Shuttleworth on Ubuntu's Direction and Intent

cj2003 writes "Mark Shuttleworth has released a FAQ about Ubuntu's Direction and Intent. It comments on the discussions of funding, of being a Debian-fork or not, of the strange names, and many other 'hot topics' relating to Ubuntu. In his own words: 'This document exists to give the community some insight into my thinking, and to a certain extent that of the Community Council, Technical Board and other governance structures - on some of the issues and decisions that have been controversial.'"

Re:Professional Addition

[aichpvee]

Not if you give away the discs with free shipping.

Re:Professional Addition

[FidelCatsro]

The tagging of "Professional Edition" on to an OS or piece of software is the equivalent of " FROD LOCUST GT EDITION ... 2.6 cam engine Car " .There is likely no real advantage for most users and perhaps a few disadvantages , but people like to think they are getting the best .
The easy answer ;Name the normal version "Professional " or "Power user" and name the true pro version "industry " or such like .

I disagree.

[Henry V .009]

Windows has taught the world that "Home Edition" is synonymous with "Crippled Edition."

Money Talks

[mpapet]

And it sure does make it easy to build a better distro.

He's certainly made me believe he's sticking to Debian for the heavy lifting then Q/A and patching to make the packages perform the way he wants them.

I do wonder though if the Debian volunteers will really stick around and still take pride in working on the distro that makes Ubuntu so good.

Re:Propietary Software Industry

[Xtifr]

> I agree that some tactics of the proprietary software industry are less than desirable, but how many of us would be able to earn a living without them?

From available evidence, the outstanding majority. In fact, a majority (approx. 90% by some counts) of all programmers already do earn a living working directly for companies that use the software, rather than for those companies which sell software for others to use. Beyond that, of course, I'm sure companies existing and new will learn to adapt as the market changes. Once, all computer companies sold their own, incompatible, proprietary machines; now most sell open, compatible, semi-generic systems. And yet, the industry is hardly any poorer for that.

Re:I disagree.

[kubevubin]

Although I don't quite agree with you considering "Home Edition" crippled, I must say that it would make sense to "cripple" a home version of Windows (or a user-friendlier version of Linux) to aid in helping newbies learn the ropes. It may seem a little drastic, but you'd be surprised just how many people honestly don't read the plethora of popup dialog boxes and system tray bubbles that appear.

And - funny as it may sound - you'd be surprised just how intimidated newbies are whenever the Start menu automatically pops up the first time that they boot into Windows XP.

Re:Propietary Software Industry

[kfg]

. . .how many of us would be able to earn a living without them?

Pretty much all of you. This may come as a shock, but the majority of people in the world manage to get by without ever writing a single line of code.

This may also come as a shock to you, but the world doesn't give a flying you know what about what you wish to be paid to do. In fact, it works the other way around, you either have to take care of yourself or be willing to do whatever other people are willing to pay you for.

I do not owe you a living. I have a hard enough time scraping up my own.

KFG

Maybe now

[i_should_be_working]

we won't have to hear questions of why Ubuntu isn't part of the 'DCC', From TFA:

Why is Ubuntu not part of the DCC Alliance?
I don't believe the DCC will succeed, though its aims are lofty and laudable. It would be expensive to participate, and it would slow down our ability to add the features, polish and integration that we want in new releases. I'm not prepared to devote scarce resources to an initiative that I believe will ultimately fail.

Ouch. I thought the simple fact that DCC is based on Sarge, and Ubuntu on Sid was reason enough.

Also, this FAQ should put to rest the question of leeching and other dumb shit that Ubuntu has been accused of.

Re:I disagree.

[BridgeBum]

The only thing I miss in Home Ed vs Pro is Remote Desktop. VNC will do (of course), but sound integration in RDP is nice.

What a nice guy

[barkholt]

How wonderfull the world would be if his behaviour and attitude was the default among rich people - using his money with a vision to improve the world, instead of getting 8 sportcars and a larger penis.

The should be...

[saleenS281]

If they're doing it for the reasons they claim they're doing it, it shouldn't matter. If they're all talk, well, you'll see the mass exodus. Guess it's a nice little "trial by fire".

Ubuntu Talk at Debconf 5

[jooon]

If you want to see and hear him talk about many of the things he mentions in the FAQ, you should watch his Ubuntu talk at Debconf this year. Theora 132MB [debian.net], MPEG 257MB [debian.net]

They're CODENAMES!

[a.different.perspect]

You know like Windows Whistler, or Longhorn? I mean, Longhorn could be the name of a porn movie. I certainly wouldn't want my child using it, especially if Bill were in it. But it doesn't matter, because the actual release is called Vista. Similarly, Ubuntu codename "Breezy Badger" is, officially, Ubuntu 5.10; "Hoary Hedgehog" was Ubuntu 5.04; "Warty Warthog" was Ubuntu 4.10. As you so astutely notice, naming as a matter of "marketing"; how much marketing do you want them to put into the names of unreleased software? When the final releases are professionally, numerically named, what, exactly, are you complaining about?

Re:The strange names...

[Anonymous Coward]

That's complete bullshite...

It's been the number one distro on distrowatch.com for some time now and it's only had two releases. It's already well on it's way to becoming mainstream (if it isn't already). No one would care if it had homosexuals dancing on the cover burning American flags on it, it is a polished distro that you can install on a wide variety of systems and have all the various components Just Work (TM).

The amount of work you have to put into a distro post install is what "talks" when it comes to the desktop market, the stupid development names and half naked dancers are what "walks". It could have purple monkies and I would still use it just for the simple fact that I need to do next to nothing after an install to get my hardware up and running. A lot of other people no doubt feel the same way, otherwise there would not be big debates about it or high numbers on distrowatch for it. Call us back when you figure out what really makes desktop Linux tick.

Call me a fan boy - I just want a nice, clean, no fuss desktop distro where I won't have to think "well, it's not windows so no wonder some stuff doesn't work".

Re:The strange names...

[i_should_be_working]

Ubuntu might be popular within its own community, but the distro won't go mainstream until its image matures past high school sophomore.

Or until some people become less anal-retentive. Did you read the part about NASA being one of their customers? And is an interacial menage a trois somehow worse than a single race one?

Re:I disagree.

[mikek3332002]

I agree it makes sense to MS to cripple a windows versions so they become expensive demos. If you want IIS pay(IIS is useful if you're playing around VS.net, apache much better though), if you want RD pay, if you want lock your kids accounts pay.... Though its not cripp,ed if all you want to do is download porn, spyware, addware, surf the net, check email, piss off the *AA.

Re:Professional Addition

[Deekin_Scalesinger]

They have a foundation that helps take care of some of the administrative costs. One of the ways they make some money back is by paid tech support as an option from a third party provider (Canonical is technically that in this case). There is also free tech support, boards, etc at no cost. Their intent is that if you have no money you should not be denied anything from them - its nice to just see people being nice in the world for a change.

Pffft

[Chuck Chunder]

Ubuntu is Linux for Human Beings and thankfully most humans aren't humourless.

Criticising Ubuntu's 'marketing' is ludicrous given that they have had outrageous success in accruing brand recognition very quickly.

I don't think the problem you see really lies with Ubuntu. With your references to "half naked and interracial menage-a-trois" and Dapper Drake being a "gay duck" I think it is you that has maturity problems, not Ubuntu.

Re:I want a server edition.

[Directrix1]

Just type 'server' at the install CDs lilo prompt.

Re:Propietary Software Industry

[styrotech]

So how is Ubuntu's model any better? He paints Red Hat as evil for offering both a commercial and a free version, but then expects Ubuntu to be extended in exactly the same way (or worse)!
The only difference here is that Red Hat is a single shop.

And? It sounds like what you are calling "the only difference" is what is actually the whole point - especially in the context of the cross distro collaboration efforts he talks about. The contradictions are entirely in the way you chose to interpret them.

But since the GPL guarentees the same enduring freedoms for Red Hat, Fedora, Ubuntu and Ubuntu-derivative distributions, why should we care who encourages an effort, especially when they have everything to gain by doing so? I would think the collection of talent working on both together would have a better synergy: design, bug fixing, packaging should all be improved.

If you read the rest of the stuff about the relationship with Debian and the amount of work they're doing to develop ways in which different distros can work together you'd have your answers. No one distro can fit everyones needs, so they're working to ensure that improvements can be shared easier for everyones benefit.

Uh, if Ubuntu is so free, why is it necessary to make this distinction? Does it mean Ubuntu's leader could be associated as having the same commercial structure previously vilified in the competing distribution?

and

But this continuous bashing of Red Hat serves nothing. It is especially ironic when it comes from individuals who have to equivocate on their own position to avoid appearing the same way! These arguments are naive, poorly constructed, petty, and generally irrelevant. They only stir up trouble and are the perfect distraction from the real work at hand.

Huh? Did you even read the thing? Where is this vilification and continous bashing? It seems like you're in a reactionary paranoid delusion where every mention of your beloved RedHat is an attack on it. You're reading far too much into this stuff.

Re:The strange names...

[be-fan]

What? Are you seriously arguing that a mildly risque advertisement is "unprofessional"? What color is the sky on your planet? More importantly, on your planet, what do "Gap" ads look like?

And please learn the English language. "Dapper" doesn't mean gay, it means stylish!

What to do about Debian?

[FishandChips]

It's so refreshing to see someone in his position tell things straight and in a way we can all understand.

Even so, I suspect there's a problem here that's slowly appearing on the horizon and that's the future of Debian. It's beginning to resemble an old tramp steamer. Years of sterling, cargo-carrying service but now the crew are arguing on the bridge and some are even trying to force the captain's safe. The engineers (fewer than there were) are desperately trying to keep the ship's rather aged boilers from bursting. And a flotilla of other vessels, some flying the skull and crossbones, are circling, many darting in to nick some of the deck cargo and occasionally a few crew members to boot (although the chief purser has so far proved too weighty to carry off in a pirate lighter). If the old girl starts to founder then a whole lot of people are going to be in a serious pickle.

It may be that simply contributing patches back up to Debian isn't enough. Debian is a huge and amazing project, but for that reason is needs a lot of organization and talented manpower to keep it not merely going but a beacon of excellence. If it catches a cold, so does everyone else. With Debian being pulled in different directions, you have to wonder how long it can hold up for without beginning to suffer.