A Year of Victory for Linux

Opinion: No longer merely on its way up, the platform now boasts converts from governments to small and large businesses—and it’s only getting bigger.

Looking back at Linux in 2004, I see one thing as clearly as I see my hand in front of my face: Linux is the mainstream.

Which companies stand behind Linux today? I mean really stand behind it, and not just give it lip service? It’s companies such as Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Novell and Oracle. We’re talking the who’s who of American technology vendors.

Who’s using Linux? Everybody. Small companies, Fortune 50 enterprises, nonprofits, governments. Everybody.

Why? Because, when you cut through all of the FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt), all of the bought and paid-for ROI (return on investment) and TCO (total cost of ownership) studies, all of the intellectual property fears, the bottom line is that Linux simply works.

Heck, with today’s CD-based Linux distributions such as Knoppix and Gnoppix, you don’t even have to install Linux on a PC. You just boot it up from a CD-ROM and give it a test drive. What could be easier?

In the past year, hundreds of thousands of users and thousands of companies have done just that, and they’re now shifting over their infrastructure and edge servers to Linux.

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