Highway patrol gives Linux a green light

As Microsoft’s support for Windows NT Server 4.0 grinds to a halt, many enterprises will be tackling challenging server upgrades.

Information systems directors, like Cliff Gronauer of the Missouri State Highway Patrol, have tuned and tweaked NT servers during recent years to keep
systems afloat. Gronauer has decided to avoid the “expense and pain” of upgrading to Windows Server 2003 and opt for Linux when support from Microsoft
concludes at the end of 2004, he said Wednesday at the Enterprise Linux Forum conference.

“Our planning started a year and a half ago and, during the last six months, we’ve gotten everything of substance implemented. The functionality is
there and the performance is there,” Gronauer said. “Most customers don’t even know we’ve converted, which is a good thing.”