Today Dell released a survey to all of its users who are interested in Linux on the company Direct2Dell blog site. This survey is designed to..err..survey its users as to their preferences between varying versions of Linux, so the company can best accommodate the largest group of Linux users.

As many of you may have read here recently, Dell has been swaying back and forth in the favors of the Linux community, first promising pre-installs on its business machines, and then revoking that promise just days later.

All the while, half-hearted attempts at parlay were made with promises of multiple Linux OS’s being certified to run on Dell corporate machines, but the Linux community only wagged its collectively angry finger at Michael Dell.

Dell is doing the right thing by rapidly making amends; most of the survey questions are indicative of soon-to-be-implemented ideas, such as whether Linux users prefer Ubuntu or Fedora.

A Dell software architect by the name of Matt Domsch, who contributes to the company blog, said, “Taking a few minutes to complete this survey will help us define our forthcoming Linux-based system offerings…We’ll take some time to analyze your feedback and work to provide the platforms and options you choose.”

It seems that the survey website is overloaded with traffic, which seems to be a good sign that the Linux community is eager to assist Dell in its implementation of the popular open-source OS.

Though Dell has been going through a severe financial slump, a large percentage of which can be chalked up to the pre-Vista release dark ages, Michael Dell is ambitiously attempting to nurse his company back to health.

Although many feel that Dell cannot overcome the challenge of creating short-term profit to save this year’s numbers, attempting to gain the support of the Linux community might be step in the right direction.

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Entry was posted on Tuesday, March 13th, 2007 at 12:28 pm under Linux.

Read more entries by Triston McIntyre.
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