1.4  Client environments

The choice of an appropriate client platform for a particular set of users can 

depend on their functional role and the applications they must use to accomplish 

their objectives. 

More and more line of business applications are being developed to depend less 

on the underlying operating system by taking advantage of open standards and 

pervasive technologies such as Web browsers. For economical reasons, many 

enterprises are quickly moving toward Service Oriented Architectures (SOAs) 

that allow them to compose applications out of existing services. This allows and 

encourages the reuse of application logic and data across the enterprise and 

even between enterprises. 

SOAs are often implemented through Web services. Web services is an 

emerging set of standards that ensure interoperability by using such common 

technologies as Extensible Markup Language (XML), Simple Object Access 

Protocol (SOAP), Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP), and others.

Clients for applications based on Web services are often written in Java  or 

based on Web browsers accessing portals. This makes the underlying operating 

system for clients transparent to the application and allows flexibility of choice, 

based on cost, support, flexibility, support for open standards, and so on.

This kind of environment makes for a good objective toward which many 

enterprises are moving. However, it will not happen overnight. There are still 

legacy applications that must be accessed and used as they are written today. 

Therefore, it is important to understand what functions are required by a client 

platform to meet the needs of users today, while keeping an eye on the direction 

of technologies and enterprise architectures. This helps to ensure that the 

choices made today provide the capabilities that are required now and support 

the requirements of future architectures.

1.5  Why Linux

Linux has evolved into a powerful desktop operating system that can run on 

already existing hardware. In many cases, it requires less memory and 

processing power than other alternatives to provide similar performance on the 

client. 

Because of its core design and open nature, Linux can be easily customized. 

Linux is available under the GNU General Public License

2

 (GPL) agreement and 

can be obtained for free. However, most enterprises buy a Linux distribution to 

 Chapter 1. Introduction 

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