www.livingwithoutmicrosoft.org/
among other sites.

Disclaimer: I work for Sun Microsystems, so am not
necessarily completely objective. That said, I'm
enough of a technology geek and pragmatist that
I won't deliberately inconvenience myself to make
a point, no matter how I feel about some company's
business practices.

Eric




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Eric J. Ray                  ejray -at- raycomm -dot- com


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