Sun announced a trio of education institutions have deployed Sun's Java Enterprise System (JES). The Singapore Ministry of Education, Argonne National Laboratory/University of Chicago and Ohlone College have all migrated to Sun's Linux desktop.

On the economics of the decision, Dave Salbego, Manager of Argonne National Laboratory's Computing and Instrumentation Solutions Division said. "Sun's subscription model for deploying software was much more economical than purchasing components separately as offered by other vendors. We estimate a cost savings of more than $50,000 per year in licensing and support."

Sun's Java Desktop System (JDS) is a Linux-based desktop OS with open-source software components such as the Mozilla browser, Evolution e-mail/calendar client, and Star Office. JES adds Java-based software, including application server, portal and identity management server, for a yearly subscription price. This pairing introduces a business model to education institutions that provides a single price of US $25 per desktop per year for the desktop software, maintenance, support and training, says the company.

Here is Eben Moglen's address and Q & A at Harvard February 23. This has been reproduced in its entirety for your convenience from a posting on Groklaw. You can find the original posting here:

Groklaw's original posting

Linux expertise gives tech workers an edge in gaining high paying tech jobs according to a report at NewsFactor. Linux skills are in demand say headhunters, which shows that the popularity of the open source OS is on the rise. Red Hat's vice president of global learning services at Red Hat, Peter Childers comments that the company has seen a 30% increase in attendence during each of the past three years in training and certification programs. System administrators, IT staff, and engineers top the list of workers seeing a surge in demand for Linux expertise.

A just-released IDC report on the global server market estimates sales figures from Linux servers generated $960 million in quarterly revenue. "Linux servers showed 63.1% growth year-over-year, while unit shipments grew 52.5% year-over-year," according to IDC. The Windows server market also remained strong, with factory revenues increasing by 16.1% year-over-year and unit shipments gaining 23.3%, says IDC.

This data "demonstrat[es] that Linux servers are taking on important roles in IT customers' computing infrastructure. What began with edge and Web-centric workloads is branching out to include HPC and commercial workloads," notes Jean S. Bozman, vp in IDC's worldwide server group.

Competing with Linux is not an easy proposition for Microsoft, they are not competing with a product but rather a whole new paradigm. LinuxPipeline examines the tactics Microsoft has employed against competitive threats in the past, and discusses how open source presents the Redmond software maker with new challenges. The winner in the struggle, notes the article may be the customers who benefit most if Linux and Microsoft stay in a constant struggle.