Actually that's how it is in most companies that have anyone half competent. I'm sysadmin with a real engineering degree, the engineering degree is used more than the sysadmin hat. Everyone on my network is an engineer or scientist. there is NO WAY i would let these people install their own OS, and we are a small house. At the medium sized engineering firm I was at before this, installing your own OS was a termination offense. Having a pHD and years of experience in field doesn't make you some 3l33t3 4u43 with computers. If a user needed that linux partition they should have come to me first. When you call me a bureacratic fool to the VP because I overwrote it, I will calmly explain to him that your actions put us at risk for a hacker to compromise our systems and steal our exposed IP, or allow a disgruntled employee to steal the VPs email. The VP will calm you down and be polite and tell you to put up with the rules and ask IT to install any operating systems you need. IT will have Root on that box. Then he'll privately tell me that he knows you're being arrogant and that security of IP is priority number one and I should come to him if anyone else is putting the future of the company at risk. "Operating on the premise that all staff are luddites, criminals, or not to be trusted..." Go work some time at an IT helpdesk and you'll realize that this is a good assumption.