Linux: Who Needs the Desktop?

The CTOs of Red Hat and Novell agree: Linux doesn’t need to win the desktop battle in order to conquer.

Think of Linux as the beat cop of the software world. While Windows sat snugly in your office’s desktop, the open-source operating system roamed the streets and alleys of the networking world. Microsoft’s Windows minded word processing and spreadsheets. Linux served up web pages, fetched email, and powered security systems—all the kinds of jobs that put meat on your frame. More than 60 percent of the World Wide Web’s servers, for example, run open-source software.

Nevertheless, some open-source enthusiasts await the arrival of Linux on the desktop the same way fundamentalists await the Rapture. When Linux takes a big slice of the desktop market away from Windows, they argue, open source will have arrived. Linux hasn’t made the “big breakthrough,” a deal to bundle Linux with desktop systems sold by a major PC vendor. But with Microsoft stumbling in its effort to get out a new version of its Windows operating system, open-source advocates are seeing an opportunity.

More here