Six tips for Linux, open source desktop migrations

4. Make back-end moves to set up desktop Linux success

Certainly, a Linux desktop deployment will be challenging for organizations that are built largely on Microsoft Active Directory, or where servers are predominantly Windows-based.

"Even if you have a Windows-based file server, everything you need is on the Linux client to make it work well," says Tyler, the professor and author. "If you've built an LDAP-based directory structure, you're in good shape for a mixed Linux/Windows environment." Networks based on Active Directory will have more work to do.

Vince O'Connor, IT administrator for the City of Steamboat Springs in the U.S. state of Colorado, is taking a kind of back-door approach to getting users onto Linux desktops. The first step was to install the PostPath Email and Collaboration Server. PostPath is a Linux-based e-mail server that emulates Microsoft Exchange servers and allows Microsoft Outlook clients to access mail, calendar and groupware features. Samba -- an open source file-and-print server package -- is an old standby for many IT organizations. It supports mixed environments, which O'Connor has deployed in anticipation of more Linux machines coming online, that also will have to share files and access printers used by Windows PCs.

5. Consider the devilish details

"One thing that is very important is to deploy the same, or similar fonts," Tyler says. "The Standard OpenOffice font set on Linux is reasonably close [to Microsoft's]," he says. However, for true compatibility, users can also get Microsoft Web fonts, which were made available few years ago from Microsoft. Although Microsoft has since withdrawn the distribution of these fonts, the license under which they were released allows them to continue to be distributed and used.

"This includes things like Arial and MS Comic Sans -- all of those fonts that are typically found in Office documents," Tyler says. There are a number of sites that make them available.

Starting to migrate users to a document formats that works well across Linux, Windows and other platforms is another good step to take before making larger desktop moves, IBM's Kelleher says.

"Part of the strategy is not just the strategy of migrating end users and their applications," he says. "To take it to the next level is to think about file fidelity and document format."

A Linux desktop and its Windows-compatible, or nearly-compatible, applications may run well in a lab and provide low cost of ownership, but "it won't really meet the needs of the end-user . . . if you're in a big organization and the fonts don't come across on 10,000 documents. That's a substantial issue."

6. Don't have an agenda

"Our goal is to go ahead push out desktop Linux to users, but it's not a fanatical movement," O'Connor says. "Our IT department is philosophical about going 100% open source, but there are some very real-world constraints we're working with."

Instead of ordering 200 workstations with Linux preloaded, O'Connor is deploying a very limited number of desktops to a select group of office administrators. O'Connor says he and his staff avoid disparaging or promoting one operating system over another, and letting small groups of end-users see for themselves the differences, ask questions, and make suggestions on what might make it easier for them to use Linux.