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A couple of years ago, I suggested that the only way to re-energize the market was to improve the debate about the merits of Linux vs. Windows. It was past time for some honest comparisons of the type that matters most to the average company. Vendors needed to explain the difference between Linux and Microsoft systems in the only manner that means anything to the average business manager: cost. Evangelists for Linux (or that matter, Unix or Windows) should have to compare the cost -- the total cost -- of owning a computing system based on Linux compared to the total cost of owning an enterprise architecture based on a proprietary Unix or Microsoft platform.

These "total cost of ownership" (TCO) calculations are a little more complicated than comparing the cost of a package of a couple of Red Hat CDs to the cost of thousands of Microsoft licenses. Even at Microsoft prices, the cost of software is only a small part of the total cost of managing a large IT environment. In recent years, Gartner, KPMG, and Forrester have all issued reports that agree that hardware and software combined represent less than 20% of the total cost of owning a system.

Far more important are the costs of running the local help desk, performing system audits and other administrative functions, and writing and supporting custom code. At most larger companies, these and similar costs are far more significant than the price of the enterprise software platform. So are the costs associated with improving or degrading employee efficiency. A California-based financial services company I worked with last year calculated it could justify the cost of a wholesale upgrade of its enterprise architecture based on the fact the the proposed system could shave five seconds off the time it took most of their 2,000 employees to log on to their complex of system resources.

Reliable TCO assessments can be hard to do. Many firms attempting a TCO analysis quickly give up. There claim there are simply too many factors to account for. Many are difficult to calculate objectively. Most evaluators lack the required expertise in accurate cost accounting and performance benchmarking Even so, most companies can, if they try, assess the financial impact of :

• Controlling the number of desktop and server images
• Reducing logon failures
• Reducing support costs
• Minimizing end-user training costs
• Lowering set-up costs
  Enhancing flexibility by allowing users to "work from anywhere" while accessing the system resources needed to do their jobs

Other factors are harder to quantify. For example, what is the degree of risk associated with reducing unauthorized access to system resources by outsiders? And what is the financial impact?

After a slow start, there's a growing trend by vendors and purchasers to perform TCO analyses when justifying competing IT platforms. Firms like Compaq have introduced TCO as an element of their sales and market education programs. Apple enthusiasts are promoting TCO analyses to justify retaining Macs in the workplace. A variety of organizations have tried to use TCO analyses justify the deployment of Linux throughout the enterprise.

Many of these Open Source "analyses" are fairly primitive. Some do little more than wonder aloud, "what possible combination of costs could Windows servers offer a lower TCO than Linux or OpenBSD servers?" without an honest look at those costs. Others have done their homework. Last year, Red Hat sponsored a devastating IDC study that quantified the TCO benefits of running Linux compared to Unix. The study confirmed the findings of a 1999 Gartner Group study that suggested companies deploying a Linux platform would enjoy a 20% overall cost advantage compared to firms running Unix. Proprietary Unix vendors have been on the defensive ever since.

What about Microsoft? A study for the U.S. Department of Defense conducted by MITRE [PDF] gave the lead to Linux over Microsoft NT in the back office because Linux was easier to manage, had more robust security features, and supported remote monitoring and management more effectively. MITRE found that each of these features resulted in measurable cost savings and risk reduction. A study for LinuxWorld.com was less credible, because the author cooked the books a little. For example, he assumed that Microsoft-based systems would require all parties to upgrade upgrade their equipment and software every few years, but that, for some reason, Linux users somehow would add nothing to their desktops and system managers would add nothing to their back-end systems during the same period.

In any case, Microsoft's product managers claim that much of the reliability and support costs cited in these studies were specific to the limitations in NT. Beginning last September, they began to use TCO justifications to promote Windows 2000 as "An Operating System Even a CFO Would Love." Microsoft has put together a "Rapid Economic Justification" SWAT team to promote sales based on quick returns on company investments in IT hardware and software. In addition, the company has begun to publish a series of white papers and customer profiles showing, the company claims, that Windows 2000 and its successors are generating dramatic improvements in reliability and significantly lowered administrative and support costs.

Are these claims for real?

Compared to NT, they almost certainly are. Even in mixed NT/Unix environments, it is not hard to believe the numbers in an upcoming customer study that claims a company could reduce its internal domains, cut the number of servers and reduce IT support staffing by 20% by moving off NT to a different operating platform. Other Microsoft-sponsored TCO studies, such as one focused on Allegis, merit a slightly more skeptical look. According to that study, Allegis claims it could generate new product faster running on Windows 2000 than on Unix. Perhaps.

In any case, such papers, and similar efforts by Open Source and proprietary vendors represent a marked improvement over earlier, cruder efforts to draw cost comparisons between Microsoft and its competition. Moreover, they advance the competitive discussion. Competing systems vendors from the Microsoft, Linux and Unix communities need to move away from from rancorous exchanges of disinformation and begin to focus on issues that will advance the interests of their customers in a safe, secure, inexpensive operating environment. If they compete hard enough, their products might improve. And that wouldn't be a bad thing, either.

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