Where Linux Gained Ground in 2007

christian.einfeldt writes "Computer scientist and media maven Roy Schestowitz takes a look at platforms where GNU Linux gained the most ground in 2007. In a thorough review which is the first of a two-part series, Schestowitz looks at trends in supercomputers, mobile phones, desktops, low-end laptops and tablets, consoles, media players and set-top boxes. Schestowitz finds that GNU Linux solidified its dominant grip on supercomputers; made huge gains in low-end laptops and tablets; won major OEM and retail support on the desktop; gained new entries into game consoles; and also spawned new businesses in set-top boxes while holding its ground in pre-existing product lines. He sums it all up by saying that '2007 will be remembered as the year when GNU/Linux became not only available, but also properly preinstalled on desktops and laptops by the world's largest companies.'"

Not on the Wii.

Linux can not be run on the Wii as the article suggests. It can be run on the Wii in Gamecube mode, but it has no Wii funtions.

Re:Not on the Wii.

running homebrew in wii mode was demonstrated at the CCC congress. check the video about the xbox360 security breakeage

Easy Answer

It got nowhere, depending on who you ask.

Where are the commercial game ports for Linux? No one wants to make them, obviously, save for the FPS crowd (and there's only an Unreal Tournament for Linux because Epic passes the buck to Icculus to get the job done, not because they have the in-house talent to do it themselves). There are a few commercial games for Linux, yes, but only a few, and there's very little variety between them. In the open source world we have a few good games (the majority of them being FPS's, what a surprise), Battle for Wesnoth if you like strategy games (turn based ones, that is). Then we have the unfortunate, ugly ripoffs like "Secret Maryo Chronicles," and other games that look like they were developed for a C64. [happypenguin.org] Plenty of selection, not a lot of quality.

We have Parallels for Mac OS X, which seems to be quite capable at running Windows programs at a decent speed, with good compatibility. What do we have on Linux? Wine? Crossover Office? I think anyone who's actually tried to use either of these will probably tell you that if you really want to run Windows programs on your Linux machine, you're going to have to install Windows too...and the fact of the matter is that most of the commercial software out there is for Windows, whether you like it or not (being an Ubuntu user, I would have to say that I do not :>). Apple has the best of both worlds on their platform -- why can't, say, Canonical, or (dare I mention them) Novell? They had a few hundred million thrown at them by Microsoft, supposedly to increase interoperability with Windows and Linux...where are the results?

Distributions are still a fragmented mess, it's incredibly difficult to produce a binary for Linux that will work across all distributions (especially with Gentoo and their whole CFLAGS fiasco...thank goodness that fad died off). As much as you'd like to complain about Windows and Apple, binary compatibility is not a problem. There's plenty of smart, dedicated people out there that could find a solution to this, particularly the people working on the kernel. Why isn't it a high priority to increase compatibility -between- Linux distributions, or to form some sort of a community-based standard...one that actually works (as opposed to the LSB)?

Professional audio? Don't even bother. ESounD, ARTS, JACKD, now PulseAudio seems to be the big name in useless sound daemons...but that doesn't mean everyone will standardize on it. As if we needed yet another sound daemon anyway. If the Linux kernel is supposedly so "flexible" that it can be used in any range of devices from computers to cell phones, then why is it that 18 years or more later after the first release, there -still- isn't an easy way to do very low-latency, high quality audio recording on Linux? Linux distributions could _EASILY_ supplant a lot of the Windows based environments for professional audio if the kernel was up to the task. And for those out there who think that Audacity and Ardour are adequate replacements for ProTools...wake up.

I haven't run Windows on my PC in over six years, so clearly Linux has been capable of meeting my desktop needs...but the fact of the matter is that there's _PLENTY_ of problems that just aren't being addressed, that could solidify Linux as a real desktop computer competitor.

Re:Easy Answer

Where are the commercial game ports for Linux?

Beyond the obvious FPSes, Eve Online and Second life. There are also these game companies [quickfox.org] that have commercial ports for Linux systems.

We have Parallels for Mac OS X, which seems to be quite capable at running Windows programs at a decent speed, with good compatibility.

VMware server works fine for me. But best perforance tends to come from wine and crossover I have noticed.

I think anyone who's actually tried to use either of these will probably tell you that if you really want to run Windows programs on your Linux machine

I run all the source games (includes half life 2 and all it's episodes, portal, hl2 death match,, team fortress 2) just fine, Steam and so on just fine under. I hear World of Warcraft runs quite well too.

and the fact of the matter is that most of the commercial software out there is for Windows

Most commercial software available for the most popular platform. Who would of guessed?

Distributions are still a fragmented mess, it's incredibly difficult to produce a binary for Linux that will work across all distributions (especially with Gentoo and their whole CFLAGS fiasco...thank goodness that fad died off)

No it isn't. Follow the LSB.

As much as you'd like to complain about Windows and Apple, binary compatibility is not a problem.

I have plenty of applications that don't run on OS X from older versions of OS X. Windows Vista has issues running some older Windows programs. As for Linux... I can't think of a time EVER when a LSB program didn't work.

Professional audio? Don't even bother. ESounD, ARTS, JACKD, now PulseAudio seems to be the big name in useless sound daemons...but that doesn't mean everyone will standardize on it.

Gnome and KDE are adding support for it. gstreamer and KDE4's new sound system supporting it as a back end pretty much means it is going to be supported by a wide range of applications already.

Linux kernel is supposedly so "flexible" that it can be used in any range of devices from computers to cell phones, then why is it that 18 years or more later after the first release, there -still- isn't an easy way to do very low-latency, high quality audio recording on Linux?

Simply because the problem hasn't been addressed yet.

Linux distributions could _EASILY_ supplant a lot of the Windows based environments for professional audio if the kernel was up to the task.

I heard similar crap about when wine would run Photoshop and others. When Wine finally did for a large period of time, nothing changed at all. So forgive me if I just remain skeptical.

I haven't run Windows on my PC in over six years, so clearly Linux has been capable of meeting my desktop needs

I use Windows, Linux, various BSDs and OS X regularly.

Re:Easy Answer

1) running Windows games on Linux
I've personnal experience of playing GuildWars flawlessly under Linux using Cedega. Cedega also supports World of Warcraft and other games making it probably much better than Wine (well, I should check on this one, lots of progress have been done) and CrossOver Office (which wasn't meant for games in the first place)

About Linux commercial games, you forgot about NeverWinterNights, and some promising products like Planeshift. And the upcoming "project Apricot" (Blender Foundation and CrystalSpace).

2) Audio
Very few sound engineers rely on only ONE program. Most of the time, they switch from one to another depending on the task they've to do. Don't forget that SAE is behind Ardour... They would not lose their time and money with it if it was useless...

3) compatibility
Linux rely on some standard components like openGL, X11 and the kernel. If you want to distribute some closed source binary, you may statically link those libraries which may be a problem.
Source distribution don't have many problems thanks to the autoconf and automake.
Did you already try to run some old Windows 3.1 softwares on Windows XP or Vista ? Often, Windows 98 applications don't run under Windows 2000 or XP.

4) ESD, aRTS, JACK,...
Well, ESD was GNOME, aRTS was KDE and JACK was for Realtime with low latency... You forgot about OSS and ALSA, GNOME/KDE and lots of other similar duplicate efforts.
GNU/Linux is also about choice... something lots of people have forgotten since the old ages...
COMMAND.COM or 4DOS.COM ?
Sound Blaster or GUS (now, most of the time, it's the onboard sound card)
EMM386 or QEMM386 ?

If you're "computer illiterate", you don't mind about what's installed and go with what the system install (aRTS, ESD, what are those things ?)
If you know what you're doing, well, you will choose the one which suits the best your needs...

I agree that there is still lots of place for improvement, but when I look back to the old time of Linux 0.99pl10, yggdrasil (CDROM) or SLS/Slockware/MCC (floppy) installs, the X11 Config file to build by hand (with a calculator and the specs of your monitor), very basic keyboard support (US qwerty, FR azerty and DE qwertzu, nothing more),... the way behind is much bigger than the way ahead...

Lately, I had to install a brand new computer in dual-boot Windows/Linux. Linux didn't need any extra driver but Windows needed lots of extra drivers (Video, sound, network,...). Security updates were also much faster to install under linux (and they included lots of apps, unlike Windows)... So, unless you need some specific software or plan to use the computer for gaming, Linux is going to become a better choice than Windows... Truly PnP !!!

Fragmented mess?

People who say that a problem facing Linux is that there are too many distributions and too many different ways to do things have the wrong perception of what an OS is. Different distributions are different operating systems, and expecting binary compatibility across different OS's is folly regardless of what kernel is in use. That's why systems like automake/autoconf exist, and standard API's like POSIX, exist, so that source code can be recompiled on different platforms without too much pain.

"Linux" is not a single operating system, it is just a kernel. The kernel can be run without GNU utils, without X11, etc.

Re:Easy Answer

Where are the commercial game ports for Linux? No one wants to make them, obviously, save for the FPS crowd (and there's only an Unreal Tournament for Linux because Epic passes the buck to Icculus to get the job done, not because they have the in-house talent to do it themselves). There are a few commercial games for Linux, yes, but only a few, and there's very little variety between them. In the open source world we have a few good games (the majority of them being FPS's, what a surprise), Battle for Wesnoth if you like strategy games (turn based ones, that is). Then we have the unfortunate, ugly ripoffs like "Secret Maryo Chronicles," and other games that look like they were developed for a C64. Plenty of selection, not a lot of quality.

The following publishers develop comemrcial linux games:

http://www.pompomgames.com/ [pompomgames.com]
http://www.garagegames.com/ [garagegames.com]
http://www.introversion.co.uk/ [introversion.co.uk]
http://frictionalgames.com/ [frictionalgames.com]
http://sillysoft.net/ [sillysoft.net]
http://www.basiliskgames.com/ [basiliskgames.com]
http://www.guildsoftware.com/ [guildsoftware.com]
http://www.shrapnelgames.com/ [shrapnelgames.com]
http://www.rune-soft.com/ [rune-soft.com]
http://grubbygames.com/ [grubbygames.com]
http://www.caravelgames.com/ [caravelgames.com]
http://www.planewalkergames.com/ [planewalkergames.com]
http://www.graalonline.com/ [graalonline.com]

There are also the high profile ones such as neverwinter nights, the doom and quake series, unreal, etc.

There are many high quality independant titles such as neverball, you mentioned wesnoth, crimson fields, flight gear, torcs, the spring project, total annihilation 3d, tecnoballZ, powermanga, tile racer, pingus, clonk, freeciv, ultimate stunts, planeshift, scorched3d, VDrift, silvertree (not complete, but being created by the wesnoth guys so likely will not be vapor), ufo: alien invasion, scourge, etc.

http://spring.clan-sy.com/ [clan-sy.com]
http://www.wesnoth.org/ [wesnoth.org]
http://torcs.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net]
http://www.flightgear.org/ [flightgear.org]
https://icculus.org/neverball/ [icculus.org]
http://ta3d.darkstars.co.uk/ [darkstars.co.uk]
http://linux.tlk.fr/games/ [linux.tlk.fr]
http://tileracer.model-view.com/ [model-view.com]
http://pingus.seul.org/ [seul.org]
http://www.clonk.de/ [clonk.de]
http://freeciv.wikia.com/ [wikia.com]
http://www.ultimatestunts.nl/ [ultimatestunts.nl]
http://www.planeshift.it/ [planeshift.it]
http://www.scorched3d.co.uk/ [scorched3d.co.uk]
http://vdrift.net/ [vdrift.net]
http://www.silvertreerpg.org/ [silvertreerpg.org]
http://ufoai.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net]
http://scourge.sourceforge.net/ [sourceforge.net]

Many of these are very impressive independently made free games. Perhaps they lack the multi million dollar marketing budget and won't make your geofrce 8800 gtxz 45 x super elite ultra melt, but theya re *fun* games, and they are numerous. Also keep in mind this publisher and free game list is only what I could find in 1 hour of searching.

Then there are freed older commercial games such as warzone 2100, homeworld, descent 1 and 2, doom, quake, etc.

Lets not stop there, there's also emulation: pcsx, ePSXe, zsnes, snes9x, pcsx2, mupen64, mednafen, gens, and many many more emulators.

Special mention of this project as well:

http://apricot.blender.org/ [blender.org]

Also, last, but not least. If you absolutely desperately must have the latest and greatest hyped to hell and back 9 figure budget game in lunux:

http://www.transgaming.com/ [transgaming.com]

Linux gaming is alive and well.

We have Parallels for Mac OS X, which seems to be quite capable at running Windows programs at a decent speed, with good compatibility. What do we have on Linux? Wine? Crossover Office? I think anyone who's actually tried to use either of these will probably tell you that if you really want to run Windows programs on your Linux machine, you're going to have to install Windows too...and the fact of the matter is that most of the commercial software out there is for Windows, whether you like it or not (being an Ubuntu user, I would have to say that I do not :>). Apple has the best of both worlds on their platform -- why can't, say, Canonical, or (dare I mention them) Novell? They had a few hundred million thrown at them by Microsoft, supposedly to increase interoperability with Windows and Linux...where are the results?

You compare parellels with wine? Do you know the difference? We here in linux land have virtualization too. We can even do what you mac users call "coherence". Welcome to virtual box:

http://www.virtualbox.org/ [virtualbox.org]

And holy crap, it's even gpl'd.

I'm not sure what your beef w/ wine is. The very few times I've used it, it ran windows applications just fine. From photoshop to ms office to internet explorer to imgburn to nero. Piece o' cake. All I did was click on the windows exe in my pretty konqueror window and voila, windows app up and running.

Distributions are still a fragmented mess, it's incredibly difficult to produce a binary for Linux that will work across all distributions (especially with Gentoo and their whole CFLAGS fiasco...thank goodness that fad died off). As much as you'd like to complain about Windows and Apple, binary compatibility is not a problem. There's plenty of smart, dedicated people out there that could find a solution to this, particularly the people working on the kernel. Why isn't it a high priority to increase compatibility -between- Linux distributions, or to form some sort of a community-based standard...one that actually works (as opposed to the LSB)?

Are you kidding? If the binary is elf, compiled for the correct architecture (x86, x86_64, ppc, etc), and the needed libraries are installed... then it runs. This is pretty much the case for all modern operating systems. That's why, for example, a company can distribute a tarball with binaries for x86 linux, and it "just works". Everything from games (doom3), to apps (vmware), to modules/libraries (ioncube php loaders) are all distributed with a basic elf binary that runs on typical linux distros with glibc. This compatibility exists without the LSB. The LSB makes cross distro compatibility even more braindead. If you are having trouble compiling a binary that works on any distro then perhaps you shouldn't be writing code to begin with.

Professional audio? Don't even bother. ESounD, ARTS, JACKD, now PulseAudio seems to be the big name in useless sound daemons...but that doesn't mean everyone will standardize on it. As if we needed yet another sound daemon anyway. If the Linux kernel is supposedly so "flexible" that it can be used in any range of devices from computers to cell phones, then why is it that 18 years or more later after the first release, there -still- isn't an easy way to do very low-latency, high quality audio recording on Linux? Linux distributions could _EASILY_ supplant a lot of the Windows based environments for professional audio if the kernel was up to the task. And for those out there who think that Audacity and Ardour are adequate replacements for ProTools...wake up.

Professional audio recording and mixing is not my field, so I really cannot comment. However, I will say that when the foss community puts their weight behind something, you can usually expect results. Pro audio may have been neglected for some time, but the tides are beginning to change.

http://www.rme-audio.com/english/linux/alsa.htm [rme-audio.com]
http://puredata.info/ [puredata.info]
http://ardour.org/ [ardour.org]
etc.

From a unixy kernel to a full toolchain to X to DE's to games and hundreds of other areas FOSS came, and it conquered. This will be no different.

Re:Easy Answer

[quote]Making software that works right out of the box requires a grown up sitting at a desk working their ass off 40 hours a week getting paid a nice fat wage.[/quote]

This is why most of the best open source software is written by people who work for a company which derives its profit from elsewhere.

Roy is a bit of a nutjob...

I understand that there is "telling it like it is" and not pulling any punches, but if you've read http://boycottnovell.com/ [boycottnovell.com] for more than a day you might start to think that Roy Schestowitz is a little bit paranoid... there are several people in the open source world that have openly argued with him on his blog, because he has made baseless accusations without factual evidence.

See http://boycottnovell.com/2007/11/25/gnome-foundation-ooxml-ecma/ [boycottnovell.com] for an example of this... Jeff Waugh (of the GNOME foundation) is one example of someone who has argued with him

PST Files and Synch with HP Phone

These are the only things keeping me from switching all of my home computer over to Linux (Main box - Vista, Web Camera box - Xp , Home Automation box - Just switched to Ubuntu during the Christmas break, Poker Night Laptop - XP but really only needs Java, Wife's laptop - Vista, and Windows Home Server - Yes, I now know I can do all of the same things under Linux, but this was easier at the time)

The Home Automation box (misterhouse) just got switched over...the laptop I use on poker nights is next, followed by the box running the web camera security system (I haven't looked for software, but I'm sure it will be out there :)

I have saved emails since 1998, always under Outlook pst files. I tried Linux 2 years ago, but there was no way to transfer over the emails...as far as I can tell, you still can't!

My wife won't care what OS she is running (I already deleted IE and installed Firefox on her laptop) but she would freak if she lost all of her email.

Truthfully, I don't even care about syncing my phone. But how do I get all the email stored in PST files?

Linux FTW!!!!

I took the hard disk out of my broken Packard Bell laptop (daughter had spilled cola over it and it refused to work again) and put it into my Sony VAIO laptop... started it up and it booted perfectly into KDE... absolutely no problems at all... and all the hardware was different... different mobo chipset, different processor, different graphics card.

We were able to rescue all her data and coursework that she'd been working on when the accident occurred...

Out of curiosity. when I tried to boot the windows XP on the other partition it blackscreened... with a cryptic FATAL error code...

Ubuntu Linux 1 : Microsoft XP 0

Re:I sense some bias...

Oh please. I like Linux as much as the next person (and use Ubuntu on 2 desktops), the the idea that the Linux on the desktop has doubled in 2007 is absurd. Of course I expect this kind of "reporting" from someone who insists on writing GNU/Linux all the time instead of just Linux (it's nice to be accurate, but the GNU pedantry annoys more people than it attracts).

I dunno. It's hard to get figures, but given how small the market share is for Linux on the desktop anyway, doubling it would not be out of the question, at least in the geek community where the majority of its desktop use would be.

Re:I sense some bias...

While I too doubt the estimate that the number of users running Linux has doubled in 2007, I don't doubt it by much. I know that between 1/1 2007 and 12/31 2007 I have seen more new people install and run Linux than any other year in my memory, and I have not seen any of them abandon it after a few weeks or days. The very fact that user survey participation on Linux specific sites has more than doubled is a strong sign that, even if the actual number of users didn't double, at least the number of people interested in it has, and that's big. If only Dell would take their Ubuntu machines off of the separate page and let us install it on more than two models as a drop down alternative to Vista/XP (with a big warning dialog to scare clueless buyers away from a product they probably don't want) I think 2008 would definitely see the number of Linux desktops double.

Just as importantly, I've seen a massive move toward non-MS products even on Windows machines. My college has Firefox installed on virtually every machine, and I can't even remember the last time I saw an open IE window; I've even seen a few installs of OpenOffice next to Office 2007 on the least frozen machines. The more cross platform apps gain steam, the less reason anyone has to pay the Microsoft tax, and the less likely people are to actually do so.

So yes, doubled is probably an exaggeration, but it's definitely been a banner year for (GNU/)Linux and FOSS in general.

Re:I sense some bias...

I think you're close, but not fully there. If Dell gave users an option to install both with dual boot setup easily (which might require license haggling), it could be bigger. "No worries, if Linux isn't good for you, switch back to Windows by rebooting!" It's working for Mac, isn't it?

Re:I sense some bias...

How about this, then: for the first time in ten years of using Linux, I was asked by someone else to install it. In fact, two different people requested it. That' definitely different

Re:OSX...

I agree with you in general. I've pretty much been Mac-only at home since 1988. However, as a Java developer the Mac is obviously very, very lacking. In addition, the hardware is frustrating-- no 2nd mouse button (why can't they do a Mighty Buttonbook?), no dock, no 2nd monitor out (which I get with a dock on my work Dell).

If I wasn't so tied to Macs, I'd be seriously thinking about a Dell right about now.

Re:OSX...

I admire the work being done with Linux on the Desktop, but all of this talk of "Linux on the desktop in 200X!" is getting to be kind of silly.

Article nor the summary says that.

You want Unix

Unix is not important to me, I also don't think the majority of people who use Linux, use it because they want something Unixy. But! If I were to choose a system for Unix capability, I would choose windows over OS X since Windows' POSIX subsystem actually behaves completely to spec for one, unlike OS X's BSD subsystem (which still managed to some how get certified). My first choice would be a Linux distribution for the main reason that lots of things would just work without having to work too hard. I mean for one, the x11 support in Linux is superb. It supports drag and drop, no clipboard issues, X11 communications work flawlessly unlike on OS X with it's poor x11 support.

and a production quality desktop with tons of high quality third party apps with a buttload of real-world usage?

Tons of high quality third party applications and you are going to mention OS X? Can I have what you are smoking? There isn't that vast large amount of third party applications for any specific given version of OS X, never mind claiming the majority of those are high quality.

Stop waiting on Linux and switch to OSX... What you want is here, now.

Having used OS X for many years and still using it. Sorry, I don't agree with your reasoning

Forget about all of this "It's got to be 'free', man" stuff and just recognize the fact that it has to work, and work well... 10 years I was with Linux, set up hundreds of machines in various places. Now, I just tell people to go buy a Mac and let the computer work for you instead of having to learn (what is to the lay-person) a bunch of voodoo magic.

I use Linux because I consider it superior for my uses. I also find the desktop environment available are superior for my uses. I have even paid for certain distributions like SuSE and Mandriva and I have no problem with paying for Linux software which I have done also in the past too.

Re:OSX...

The biggest drawback for Linux isn't the platform or OS, it's all those dumbass Klingon sounding names for the applications. Fix that - and for god sake don't make people use a perl script to install it - and you might be able to claim more inroads into general public market share. People don't WANT to use Linux, more people just don't want to use Windows because they've realized how treacherous it is. The iron is hot.

For that reason, your instincts are good for OS X because I've seen many people switch off the Windows platform in 2007 and never look back. They love their Macs mostly because the OS leaves them alone to work plus they've discovered all the software that comes with it. If you are the kind of person who can install any Linux flavor and be able to answer the question "ok, now what?" then Linux is for you. That excludes the vast majority of people who just want to use a computer.

Re:F40PH Factor

This F40PH?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EMD_F40PH [wikipedia.org]

"pain and suffering"

You're right: learning and knowledge are completely overrated, and intellectual curiosity is merely some historical fiction.

Re:OSX...

You want Unix and a production quality desktop with tons of high quality third party apps with a buttload of real-world usage? Stop waiting on Linux and switch to OSX... What you want is here, now.

And yet, we're not "waiting on Linux". We're using it on our desktops today. What does that say?

Forget about all of this "It's got to be 'free', man" stuff and just recognize the fact that it has to work, and work well...

I saw a NeXT cube when I was in college, and I thought it was the greatest computer ever ... until I saw a Pentium-75 running Linux 1.0 (without even X). I suggest that it is you who are ignoring the elephant in the room. We've seen Mac OS X. We've used it. We've developed for it, and played games on it. And we still want Linux! We are not so shallow to think that if it's Unixlike, then it has all of the benefits of Linux. You can put our words in 'quotes' and pretend that we talk like stoner-dudes, but it does not change anything.

I realize that if you've been setting up hundreds of Linux boxes, you're probably just ranting, and want nothing more to do with something called "Linux" no matter how good it is. I could tell you that these days it's pretty much "insert Ubuntu installer CD, reboot, press return" (you don't even have to give away personal data like on the Mac), but you wouldn't hear me. That's OK. We'll still be here in 20 years if you ever decide to come back.

Re:OSX...

What, so I can pay $250 a year for updates that break my apps? Riiiight...

Apple and Microsoft both need to stick to hardware.

Re:I sense some bias...

...the the idea that the Linux on the desktop has doubled in 2007 is absurd.

Not necessarily absurd--just count the number of Dell and HP computers that came shipped with Linux. I've no idea what the numbers are, but it's going to ping the stats. Then add how many people "converted," even if it's on a secondary box....

One desktop at a time is all it needs.

Freedom.

Freedom is the main reason a lot of people use Linux.

Re:I sense some bias...

the idea that the Linux on the desktop has doubled in 2007 is absurd.

Sure Linux on the desktop doubled, now there are two users!

Re:Linux on the desktop is redundant now

Want user friendly UNIX?

I have doubts that most desktop users care that much about their desktop being UNIX

I can't see any reason for using Linux on the desktop at all.

Well, there are those who have philosophies - opensource, free. Don't want to pay for a expensive machine just get to get OS X (since Apple machines are higher priced and higher speced than the low end in the PC industry).

And then there are people like me, who don't really care about price. But use a OS because they feel it is technically superior for their needs.

In my case: OS X is too difficult - Getting things like applications in Darwin ports working is far more difficult than just using your average linux distribution. The GUI is simplified beyond my liking, I am a power user and I like to customize my desktop a little. Most OS X applications are geared towards the user who has never used the program before but don't hold applications for the more advanced users -- To explain this as simple as I can, a VIM user is likely going to be much faster with LaTeX from scratch to make a pdf document than a user that uses a GUI centric application like Pages and/or Microsoft Office to do so the same.

The reason is that the experienced user with VIM is capable of operating a lot faster with his aliases, tiny commands and so on than a user who has to rely on the mouse and various GUI menus popping up offering various options (yes, I am aware there are VIM ports on OS X). The problem is that OS X in this scenario doesn't really have many applications that even do a compromise by doing 50/50 in capabilities.

OS X doesn't handle x11 properly. I want to use a x11 application, that means I expect to be able to do simple things like drag and drop and copy/pasting properly.

I personally find OS X slower. I run Linux on the same hardware and I find general multi-tasking is just 'faster'.

I find OS X's bugs annoying. Can we please FTFF! (No, Leopard didn't) I am sick of stupid bugs that cause Finder to freeze up on silly things like file shares and even crashing on ungraceful events.

What is really sad is that OS X managed to get Unix certification, but still the BSD subsystem can't handle signals properly. Even Windows' POSIX subsystem does this correctly (that's right, Windows is capable of being more UNIX-like than OS X is in it's current state).

My Linux system does not have these limitations. I hope this was informative to you as to why at least I don't use OS X -- I don't particularly have any real philosophies when it comes to proprietary or opensource software.

Linux's modularity and potential small size mean it might still have a place for embedded devices, but even there, if you don't mind less initial user friendliness, there's NetBSD...and with NetBSD not only do you have arguably greater portability, you've also got a more liberal license, and the above mentioned social benefits, as well.

It is my belief that Linux has been ported to more architectures and platforms than NetBSD has. There are RTOS versions of the OS even that NetBSD does not have. Heck, take a look at the Linux on xbox, Nintendo DS and other random projects people have created. It seems to be running anywhere these days.

Re:I sense some bias...

the the idea that the Linux on the desktop has doubled in 2007 is absurd.

I bought a much bigger display in 2007, so my desktop has nearly to doubled.

Re:OSX...

If you lived and worked in areas of the world which I would call "developing," you would favor freedom more than you do now. For some of, forgetting about "it's got to be free, man" is like giving up on real democracy and just accepting the corruption that exists and destroys as inevitable. Free software may not mean much for the deleveloped nations of the west, but for the rest of the world, Free software equates to national freedom.

Re:I sense some bias...

I like Linux as much as the next person (and use Ubuntu on 2 desktops), the the idea that the Linux on the desktop has doubled in 2007 is absurd.

An of those desktops, how many were you using in 2006? I had played with a couple distros before last year, but they simply were not a replacement for anything. Last year I converted my old PIII machine, an IMB Thinkpad, and put Ubuntu on my new homebuilt Core 2 Duo box. In the process, I have helped a bunch of people switch. There are many who abandoned old versions of Windows and upgraded to Linux last year. Last year is the first year Linux is my primary OS, not a toy.

Re:OSX...

You want Unix and a production quality desktop with tons of high quality third party apps with a buttload of real-world usage? Stop waiting on Linux and switch to OSX... What you want is here, now.

If I could run OSX on whatever hardware I wanted, I'd consider it.

LK

Re:Linux on the desktop is redundant now

With both of the above alternatives available, I can't see any reason for using Linux on the desktop at all.

Better device driver support.

LK

Re:OSX...

Switching from Linux to OSX [...] ranks up there as one of the largest impacts, for the better [...]. Now, I just tell people to go buy a Mac and let the computer work for you instead of having to learn (what is to the lay-person) a bunch of voodoo magic.

I can share my operating system and all of the installed software with my friends. You can not.

I win.

Re:OSX...blue screens alot

my daughter has OSX, sure it's cool and I can do Unix admin tricks to manage it remotely from my GNU/Linux box, but the truth about Mac OSX is that it's slightly too bleeding edge and unstable. Fork out $120 for the latest version of Mac OSX and things bring in return. And MacOSX has issues with my favorite coding language.....

Re:OSX...

I'll move to OSX the second I don't have to throw away my perfectly usable hardware.

Troll Alert - or user is dated.

I remember this guy, he has been a big Mac Pusher for at least the last two years. If you have not been using Linux during the last six months, you are out of date.

The other rebuttals will take care of your actual errors.