No Wine for Dell Ubuntu Users, Says Shuttleworth

yuna49 writes "News from last week, but still worth noting: Mark Shuttleworth told eWeek in a May 3rd interview that Dell will not include open-source software such as Wine with the PCs it plans to bundle with Ubuntu Linux. Says Shuttleworth: 'I do not want to position Ubuntu and Linux as a cheap alternative to Windows ... While Linux is an alternative to Windows, it is not cheap Windows. Linux has its own strengths, and users should want it because of those strengths and not because it's a cheap copy of Windows ... Often we see proprietary software companies just completely fail to understand not only the motivations of the Linux community, but also the processes. It's very practical, there's a way to get things done, and it's different. The VMware guys have really engaged with us completely and worked to the agenda set by the Linux community, which is not an ideological agenda but a practical one.' Does that mean Wine won't even be listed in the package manager?"

And one of those is

[by Anonymous Coward]

Linux has its own strengths, and users should want it because of those strengths and not because it's a cheap copy of Windows

And one of those strengths is that you can still install WINE after you buy the computer despite the decisions made by a large company or single individual.

Re:And one of those is

[jimstapleton (999106)]

That's an option with any OS though.

I've yet to see a company ship windows with Corel Photopaint, many don't ship with Nero, or McAffee Enterprise. Often the do ship with Adobe Acrobat, but never with Foxit...

And I uninstall acrobat, and then install the rest.

That's the whole point of having a computer, and it can be done with any OS, as long as the software is available.

Now occasionally a new version of one will break the compatability with another, but I've seen that in OSS software, and while yes, I could fix it in OSS software, I don't (and most people) don't have that kind of time to waste for every application they use, and will end up doing the same thing I would with non OSS software - finding versions that do work.

Re:And one of those is

[yahooadam (1068736)]

sudo apt-get install wine

seriously - whats so hard about that ?

TBH i think this is a good idea, why should dell install a boatload of rubbish on your PC, the same goes for windows, you can install it yourself if you want, that's why its a PERSONAL computer

also - although wine is good, it is no alternative to windows yet, its still not simple and easy to use, and its not 100% there, but if you are moving over its definitely a nice way to keep your favorite windows apps going (if they work)

Re:And one of those is

[Robber Baron (112304)]

In fact if it's all the same to you guys, I'd prefer it if Dell DIDN'T bundle their computers with all that useless bloatware that they currently do (not that WINE is useless or bloatware)! It's almost at the point where it's better to wipe the damn thing clean immediately and then re-install the OS from scratch!

PC Decrapifyer

[flyingfsck (986395)]

Well, the PC Decrapifyer makes short shrift of it: http://www.yorkspace.com/2006/08/62 [yorkspace.com]

Re:And one of those is

[Milton Waddams (739213)]

You mean Linux lets you install software now?!?! Wow, maybe this really is the year for Linux on the desktop...

Re:And one of those is

[sgholt (973993)]

I think you and many of the other posters have missed Shuttleworth's point.
He doesn't want linux to be a platform to run windows software. Wine is a great application, but windows software with a few exceptions is never going to run as well as it would on the Windows OS.
That can only hinder linux adoption by those still tied to windows applications.
The key to linux adoption has not changed...we need software companies to make software for linux.

Shuttleworth has put a lot of money into advertising and promotion of linux...he is doing what needs to be done. The more linux users there are, the more interest software companies will take. Wine is a temporary fix to the bigger problem...it will always just be a temporary fix. These things take time but I think his comments do show a good understanding of the real problems.

Re:And one of those is

[sgholt (973993)]

Come on now...try thinking 10 years from now...do you really think linux users will be using wine? I really doubt it...linux is on a long road one that does not end tomorrow. It needs to stand on its own and not rely on the ability to run non-native software. You and many others are blinded by what they need right now...but in the bigger picture it can not remain that way.

Re:And one of those is

[Dan Ost (415913)]

That someone will come and make an even better tool which does run in Linux, thus making wine unnecessary.

I'm trying to decide if that's a presumptuous statement or merely an optimistic one. In either case, it might be true that eventually a better app will be written that runs in Linux, but that doesn't solve my problem right now. If the tool for the job is a Windows app and I'm running Linux, having Wine can make my life easier. Therefore, Wine has value since it helps me solve my problem right now.

The goal is that all the good tools are cross-platform, or at least work on linux

Wouldn't Wine help achieve this goal?
I guess I still don't understand your position.

The real reason is they don't want to support it

[bberens (965711)]

Imagine average joe user calling Dell because [insert Windows app] doesn't work in wine. Dell doesn't want that.

Re:And one of those is

[0racle (667029)]

What in the hell are you talking about? The Ubuntu that will ship not have Wine installed by default. The article does not say it will not have Wine available. You will still be able to launch Aptitude or whatever Ubuntu actually uses and install Wine from the Ubuntu repositories.

Re:And one of those is

[mhall119 (1035984)]

Um, WTF? If Windows doesn't include software I want, I download it and install in. For linux, it's probably in the distro's repository, so downloading and installing it is even easier. If it's not, then I'm back to where I am on Windows, download it and install it.

Now I doubt Ubuntu will setup a different repository for Dell installs, so Wine will likely be only an apt-get away. The announcement is just saying that Wine will not be in the default installation, for the logical reasons given.

But lets say you're right, and Ubuntu doesn't offer it for Dell installs, you just download [winehq.org] it and install it yourself, it'll even handle downloading and installing any dependencies for you.

So the absolute worst case scenario here is that installing software in Ubuntu is as easy as installing software on Windows, but chances are it will be much much easier. Basically everything about your post was FUD, and not even intentional FUD, but ignorant FUD. From someone who claims to be a Linux developer (and a Wine developer too?), I can't fathom how you could not know this.

Re:

[kestasjk (933987)]

The weird thing is WINE wasn't part of the last Ubuntu I installed anyway. Has it become part of the default install since then? If not then why is it a big deal if it won't be installed by default on Dell either?

Re:And one of those is

[mhall119 (1035984)]

Again, WTF?

What happens if you are not included in a distribution (or just as badly, included but packaged wrong or out of date)? As there's a lot of confusion around what this means, it means you aren't apt-gettable by end users. Not in the repositories.

You offer the file for download directly from you. How do you do it in Windows?

That's OK if it's only one distro, but it quickly becomes annoying if it's several.

No it's not, there are about 4 packages you can make that will cover 99% of users: RPM, DEB, TGZ and source. Just configure your build script to make each one every time you build, it's a 1-time cost in effort for the author.

A package for Feisty isn't good enough. You need the last couple of versions as well, because not everybody upgrades at the same time. To do that you need a separate install of each version, and you need to build the package on each install, using multi-boots, or VMware, or chroots, or just relying on volunteers to fill in the gaps for you. So if there are 3 distros you want to support, each with 3 versions in the wild, that's 9 packages you need (therefore 9 independent OS installs).

Only if your program is written to require the latest and greatest versions of dependent libraries, otherwise if Feisty has a binary compatible version of your dependency, you don't need to create a new package. And your autopackage system will improve on this how? You can create a single package that works with multiple incompatible versions of dependent libraries?

Then you have to tell your users how to install it. Look at the complexity of the page you linked to. This is a light year away from "just download and install it yourself".

That is only because WineHQ offers a repository for easy updating. They could just offer the .deb file for you to "just download and install".

See, this is what I have problems with. It's the general design of the software distribution scheme that's bogus. It can never work reliably. It's like Microsoft announcing that Vista will only install software you got from Microsoft Download Center ... nobody would accept that: it doesn't scale, MS aren't trusted to be impartial, etc. It wouldn't work for Microsoft, so why would it work for anybody else

Or, you can just download and install the RPM or DEB. Seriously, how can you not know this?
   

Re:

[Jonner (189691)]

I suspect that the only reason this is being commented on is that if Dell ships machines with an alternative to Windows, some will automatically expect the alternative to be a direct replacement and Wine is an obvious choice to try to replace Windows. Since Wine is available for installation on normal Ubuntu, it would be exceedingly strange if the same weren't true on the Dell machines.

The eWeek article has a bunch of quotes, but it's somewhat difficult to interpret. I am listening to the interview, but it'

Re:

[MadJo (674225)]

But Wine is available in Ubuntu's repositories, so you CAN install it yourself. And adding repositories is easily done (even for a lesser-technical user). (there is even an Ubuntu repository for newer versions of Wine too)

Re:

[popejeremy (878903)]

1. Click on "Applications"
2. Click on "Add/Remove"
3. Choose WINE from the list.

It's not any harder than that. I don't see what you're raising a stink about.

WINE isn't included in the main distribution Ubuntu by default, and there's a good reason. It's still a beta. The current version in Ubuntu is 0.9.36. But anyone who wants to have WINE can add it easily in three, easy-to-understand clicks. Why should Dell do anything differently than the main distribution?

Re:And one of those is

[Narcissus (310552)]

If a package isn't included in Ubuntu, your only option is either to compile it from source (good luck with that if you aren't technical) or using something like an autopackage. Neither Windows nor MacOS X practice this kind of software censorship.

That line intrigued me. This is an honest question: nothing else. Can you explain to me, please, how 'source or autopackage' for Ubuntu (specifically) is different to 'source or installer' for Windows, say? I mean, Windows installers don't magically appear... the developer has to create it, so how is 'requiring' an installer different to 'requiring' an autopackage package (or whatever it's called)?

Hopefully you understand the question... Following on from that: a Windows installer isn't required as you could just put a built executable in a ZIP file and run it like that. But can you not do that in Ubuntu, too (so long as the app is built for Ubuntu)?

I mean, as far as I can see, there are a number of options for Windows: download source, provide a ZIP of the built code or provide an installer, which the developer has to create: it's not magically there. For Ubuntu, you could provide source, a ZIP of the built code or an autopackage (which again is not magic: the developer needs to make it). So how is it that Ubuntu is 'censoring' while Windows is not? The way I see it, Ubuntu is ENABLING by providing a way to install many pre-selected packages while Windows does not. For the situations where a package has not been selected for this 'enablement' (which is the case for all packages in Windows), how is the Ubuntu process any worse than the Windows one?

Re:

[prelelat (201821)]

you do know it takes like 4 clicks to install wine right? It has a package manager that is hard to beat, infact its nicer than installing things on windows sometimes. Go to applications->add/remove->look for wine check it off->click apply. If thats harder than in windows I'll shoot myself in the foot. Granted thats if the repository is there.

Chances are that a user that knows about wine will know how to go through that process and set it up. Why would you setup a system with wine so that you

Re:

[1u3hr (530656)]

Bad journalism: how about "Dell will not include open-source software such as Wine..." which on its face implies that no open source software will be included; which was so absurd I knew it must be wrong. Of course, it's not "open source" that's being excluded, but "emulation" software (yeah, I know what WINE means, eWeek's headline was "No Emulation Software for Dell Systems" so take it up with them).

omg.. you might have d/l it yourself..

[uncledrax (112438)]

Um.. so it's not included? Big deal..

apt-get install wine

done...

What's the problem?

Re:

[itlurksbeneath (952654)]

Nothing really. It's a PR type statement by Mark that Linux is good enough to stand on it's own and if you give it a shot you shouldn't need Wine.

Re:omg.. you might have d/l it yourself..

[HoosierPeschke (887362)]

Clearly, the "problem" is that we, the Linux community, should be trying to "convert" the n00bs out there who don't know what apt-get is. Having WINE preinstalled would help them get over the fact that they're not running Windows, yet everything is fine, and they can do pretty much everything today they that they could when they were running Windows yesterday.

But the problem is, WINE doesn't always work like it supposed to. Sometimes it requires tweaking. In my opinion, I would rather a "n00b" learn about a native Linux application that can do what they want it to than fiddle with WINE just to get their Windows application to work.

Re:omg.. you might have d/l it yourself..

[nomadic (141991)]

But the problem is, WINE doesn't always work like it supposed to. Sometimes it requires tweaking.

I think you're wrong. About the "sometimes". Take it out and the sentence is good.

Re:

[metalzelot (1050906)]

Acutally the 'sometimes' is correct. I'm able to run windows-only applications (including games) without tweaking wine for it. Of course there are things where you have to tweak wine a bit, but fortunately many applications work "out of the box". But despite of that I think its better for linux newbies to get common to native linux applications. Because most of the time they are better anyway :)

Re:

[Ephemeriis (315124)]

And that, I think, is the whole point. Rather than advertise Linux as some kind of discount version of Windows, advertise Linux as an alternative. Apple doesn't ship Parallels with new Macs. Folks understand that if they buy a Mac there is going to be some learning involved. People buy a Mac because it is NOT Windows. And for the programs that people absolutely have to run in Windows, they can grab Parallels, tweak it a bit to get things up and running, and then run those few programs through it.

Way to go, Mark

[KingSkippus (799657)]

Every time I read something about Mark Shuttleworth, I become just a little bit more of a fan.

While I have nothing against WINE—indeed, I use it myself for several things—I have to agree that it's just not right for distribution by a company like Dell. There's an art to getting it set up and configured, and while it's good, there are still a lot of applications that either don't work at all or don't quite work right in it.

This is a massive problem, and could seriously backfire on Ubuntu. If people buy a Dell machine with Ubuntu and WINE installed thinking that it will run Windows software, when something doesn't work right (and there will be things that don't work right), the average consumers will get mad at the wrong people: Ubuntu and WINE, not Microsoft. The focus will be on how Ubuntu sucks at running Windows software, not on how Ubuntu rocks at running Linux software.

I see here a golden opportunity for desktop Linux to make major inroads with the public and take a significant step towards advancing free open source software. I also see here a golden opportunity to destroy the reputation of desktop Linux as a viable alternative to Windows and give people the impression that free open source software really sucks. Don't you think for a second that Microsoft is going to be trying their damned best to see that Linux on Dell machines gives people a bad taste for open source software.

I have to give Mark Shuttleworth a pat on the back for seeing the big picture, for sacrificing trying to please everyone for the sake of making sure that this is done right, and that the software that people get is great, not just "it works good enough with a few hours of tweaking."

Re:Way to go, Mark

[liquidpele (663430)]

exactly. This is a wise decision based off of psychology.
You can't let the consumer think they are getting something (ability to run windows software on linux) and then take that away (doesn't really work). They will be 6 times angrier than if they never had those features/expectations to begin with.

Re:Way to go, Mark

[Chandon Seldon (43083)]

if independent developers would test their stuff under WINE and label the retail boxes with "Runs under WINE"

If they want to go that far, they can just compile the app with winelib and have a Linux binary. That way they don't need to worry about a new version of wine changing out from under them at all.

Re:Way to go, Mark

[IamTheRealMike (537420)]

The focus will be on how Ubuntu sucks at running Windows software, not on how Ubuntu rocks at running Linux software.

Well, that's great as long as there are perfect 1:1 replacements for all the Windows software somebody wants. That isn't true for any serious gamer, for instance, or people who use custom business apps, which basically means every business that uses IT, or anybody with kids who wants to use a particular educational software package.

Hell I'll happily admit I'm biased, because I used to work on Crossover and Wine, but even the MS Office+Wine combination handily beats OpenOffice. Even when not doing anything Wine or software related, I'd use Word/Excel for office tasks on Linux, because it worked a lot better than OpenOffice did, and the small amount of integration OO had into the desktop wasn't a big deal to me compared to things like, not being sluggish, and being able to perfectly import Word docs. Now don't get me wrong, OO has improved a lot since those days and I want to love it, I really do, but I know there are still a lot of people who use MS Office on Linux over OpenOffice just because they prefer it.

This is just a re-run of the ancient debate about whether Win32 emulation is harmful or good. It never interested me, because it assumes an operating system can be a closed world. That's clearly not true and never has been true, if it was, you should argue that MPlayer being able to play non-Ogg codecs is bad and should be pulled, or OpenOffice being able to read .DOCs is bad and should be pulled, or Linux being able to read FAT32 partitions is harmful and should be pulled. It just makes no sense, actually, because if people need that compatibility they'll either use the compatibility layer or they'll just stay with Windows, in which case you haven't even helped them a little bit.

Re:

[KingSkippus (799657)]

how would it be Microsoft's fault...

Because some of the API's either aren't fully documented or don't work as they are documented. Also, they've patented some of the critical components that allow software written for Windows to run. The end result is that people working on the WINE project have to do a lot of reverse-engineering of what the APIs actually do (as opposed to what they say they do) and figure out alternatives to really basic things that are legally off-limits.

And let's not kid ourselves.

That's fine by me

[cHALiTO (101461)]

It's their choice, and I'm ok with it. Other distros also add or remove support for certain packages based on ideological positions (non free software, no binaries, stuff like that), so ubuntu and Dell can very well agree to do this to promote that way of considering GNU/Linux.

And besides, it's still ubuntu, so nothing prevents those who MUST have wine to add a rep to their sources.list and get it somewhere else.

Ubuntu Fork

[jshriverWVU (810740)]

In order for them to control what apps are available, this makes me wonder if they are going to do a respository fork. So when you apt-get install it's not coming from ubuntu.com but ubuntu.dell.com or something like that. Will be interesting to see how it unfolds.

Personally, I Use Codeweavers' Crossover Office

[NeverVotedBush (1041088)]

It's built on wine, they feed back into wine, and it allows me to run the few remaining software apps I need to that are only available for Windows. I also still run Microsoft Office under Crossover but am almost always now using OpenOffice instead. Using Crossover, I hardly ever boot into Windows any more (yeah, I am set up dual boot still...).

No.

[otacon (445694)]

No, he probably didn't want to include WINE because it will make Ubuntu bad because WINE is too hard for most novice users or a beginner to get working properly...if you make promises that it can run windows software to people, then you have to be able to be able to deliver on that.

I agree

[UbuntuDupe (970646)]

I think we need a rule: "No Wine for Ubuntu users." That might make them less likely to think up names like "Breezy Badger" and "Dapper Drake". Although perhaps extend the rule to Beer, Liquor, and perhaps Shrooms as well?

Good

[Tribbin (565963)]

I haven't installed MS software on my computer for about seven years now. People ask me if I got MS Office working on it; it is the first thing they try when they install linux.

"I haven't tried it."

People find that awkward.

Also people often say that 'app X does not work the same as commercial product X'.

Sure, intercompatability is pushed from the open side because of demand. But ...

LINUX IS NOT WINDOWS!

People find that hard to understand.

I think this step by DELL + Ubuntu is a step in the right direction of bringing that understanding.

if you're angry @ dell because this...

[Adult film producer (866485)]

it's because you haven't faced up to the reality: Wine isn't very good.

Sure you can make some programs work, sometimes. And sometimes when applications do work under Wine they act horribly, weird, strange, lots of font issues. It's not that the wine developers havent tried, it's just that emulating a Piece of Shit like Windows is nearly fucking impossible.. nobody can emulate the development hysteria that went into building windows. I don't fault the Wine devs, they tried mimic microsofts bullshit, but failed...

It's a work in progress, I know... but now Vista is out now.. and microsoft will release another POS of OS soon enough... they have no chance to keep up with the Redmond madness.

Great idea

[sootman (158191)]

I've seen for a decade in my LUG what people go through when they try to use Linux as a 1:1 replacement for Windows. It's miserable. Linux should not be positioned as "like Windows but cheaper." (Especially since Dell's OEM deal with MS and crapware vendors means that a Linux system from Dell will probably cost exactly as much as a Windows system.) Mark S. is doing exactly the right thing here.

That said, I have the feeling that these things won't sell well at all. (Not that adding Wine would make much of a difference.) Be honest: what does Linux offer the average user that Windows doesn't? The main one is "won't get infected with crap."* That's great, but that's not enough. People have put up with crappy Windows systems for so long that they think it's normal to reinstall Windows periodically, or pay a neighborhood kid or local shop $50-150 to clean off the spyware every few months (if they even bother at all), and to buy a new computer every couple years when the one the old one gets slow. People are used to Windows. They fear change. "The devil you know is better than the devil you don't." We love Linux, but we know what's involved, and we understand what the million little differences are and why they're there. The rest of the world just thinks "this isn't working right." The result of all this is, Joe User will NOT be buying Ubuntu machines from Dell. Dell will sell a few, but not many, and there's a very good chance this program will be axed within 6-12 months.

* OS X offers this same benefit, plus it has the great iLife suite, gorgeous hardware, and unbeatable hardware/software integration. Not perfect, but miles ahead of anything else. That is a compelling reason to change, and I've seen a few people go from Windows to Mac, but even so, Windows has 90%+ share and will continue to dominate for quite a while.

Nothing to see here, move alon

[Brunellus (875635)]

WINE isn't even in a default Ubuntu install. With or without Dell, Ubuntu does not ship with WINE. It never has. I hope it never does.

One gripe I have with the community is that we tend to oversell WINE. Even though the WINE team have made a lot of progress lately, I still find WINE to be an imperfect solution, at best. Knowledgeable users know this. But the community insists on preaching WINE to every Windows convert. This is counterproductive.

Rabid WINE advocacy builds unreasonably high expectations of 100% compatibility. This is not yet possible, and it is debatable whether this will ever be possible. New users don't appreciate the difficulty in the project, though. All they know is that NIFTY.EXE won't run. They resent the fact that they've been given "Broken Windows," rather than a "real OS."

This is not to say that I'm against the WINE project at all. Quite the contrary: the compatibility layer gives the Linux community an extra tool. But I cringe every time I see people treating WINE as some sort of panacea, rather than using it correctly as a tool of last resort.

Wine is REALLY important

[robinjo (15698)]

Wine is one of the most important projects for Linux. The fact that a small project like Wine can run a big number of Windows software is just amazing. However, Wine has a bad reputation among Linux geeks who really don't understand how the world of the end user works.

I have used Linux for more than 10 years. I have never used anything else as a server. I am working at a company that produces software for Windows. That's what we do because our clients have always used Windows. However, we've been also keepi

Perfect decision

[FullCircle (643323)]

I completely agree with their decision. If you want Windows, buy Windows.

Linux needs to stand on its own merits. Running Linux to use your Windows apps would make Dell and Linux look bad by giving a bad user experience.

Wine as a Windows replacement is hard to set up, largely incompatible and the wrong solution for more than one or two applications.

Let Linux have a fair chance on the desktop without false expectations of running Windows applications. If that's not enough, then Linux isn't ready for mass market adoption.

OS/2

[thetagger (1057066)]

Good. Windows compatibility is one of the things that killed OS/2.

WINE does come with "normal" Ubuntu

[beswicks (584636)]

I've been running Ubuntu for some time now, I have even "spread the word" my installing it on a few poor students laptops when there windows installation has died and I couldn't be bothered to find the windows drivers for the laptops hardware. Most of the people I have installed Ubuntu for are happy with it right out of the box, once i've added Medibuntu so that it can play DVD's ofc.

However I personally like to play a few Windows games like Half-Life 2, World of Warcraft and Counter Strike and in order to do so i've had to "apt-get install wine". So I don't see how dell not including wine on the machines is a big deal, as it doesn't make there distribution any different from "plain" Ubuntu.

Dell are quite right not to install wine out of the box, as a user who can not "apt-get install wine" or if they have there own partial Dellbuntu mirror, adding the real Ubuntu software sources to apt, will have pretty limited luck getting it working anyway.

What I would find interesting is dell including a way to play copy protected dvd's out of the box, as to be that seems to be the one real problem with a default Ubuntu installation that people are likely to notice.

Hardware compatibility is the reason to buy a Dell

[q2k (67077)]

The reason to buy a Dell with Ubuntu pre-installed is not Windows related at all. It's all about hardware. A Dell desktop or notebook PC with Ubuntu pre-installed should work out of the box. The stuff we fight with any Linux distro, wireless drivers (although that's gotten much better with Feisty), suspend / hibernate not working, etc should not be an issue with the Dells.

My wife's XP box is 6+ years old, so I'm expecting it to die soon. She doesn't do anything on it that requires Windows, so her next computer will have Ubuntu on it. I wouldn't hesitate to buy one of the Dells. The market for these (at least initially) is not newbies looking for their first Linux box, it's people that are already at least a little Linux savvy that want a new box with minimum hassle involved.

Gotta agree with Shuttleworth

[ajs318 (655362)]

I have to agree with Mark on this one.

WINE isn't always easy to configure. I tried it once, didn't get very far, thought "sod it" and looked to native Linux applications instead. And I have to say, they've improved with every version I've tried. (In all probability, so has WINE, so you may have a better experience than I did).

The thing is ..... teaching a cat to bark will ultimately be a disappointing exercise. If your heart is dead set on something that barks, go and buy a dog. If you go for a cat, appreciate it for its felinity. Embrace the fact that it's not a dog, and enjoy how it can do things dogs can't do. It's really quite rare for anyone actually to need a cat with the ability to bark; most of the time you could get by with not barking, or borrow a real dog.

Also, what we tend to think of as "native Linux applications" can usually be persuaded to compile and run under Windows precisely because they are Open Source. (Windows applications probably could be got to compile and run under Linux -- if we only had the Source Code. But you don't very often see an Open Source project that started development on Windows and got ported to Mac and Linux -- usually, they start out being developed on Linux or BSD and get ported to Windows. I think that speaks volumes about the mentality of Windows developers.) Firefox/Thunderbird, OpenOffice.org, Gaim and Audacity probably would meet the requirements of 90% of Dell's customers, and of course are potentially available on both platforms. But Microsoft won't be happy at the thought of something taking marketshare from Outlook and Office; and I'm not sure the various advert-pushing IM networks are entirely thrilled about Gaim.

Great Idea

[MrCrassic (994046)]

Honestly, I think that the decision to not include WINE in the Dell-packaged Ubuntu install is a great idea. As many pointed out already, WINE is really a crapshoot application (at least in my experience). Some applications will work wonderfully (like Internet Explorer or Winamp), while others will not work at all (Microsoft Office, Photoshop, etc). I'm sure that if the application were more mature and had support for most applications, then it would be valuable to include it (and charge for it as well).

Plus, it's not like the option to install it disappears when you get a Linuxed Dell. There are still repos and other outlets that will make the software available, so it's really just up to the user as to whether he wants to try it or not. Then again, in a couple of months or years time when more people unfamiliar to the Linux platform start purchasing these laptops, there is a very small possibility that they would have an interest in using it as supposed to, say, VMWare (free).

On top of THAT, Ubuntu doesn't even install WINE by default so this is a non-issue to begin with.

Who will this hurt?

[ZombieRoboNinja (905329)]

Obviously techies can just apt-get WINE, and semi-techies can just go to the website and download it. The only people this would seem to HURT are non-techies who can't even manage that much. Can you imagine even explaining the situation to those people?

SLASHDOTTER: Bad news, Grandma. That new Linux Dell you're getting won't come with WINE.
GRANDMA: Wine? Like, alcohol?
S: No, no. It's a program CALLED "WINE."
G: Why's it called that?
S: It's an acronym.
G: What for?
S: Um, "WINE is not an emulator."
G: It's in its own acronym?
S: Well, yeah, it's recursive. I think it's kind of a joke.
G: Okay, well, what does it do?
S: It emulates Windows so you can...
G: I thought you just said it's NOT an emulator.
S: Well, right.
G: It's in the name of the program.
S: Yeah. So technically it's an interpreter, I think, but EFFECTIVELY what it does is let you run Windows programs in Linux.
G: But didn't you say that Windows programs are buggy and full of viruses?
S: Well, yeah.
G: And that's why you're making me learn this Linux thing instead of just running Windows in the first place?
S: Yeah.
G: So why would I WANT to run Windows programs?
S: ...NO CARRIER.
G: Oh my stars, not again.

Re:Well

[Silver Sloth (770927)]

Er... but you're a techie. For the other 99.9% of PC purchasers who want their machine to 'just work' what is, or is not installed by default is quite important. After all, the reason Windows is the most popular OS is because Windows is the most popular OS.

Re:

[fruey (563914)]

Yeah, like Windows "just works".

• A lot of people expect Office to be included with Windows. It isn't.
• A lot of people expect Outlook to be included with Windows. It isn't (but it is free).
• A lot of people expect all their hardware to work first time. It doesn't. Even if you get an OEM bundle, sometimes just the order you actually start to use stuff / plug it in can cause glitches. A noob could hose a USB pendrive by just unplugging it during a big write, for example.

I don't think Linux is any differen