世論 What Japan Thinks

japan.internet.com, in conjunction with JR Tokai Express Research, at the start of June looked at what engineers thought about changing to Linux. They interviewed 330 engineers (not just software, I don’t think), with 90.6% male (a sad reflection on women in the workplace), with 12.7% in their twenties, 43.9% in their thirtiees, 37.6% in their forties, 5.5% in their fifties, and just one person, or 0.3% of the sample, aged sixty or over.

The reasons for people refusing to use Linux on their primary desktop seem interesting (just for the record, I would probably put myself in this category); the top answer, the lack of usable applications, doesn’t mention what sort of stuff people feel is missing. Next, Windows (Microsoft Office, I suppose) document compatibility; if my workplace is anything to go by, there are a number of (needlessly, IMO) complex macro-based documents that we use, which, I hear, causes major problems for the free software alternatives. The third reason, difficulty in set up and settings is mostly untrue, although there are problems if you have an unsupported device that needs a manual install. Other applications often don’t stick a nice friendly icon on your menus when they finish, which is a genuine problem.

Q1: At work, what operating systems do you use as a client or a stand-alone machine? (Sample size=330, multiple answer)

	Votes	Percentage
Windows	327	99.0%
Linux	43	13.0%
UNIX	39	10.9%
Macintosh	26	7.9%
Don’t use a PC	2	0.6%
Other	1	0.3%

Q2: Do you think you could use desktop Linux as a replacement for your current Windows, etc machine? (Sample size=330)

Yes, currently using	3.9%
Yes, I’d use if I had the chance	33.6%
No (to Q3)	35.8%
Don’t know	26.7%

I presume the difference between 13.0% reporting using Linux in Q1 versus 3.9% reporting it in Q2 is the difference between using Linux as a primary machine (eg document preparation in Open Office instead of Microsoft Office) in Q2 versus having Linux installed for application development or other specific uses.

Q3: For what reason won’t you use desktop Linux as a replacement for Windows? (Sample size=118, multiple answer)

	Votes	Percentage
Few usable applications	81	68.6%
Not very compatible with Windows document formats	62	52.5%
Set up or settings are hard to do	47	39.8%
Linux is suited for use as a server	31	26.3%
Hard to use	27	22.9%
Costs for effective support, etc are expensive	27	22.9%
Worried about security	4	3.4%
Don’t know	1	0.8%
Other	19	16.1%