Ask Noah Broadwater why the nonprofit Sesame Workshop is migrating as many of its applications as possible to Linux, and you’ll get three compelling reasons. “Cost, cost and cost,” said Broadwater, the vice president of information services for the New York-based media organization.

Since 2000, Sesame Workshop has been running some variant of Linux, beginning with Debian at its web infrastructure co-location facility and, in 2003, switching to SUSE. Currently, the company is running SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10.1 from Novell on 10 servers for some of its Web and back-end applications. In moving a subset of these applications that were running on three Sun Sparc machines to two Xen-based virtualized x86 machines running Linux, Broadwater estimates he has saved $60,000.

Broadwater aims to use Linux to propel more savings in the future. Within three years - once Sesame Workshop completes an overhaul of its enterprise resource management (ERP) system - Broadwater hopes to retire the Sun Sparc machines running Solaris that hosts the organization’s ERP. “If we can eliminate the 20 Solaris servers that cost $24,000 each, and replace them with fewer, virtualized Linux servers that cost $6,000 each, that’s quite a bit of money,” Broadwater said.

While cost is certainly the predominant factor for migrating to Linux, it’s not the only one. Broadwater says that any one of his four-person engineering staff is capable of administering Linux servers, enabling him to get the most out of personnel resources. The same can’t be said in terms of administering the Solaris, Windows or NetWare servers running at Sesame Workshop. In addition, Linux will run on the same x86-based hardware, enabling Broadwater to simplify the spare parts inventory he will need to keep on hand.

While Broadwater is a true fan of Linux, Sesame Workshop’s IT is still very much a mixed shop. Currently, the organization has 20 Solaris boxes, 10 Linux boxes (which are virtualized and provide the processing equivalent of 30 servers), 10 Windows boxes and a handful of NetWare servers that Broadwater is migrating to Linux.

With an ERP upgrade on the horizon, Broadwater is basing his decision on the ability to migrate to Linux. For this reason, ERP systems from Oracle and SAP are the leading candidates. “Wherever we can migrate to Linux, we are migrating,” Broadwater said. Choosing applications that facilitate such a migration is central to Sesame Workshop’s IT strategy.