Looking for research on business desktop and server popularity

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I wonder if anyone knows of any research/survey for the UK that shows:
1. Top 3 most popular desktops
2. Top 3 most popular servers

I had an interview once for quite a large company and they were using NT, I'm just wondering how many businesses are using ancient software and how many are up to date using Microsoft Server 2008 or at least 2003?

I think this is important know, if most businesses are using NT then certification for Server 2003 or 2008 may not be worthwhile since you don't get much opportunity to use those skills.

3. Also, has anyone come into contact with alternatives to Active Directory and Exchange?
4. What is the most popular open source server? is it Solaris? CentOS? RedHat?

 

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I doubt you'll get access to actual survey data as they would have been costly to undertake and the companies sponsoring them will want to retain the data.

For MS stuff you could trawl through their site or contact their publicity/marketing people who may be able to point you to articles they have produced based on survey results.

For alternative o/s stuff etc maybe look at TechRepublic (you can search papers on there) but results may be US based rather than UK.

There's always good ol' Google of course

Other than that try the "serious" magazines - Computing etc. who tend to have and publish some data that may be of use. You may also want to think about the size of the organisation you're looking at as that may have an influence on what is used.

If you're a BCS member you have access to Forrester reports - not sure if there's anything in those that may be appropriate.

HTH

 

In my experience (which may or may not reflect others):

Top desktop O/S:

1 Windows XP (65%)
2 Windows 2000 (20%)
3 Windows NT (13%)
4 Owt else (2%)

Top Server O/S (Windows):

1 Server 2003 (60%)
2 NT (25%)
3 Server 2000 (10%)
4 Server 2008 (5%)

Alternatives to AD & Exchange:

There are still some Novell shops out there, and some places I've encountered run LDAP-based authentication on Linux. There are plenty of alternatives to Exchange as well.

Most popular open-source server

This depends entirely on what purpose the server is used for. Solaris is still widely used in hefty environments. Linux (all ditros) are popular, especially because they can be tailored to suit their purpose (e.g. LAMP, Security, Mail, File & Print etc). There really is no answer to this question.

In short, the most pervasive environments you'll come across are:
2K3 server/AD infrastructure with XP desktops, followed by
NT4 domains with the odd 2K/2K3 server thrown in and NT4/XP/2K on the desktop

Not very scientific I know, but that's a five minute guesstimate!

 

Vista?