wow, everybody sure likes me :-)
I see @deegee replies... :-)
Sorry, it would take me too long to reply to each comment individually.
The facts are people, there is more free software for Windows than Linux, there is a wider variety of hardware and software support for Windows, etc.
You can argue all you want, but the fact is that overall Linux is not a better platform when ALL things are considered. And any corporate CTO, IT, etc. worth half his salt will know this.
Check out SourceForge (~50/50), CodeProject, or just google it, and I guarantee you will find more free applications and code for Windows on a wider variety of application levels than for any other platform out there.
Re: all the thrashing I got regarding Linux source.
Let's say I have a small company with 5000 XP desktops running Office and SQL doing document and data processing, and 5 2k3 file servers. The hardware can be Dell or whoever you prefer.
Name me 1 (one) plausible, common, often-encountered reason why I would ever require the source code for the OS's. And I don't mean some made-up cr*p.
What "little problem" am I going to fix in an app like Word or Excel, let alone in the OS kernel? C'mon, put your code where your mouth is.
And even if you did come up with one half-crazy example, show me any regular office worker or joe-IT person who will be able to successfully patch anything in a Linux Kernel without years of prior coding experience.
The "oh but someone else in the community may have already coded it" is totally lame. If it is a common serious OS bug, then no doubt MS has addressed it; if it was a feature request for the apps, then use Office macros/scripts or for anything a bit more involved download the FREE VSExpress and throw whatever simple utility you need together in VB or C#.
Everyone in the Windows community seems to get along fine without the OS source code. I don't see corporations grinding to a halt because they don't have the OS source, and I've never seen that point listed on any feature request by companies looking to buy.
Since so many of the Linux-fanbois are stuck on OpenOffice, well you can get that for Windows as well. Most of what is available on Linux is also available on Windows also for free. So if I'm stuck on 'have-to-have' OO, then I pay $50 per workstation to get Windows OEM on it and run OO. I have a better OS with more overall support and a better GUI and user experience, and I can still run OO. And down-time is a non-issue for any good corporate structure regardless of OS, so don't bother trying that in the Linux vs Windows.
For the typical Linux comeback of "what can Word do as a wordprocessor that any other wordprocessor like OO can't, it's just text". Office has other apps as well...
Regarding the comment about the Linux apps getting tested before put into the distro. Is that supposed to also mean that it is good software? Sorry, but at least 90% of all of the Linux software I have looked at in more than 15 years of working with Linux is pure cr*p. I'm not saying that it is bad code or algorithms, I'm saying that the developer(s) need to learn about usability.
I agree that this does also happen on Windows apps, but my point is that this is a non-discussion as it is meaningless.
Regarding the comments of "I/my xxx switched to Ubuntu and now it loads and runs much faster than Windows".
This is not proof of anything... maybe in your specific case it was faster, that doesn't mean it will be for everyone else. I dual-boot W7RC and Ubuntu on an Atom 330 MiniCube system dedicated to surfing. Ubuntu is almost unusable on this since the UI is so terribly slow. W7 using its Aero acceleration is easily 4x faster. And looks better. And has more features.
"Free" is not free if the installation/deployment/maintenance is more time on Linux than on Windows. Time = Money. The Linux community so badly needs to learn this.
I'm not a newb people, I've been doing corp. IT and software dev for the last 15 years and before that I did 15 years of IC and hardware design, assembler OS development, embedded systems, HDA, etc. (yes, I'm an old guy)
The main software that I have been using on my desktops for the past few years are: MSOffice, 3DS Max 200x, Adobe Audition, CorelSuite, VisualStudio 200x (yes, all legal copies).
If any Linux person can show me free or even cost Linux platform software that is equal or better than all of these for features and usability, I'll not only switch completely to Linux, but I'll send them $1000.
If not, then STFU and GTFO because you just proved my point from my earlier post that you had flamed (I stated that Linux is limited on what you can do with it). Feel free to go up and read it again.
Two of the main reasons why Linux will never grow to a large user adoption are: the community is stuck on "free" and GPL so the majority of software developers won't touch it; the community is spending too much time and resources re-inventing the wheel over and over as each little dev group releases "their" version of this-or-that with the net result that forward movement takes years/decades.
I am not against Linux, I currently have it on one of my desktops, and have used it on previous systems as well over the years. It's use for me has been slowly retired to secondary basic desktop surfing as it has been easier and cheaper simply to move all other desktops and servers to Windows.