http://www.cioinsight.com/article2/0,3959,209,00.asp
To get a better idea of what this means for CIOs, CIO Insight Deputy Editor Terry A. Kirkpatrick recently convened a roundtable of nine experts to chat about it-corporate IT execs who have deployed Linux, analysts who have studied it, and vendors of both open and proprietary software. If there was consensus in this diverse group, it was this: Open source software should be treated no differently than any other software-the migration, testing and support issues will look familiar. These are the "hidden" costs that could wipe out any cost-savings on price. At the same time, however, there may be unexpected savings on hardware. Beyond the technical issues, though, there are other considerations. Linux is both an operating system and a development model, "a dessert topping and a floor wax," as one roundtable participant put it. Open source comes "shrinkwrapped" in a philosophy of software creation and ownership that is at sharp odds with the prevailing proprietary model, and this continues to stoke a shrill debate between the two camps. Should these "soft" issues matter to a CIO faced with hard business decisions? The discussion began with the issue of cost-the price of open source software being its most notable feature and something that tends to catch the eye of CIOs in these lean times. (continued in article)