Interesting. 10 years ago, printing and scanning from Linux was just agonizing. But today, I actually find Ubuntu 10.10 almost as easy as the MacOS: I ask it to look for new printers, it gives me list of printers on the network, and I choose the one I want. Everything just works. Similarly, the Gnome scanning application is a lovely way to make PDFs.
This usually surprises the Windows users, who were telling me, "Oh, you're going to have figure out where the CD is, and install some software, and you may have problems with <X>..."
Now, I'm sure that there are other printers and network configurations where Ubuntu will fail. But for the most part, they've done a great job.
On the other hand, I do need to keep MS Office around for marking up contracts. Open Office doesn't support Microsoft's Track Changes feature, which is a dealbreaker.
The Foreign Office started migrating its servers to Linux in 2001 and since 2005 has also used open source software such as Firefox, Thunderbird and OpenOffice on its desktop systems.
Even in 2005, configuring printers in Linux was painful. And a big government bureaucracy cannot be deploying every distro-du-jour to keep up with improvements... most comparable Windows shops are still running XP.
One thing that I think a lot of tech folks don't appreciate is how much business generally craves reports and printing. Its just reality, utopian dreams of a "paperless office" notwithstanding.
I worked at a company that built a web-based system for a government agency. One thing we did, with EVERY release and EVERY new feature was include new or updated reporting (Crystal Reports) that paralleled the new features. Developers hated working with Crystal and hated doing report work in general. But the customer LOVED it.
This usually surprises the Windows users, who were telling me, "Oh, you're going to have figure out where the CD is, and install some software, and you may have problems with <X>..."
Now, I'm sure that there are other printers and network configurations where Ubuntu will fail. But for the most part, they've done a great job.
On the other hand, I do need to keep MS Office around for marking up contracts. Open Office doesn't support Microsoft's Track Changes feature, which is a dealbreaker.