3 ms·

> The common reason why people tend to stick to Windows is games For home users perhaps. Enterprise users are often locked into ERP clients, for instance, that

> The common reason why people tend to stick to Windows is games For home users perhaps. Enterprise users are often locked into ERP clients, for instance, that are Windows only. But the real killer reason enterprises use Windows is Active Directory. Simple GUI SSO and policy based management. For instance I could have a white-list that didn't have this adware on it and could apply it by group-policy...

Fnoord 8y ago
Active Directory is just a fancy name for LDAP, Kerberos, and DNS (often in combination with CIFS). There's no reason why you cannot use an equiv in a partly or pure Linux/UNIX environment. And indeed, there are many partly Linux/UNIX environments where the servers are running on Linux/UNIX yet the clients are running on Windows. The killer feature of Windows is that people are used to running it as desktop, meaning a less steep learning curve. Another one to add to the list of features is Exchange, but even that has *NIX alternatives.
- Conan_Kudo 8y ago
  I've found that FreeIPA tends to be a fantastic replacement: https://www.freeipa.org/ https://www.freeipa.org/ If you're using Red Hat/Fedora GNOME desktops, you can pair that with Fleet Commander to set up desktop policy: https://fleet-commander.org/ https://fleet-commander.org/ At some point soon, I expect it to work for SUSE and Mageia systems, too. I currently run this on a Fedora Server setup to pair with some Fedora Workstations I manage.
- minimaul 8y ago
  Except AD lets you do an awful lot more than this with Group Policy - you can configure and enforce endless amounts of settings on client machines from the simple - wallpaper for example - to software installs to executable restrictions... This is a big plus for locking down mostly untrusted users (eg average employees in a larger enterprise). Edited to fix stupid autocorrect.
- sk5t 8y ago
  Group Policy (which is really a mostly-unrelated thing propagated through AD) is probably the hardest-to-replace part of the equation.
- jimnotgym 8y ago
  > Active Directory is just a fancy name for LDAP, Kerberos, and DNS (often in combination with CIFS). I don't quite agree, Active Directory is an easy to learn and deploy implementation of LDAP, Kerberos, and DNS (often in combination with CIFS) with a friendly GUI interface. It also adds Group Policy, which is less simple to replicate on Linux. Then it adds a huge pool of admins which have been through the vendor supplied training process. I can show people how to create a user and add them to my company defaults in minutes, and not just because they are familiar with Windows, but because they are familiar with the desktop metaphor I am a keen Linux user, I am typing this on Linux in fact. We have lots of processes running on Linux in fact. But I cannot replace the ease of AD in Linux. And more than that, our ERP client only runs on Windows...

Fnoord 8y ago

Active Directory is just a fancy name for LDAP, Kerberos, and DNS (often in combination with CIFS). There's no reason why you cannot use an equiv in a partly or pure Linux/UNIX environment. And indeed, there are many partly Linux/UNIX environments where the servers are running on Linux/UNIX yet the clients are running on Windows. The killer feature of Windows is that people are used to running it as desktop, meaning a less steep learning curve. Another one to add to the list of features is Exchange, but even that has *NIX alternatives.

Conan_Kudo 8y ago
I've found that FreeIPA tends to be a fantastic replacement: https://www.freeipa.org/ https://www.freeipa.org/ If you're using Red Hat/Fedora GNOME desktops, you can pair that with Fleet Commander to set up desktop policy: https://fleet-commander.org/ https://fleet-commander.org/ At some point soon, I expect it to work for SUSE and Mageia systems, too. I currently run this on a Fedora Server setup to pair with some Fedora Workstations I manage.
minimaul 8y ago
Except AD lets you do an awful lot more than this with Group Policy - you can configure and enforce endless amounts of settings on client machines from the simple - wallpaper for example - to software installs to executable restrictions... This is a big plus for locking down mostly untrusted users (eg average employees in a larger enterprise). Edited to fix stupid autocorrect.
sk5t 8y ago
Group Policy (which is really a mostly-unrelated thing propagated through AD) is probably the hardest-to-replace part of the equation.
jimnotgym 8y ago
> Active Directory is just a fancy name for LDAP, Kerberos, and DNS (often in combination with CIFS). I don't quite agree, Active Directory is an easy to learn and deploy implementation of LDAP, Kerberos, and DNS (often in combination with CIFS) with a friendly GUI interface. It also adds Group Policy, which is less simple to replicate on Linux. Then it adds a huge pool of admins which have been through the vendor supplied training process. I can show people how to create a user and add them to my company defaults in minutes, and not just because they are familiar with Windows, but because they are familiar with the desktop metaphor I am a keen Linux user, I am typing this on Linux in fact. We have lots of processes running on Linux in fact. But I cannot replace the ease of AD in Linux. And more than that, our ERP client only runs on Windows...