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Scot Finnie

Digging on Operating Systems and Platforms

An Object Lesson

2 comments

Today was a tough day, but one that drove home an important object lesson.

A mistake made by a third-party service company that manages some of Computerworld's research projects created the potential for some company data, supplied by participants in one of our surveys, to be exposed to other survey participants for a short period of time.

Potentially affected was company-survey data for Computerworld's 2008 Best Places to Work in IT, one of our best annual projects and cover stories. The likelihood was very low that this issue led to any significant exposure of data. What's more, the consensus among the survey participants I've corresponded with is they don't consider the data in question to be highly confidential. And, of course, all our survey data has been completely secured.

But this isn't a thing to stick your head in the sand about, make assumptions about, or attempt to rationalize. The only correct course of action is to transparently communicate to all potentially affected parties. And that's precisely what Computerworld did.

What that meant for this publication's editor-in-chief today was a great deal of manual copy-and-paste work in sending out more than 100 e-mail messages, one by one, to all Best Places survey participating companies telling them what we know about what occurred.

The object lesson comes from the school-of-hard-knocks knowledge that no matter how much you work to secure electronic data, there's always a weak link somewhere. There's no such thing as perfect protection. For us the weak link was an outside service company, a subcontractor. But it might have been anywhere.

Writing about an issue like this as I've done in past is not the same as seeing one unfold right in front of me. My eyes are now wide open, and I am doubly imbued with security conviction.

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Total IT costs of Microsoft vs Apple based systems.

Submitted by Michael Rosenthal on April 13, 2008 - 12:50 P.M.

About a year ago I wrote to you suggesting a cost comparison between similarly configured PCs and Macs. You responded that there were difficulties in doing such a study. Then an article appeared in June CW declaring parity in cost when systems were paired.

Scattered about are postings and journal articles about businesses that have made the switch to an OS X based workplace; about the remarkably lower IT costs supporting XServe; about schools and governmental offices switching totally or in part to OS X. In my town, Claremont (CA) the IT department of Pomona college went platform agnostic and half the staff and faculty switched to Macs in short order. The City of Duarte (CA) is in the process of total conversion to OS X.

Cisco acknowledged last week that Mac utilization in enterprise doubled in the past year and as a consequence WebEx is now available to iPhone and Mac users in the workplace.

The questions that need some research and clear answers are these; (1) What is the total cost of maintenance of an OS X based system compared to other platforms, and (2) What is the cost of conversion?

It is commonly believed that IT management is the largest cost factor in maintaining enterprise computer systems. One post suggested that for XServe alone maintenance was 90% less than MS based servers. (It may be that IT workers supporting MS systems are fearful of losing their jobs in an Apple-centric workplace.)

There has been concern that Apple offers little support, but some ITs were simply calling the wrong phone number in Cupertino. There are also stories of the extraordinarily strong support Apple engineers offer businesses that are establishing systems based on their products.

I think that there is a blockbuster story here, either substantiating or exploding a myth about the cost of OS X to business.

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Great, but ...

Submitted by Scot Finnie on April 20, 2008 - 7:42 P.M.

Michael, I appreciate your cogent argument -- and even agree with several of the points you make, but this is not the place for it. I read and respond to e-mail from CW readers every day. My email address isn't hard to find. I don't recall, to be honest, the message thread you're talking about. But Computerworld has treated the subject of enterprise conversion to Macintosh products many times. Executive Editor Julia King has written two parts in a series on Auto Warehousing Co., a company that went through such a conversion.

I think you'll find some analysis in the vein you're asking for in this March 2008 piece about Auto Warehousing Co.:

Mac switch revisted: An enterprise PC shop's move to Apple isn't as easy as expected.

One thing that's clear from the AWC example is that one size does not fit all companies. Here's the first in the AWC series from last summer:

Mac Attack! An enterprise PC shop switches to Apple.

In January 2008, we ran this story:

Can Macs conquer the enterprise? The time is ripe ... .

Here's what I'd say back to you: Computerworld is doing its best to cover this interesting IT trend (as well as many others). Not very many enterprises are willing to go on the record with us and tell us what they've learned with their conversions to the Mac. When they do, we'll be able to publish additional articles that cover technical and financial aspects of such moves.

-- Scot

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