
Will Linux, Mac Adoption Rate Ever Break 20%? - abennett
http://www.itworld.com/small-business/69222/will-linux-and-mac-desktop-adoption-ever-reach-20-8020-rule
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makecheck
I figure the majority of the challenge is in businesses. And there, changing
the Windows adoption rate requires visionary people in charge, a complete set
of applications on another platform, and a realistic transition path.

I haven't seen a lot of vision in current IT groups; more like, CYA. So it may
take a generation or more before enough of the establishment changes to even
consider moving away from the current stack of Windows/IE-based enterprise
software (the quality of which is oddly irrelevant to many managers). Either
that, or a catastrophe so substantial that upper management is forced to start
over with IT.

Making competing applications on other platforms is technically doable. But,
unfortunately, most of the work that needs doing isn't _interesting_. Years
have gone by, and it shouldn't be surprising that people have avoided spending
their precious free time developing open-source business apps when they could
do something more fun. What's more, with each passing year, the number of new
enterprise apps bolting businesses to Windows is increasing (as is their data
dependency on existing apps).

And then there's the transition. How do you even _convince_ companies to
change, much less address the technical hurdles (e.g. different data formats,
software bugs) and the user community (different user interface, retraining
costs, etc.)?

For what it's worth, I really want Windows' share to decrease, but these are
big challenges. I do what I can to help. :)

