I work as a web developer for a large software house and have been told to move away from using Microsoft technologies (Windows Servers, IIS, ASP, SQL Server, etc). Instead, I have got to use the likes of Linux, Apache, php/jsp, etc.

Being the pesinist that I am, I see this as real pain in the backside rather than an opportunity to increase my skillset.

So, please guys, any hints, tips, advice, links,etc would be much appreciated. Also, comparisons between MS and the other technologies would be great. What about getting up to speed? Do you recommend books, web tutorials or classroom based training ???

Finally, what do you reckon - is this going to be the pain that I expect or a great opportunity ???

Thanks for that Michael......

If I'm right, asp can run on Apache - anyone had any experience with this & is it 100% compatible with code written for IIS ???

ASP is crippled on Apache.

If you're a vary good MS technolgy developer you're better off to build on your background and move along to the ASP.NET technologies than go with the *nix stuff.

This'll probably start a flame war, but the *nix world falls into two categories... low end development which is basically around scripting languages and high end stuff around JAVA/J2EE/XML and application serers. (Although JAVA/J2EE runs on MS platforms as well).

MS technologies are pretty much moving into .Net to handle both ends of the spectrum and it does a very credible job of that. If I were a developer with a MS background, I would build upon that by getting heavily into .NET and XML in order to position myself for a larger job market - low and high end.

My $.02

No flame here - I agree. So far the biggest problem with the *nix community is that they insist on creating overly complicated ways to do simple tasks. MS excels at simplifying things. A quick look at any MS IF structure vs. any *nix based language will immediately reveal how intuitive MS is and how counter-intuitive *nix stuff is. e.g. Give two logically identical pieces of code to a "layman" and scanf him to printf what it means...

As for opportunity, well... yeah, it's a good opportunity. Although I'm no *nix fan. Mostly because of the snotty attitude you get from a lot of them. For such a bunch of smart guys, I keep hearing some real silly stuff. BTW - there are MORE  security holes in the *nix platform than there are in MS --> Check CERT. However... MS holes are pretty damn big

Oh, and yeah... I'm in the middle of cross-grading to *nix as well...

Whatever works though...

I've been working *nix for 20 years, So I'm a little partial to it. It's much better than it used to be as far as being intuitive goes. I think that the detail you have get into has it's advantages. Sometime MS does a little to much handholding.

I agree with what you said about security. Nothing is safe out of the box. Everything has to be tuned. One of the problems with MS is the script kiddies get a hold of something and suddenly you're bombarded. With *nix, the attacks tend to be fewer, but more dangerous and harder to detect unless it's something overt. On the other hand, You can usually run with only the pieces of the OS you absolutely need which limits your exposure.

im currently setting up a redhat webserver (Apache 2.0) and have found a free asp component for Apache its called iASP when ive got it all installed i will let you know how good it is, and if you can run wwf on it.

Like Gary im being forced to move away from MS and into Linux which i dont mind at all as linux is by far the better server, but need to migrate  without rewriting all my sites in php or equiv.