Zen and the Art of Nonprofit Technology

In the course of working with some clients, I have been in the process of trying to find technology providers, specifically, server, desktop and network support organizations, that support Linux. Several years ago, they were very few and very far between - mostly individuals who focused solely on Linux. Now, there are many more, and traditional Windows shops are beginning to either add staff who know Linux, or learn it themselves. But there still isn’t a lot out there.

At least in Massachusetts, the majority of nonprofits work with network support people who don’t focus totally on nonprofit organizations (there are some wonderful exceptions, however, of companies that focus on the sector.) The good thing is that since the business world seems to be moving ahead much more quickly on Linux and FOSS adoption, companies that work in both the for-profit and nonprofit sectors are gaining Linux expertise - expertise that nonprofit organizations can benefit from. But I think more is needed.

One of the interesting dynamics of any technology provider of any stripe is the way they choose the technology they will focus on and support. I think this is something that many nonprofits, especially those without in-house technology expertise aren’t that aware of. No technology vendor, even the largest ones, can support everything. Most support only a subset (sometimes a very small subset) of the available options. This is because all providers start out with some personal experiences or biases, and most are too busy taking care of clients to spend lots and lots of time gaining new expertise in a broad range of topics - they need to focus. And even if they hire expertise, there has to be enough overlap for synergy to happen. Most of the time, for clients, this doesn’t matter. Sometimes it does matter, both to an organization that might use that vendor, and to the vendor themselves in terms of viability of their business model.

I came across this discussion of Linux distributions and their strengths and weaknesses in terms of vendors who might resell Linux. It was interesting not as much for its focus on the presence or absence of “channel programs” but for the way it characterized the qualities of the different distributions in terms of the business model of reselling Linux. In a sense, of course, if you are a technology provider and you install Linux on some servers or desktops in an organization, you are “reselling” Linux. But since most Linux distributions are free (as in beer), that’s not really quite the way to look at it.

So I thought I would take from their model, and instead, talk about distributions from the perspective of the needs of a small to medium-sized technology support organization (for profit or nonprofit) that serve nonprofits. I’m really interested in helping technology providers get up to speed, so that the amount of support available for nonprofits using Linux (and open source in general) increases. If you are a provider, please feel free to email me if you want more info or help and support in moving forward.

Ubuntu

As this article states, Ubuntu is a very popular distribution right now, and Canonical is working hard to get Ubuntu in as wide a range of hands as possible. The basic philosophy of Ubuntu “Linux for human beings” is certainly one that makes sense for a lot of nonprofits, and it also has made Ubuntu the easiest distribution to set up and use, especially on the desktop.

Ubuntu also has also focused a lot of effort on building community, and has, hands down, the most vibrant, helpful and deep community of any Linux distribution. They have mentorship programs, they are building regional networks, they have almost unparalleled bulletin board, email and IRC community support. This community is one of Ubuntu’s great strengths, in terms of the ability to find helpful and sometimes instant support (via an incredibly active set of IRC channels.) And, Canonical also provides professional support. Canonical has a lot of connections in the nonprofit sector.

In my opinion, it’s a good distribution to start with if you are just beginning to learn Linux, and thinking about adding it to your business because of the vibrant and deep community that is there to provide support. But, as the article linked above says, they don’t have an official affiliate program, so it will take some shoe leather on your part to build the business aspects.

Red Hat

Red Hat is the old standby, and is in the server rooms of many nonprofits all over the country. The old adage “no one ever got fired for buying IBM” which, of course morphed into “no one ever got fired for buying Microsoft” in the Linux world might be “no one ever got fired for implementing Red Hat.”

Red Hat has a well-built business of providing enterprise level support for its distribution. It was the first Linux distribution to make it big in the business world. Its focus is on servers, and Fedora, it’s “community version” does certainly benefit from Red Hat’s development expertise and resources, but it doesn’t have as vibrant a community as Ubuntu, for instance.

However, because it is so common, and there is reasonable community support, and because of the strength of Red Hat, it might be a good choice, especially if a technology support organization works with larger organizations.

Debian

I’m a real fan of Debian, and have been using it on the server-side for a very long time. It is a rock-solid distribution with what is arguably the best package management system. (Ubuntu is based on Debian). It has a vibrant user community. Debian is the favorite of most serious Linux geeks. The Debian community is dogmatic in their approach to licensing - nothing in Debian depends on software that is not truly free (as in ‘libre’.)

Debian used to be one of the most difficult distributions to install, but that is no longer the case, so it is definitely a distribution that you could try as a Linux beginner (although beware that the community isn’t going to be as friendly to newcomers as the Ubuntu community.)

I think it’s certainly a possible choice, especially if you’ve got a philosophical approach that’s resonant with Debian (a lot of activist technology organizations use Debian) and have (or can find) the expertise needed. But it is a bit less known and popular, especially with the presence of Ubuntu, which has most of the strengths (in a technical sense,) and none of the weaknesses (in a business sense) of Debian.

CentOS

I’m only including this in my review because I have come across a surprising number of technology providers that have chosen to focus on CentOS. I had not heard of it until then. CentOS is a bit of an odd beast. It is Red Hat, with branding removed. In their words: “CentOS is an Enterprise-class Linux Distribution derived from sources freely provided to the public by a prominent North American Enterprise Linux vendor. CentOS conforms fully with the upstream vendors redistribution policy and aims to be 100% binary compatible.”

So they take RHEL (Red Hat Enterprise Linux) and repackage it. So it has everything RHEL has except … Red Hat support. Which, of course, is why most people buy Red Hat, instead of installing Fedora or Debian, etc. I’m not sure what I think of this. I guess it makes sense at one level - here is a way for a vendor to provide basically Red Hat without having to either provide a markup in reselling it, or charge a nonprofit for it.

What makes RHEL “Enterprise” is basically the support. That’s about it. Debian or Ubuntu are just as “Enterprise-class” as RHEL without Red Hat behind it. So CentOS really isn’t any different a choice - unless as an organization you are very familiar with Red Hat, and want to stick with it, but don’t want to pay (or have organizations pay) for it. If you are new to the Linux biz, there isn’t any reason I could see to adopt CentOS.

Novell

I think the article says pretty much everything that needs to be said about Novell, and SUSE Linux. They take directly from the Red Hat playbook, and have a community version called openSUSE. It’s certainly a good option, although in the US, SUSE isn’t very common.

Other Distros

There are, of course five bajillion Linux distributions of varied popularities. Any of which could make a reasonable choice for you as a technology provider (There is a good review in Distrowatch of the top ten distributions.) Only you really know what makes the most sense, given what you want to do with Linux, and what expertise you have on hand. And, luckily, once you’ve learned some Linux, supporting other distributions isn’t such a big deal.

This entry was posted on Sunday, August 12th, 2007 at 12:46 pm and is filed under Linux, Nonprofit Tech. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.