Well, progamatically there isn't much wrong from the "Linux as your OS"
perspective. I think the other areas of objections are in implementation and
support for "small" scale (<10 units) installs:
1) Thin clients aren't much cheaper than full systems and require
significant
servers.
2) Trouble shooting and support move form the widely understood
hardware/os
layer and into the less well known network and boot protocol layer.
3) Folks still perfer to be lemmings (they want windoze crap).
These are more business resons than technical, but they are all significant
impariments to the LTSP concept in SMB* adoption of LTSP (#3 is a linux in
general point but very significant for SMB). Here are the ways I have
addressed each in my plan:
1) LTSP5 to the rescue. Build full clients but make them FAT. ADM
Athelon or
bigger, >512MB ram (prefer 1GB). Leave out things that aren't needed like HD.
CD, floppy. Use inexpensive PXE capable MOBO to avoid unneeded costs. 5
systems plus server that will handle more ~15 clients <$2500 USD.
2) Buy a support contract (that is what I do but not for LTSP
specifically).
I "give you the HW" (no appreciable mark up) and you pay a support fee. Now
the get a veteran Linux/Solaris/Network guy, for less than the cost of a high
school nerd.
3) Use KDE and listen to them say "You didn't tell us these were Apple
Macs!!" It still amazes me how little folks consider that Apple is just as
incompatible with winblows as Linux. Once you explain this concept most folks
start asking the real questions:
Show me the word processor.
Show me the spread sheet.
Show me a photoshop type thing.
As a terminal server implementation LTSP is the bomb. As a computer
environment it suffers from the stock Linux hindrances as well as the added
complexity of being "unknown" technology.
Hope this helps.
Jaysen
* SMB is the glossy rag sheet way of referring to "Small to Medium Business"
and is the big buzz word in MS IT right now. Sure woudl be nice if the chose
acronyms that were not already used for protocols!!!
On Sunday 18 February 2007 06:48 am, Ben Green wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I am writing a best pratice document around LTSP. I am having trouble with
> the section on situations where LTSP is inappropriate. I have been
> advocating it for so long I can't really see and disadvantages in most
> situations, and many I could have sighted are removed using LTSP-5.0.
>
> What I have so far is:
>
> Reason against using it for a particular user are:
> * Particular legacy applications need supporting
> * Very high performance multimedia tasks are being undertaken such as
> # live music performance
> # video editing
>
> Has anyone got any more key areas where LTSP is weak? Other people I have
> asked have mentioned things like portability and remote access, though I am
> really having trouble finding an area where there isn't a simple solution.
>
> Cheers
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