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68 | august 2008 www.linuxjournal.com

Five years ago, I made one of the

greatest life-changing decisions in my

career—I switched my organization to

the GNU/Linux operating system and

supporting applications. It’s not uncom-

mon to read about businesses, schools

and other organizations making this

switch; however, what happens after-

ward? How do users adjust, and what

about this total cost of ownership (TCO)

we always hear of? Is Linux really ready

for the desktop? Was it worth it to

make the switch?

In 2002, Greater Houlton Christian

Academy (GHCA) adopted Linux; you

can read the details as to why and how

in the February 2003 issue of Linux

Journal. It’s not an exaggeration when I

describe this as a life-changing decision,

not just for me, but for the school as

well. I used to be a die-hard, Microsoft

fanboy; now I use open-source software

almost exclusively. Our school, which

once had a mish-mash of dilapidated,

old, donated computers that barely

worked, now is recognized as being a

leader in our region because of our

computer technology—all of this from

that fateful decision back in 2002.

Five years after the article was pub-

lished, I find myself reflective, pondering

where we’ve been and wondering what

the future holds. Did I make the right

decision? Would I do it again? There’s

much to consider in order to answer all

these questions. Because that decision

initially was based on financial need,

let’s first look at TCO.

Redmond Weighs In

Sometime after we adopted Linux,

Redmond released a study claiming that

the TCO for Linux actually was higher

than for Microsoft Windows—even

though Linux can be obtained for free.

Microsoft has been pushing this idea

ever since with its “Get the Facts”

campaign. Had such a study existed in

2002, I might have wavered on making

the switch. After all, price was the driv-

ing factor for us to use Linux in the first

place. In some ways, that initial decision

was a desperate decision. Since then,

I’ve had time to consider TCO. So, was

Redmond right?

The initial switch saved us money,

because it allowed us to put what fund-

ing we had directly into hardware while

avoiding the Microsoft tax (pre-installed

Windows on computers). In fact, we

could not have upgraded our computers

if we had to purchase proprietary soft-

ware as well. That’s not to say there

aren’t some hidden costs in having the

IT staff install software on bare-bones

hardware, but for us, the savings far

outweighed any extra labor costs. What

is more important, however, is how

using Linux and open-source applica-

tions continues to save us money today.

But, before discussing this continued

savings, I need to stress that software

evolves. Applications improve, bugs and

security holes are patched (hopefully),

and new technologies emerge. With

proprietary software, it can be years

between major releases, and upgrading

to that new release costs money. With

open source, applications are improved

all the time. After making the initial

switch to Linux, one needs to consider

how to keep up with the latest patches,

upgrades and releases.

Being a tweaker who loves to

squeeze every bit of efficiency from my

computers, I was attracted to a distribu-

tion called Gentoo. Not only did it allow

me to optimize Linux and thousands of

applications for our computers, but also

I found the package management sys-

tem far superior to other distributions

I had played with. It also forced me

to learn the under-the-hood details

about the Linux kernel, the GNU

programs and many other OS man-

agement techniques that have helped

me as a Linux administrator.

Linux for the Long Haul

Linux proves its worth more and more as you use it. MICHAEL SURRAN

INDEPTH

Figure 1. Our third-grade students have no trouble using Linux as part of their lessons.

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