Server Operating Systems Report

Long-Term - 2009 onwards

The winners in the long term will be Linux and .NET, with the Open Source offering penetrating the market from file and print server, through to the mainframe. The high-end proprietary UNIX offerings will have lost to both Linux and .NET, but predominantly the former as there is the opportunity for considerable skills transfer from the UNIX environment.

To cater for longer-term requirements, Butler Group believes it is imperative that the industry as a whole starts collaboration on a next generation Server Operating System. The current offerings are tired and no amount of papering over the cracks with new features hides the fact that the fundamental architecture designs are over twenty years old, dating back to a time when computing hardware and business needs were very different. In addition, the computing landscape is due to change dramatically over the next ten years with the arrival of Grid and Web services technology. The explosion of wireless intelligent devices and appliances using voice and streaming multimedia interfaces will, for example, make device driver software obsolete.

The present penchant for large, highly integrated operating environments is not the long-term answer. It just increases the complexity and reduces the operational flexibility of IT managers. It also locks the organisation into one particular vendors offering. The industry must consider repositioning to provide Server Operating Systems that are small, simple, and meet the two main objectives of virtual machine and resource management, with more distinct demarcation between the operating system, utilities, and application, allowing users to implement the rudimentary components and then choose which other options they wish to deploy.

Der vollständige Bericht kann bei der Butler Group bestellt werden.