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[Roy Vestal]

Magnus makes a good point. The upfront work that is necessary for the 
kind of automated installation he is referring to is the same amount of 
upfront work necessary for Windows Server installations.

As in my job I have to automate Windows and Linux installations, I can 
tell you that once the upfront work is done, it takes my Linux Server 
installations less time, about 30-40% (internal company benchmarks) for 
the actual install.

Jim,
 As I understand it, you are quite familiar with Windows and 
comparatively not as familiar with Linux as you are Windows. I came from 
the same boat. My original use for linux was it was "free".

However, the main arguement you are making is not a true comparison of 
"apples" to "apples". Linux, as with other Unix-like OS's, uses a 
different set of tools and a different mind set. Therefore I have to 
disagree with your original point, setting up a Linux server is longer 
than a Windows server. If you are just installing the OS, then that is 
easily seen as incorrect. If you are installing apps AFTER the OS is 
installed, it depends on the application: How was it written? What are 
the install criteria? What dependancies are needed?

Here are 2 examples of how I had to learn this:

Oracle on Windows Cluster/Linux Cluster:

At the time I had to install both to see which cluster faired better as 
an Oracle cluster, I had to learn  *how* to cluster on both. Windows 
seemed easier to me, as I was more familiar with Windows server at that 
point in my career. Now, I can setup both clusters, in about the same 
time mainly due to experience.

Setting up Oracle was a little different.
 For the Windows installation, the application came with bundled 
dependancy libraries, such as the ODBC drivers/MDAC and such. Linux 
didn't, I had to get those. Oracle did NOT bundle the Linux 
dependancies. I'm assuming it was due to the differing flavors of linux 
people use. However, their docs did describe how to install these linux 
dependancies for the specific linux flavor I was using. This is NOT an 
apples to apples comparison as the installtion methods are different.

Finally, the Windows installation used the same obligitory Windows 
Installer setup wizard. The Linux installer used Java and therefore java 
libraries had to be installed.

Now with this information and time to setup the installs for automation, 
I can install the Linux cluster 2x as fast as I can the Windows Cluster. 
Why?  Less reboots. None of the dependancies in the Linux install 
required reboots. Also, the footprint of the install was almost 200MB 
smaller in Linux. This IS more of an apples to apples comparison.



SAS Enterprise:

SAS is similar to Oracle in it's install methods. SAS uses the Windows 
Installer setup wizard as well. However, the *nix (SAS supports only 2 
versions of Linux, as well as, Solaris,HPUX, and AIX) installer uses 
text only. Again, automating these took me twice as long on the Windows 
installation as it did on the *nix installations (I setup various 
Windows, Linux, and Solaris installations at that time).

Again, AFTER the automation was complete, the installations of the 
servers and applications was 2x as fast on the Linux servers as it was 
on the Windows servers. This is more apples to apples comparison as well.


My conclusion:

Windows folks have an easier time with Windows Server installations, and 
Linux folks have an easier time with Linux installations. There are very 
few of us (I include myself in this grouping) that can do both in an 
effective, efficient manner. Most of the people that I know that have 
the skillsets necessary to perform this type of "two-world" system 
administration and somehow make them work homogenously are part of TriLUG.

My advice, next time you want to do an "apples to apples" comparison, 
make sure the data is correct.

Just my $0.02.