Linux in the Corporate World Maintainability is always a question when using open-source products. For us, the question is easy because our network management services would not exist without open-source tools. Using it to make the network information available on the Web would have been extremely expensive to set up and maintain. Anyone with minimal Perl experience will be able to maintain these scripts. We don't use compiled languages and keep our scripts as simple as possible to ease maintenance.
Security is another issue that needs constant attention.
In security audits, I have noticed consultants give extra attention to each Linux box found in the corporate Intranet. Fast-developing Linux software may introduce new security problems, and the powerful features of Linux give both the cracker and the administrator the potential to generate security holes. Summary Our customers feel they can do their job better now that they can access real-time network information with their browser. A telephone call to a human operator sitting in front of his expensive network management workstation cannot give them this service. We are expanding our use of the Linux platform into new applications such as directory services, log file management and network traffic analysis.