Encouraged by a solid 3,300 user responses to its Desktop Linux survey, the Open Source Development Labs (OSDL) Desktop Linux Working Group (DTL) Tuesday thanked all its respondents by email and began sifting through the mountain of data the survey provided.

The month-long online survey focused on determining the key issues driving Linux on the desktop as well as the major barriers to Linux desktop adoption, OSDL officials said.

"What was most surprising to us was probably the top two reasons given for deploying Linux on the desktop," OSDL's Principal Analyst Dave Rosenberg told Ziff Davis Internet. "It's not TCO (total cost of ownership), or security, or lack of license fees. It was 'employees requesting Linux (user demand)' and because 'my competitors have successfully deployed Linux.' "

A recent report authored by Security Innovation tried to set a methodology and track real world IT pain from installing and maintaining both a Windows Server and a Linux server in the Enterprise. The study itself was sponsored by Microsoft and not-unsurprisingly, came to the conclusion (as all MS sponsored studies tend to do) that Windows caused less IT pain than Linux.

The author of the study has been very forthcoming in attempting to defend his methodology and stress that the study itself was independent of the funding and was not MS sponsored FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) that has characertistically been part of the MS Get the Facts campaign.

Paul Murphy looks at the study and determines why it fails to adequately address real world comparisons and gives Windows a built-in advantage over Linux.

Crashes, viruses, worms, patches, forced-upgrades... Despite all these drawbacks, why does Windows still dominate the PC desktop? Why haven't users switched to Mac or Linux? Tony Bove answers these questions and explains how to "escape the Beast from Redmond and still function," in his new book, Just Say No to Microsoft.

According to its publisher, Just Say No to Microsoft is an entertaining overview of the computer desktop world, but it also features practical information about alternative operating systems and programs that will help Microsoft captives exercise their freedom of choice.

After tracing Microsoft's rise from tiny startup to "monopolistic juggernaut," Just Say No to Microsoft "chronicles how the company's practices have discouraged innovation, stunted competition, and helped foster an environment ripe for viruses, bugs, and hackers." Bove also examines other operating systems, such as Linux and Macintosh, and Microsoft Office alternatives that will keep readers productive and able to interact with their Microsoft-using colleagues and friends without missing a beat.

Computer buyers interested in obtaining a pre-loaded Mandriva Linux laptop from a mainstream manufacturer (Dell) can now do so, but they have to buy it through a French sales outlet, reports Steven J. Vaughan Nichols in eWEEK.com.

"This is the first time any Dell laptop with pre-installed Linux has been sold or supported by Dell," Vaughn-Nichols writes. "Previously, only Dell N-Series Precision Workstations with Red Hat Linux were available from Dell."

Indonesia's Ministry of Research and Technology Thursday said it will implement a Java Desktop System (JDS) on Linux as a national-standard desktop, customed-designed for its own culture. This desktop software will be a major component of the new Indonesia Goes Open Source (IGOS) program that aims to help eliminate the "digital divide in the world's largest archipelago," the ministry and Sun Microsystems said in a joint announcement.

The ministry said it will develop its own IGOS-branded software stack using JDS on Linux as the base platform. The agreement with Sun -- for an unspecified number of years -- has the goal of installing copies of the open source-based desktop across Indonesia, beginning with its government-affiliated offices, the ministry said.