Analyst: Jean Bozman

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Takeaway: Linux is a rapidly growing server OS, and it will soon be fit for almost any industrial use.

IDC's supply-side data shows that the Linux server market is the most rapidly growing segment within the entire worldwide server market.

Linux server sales are growing dramatically, even though the worldwide server market was shrinking in 2002. IDC's worldwide server group reported that revenue for Linux servers grew 26% in the third quarter of 2002, when compared with the year-ago quarter. Then, in the fourth quarter of 2002, we reported that Linux servers grew revenue 41%, compared with the year-ago quarter.

Clearly, the revenue growth for Linux servers is accelerating-but what are the factors that are driving this growth? Why is this happening? And what workloads are most appropriate for Linux server technology, both for technical users and for commercial users?

Linux servers have proven their value during the economic downturn. They are inexpensive to acquire, and the Linux operating system itself costs very little-it is priced below $100 and is available from many Linux distributors worldwide. It's also important to note that all major server vendors now offer Linux servers.

Reliability and uptime for Linux servers are generally good, but many of the Linux servers installed today have only one or two processors-and the systems tend to support simpler workloads than those that run on Unix servers and Microsoft Windows servers.

Flexibility is another key to Linux popularity. It's easy to expand Linux server farms in a flexible fashion. As customers need to add capacity, they can add Linux server building-blocks, to their server farms, or to their Linux clusters.

But, in the light of Geoffrey Moore's book, Crossing the Chasm'-some uses for Linux servers are for early adopters only-while others are for mainstream adopters.

Maintenance and upkeep of Linux servers can be expensive for some sites-especially in cases where custom applications are being developed. Those sites that already have Unix skill-sets in-house may experience slightly lower costs than those that don't.

They will be able to leverage the Unix programming experience they already have. Otherwise, customers may need to work with service providers or with consultants to develop, deploy and maintain Linux server solutions.

Customers need to take a look across the market of available Linux platforms and software solutions to find out where Linux servers fit best in their IT organizations.

Today, Linux servers are deployed for a variety of workloads-to support file/print, to provide Web-serving, proxy-serving and caching of Internet content-and to support custom and packaged applications--and this is true both in the commercial and technical spaces.

Given the continuing economic downturn, one of the biggest questions on the minds of IT managers is: Can I use my Linux servers to run workloads for my enterprise? The answer to that question is: yes-and no!. It very much depends on the type of workload . . .

For the technical user, Linux servers are a mature technology. Linux-based servers and Linux clusters are 'taking off' in the high-performance computing or HPC space. This is due to several factors, including:

Knowledge of Linux and open-source software in the technical community, which has a history of using Unix computers and Unix-style programming.

Ability to use Linux server 'clusters' to run compute-intensive scientific/technical workloads on clusters of small servers . . . These HPC clusters use workload-balancing software to run workloads that historically ran on expensive supercomputers.

Linux server use in the rapidly growing bio-IT, life sciences and pharmaceutical vertical markets, and in the oil and gas and seismic analysis markets.

For the commercial user, there are an increasing number of custom and packaged Linux applications. However, there are several barriers to the quick adoption of Linux servers across the spectrum of commercial computing workloads, including:

Immaturity of the Linux 'ecosystem' for hardware, system software, and applications. Based on the total number of packaged applications, most commercial applications run on two types of server platforms-Microsoft Windows servers and Unix servers.

Still, the number of applications for Linux servers is growing, and major vendors-including Oracle and Veritas and SAP, among others-are supplying applications, databases, and infrastructure software to the marketplace.

It is still relatively 'new' to use Linux servers for commercial applications. So, customers must climb an experience curve before trusting their most mission-critical applications to Linux servers.

Linux can be expected to run, in partitions, on scalable servers in the future, including partitions on mainframes and on Unix servers. And IDC forecasts that the Linux server market will grow from today's $2 billion to nearly $7 billion by 2007.

Here's some essential Guidance for TECHNOLOGY BUYERS:

IDC has been watching the Linux server market since the late 1990s, and recommends that organizations strongly consider which workloads are most appropriate to run on today's Linux servers, and which ones will run better on other types of server platforms, such as Windows, Unix, and Novell NetWare.

Linux servers have become a mature technology platform for a variety of workloads, especially in the Web-centric workloads and networking infrastructure spaces. In addition, Linux server clusters are gaining in sales for high performance computing servers and clusters.

But it is still 'early days' for Linux servers to support commercial workloads in the enterprise server space. But that aspect of Linux server use can be expected to grow, and to become more industrial-strength, in coming years.

That will happen, over time, as more ISV applications become available and as IT managers gain more experience in gauging the features and functions of Linux servers in mission-critical commercial environments.

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