From: Michael Hanke Date: Tue, 28 Jun 2011 03:23:38 +0000 (-0400) Subject: Survey paper blog. X-Git-Url: https://git.donarmstrong.com/?a=commitdiff_plain;ds=sidebyside;h=be429a487f6102677a2a0daf26d2dc91c40009cf;p=neurodebian.git Survey paper blog. --- diff --git a/sphinx/blog/2011/2011-06-27_software_survey.rst b/sphinx/blog/2011/2011-06-27_software_survey.rst new file mode 100644 index 0000000..eb6b9bb --- /dev/null +++ b/sphinx/blog/2011/2011-06-27_software_survey.rst @@ -0,0 +1,39 @@ +:date: 2011-06-27 23:00:00 +:tags: debian, neuroscience, survey + +Neuroscience runs on GNU/Linux +============================== + +While everybody else is waiting for Linux to become the standard on the +desktop, in the field of neuroscience research we have made this step already +-- so silently that we haven't even realized it ourselves. + +In the NeuroDebian project we were trying to figure out what software would +need to be integrated into Debian to have a maximum impact on enhancing its +utility as a research platform. So we ran a survey, asking people to tell us +what software they use in their research and what platform they run it on. We +also asked people to describe their personal preferences regarding a computing +environment and how that might differ from the computing platforms they are +institutionally provided with. + +The main result of this survey was very simple and pretty surprising (even to +us): Despite common believe, GNU/Linux is the current standard computing +platform in neuroscience -- and that is both on the big compute clusters +**and** on the laptop and desktop. It turns out that researchers on GNU/Linux +are not only the majority, they are also much happier with what they get, and +spend less time on non-research maintenance tasks than the guys who are still +stuck with Windows. + +It was also nice to see that Debian-based systems are preferred by +neuroscientists among GNU/Linux distributions for their personal computing +environments and that even proportions of Red Hat and Debian-based systems +together represent the vast majority of GNU/Linux deployments in institutional +computing infrastructure. + +Well done Debian! + +The results have just been accepted for publication in the journal `Frontiers +in Neuroinformatics `_. A link to +the manuscript, the original survey form, collected data, as well as +supplementary analysis results are available at: +http://neuro.debian.net/survey/2011/