Unlocking The Future: Open Source Opportunities In Custom Systems

Given time, however, Dominick Sartorio, president of the Open Solutions Alliance (OSA) and senior director of open source solution provider SpikeSource, sees a great future for open source applications in the custom systems space. He bases his faith not only on the illustrious history of custom systems (Sartorio points out the computers responsible for the lunar landings were custom systems), but on the inherent adaptability and customization open source provides.

"The very first computer systems were, by definition, custom," he said. "You always ran into unique requirements where performance or reliability were such that you couldn't just take it off the shelf, you had to tweak it in some way. Obviously open source makes that really easy."

Sartorio points to the 1990s, when the National Security Agency (NSA) turned to open source to provide a custom system solution. "The NSA had unique requirements regarding security and performance, and no existing operating system met them, out-of-the-box," he said. "But Linux was open source, so they could make their own changes to meet their requirements." When the NSA's changes were contributed back to the community, Red Hat picked them up, and Red Hat Enterprise Linux was the eventual result.

"The main point is that there are diverse requirements out there, and packaged operating systems can't meet all of them," Sartorio said. "But open source allows customers and integrators to make changes themselves, without onerous licensing requirements. Consequently, open source provides system builders with a unique opportunity to deliver custom systems at low cost."

The NSA story, he said, is just one example of this. "The general message is open source makes it really easy to build custom systems, especially down at the operating system or driver level," he said. "A Microsoft cannot think of all the differences someone might need, that level of customization."

Along with the right certifications, Sartorio agreed with Maser that support for open source custom systems is key. "The biggest challenge I've seen is, if I make a change, how do I get it supported on an ongoing basis," he said. "The higher up you go in the stack, the more likely you'll need to make code changes in the average engagement."

Often, solution providers want to do a project for a customer and then move on to the next one, he said. Support issues, which can require considerable additional time and effort, present a challenge. "This is sort of an ongoing pain point for solution providers: The more arcane your requirements, the harder it is to find someone to step up to support," he said. "If the system could go down and it's a mission-critical thing, you may be spending an inordinate amount of time dealing with it."

That's the double-edged sword of open source solutions, he said, but a smart system builder can use the advantages of open source products to the company's advantage. "The strength of open source is it's easier for downstream custom systems builders to make changes, but it's more important for the owners of those projects to make them easily extensible and highly modular," he said. "If it isn't, you're going to lose out to products that make it easier to interoperate and maintain."

Although Sartorio noted it's usually in the enterprise space where custom system builders can take advantage of a company's unique requirements, highly specialized SMBs provide opportunities as well. "The average SMB will have pretty standard requirements for setting up a CRM or something like that," he said. "That's not always true, though—you will find some opportunities at the low end, like when they're required to or they don't have a lot of budget, but the open source option allows more wallet space to make a custom solution."

Swank pointed out as more success stories around open source systems emerge from the enterprise, open source solutions may gain additional prominence, but demand for technicians who can navigate the intricacies of open source operability will also rise. At the same time, he recognizes a push for greater compatibility and interoperability. "It's not an easy skill—you don't just read a book and become a Linux programmer," he said. "You better know what you're doing, but if you have those skills already, the sky is the limit."

Linspire Inc. president and CEO Larry Kettler agreed that open source implementation can be a double-edged sword. As head of the San Diego-based Linux-based OS developer, he said lower cost and stable performance combat the inherent comfort with Microsoft. Penetration into vertical markets remains a challenge. "Where's the verticals?" he asks. "That's the question everyone wants to know the answer to—and that's the problem. It's not defined."

Viral growth is occurring across all markets where people are trying an alternative operating system, Kettler said, but no one is demanding one specific brand of Linux, which results in a "quiet seeding" out to the customer base. "As system builders put together customs solutions they just market to their customers, some of them are meeting a certain profile and are interested in trying [open source software] because it's a new, viable option," he said.

Kettler also brought up the added cost that quality support can bring. "Custom system builders are making sure they select the best Linux OS when they go to market because you want a strong community supporting those new users," he said. "They're making razor-thin margins with their hardware, and multiple support calls just erode those margins. You've got to have a strong, well-known brand and a community behind the brand."

In late January of this year, Linspire announced a Linux OS Build Service designed to help partners shorten time to market and mitigate the expense of building a desktop Linux operating system. Patience is always a necessary quality for a custom builder providing open source solutions. "What they're doing is entering a Microsoft world with a hardware and certification process alone that can be very daunting," Kettler said. "Know your market and set your expectations accordingly. You want to sell it as a solution."

Kettler said system builders need to be able to explain the value of their approach and emphasize the inherent modularization of open source products. "It's partners asking for custom software stacks, specialized applications, the ability to alter the look and feel of the OS," he said. "As the market continues to grow, and as Linux is inherently customizable, why not provide that service to those clients who are looking to create customized solutions for their customers?" he asked.

The infusion of open source products into the custom systems niche will take time, Kettler predicted, and for those companies branching out into Linux or its variants, setting reasonable expectations is critical. "Learn from everything you do, market the products to your customer base, and if you stay consistent, you'll start to carve out a Linux space in your market, and they'll start asking you for more solutions," he said. "The whole idea behind Linux is collaboration—they'll want to hear from you as much as you want to hear from them."