Dell's Dance with Linux

According to a recent post on the official Dell blog, Dell's relationship with Linux is a serious one. What started as an experiment, has grown into a full blown movement and agent for change. Michael Dell is one of our most recent Linux converts by using a Linux notebook himself.

The article says that "Dell does have plans to offer Linux to more consumers in additional locations outside the United States". It is important to provide Linux Dells outside of the US in order for Linux users to purchase these machines. I'd like to buy a Linux Dell to support Dell in it's dance with Linux but I am unable to. I welcome this decision as I had also voted for this idea at the IdeaStorm website.

Furthermore, the article claims that they will "also offer Ubuntu to small business customers in the future". There were some initial glitches where some people were not allowed to buy Linux machines for their small businesses. They were not allowed to use company cards nor company addresses. This irked some customers. Hopefully, this change will encourage more companies to deploy Linux enterprise wide.

In addition, there are rumours that HP will also start deploying Ubuntu Linux in it's consumer lines. I guess Dell's Linux sales must be doing fairly well. So well that it's making it a permanent venture and attracting it's main competitor into thinking about joining the dance as well.

Finally, in order to illustrate how seriously Dell is taking Linux, the staff have created this little official video.