Institute for Advanced Professional Studies

Linux Training Survey Results* - March 2005


  • Contacts reported flat training activity for Red Hat Linux in March 2005 as compared to the year-ago period. Some contacts feel that the release of Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL) 4 may cause an up-tick in training activity. Many contacts feel that Red Hat specific training will be flat-to-down in the next three months, while others felt there may be a slight up-tick in activity due to seasonality and the release of newer RHEL 4.

  • Training seems to be a fairly even mix between developer and administrative courses, thus indicating balanced adoption of Linux. Some contacts indicated strength in developer courses while others claimed administrative training to be more in-demand. Despite the challenging training environment surrounding Red Hat, Linux training in general is steadily rising and anticipated to continue its strength. Interestingly, Linux training is trending towards a focus in specific areas rather than "broad introductions" to Linux. One contact noted that in the past everyone that came in for Linux training had little-to-no experience with it, and now almost everyone that comes in is familiar with Linux to a certain degree.

  • Red Hat seems to be losing training momentum to other Linux distributions, especially to SuSE Linux and Debian Linux as customers are looking for other mature Linux alternatives. According to contacts, Red Hat may be able to maintain its position in Linux for the short-term because companies may not be switching from one distribution to another. Contacts report, however, that simply adopting Linux does not guarantee savings. In one example, a company was switching back to Windows throughout the company because Linux did not accomplish the job without a highly trained development staff with expertise in Linux, which was hard to find. Many contacts feel that SUSE will become the distribution leader because of their relationships and experience dealing with companies. In addition, SUSE is ahead in the number of applications (through Ximian) it has and the quality of integration of those applications. One contact stated, "They [Novell] have a reputation that their products just work!"

  • Red Hat is losing developer activity to Gentoo Linux, which may impact Red Hat's future business. Contacts are reporting that Gentoo Linux is gaining momentum with open-source developer community because of its technology, access and discussion forums.

*Excerpts from a copyrighted report prepared by FTN Midwest Research and distributed by IAPS with their permission. The views expressed in the above excerpts were drawn solely by FTN Midwest Research and do not necessarily reflect the views of IAPS.

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