Red Hat Not Seeing Microsoft, Ubuntu as Threats 241
Ian Price writes "Red Hat is shrugging off Microsoft's entry into the cluster computing space after Microsoft announced that it has completed the code for its Windows Compute Cluster Server 2003 targeting high-performance computing. From the article: 'Scott Crenshaw, general manager of enterprise Linux platform at Red Hat, dismissed Microsoft's entry into cluster computing. "They're playing catch-up," he said. "Linux is often associated with high-performance computing, but Windows has never achieved that on a large scale."' Crenshaw also commented with respect to Ubuntu: 'Their user base is still small, so we're not seeing the impact of it [Ubuntu] so far.'"
Famous last words (Score:5, Insightful)
Just like MS (Score:5, Insightful)
I am sure Microsoft said the same thing about Red Hat. Pride goes before a fall Red Hat.
Re:Just like MS (Score:5, Insightful)
Red Hat doesn't need to do much. (Score:5, Insightful)
Fix your package manager!
I am sick of downloading packages from weird websites, version conflicts, and typing this stupid and overly long command into the shell over and over, hoping - nay, praying - that RPM won't spit out another conflict error this time. YUM seems tacked on, and I've never gotten it to work properly.
I switched to Ubuntu, even though it had less polish and was so deep in development, simply because application management actually worked, and things were in a logical order (supported, unsupported, universe, multiverse).
Maybe it's not practical, maybe I'm talking out of my ass having not used a Red Hat operating system since Fedora Core 3, but it's the only thing that prevents me from using Fedora at home or on a server, and the only thing that prevents me from recommending it to friends.
Re:In related news... (Score:3, Insightful)
indeed, ubuntu is unlikely a threat (Score:2, Insightful)
As for MS, well, they are usually able to strike a balance between "does not suck TOO much" and "has microsoft on the name" that appeals to a lot of people, even on corporate servers etc. Still, maybe the HPC market has people knowledgeable enough not to be impressed by branding alone.
In that case, they will have to have a real appeal on the quality/performance front and, even in this case, will be fighting an uphill battle against the "established" systems. Maybe they will learn how it feels to be on the other side of competition?
Re:Just like MS (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't think RedHat and Microsoft see themselves in direct competition to each other -- RedHat's focus is on the enterprise Unix market and competitors like Sun. That pisses Microsoft off because they were waiting for UNIX to collapse and the customers to come running to Windows. But RedHat hasn't done a thing to MS's existing markets.
On the other hand, Ubuntu is very much potential competition to RedHat because the software is more-or-less identical, and Ubuntu plans to sell similar support lifecycles.
Re:Famous last words (Score:5, Insightful)
Microsoft's buisness plan (Score:2, Insightful)
They absolutely done it more than once. Im suprised how microsoft keeps getting away with it.
Microsoft and Ubuntu not a threat (Score:5, Insightful)
Ubuntu market and RHEL market is totally different. Ubuntu is "now" heading toward Enterprise desktop environment with support, but Ubuntu had and always has been about average joe's Desktop PC while RHEL had and always has been about heavily toward Enterprise customers. So I think, by reading the article, it looks like RH is taking Ubuntu as not a competitor, but rather as a grassroot movement trying to reach that "critical mass". And to be fair, Crenshaw did point out a very good point here. That is, popularity doesn't count for the vendor certification which is the industry embracing OS distro with hardware and software for better customer support and that is what Enterprise customers look for.
Microsoft being in cluster market so late in the game, it's fair to say that MS had failed to grab the market share early on. So the statement in the article is accurate. Who knows if MS will monopolize cluster market share in coming years? But this statement is on the bull's eye.
"Linux is often associated with high-performance computing, but Windows has never achieved that on a large scale."
This has been the case for Microsoft. When Win2k Data Center edition was coming out, I was hoping better support for complete cluster suite, but wasn't satisfied with MS's offering with half baked solution and limitations. Besides, call me crazy, but 200+ cluster nodes, there is no way single Windows cluster node installation will be easier than a kickstart/NFS/bash script of RHEL cluster node. I don't know, maybe there is similar thing for Windows... I'm not a Windows guy, so I'm not sure. Please do correct me.
ubuntu is getting stronger by the day (Score:2, Insightful)
How Google trends see the situation (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Microsoft and Ubuntu not a threat (Score:3, Insightful)
Ubuntu right now is your classic dotcom strategy -- blow through venture capital to get "eyeballs" and then figure out later how to build revenue out of that. And if Ubuntu can't figure it out, they end up just like Mandrake and Corel and all the other Linux Desktop business failures that have been forgotten about.
The thing is that RedHat has "been there, done that" -- they survived off an enormous amount of VC for years as the "first mover". And after a decade, they eventually figured out you can't build a business off free downloads and $50 boxes -- there's just no profit in mass-marketing Linux. So they gave the finger to a lot of their loyalists and went Enterprise, and it worked. So, unless something has changed in the last few years, Ubuntu is going to have to do the same -- go where the money is (corporations) or die.
Microsoft? Not a huge market.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Even with all of this though programs can be made to work. I have something like 100 custom programs that needed installed on my clusters. NCBI tools, Bio apps, stuff like that. All of them are coded to Unix environments. Compiling them on windows would be a total pain in the butt! I keep hearing that new programs will be made to work but I don't see that happening all that much. Most new programs are forks of old programs. (At least in the Bio/Geo worlds.) I still have TONS of fortran stuff out there. Lots and lots of stuff that only compiles against GCC 2.95. These things need modified in order to work with a newer version of the SAME OS.. you think a total change is going to happen?
Plus.. The cost of the OS can be killer. When you are talking $1200-$3400 a node an added $500 is huge! Our Mac OS cluster cost us $50k in software licenses. And its 50 nodes. Even if Microsoft drops the price to $100 a pop that is still REALLY expensive. $100 a pop across 50 nodes pays for a bunch more nodes!
So I guess what I am saying is that unless Microsoft starts writing tons of its own apps it won't break into the cluster world very fast. They will be luck to grow as fast as Apple has (%1 of the top 500 list in 4 years).
Re:indeed, ubuntu is unlikely a threat (Score:1, Insightful)
pun intended, I mean Mark Shuttleworth.
Ubuntu is still a new distro and just published their first LTS version.
Way to go, but they're going the right way. Sooner or later Red Hat will see the impact considering the momentum Ubuntu currently gains.
One thing I find commical.. (Score:3, Insightful)
What now in 3 years they are going to release Cluster Server 2005....
And we're supposed to be worried about it? Their software is admittedly at least 3 years behind the times right there in the title of the software it says so.
Even more strange... (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Microsoft and Ubuntu not a threat (Score:3, Insightful)
While this is true and i do agree with you. you still need to pay for those products up front.
unless i am missing something the support service offered by Ubuntu / Canonical ( spl ) are support contracts
this still leans towards comunity based support for most ppl , but gives the PHB's that nice warm feeling they get when they have someone to call on / point the finger at
and at $250USD for 10 cases, that doesnt seem so bad , specially when you compare the cost of getting an Real Live MS Tech on the phone... you do have your credit card handy right ???
Re:Red Hat doesn't need to do much. (Score:3, Insightful)
I remember when tech websites were clamoring over the latest Fedora release as much as they're clamoring over Ubuntu now. Red Hat almost got it right, except for one thing.
Fix your package manager!
I am sick of downloading packages from weird websites, version conflicts, and typing this stupid and overly long command into the shell over and over, hoping - nay, praying - that RPM won't spit out another conflict error this time. YUM seems tacked on, and I've never gotten it to work properly.
I have worked with both dpkg and rpm, and there is no question: rpm is vastly superior to dpkg, when it comes to building packages, checking what package a file belongs to, or verifying the installed software (can't do it with dpkg).
Apt-get has been available for RPM for years, it works perfectly, it contacts the repo and installs whatever you need. And, there are other similar systems like yum, smart, and rhupdate. All are actively developed. If you can't get YUM to work it says more about your ability fo manage a system than it does of YUM and RPM. All you need to do is to edit one configuration file. And "tagged on"??!?? YUM is no more "tagged on" that apt-get. It's Unix, everything is "tagged on"!
The big advantage of Debian (and Ubuntu) is that they have a centralized repo of thousands of packages (I think ~12000), and a set of strict guidelines for packagers to follow. Redhat does not distribute many packages (2000-3000), so you have to rely on third party repositories to go outside Redhat's vanilla selection. For example RPMforge [rpmforge.net].
Wrt, Fedora, it is meant to be a playground for geeks who want to play around with the newest bleeding-edge versions of all the major packages. It is not for amateurs. It's for people who enjoy getting into the latest stuff and solving the problems that are there. So it's kind of silly to critizise them for not being completely without wrinkles! Having said that, it runs surprisingly well out of the box. If you want something really stable and well tested, you should go for CentOS [centos.org] or any of the other RHEL rebuilds.
This is silly (Score:2, Insightful)
Microsoft Windows is often associated with desktop computing, but Linux has never achieved that on a large scale.
So RedHat is basically saying that (RH)Linux will never ever be able compete on the desktop. Then why are they putting all the effort in it?
Except that (Score:5, Insightful)
If RH starts loosing market share, it'll more likely be to other Linux distributor or other opensource os, like suse,ubuntu,debian,openbsd,etc.
It's not the whole Linux community of developppers ingoring they adversaries, it's only *a* specific solution vendor.
You can kill distribution, but it's much harder to kill Linux as a whole.
Netscape Navigator almost disappeared back then, because it depended on a sinle company and that company failed to notice the threat and lost market shares.
That and I'm sure Microsoft will manage to build something that sucks in terms of scaliability, reliability and above all : possibility of customisation and reasonnable per-CPU license price.
Some labs build huge clusters, this new Windows flavor must cost less than the "Windows Beginners Edition [a.k.a. 3rd world edition]" (*) and provide impeccable service, otherwise it can't compete with opensource softwares.
Plus, unlike in the browser case, Microsoft can't try to leverage its desktop OS monopoly : you can bundle a browser on a widely deployed OS, but you can't "bundle a cluster" inside the OS - that sentence doesn't make sense.
Clusters are mostly custom build to specific needs, by people who have enough technical knowledge to assemble whatever they need. Windows Cluster-flavor must attract them by its qualities, not because laziness drives them to choose whatever option came with the box...
(*):
Re:Except that (Score:3, Insightful)
If that were the case, Windows would have been wiped out by Linux 5yrs ago. Not only has it failed to wipe out Windows, we're still having the "is it ready for the desktop" debate.
And you can't even argue the 'back-end vs desktop': the latest numbers [netcraft.com] show IIS is chipping away at Apache...
There used to be a saying (maybe still is?) "You won't get fired for choosing IBM". Today this can easily be stated as: "You won't get fired for choosing Windows". There's plenty of CIO's that would rather pick the devil they know aka:Windows and have predictable and known problems that everyone else in the boardroom understands (and sadly expects!), than strike out into an 'unknown' platform with unknown risk for the sake of a coupl'a hundred grand -- and more importantly: risk their job.
Re:Red Hat doesn't need to do much. (Score:3, Insightful)
mok00 starts with a good reply that shows some real knowledge. He also includes the comment "...rpm is vastly superior to dpkg when it comes to..."
dondelelcaro replies with pretty good counter arguments to several points. He doesn't say that dpkg is necessarily better, just points out that "these things can be done fairly easily using dpkg"
mok00: Now, can we get over this Debian snobism 'dpkg is soooooo much better than rpm....'"
Where did that come from? As far as I can see you are the one making claims about "vast superiority"...
Re:Famous last words (Score:3, Insightful)
You'd think one of the things about having a company is that you'd be able to take the talents of all the people in it and create an organization that could both innovate technologically, and bring those technologies to market competitively. But over the years I've come to doubt this. It's rare to have a company that does both; perhaps Google.
Microsoft has consistently waited to for other companies to prove that a technology is feasible and that people will buy it. Then they step in and outmaneuver the technology innovators with their superior marketing.
Examples:
It's a very successful strategy. Somebody else takes the technical and marketing risks, then you move in steal their lunch money. Catch up is an expensive game to start, but if you can see the end it's a very safe investment. And it takes a set of attributes that are probably, in sum, unique to Microsoft: a keen eye for watching technology trends, a vast customer base, a large and talented engineering force and the resources to pour cash into a money losing product through rev 3.
I think the rest of the world is on it's own revision 3 of "How to deal Microsoft".
Revision 1 (ca. 80s) was treat them like an ordinary competitor (e.g. Borland). Darwinian evolution pretty much puts a stop to that, although the mutation does crop up now and then on a brand new evolutionary dead end.
Revision 2 (ca 90s) was to tiptoe around them. You either tried to partner with them (bad idea, they take and don't give), or you tried to create a product and hoped you could get your money back before Microsoft crushed you (or if you were lucky they bought you -- patents as defensive armor). After Stacker, there was a sense that it almost wasn't worth trying
Revision 3 (present day) is to compete with Microsoft by exploiting its cultural weaknesses. Slowness and stupidity aren't among them, but paternalism and philistinism are.
Paternalism is deeply rooted in the MS world view. There are multiple ways this can be demonstrated, but none more iconic than the infamous Clippy, who earnestly wants to help (good) but thinks you're a rather helpless person (bad). If you can look at human/computer interaction on a scale than runs from software tools to intelligent agents, MS is firmly in the agent camp. They want the tool to do, not just the heavy lifting, but the heavy thinking for you. Cheerful and slapdash facades pasted over grotesque and ugly complexity abound in Microsoft's products. Microsoft would put smiley faces on an oil refinery and expect you to find it jolly.
Google is an example of a rev 3 MS competitor, that thrives on Microsoft's culture of paternalism. One of their "innovations" hardly seems like an innovation at all: stripping the tool down to its bare essentials. It's very hard to resist the temptation to do a bit more; to juice things up a bit and call attention to things you want the user to pay attention to, not what the user wants to pay attention to. That's why people don't mind Google advertising; it's just there off to the side if you want it. And while most people never are aware of it, the truth is that more intrusive advertising doesn't do much better. And it does not work at all if your customers are on Google instead of your site.
Philistinism and paternalism go hand in hand. Microsoft may not be a technical innovator, but it is definitely a technology company. It judges things along purely measurable parameters: how many bullets you can check on the punch list. Gestalt is not in their vocabulary. Therefore their products are messy, inelegant and ugly. The compound the ugliness by the aforementioned fondness for smiley face facades, tr
Re:Just like MS (Score:3, Insightful)
I would take this more seriously if Red Hat were beating Microsoft on any significant measure. At best they might be winning the server OS market, which Microsoft never had. Microsoft has considerably more revenue and profit (something like a hundred times more).
Anyway, there's no evidence that Microsoft and Red Hat compete. Red Hat mostly competes with unix providers (Sun, HP, etc.). Xandros and Mandrake are the ones targeting Microsoft's markets.
yum is no help for RHEL (Score:3, Insightful)
Ubuntu is biggest threat to RedHat and Microsoft (Score:2, Insightful)
Here's another: RedHat and Microsoft will both be seriously damaged by Ubuntu.
Reasons why:
- Opensource is the only trend Microsoft can't fight with money. As technology progresses, some applications (such as Netscape, Office, and Windows) become mature, old technologies, with little money left to go after. That's when open-source takes over. I'm a Microsoft fan, but I see the writing on the wall.
- RedHat, who is practically in my back yard, and who powered my machines for the last five years, has really messed up. By splitting into Fedora and Enterprise, and then failing to support Fedora properly (actually sabotaging it), they've PO'ed the open-source community. By trying to control ALL software that their package manager can install, they've bitten off more than they can chew. By forcing their control over the entire distribution, and ingnoring many inovations being incorporated into distributions like Debian, they've lost their lead, and are now a poor overall distribution. RedHat still has a chance, but the long string of very poor decisions from RedHat are a solid indicator of more to come.
Is Red Hat Relevent? (Score:1, Insightful)
At one time, Red Hat was almost synonymous with Linux in eyes of many people. Can anyone realistically say that today?
Re:Famous last words (Score:3, Insightful)
How do you steal something you invented ?