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Software Linux

Desktop Linux Survey Results Published 384

Posted by ScuttleMonkey from the jewels-of-wisdom dept.
An anonymous reader writes "The Open Source Development Labs has published preliminary results from its desktop Linux survey, which had 3,300 responses. The month-long online survey focused on determining the key issues driving Linux on the desktop, as well as the major barriers to Linux desktop adoption. 'What was most surprising to us was probably the top two reasons given for deploying Linux on the desktop,' OSDL's Principal Analyst Dave Rosenberg said. 'It's not TCO (total cost of ownership), or security, or lack of license fees. It was 'employees requesting Linux (user demand)' and because 'my competitors have successfully deployed Linux,' he added."
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Desktop Linux Survey Results Published More

Desktop Linux Survey Results Published

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  • Well, there you have it. (Score:5, Funny)

    by Atario ( 673917 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @04:32AM (#14145345) Homepage
    Not for stability, or security, or pricing, or modifiability, or all the great things that come to us from Unixland.

    It's because we're all so cool.

    Who could have guessed it?

    • Re:Well, there you have it. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Siguy ( 634325 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @05:05AM (#14145439)
      Geek Chic should not be underestimated. I've known quite a few people (including myself) who have run linux on a desktop with no real reason to do so other than the "cool" factor. The problem is, once you get it running and get set up you kind of realize that it is just a computer operating system and not something inherently cool like a tiger or the fonz.
      "Oh wow, I'm running Firefox. On linux! [fifteen seconds pass] Hmmm, maybe I should go download BeOS..."
      • That would include me. All of my customers have 'doze with a few macs but after I started toying around with linux a few years ago I got hooked on it. Linux on the desktop has improved dramatically since the days of horrible fonts and dependancy nightmares and as much as I'd like to see it succeed on the desktop, I'd hate to see it turn into a bloated "all things to all people" OS like windows. On the flip side, an increase in popularity would drive more HW/SW vendors to develop stuff for *nix.

        • Re:Well, there you have it. (Score:4, Insightful)

          by sp0rk173 ( 609022 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @04:26PM (#14150062)
          Linux won't turn into that, because linux is not an operating system. There will be distributions that will turn into that, like Fedora, SuSE and Mandrake already have, but since you can build a kernel yourself and compile an entire system from the ground up...again...yourself, it will not turn into huge bloatware from an OS standpoint.
      • The problem is, once you get it running and get set up you kind of realize that it is just a computer operating system and not something inherently cool like a tiger or the fonz.
        That's what Linux from Scratch is all about. In a land where linux is so easy to install, the only way to maintain geekhood is to roll your own. ;)

        Note: No, I don't use LFS. You think I'm crazy?!? ;)

    • Re:Well, there you have it. (Score:4, Insightful)

      by khakipuce ( 625944 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @09:17AM (#14146164) Homepage Journal
      I just re-read this and felt I better put in a disclamer for those of you who think I am comparing Win 95 to Linux - I AM NOT, also for those of you who use Linux everyday and think I am knocking it - I AM NOT (I use it most days too) - see if you can figure out what I am driving at by reading the whole comment.

      Back in the early 90's I worked for a company that was a late adopter of PC technology. At the time they had a mixture of DOS and OS/2 with Wordperfect and Lotus 123 . Email and most apps were on Minis and Mainframes. The assets were old and the users were SCREAMING for Windows/Office. Eventually (1996!) the company began a programme of upgrading the desktops with Windows 95 machines - which was what the users wanted.

      Only the users found that Office on Win95 worked Ok at home where they used it for an hour or so but use it for eight hours editing multiple documents and it failed due to memory leaks. Necessarily, the desktop was reasonably well locked down so they could do all the stuff they wanted (i.e. play games and install any application they wanted).So after week or two the users were as unhappy with the "new" Windows 95 as they had been with the old DOS and OS/2 arrangement.

      And I can't help but suspect that the same will happen with Linux, it may be cool at home and it may be cool to talk about it when you don't use it anger, but when you find that it hasn't magically transformed your crap job into a world of fun and entertainment, that will be Linux's fault, not becasue you have a crap job.

    • not me (Score:4, Insightful)

      by r00t ( 33219 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @09:45AM (#14146330) Journal
      My guesses would have been:

      • no need to track the silly hologram cards in fear of a BSA audit
      • no need to deal with the accounting department before installing an OS
      • not falling apart over time (from stuff like Sony's rootkit)

      That's not quite the same as license fees and security, though those may be the root causes. The license fee itself isn't so bad, but the associated hassle of budget approval and tracking sure is. Lack of security related to break-ins might be tolerated (yuck), but unknown random DRM crud mysteriously destabilizing the machine is harder to accept.

  • Built for Linux (Score:4, Insightful)

    by bogaboga ( 793279 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @04:36AM (#14145362)
    I'd say that in my case, getting the word out that Linux is just a kernel and that there are many flavours built arround it is the greatest problem.

    I have had folks getting an Ubuntu CD after having been told "all applications are there", attempting to install these apps on a SuSE distro!

    The other thing is multimedia not working exactly as advertised or not working as expected.

    With all these problems, getting Linux on the desktop is still a challenge in my case.

    • Re:Built for Linux (Score:3, Interesting)

      by log2.0 ( 674840 )
      Linux (or should I say GNU/Linux?? ;)) is a totally different landscape to windows. Everything is done differently. When I switched a few years ago, I saw the large number of changes and it feels weird using a windows box now.

      Software for Win98 will probably work in XP. This is not the case in Linux. We know this, but average Joe doesn't. I can personally see this as a barrier to desktop linux adoption.

      Either way, it has come very far in the last decade and I see it gearing up to be competitive (I use it al
      • Well, you caught my attention, but you didn't answer my long-term question. Is there any computer that actually is "Built for Linux"? At least in the sense that some major maker promises that they will provide the drivers [for which distribution/s?] and make it painless to keep the machine alive and supported to a similar degree as for their Windows-installed models?

        By the way, I have asked variations of this question a number of times, and never received any particularly useful responses. I do *NOT* want

        • Re:Built for Linux (Score:5, Informative)

          by HuguesT ( 84078 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @06:29AM (#14145650)
          The short answer is yes, plenty of machines built for Linux.

          Here are a couple of links :

          Servers, desktops etc : http://www.pogolinux.com/ [pogolinux.com]
          Laptops ! http://www.emperorlinux.com/ [emperorlinux.com]

          The laptops are well-known brands (IBM/Lenovo, Dell etc) with Linux pre-installed and supported, where everything work, including modem, wireless, suspend-to-ram, etc.
          • unfortunately when I looked at those laptops, they hadn't yet offered one with a 17" screen.

          • Re:Built for Linux (Score:3, Informative)

            by Kadin2048 ( 468275 )
            I hate to dump on any company that's selling Linux, but those laptops are outrageously expensive.

            Linux:
            IBM/Lenovo ThinkPad T42 [emperorlinux.com]: 1.7GHz, 14" display, 512MB RAM, 40GB disk, CD-RW; $2175.00

            Windows:
            IBM/Lenovo Thinkpad T42 [ibm.com]: 1.8GHz, 14" display, 512MB RAM, 60GB disk, CD-RW; $1499.00

            Quite possibly it's not Emperor's fault, I have a feeling that IBM/Lenovo may not sell ANY ThinkPads without Windows (especially sad considering that IBM ought to be the one place you could get a Linux machine, if anywhere) and thus y
        • That isn't a question for me to answer. I am not an OEM ;) However, I expect something like that to come along as demand increases. It's like the chicken and egg problem unfortunately.

          As for your openoffice dream...I share it with you. I use mostly latex to do my work since I'm in the maths field but I believe that OOo is good enough now with 2.0 and WILL take some market share just like FF has (not enough though since people are too reluctant to change)

    • Re:Built for Linux (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @05:06AM (#14145443)
      The day all hardware distributors starts writing drivers for their products in linux, will be a milestone in my oppinion. The only thing keeping me from using linux on my laptop is the lack of drivers for videocards/touchpads suspend etc. Linux for me isn't about license costs etc, it's about a stable working system at all times. A system where things eighter work or don't work at all. Thats not the case in all other OS:es...

      In other words, if installation and hardware support where as good as in for example Windows, this wouldn't keep the day to day users away.

      • Re:Built for Linux (Score:3, Informative)

        by Boronx ( 228853 )
        I was in the same boat with my one year old cheapo compaq laptop. Periodically I'd download and try out some live CDs, but there would always be something that wouldn't work.

        This week I tried a new version of MEPIS [mepis.org] and everthying worked without any tweaking.

      • Re:Built for Linux (Score:4, Interesting)

        by mysticgoat ( 582871 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @11:02AM (#14146918) Homepage Journal

        This is a kind of 'me too' post.

        I set up my computer as dual boot between WinXP and Mandrake more than a year ago, in hopes of migrating. But I'm still doing about 100% of my work in WinXP. (I have moved to Firefox, Thunderbird, OOo, etc-- but under WinXP).

        The stumbling block is that I use a Canon i9900 printer in large format photorealistic mode, and a Wacom graphics tablet in Paint Shop Pro, for a very small percentage of my work, and there are no Linux equivalents. So I'm stuck with one toe in the Windows world. I can move more than 97% of my work to Linux at any time, but I'll have to go to WinXP to print the 11x17" photos and to do some of the photo touch-ups. I spend perhaps 4 hours a month on these activities-- it really is a small but important part of my work.

        And it turns out that while I am prepared for the disruptions in habits that would go with a total conversion to Linux, I dread the thought of all the broken habit patterns that would result if I try to straddle both OSs. I don't want to surprise myself by trying to use Linux shortcuts in Windows-- that is the worst kind of interruption; it would definitely make it harder to stay in the creative sweet spot.

        I expect that I'm not the only guy around who feels stuck in a slow migration pattern. I expect that there are lots of individuals and small businesses who continue to use Windows because less than 2% of their work requires templates, or macros or something like that which they can't duplicate in Linux (yet)-- and that, combined with realistic concerns about unsupported straddling of both systems, is sufficient to keep them in Windows.

    • Re:Built for Linux (Score:3, Informative)

      by drsmithy ( 35869 )
      I'd say that in my case, getting the word out that Linux is just a kernel and that there are many flavours built arround it is the greatest problem.

      Getting the word out is not the problem. The "problem" is that the vast, vast bulk of people neither understand or - more importantly - care about the distinction.

      To most people a computer and its OS are logically one and the same. In other words, they perceive computers to be just like every other "appliance" in their lives (and justifiably so, IMHO, end us

      • Re:Built for Linux (Score:5, Insightful)

        by NickFortune ( 613926 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @06:38AM (#14145669) Homepage Journal
        In some ways the linux-on-the-desktop debate reminds me of the early days of AI. People used to think up realy hard problems for computers saying "if a computer can perform task X then it will be intelligent". The trouble is that every time we find out how to make a computer do task X, people say "oh, that's not intelligence - that's just an algorithm" and start devising harder problems to crack. Computer chess was once regarded as an AI Milestone, for example.

        Similarly, I think that what Linux needs to be considered desktop ready is being likewise constantly redefined. I mean the guys who were interested in Linux when Slackware was frst released saw "desktop readiness" happen years ago. The trouble is that each such milestone brings Linux to the attention of a larger, less technically adept group who look at the OS and say "Nice ideas, but it's not ready for the desktop..."

        Just a random passing thought

        • Similarly, I think that what Linux needs to be considered desktop ready is being likewise constantly redefined. I mean the guys who were interested in Linux when Slackware was frst released saw "desktop readiness" happen years ago. The trouble is that each such milestone brings Linux to the attention of a larger, less technically adept group who look at the OS and say "Nice ideas, but it's not ready for the desktop..."

          How well would Microsoft's products do if they were evaluated for "desktop readyness" us
          • Excellent point.

            Back when I had Windows 3.1, I had only 2MB of memory on that machine. Simply couldn't run it - it was too slow. I stuck with DOS because it was fast, and I couldn't completely see the benefit of a GUI if I couldn't run it.

            Same situation with Linux for a lot of people. Only in this case it's because the OS is "different" and they don't want "different" - they want "the same but different". They want "free Windows." So because Linux isn't Windows, they continue to pay through the nose in mone
      • It see it as more of a mind-set thing, some people buy a car, and take it to the dealership every 2000 miles to be taken care of. Some people want a car that they can wrench on and get it tricked out, some are happy with 18 inch wheels and spinners, some end up with a car with a different engine, tranny, and body pannels.

        If Granny has never changed the wallpaper on her screen, she should probably stay away from slackware or gentoo, I don't ever see the 'puter being a toaster, to many variables.
        • It see it as more of a mind-set thing, some people buy a car, and take it to the dealership every 2000 miles to be taken care of. Some people want a car that they can wrench on and get it tricked out, some are happy with 18 inch wheels and spinners, some end up with a car with a different engine, tranny, and body pannels.

          Here you are only considering one part of the car market. Other parts include companies buying cars and issuing them to employees (known as "company cars") together with companies buying

    • Automatix (Score:3, Informative)

      by Steeltoe ( 98226 )
      I hear Automatix is pretty good for settings things up on Ubuntu Just Right (tm): http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=66563 [ubuntuforums.org]

      Since I'm running mostly KDE-applications and didn't hear of it before too late, I didn't use this. So I've followed the various HOWTOs for installing proprietary codecs and compiled kmplayer (which is The best player for Linux right now, do yourself a big favour and forget all others), installed Real Player for Linux (found a utility that converted the install-binary into a deb II

  • Linux for the people (Score:3, Insightful)

    by glaswegian ( 803339 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @04:41AM (#14145371)
    The article says : "Peripheral device driver support was also a hot-button issue. In particular, USB device and networking printing were mentioned as key areas that needed improvement."

    For mass consumption, this is the biggest problem I have seen. The people I know who are not technically inclined will stay away from Linux for the time being for this very reason. When they buy a sparling new ipod and the installation cd doesn't set everything up for them they end up thinking Linux is either a) crap or b) for nerds with too much spare time on their hands.

    This is, of course, in large part due to vendors not giving a toss about Linux. With it's ever increasing popularity (especially in the corporate world) I don't think this situation will last very long.

    • Re:Linux for the people (Score:4, Informative)

      by Decaff ( 42676 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @05:41AM (#14145540)
      The article says : "Peripheral device driver support was also a hot-button issue. In particular, USB device and networking printing were mentioned as key areas that needed improvement."

      For mass consumption, this is the biggest problem I have seen.

      I may just have been lucky, but I have found in recent distribution that driver support (including for USB devices) has been excellent. A recent Ubuntu install was the first time I have ever installed an OS which fully detected and installed all my hardware - video, sound system, wireless network, USB etc. with no prompting from me at all. On the same machine, Windows requires additional drivers. I have always found Windows network printing to be far more problematic.

      • Re:Linux for the people (Score:4, Informative)

        by YttriumOxide ( 837412 ) <yttriumox AT gmail DOT com> on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @06:14AM (#14145613) Homepage Journal
        Working as a "specialist" in printing and printing technologies (see my post history for details), I can't help but wholeheartedly agree.

        I've not found anything easier for IPP, LPR or Raw (Socket/9100) printing than a simple CUPS install with a nice frontend as provided by EITHER KDE or Gnome. It even auto-searches the network for port9100 - something Windows is yet to do.

        Drivers for "toy" printers can be a pain, but even without vendor support (which I'll plug that we have) any PostScript device is a breeze and PCL devices are only marginally more complicated.

        A few months ago I tried to gauge our end user Linux adoption by the number of support enquiries I was asked to assist with (assuming our technicians/first level support couldn't handle Linux) and thought that perhaps there's not so much out there. Then I find out that there's a LOT more than I originally assumed and it just never makes it to me as an enquiry since it "just works". Enquiries about other systems (Windows, MacOS and AS/400 especially) aren't uncommon (especially Windows broken excuse for printer sharing in relation to permissions and device settings causing MANY headaches)

        That's just my take on it from an inside perspective of one of the supposed "key areas for improvement". Maybe these users just aren't savvy enough on printing in general, and it's not the OS that's the problem at all (it'd be interesting to give them a Windows environment and check out what printing issues they have...)
        • I'm amazed at how much stuff just works in Linux, usually if some hardware doesn't work, it's because some required spec wasn't implimented because windows doesn't use it and the vendor didn't bother to test for it, or decided to steal some CPU cycles to work around it in the driver.

          Usually if a printer doesn't work correctly in windows, the printer manufacturer get blamed, it's their hardware and drivers, if it doesn't work in Linux it's linux's blame.
      • I also used to have trouble with these things but my latest Debian install did a wonderful job. With USB in particular, hehehe. It used to be that only Unices needed to do the mount/unmount thing, but now Windows also requires it for all these removable USB thingies. Except the unmounting in Windows is unmount/click/click (I mean the two layers of dialogs that pop up are totally useless) while in Linux is a simple unmount.
    • Exactly. I dumped a recent Linux install in favor of Windows just for USB Webcam support. The system was for a small media center + teleconferencing with family. My distro was requiring me to recompile the kernel for Webcam support. Not exactly "plug-and-play". While compiling a kernel may not be difficult, I compare having to do this with rebuilding your car's engine just to change the radio station. It also had problems supporting the TV output on the system, and problems with several wireless cards.
  • I have a memo to go write....

  • actually (Score:5, Funny)

    by iced_tea ( 588173 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @04:43AM (#14145375) Journal
    "It's not TCO (total cost of ownership), or security, or lack of license fees," Dave Rosenberg said. "It's about the lack of a talking paper clip."

    • Exactly right - when people ask me why I use linux on my desktop I say:

      "Its not what you get with linux - its what you don't get. Spyware, viruses, IE updates that break things unexpectely, Ads on your desktop and in your word processing software, I could go on and on and on...."

  • tax software (Score:5, Interesting)

    by bogaboga ( 793279 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @04:43AM (#14145376)
    As the year steams to an end, I wonder when we shall have a free Java/QT/Mono/GTK application to handle income tax filing. Is it too late for the OSS community to cook up one?

    If this software were availed, it'd significantly boost the status of Linux getting looked at seriously on the desktop. I would not want to spend any money on the so called tax software again.

    • Re:tax software (Score:2, Insightful)

      by AuMatar ( 183847 )
      THe problem isn't programming one- its getting a team of CPA's to write and edit the rules. And handling major liability issues if its wrong. I know I wouldn't touch a line of code in one for the second reason.

    • Re:tax software (Score:4, Informative)

      by el_womble ( 779715 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @04:59AM (#14145421) Homepage
      I can only speak for the UK, but its already Java software, but its a web app. Sure you can buy Quicken UK etc, which will talk directly to the government gateway, but you can also just point any browser at government website and you can calculate and file your tax there too.

      I used it last year for my income tax and it worked a treat. I kept my accounts on excel, followed the wizard (which took about 3 hours, but you could save halfway through) and it calculated my return instantly.

      They also offer company tax and PAYE filling software, which is used far more than they ever expected - the assumption was that people would want to use a 'real' application. It turned out that nobody was tighter than an accountant and when faced with the option of shelling out for tax software or using a free, and very usable (if not quite as powerful) alternative they jumped at the web app.

      • Re:tax software (Score:2, Interesting)

        by aichpvee ( 631243 )
        I can only speak for the UK, but its already Java software, but its a web app. Sure you can buy Quicken UK etc, which will talk directly to the government gateway, but you can also just point any browser at government website and you can calculate and file your tax there too.

        In the United States the tax prep software industry bought legislation making it illegal for the government to directly provide such a service. Makes me so proud to be an american when I know how vastly superior our government is by

    • So it doesn't count if the application is deployed via the web?

      TurboTax Online comes out in January [turbotax.com]. Firefox support remains to be seen, obviously, but I'm not overly concerned, given FF's now-relatively-high market share.

      I've been using H&R Block Online [slashdot.org] under Linux for the last four years. Works flawlessly in firefox. They even keep a hot copy your records for three years - a feature I've used a few times now, and I don't need to worry about backing them up, losing the CD, etc. Tinfoil hat wearers need

    • Re:tax software (Score:3, Insightful)

      by sstidman ( 323182 )
      That's a nice thing to wish for, but it will never happen. The US tax code is incredibly complex and constantly changing. Writing tax software takes more than just programmers; it takes an army of tax accountants who read the tax code and codify it into a set of rules used by the software. Would you honestly trust a bunch of geeks (nerd herd??) to write such software?

      That said, there is no reason why someone couldn't port their tax software to Linux. Or you could probably run it under Wine. Considering

  • sigh* (Score:4, Funny)

    by Tahir Azhar ( 916001 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @04:50AM (#14145392)
    I don't know why but grandma kept insisting on NetBSD....

  • How representative was the sample? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by David Hume ( 200499 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @04:51AM (#14145397) Homepage
    Looking at the results, I have to ask, how representative was the sample group? Was it, as it appears, entirely self-selected? And what does that say about the validity of the results?

    I mean, 54% of the respondents use, or are considering, Ubantu? With only 19% for Red Hat, with another 26% for Fedora, for a total of 45%? Could that possibly be representative?

    And the second most important application is "Digital Camera/Video?"

    • Looking at the results, I have to ask, how representative was the sample group? Was it, as it appears, entirely self-selected? And what does that say about the validity of the results?

      They mention this in the full report under the section 'Statistical Anomalies'. "The survey had more exposure in certain distribution communities..."


      And the second most important application is "Digital Camera/Video?"

      Actually, the question that this answer comes from is "What mobile device support is required to meet
    • Red Hat and Fedora are not as popular in Europe as they are in the US. Here Mandr(ake|iva)/(Open) SuSE are the distros of choice for professional users. I've never personally met anyone who uses Red Hat or Fedora for example, and I know a lot of Linux users.

      I suspect, therefore, that the survey included respondants from countries other than the US.

      Bob
      • Red Hat and Fedora aren't as dominant as people might think in the US. SUSE and K/Ubuntu enjoy quite a healthy mindshare here. It's the popular binary split... there's something internally satisfying about reducing things to simplistic "people use foo in area A and bar in area B", when in reality there are statistical variations rather than hard absolutes.

        --
        Evan

    • And the second most important application is "Digital Camera/Video?"
      Sure ever try to develope product brouchures without a digital camera? Last time my oldish digital camera just worked in Linux, I'm curious to try it now, the switch to udev has caused some weirdness on my Linux system running Arch Linux.

  • The State of Linux Desktop (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ccozan ( 754085 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @04:55AM (#14145406) Homepage
    Believe it or not, i am using Linux as primary desktop continuosly from 1997 ( with just a short interval where i was forced to work on windows, or face getting fired). I've grown practically toghether with Linux as Desktop. Man, it was a challenge in the beginning. Things that for a server weren't important, they become for a desktop the equivalent of endless hacking nights. But it was worth. I was really pleased with it. Ah, and there were not that many distros, i think i started with Slackware, and since then only Redhat ( and now Fedora). I've tried also SuSE and Mandrake, but RH was the most consistent and the most easy to work with that time. SuSE was a PITA, until maybe the latest versions. Debian was out of range because of the "stable means old software" filosofy, even though i used the backports for various friends of mine, who wanted desktops with Debian.

    Now, if i take a look of latest gnome, but especially latest KDE, i can tell you, boy, this a fucking marvellous piece of UI, compared with was before. And all the small bits of integration with hardware are getting close to be a commodity, and not a luxury. I know, i didn't give back to much back to the community, but i am lurking from time to time in frenode's IRC channels, helping some poor beginners. Although, i think while the user friendliness of KDE(or gnome) has skyrocketed, there are still many hacks needed to make the user get the max out of what is offered. The weakest point and also the strongest point of FOSS is this somehow fractured and all over the world decentralised development of software. We should never abandon it, even if that would hurt the potential user ( i am not saying customer, because we talk about distribution and not commercialization).

    That being said, I applaud again the efforts of all developers, that keep us with the vision of a Linux Desktop.
    • I believe it. I have been using Linux as a desktop since 1996 (server since 1994), and it was my primary desktop from at least 1998 until earlier this year when I got a PowerMac with a 23" HD monitor. I love OS X, but I fully expect to use Linux as a desktop again in the future, especially after Apple releases systems with Intel processors supporting VT. Short of that, I will need a DVI KVM switch so I can share my new monitor with my old x86 system.

      OS X on my PowerBook is the most pleasant computing exp

  • Full results in PDF (Score:3, Informative)

    by millette ( 56354 ) <robin@@@millette...info> on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @05:00AM (#14145422) Homepage Journal
    Full results are here in PDF format (333 KiB), coral linked : http://www.osdl.org.nyud.net:8090/dtl/DTL_Survey_R eport_Nov2005.pdf [nyud.net]

  • Cabbage Patch Linux (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @05:02AM (#14145428)
    1) Put a pile of Linux CDs in a display in a store that has a "Grand Opening".
    2) Invite news media to the opening.
    3) Pay group of people to go charging into the store to fight over the Linux CDs.
    4) Profi... oh wait. They're free. And you have to pay those people. Soooo ... Loss!
  • Pagemaker? Who actually listed Pagemaker as an application they'd like to see on Linux? Quark or InDesign would make more sense. The shrinking pool of leftover Pagemaker users don't have the clout to have Adobe port it to Linux. Hell, all of the users begging Adobe to port Photoshop don't have the clout. :|
    • It was Me. I did it.

      I want Pagemaker, cos I have a ton of work I did for clients with it that I dont want to lose, and I hate booting a Win box just for that.

      However, I am a FreeBSD user, and I want a FreeBSD version of Pagemaker. (And Photoshop) And I would pay $100 for either. And thats FreeBSD on UltraSparc I don't use Dell boxes.

    • I was surprised at PageMaker as well... But actually we do have a good alternative to PageMaker if the need for it is real: Scribus! [scribus.org.uk]

      Scribus exists for some time now, and still, it was only a few months ago that I heard about it, and only 3 weeks ago that I installed it. And I was absolutely amazed at its quality (and standard support, even the latest pdf specs, including embedded script support!). What OSDL needs is a central place where all the great apps likely to be needed in an enterprise/office envir

  • Top reasons (Score:2, Insightful)

    by james_gnz ( 663440 )

    Hmmm...

    Perhaps "Employees requesting Linux" and "My competitors have successfully deployed Linux" were rated as top reasons because these were the things that got companies looking at Linux, rather than them being a final deciding factor?

    Or perhaps competitors successfully deploying Linux is seen as including decreased TCO etc. And employees' requests could certainly be based on these things (especially if they are generally IT workers, which I suspect is likely).

    In order to resolve these issues, the

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @05:16AM (#14145474)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re:Gamers (Score:5, Informative)

      by n0dalus ( 807994 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @05:26AM (#14145496) Journal
      Wine [winehq.org] has come an incredible way since it's conception. I am amazed by how well it runs some games (and other Windows software) these days. I think it's safe to say that by the time the Linux desktop is polished enough for average Joe, wine will have advanced to a point where it runs most Windows games/software very acceptably.

      I would like to think that one day wine will actually be better at running Windows software than Windows itself is. This is possible because while Microsoft is intentionaly breaking compatability between releases, wine is being developed to run programs from any Windows version. Often programs actually run faster in wine as well, since the linux kernel generally manages things better.
      • I would like to think that one day wine will actually be better at running Windows software than Windows itself is. This is possible because while Microsoft is intentionaly breaking compatability between releases,

        Have you seen Windows code? or you are getting this from the bottom of your ass?, Comeon, dont say something just to sound clever... you do not sound clever.

        Often programs actually run faster in wine as well, since the linux kernel generally manages things better.
        Ofter, actually, generally. So, I c
        • Have you seen Windows code? or you are getting this from the bottom of your ass?, Comeon, dont say something just to sound clever... you do not sound clever.

          Like I said, 'I would like to think that...'. Do I really need to explain myself? I have no idea if it will ever happen, but I think it's possible. And yes Microsoft really does intentionally break compatability between releases, and especially with their competitors. There's plenty of software that doesn't run in later versions of Windows. Think Win

          • Re:Gamers (Score:4, Informative)

            by EvanED ( 569694 ) <evaned@NOspAM.gmail.com> on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @07:43AM (#14145845)
            And yes Microsoft really does intentionally break compatability between releases, and especially with their competitors.

            Any evidence for that claim?

            There's plenty of software that doesn't run in later versions of Windows.

            Name some. I've only hit one program for a post-3.11 Windows version, either 9x or NT line, that won't run under XP. Hell, most DOS programs still run.

            Think Windows 3.11 software

            That's over a decade old. Even if they are breaking compatibility with it, I really don't think you can fault them for it.

            Windows 98 software and even Windows NT software

            Like I said, name some, because I've only ever run across one. (Hasbro's Clue. And a pretty poorly programmed piece of software too. Didn't even run quite right for me in its intended version of Windows.)

            • Re:Gamers (Score:2, Insightful)

              by CrazedWalrus ( 901897 )
              And yes Microsoft really does intentionally break compatability between releases, and especially with their competitors.

              Any evidence for that claim?

              Didn't the XP SP2 break compatability with a significant amount of software? I know our company waited as long as possible to deploy it because the SP had such a bad reputation. I also remember people reporting that their computers were not working correctly after the 'upgrade'.

              Anecdotal evidence, sure, but it's evidence I'm certain that most enterprise IT folk
        • Just today I download flash 7.0 installer.exe , right-clicked it and left-clicked run-as, Admin, password, and it broked, Admin doesn't have permission to run a file saved under a user's name, what kind of shit is that? That's somekind of effort on Microsoft's part.

      • Check out Cedega (Score:3, Informative)

        by Anti-Trend ( 857000 )
        http://www.transgaming.org/ [transgaming.org]

        Costs $15, but well worth it. Also, there are more native Linux games than you might think. Check out http://www.icculus.org/ [icculus.org] , http://www.linuxgames.com/ [linuxgames.com] http://www.happypenguin.org/ [happypenguin.org] , http://www.linuxgamepublishing.com/ [linuxgamepublishing.com] , http://www.tuxgames.com/ [tuxgames.com] , http://games.linux.sk/ [linux.sk] , http://games.linux.sk/ [linux.sk] , http://www.linux-games.com/ [linux-games.com] , http://www.linux-gamers.net/ [linux-gamers.net] ... Of course for me gaming is just gravy, Linux is my ideal OS for actually getting work done. But I find that games run m

      • Re:Gamers (Score:4, Insightful)

        by EvanED ( 569694 ) <evaned@NOspAM.gmail.com> on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @07:36AM (#14145822)
        This is possible because while Microsoft is intentionaly breaking compatability between releases, wine is being developed to run programs from any Windows version

        What's this?

        I can think of very few systems that have been around as long as DOS/Windows and have better backwards compatibility. I can think of only one Windows program that runs on an earlier version but not XP. About the ONLY thing that MS has done to break compatibility is prevent direct hardware access (e.g. for sound cards) in old DOS programs.

        Only system I know that's better (though I'm sure there are plenty more, but still a minority) about keeping backwards compatibility is IBM mainframes. What may be the best common mainframes in the world (IBM z/Series) still runs stuff made to run on the s/390 architecture.
      • A few years ago, I tried Diablo 2. It was choppy/slow, missing 3D sounds (EAX), etc. Have those things been resolved since then?

    • Re:Gamers (Score:4, Insightful)

      by rsidd ( 6328 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @05:35AM (#14145521)
      What about games?

      In a corporate set-up? "Our employees demanded games so we installed Linux..."

      Seriously, lots of windows-using kids have been hooked by the games on my Linux laptop, and my wife and I often play frozen-bubble. Nothing wrong with the games available on linux. Multiperson shooters and jaw-dropping graphics do not good games make, and people who insist on those will likely as not buy a PS or Xbox or whatever (the markets for game consoles is way bigger than the PC market). 3D acceleration works fine with linux on most systems; as linux gains popularity, game writers will likely target linux, but I hardly see why linux developers should develop games.

      • Nothing wrong with the games available on linux. You made me cry, sir.

        I have to wait till my roommate goes to bed before I can get a dose of Civ IV.

    • Re:Gamers (Score:2, Interesting)

      by Chaffar ( 670874 )
      I would THINK it would be a huge factor for home PC users.

      I'll tell you why I stopped using WinXP even though I have been playing PC games for 20 years now... The 2 factors that drove me away from XP are:

      - I was completely fed up of CONSTANTLY maintaining the Anti-virus/spyware/malware software up-to-date, and STILL get a dozen of so of them every month - I have an computer illiterate family :'(

      - IMHO, the quality of PC Games has dropped substantially in the past , oh say 5 years. I used to play PC gam

      • Re:Gamers (Score:2, Interesting)

        by LordFnord ( 843048 )
        I used to play PC games because I felt they were usually far more creative and intelligent than any console game: god games (CIV!!!)

        Some of them still are. I have done zero hours of actual work this week because of a certain newly-released game [2kgames.com] :-)

        It's like music, or films, or just about any other creatively-based industry. 90% of the stuff produced is mass-market plasticised sugar-coated crap, but there's always that 10% left over that makes the whole process worthwhile - of course, my 10% might not be

  • Email?!? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by el_womble ( 779715 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @05:17AM (#14145477) Homepage
    I've ranted about this before, but why are people so obsessed with email?

    No encryption (unless you have a degree in IT), no authentication (because people are tight, and nobody out side of IT knows what PGP is), poor support for attachments (MIME is a hack) and no enforcable equivalent to recorded delivery.

    That's before we start to think about the mess that is HTML encoded mails.

    I could live without security, but I'm really suprised that corporations can.

    We've been using email for over 10 years now, and it hasn't progressed at all and I don't believe for a moment that this is a 'if its not broke...' situation.

    If the FOSS community could establish a new email protocol that transparnetly added real support for attachments, security and formatting and it was adopted quickly by Thunderbird, Evolution and Mail.app (I'm a Mac zealot so I want it too) the next version of Exchange would support it too. In the mean time, Redhat, Suse and Ubuntu could be peddling Linux as the next big thing in email - something that might get the attention of CEOs who's only realy contact with a computer is email.

    • Re:Email?!? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by m50d ( 797211 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @05:34AM (#14145518) Homepage Journal
      No encryption (unless you have a degree in IT), no authentication (because people are tight, and nobody out side of IT knows what PGP is)

      PGP on linux is as easy as it is possible to get effective email encryption/authentication. It's really well integrated into every email client I've seen. But for encryption authentication to be meaningful the user has to generate keys, and that's the part you're probably thinking is too hard for the average user. But there's really no way to make it simpler without defeating the object entirely.

    • Re:Email?!? (Score:2, Insightful)

      by james_gnz ( 663440 )

      If the FOSS community could establish a new email protocol that transparnetly added real support for attachments, security and formatting and it was adopted quickly by Thunderbird, Evolution and Mail.app (I'm a Mac zealot so I want it too) the next version of Exchange would support it too.

      Not likely. There are two ways a standard can achieve wide adoption. One is if Microsoft pushes it (you'll ruin all chance of that if it has any association with the GPL). The other is if it's already had wide adoptio

    • I've ranted about this before, but why are people so obsessed with email?

      Because it's the most widely used and most practical application of the Internet.

      No encryption (unless you have a degree in IT), no authentication (because people are tight, and nobody out side of IT knows what PGP is),

      Public-key encryption is inherently difficult, it's not going to be made any easier by changing email protocols. There are very user-friendly PGP interfaces available already, the problem is getting people to use

  • Penguin powered for ages (Score:5, Insightful)

    by LABarr ( 14341 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @05:41AM (#14145542) Homepage
    I have been running my business on a Linux desktop and F/OSS for a number of years. (My servers are all OpenBSD, however) I have done a number of consulting gigs where a Linux deployment is discussed, and in some cases, choosen as the exclusive desktop solution. If there are no applications that the client has that absolutely requires Windows to run, i.e. beyond what they can do with e-mail, firefox, openoffice.org, GIMP, etc. --it isn't a difficult to sell them on the idea. Especially when pointing out the many advantages of an MS free office. I once recommended a Linux solution and told the client to keep a reserve of cash on hand to purchase Windows (OS and Office suite) software if they should find themselves feeling like they couldn't get by running a Linux desktop. That reserve has long since been spent, they are still running Linux, and there isn't a Windows desktop to be found anywhere. In other cases running a handful of Windows boxes for the people that really need it mixed with a mostly Linux deployment is the answer.

    Many clients have said that it is not that much of a change for them and that they wonder what all the fuss was about?

    I personally have actually found myself lost trying to do even trivial tasks on a friend's borrowed Windows machine that I wouldn't have to think twice about using my own laptop running Linux... I have started carrying LiveCD's just so this doesn't become more of an issue. The tools that come standard on many Linux distro's are far superior to those available to other OS's. It's a no brainer for me...

    ---
    Simulated Sig
    • In other cases running a handful of Windows boxes for the people that really need it mixed with a mostly Linux deployment is the answer.

      One more option. Windows boxes with Open Source software running. If there are 8 things the box must do, and one of them is available only for Windows (find a good driver for a big CNC milling machine for Linux... and a CAD/CAM software to go with it), use free software wherever it fits. OOo instead of MS Office. Firefox, Thunderbird, Gimp, Inkscape... and if needed, Cygwin

  • Bandwagon (Score:4, Funny)

    by kahei ( 466208 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @07:24AM (#14145791) Homepage

    So, in other words, Linux was installed not for business or technical reasons but because the next guy has it so we should have it too and people are talking about it so we should get one and so on.

    Linux is all grown up! Finally it is behaving in the marketplace the way real money behaves -- soon, CIOs everywhere will be propounding their 'Linux strategy' and writing articles in trade rags about 'how a switch to Linux allowed us to give our clients a competitive edge'. Heck, they already are! Then in 10 years, we'll be reading about how 'evaluating Linux alternatives forms a major part of our strategy for cutting the soaring costs of server farms' and so on and the cycle will go on.

    Yay!

  • Reading between the lines on question #12 and you'll see SuSe has a combined 60% share but Ubantu, a relative newcomer, already has 53%. Realistically I'd say SuSe is way ahead in terms of an enterprise ready system. They just need some more polish.

  • Summary (Score:3, Insightful)

    by trollable ( 928694 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @07:52AM (#14145876) Homepage
    It was 'employees requesting Linux (user demand)' and because 'my competitors have successfully deployed Linux,' he added.

    In other terms: PRODUCTIVITY
    (I'm not surprized)
  • why people don't adopt linux. It's because of the driver support. I've tried 3 different flavors of linux, and none of them will detect both my wireless and my wired nics. 3. Windows, of course, works like a champ upon install. This wouldn't be a problem except that all those idiot guides to linux or whatever don't cover modules or kernel recompilation. Listen guys, I'd like to run linux. I really would. But you don't make it easy.

  • hmm 86% need Macromedia Flash support (Score:3, Informative)

    by helix_r ( 134185 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @11:07AM (#14146952)

    Sadly, macromedia is sitting on their hands when it comes to supporting Flash on computer that use 64 bit processors.

    Basically, if you have an AMD 64 running linux in 64 bit mode, you can't see flash on websites.

  • Number Crunching for Linux Deployment (Score:3, Interesting)

    by queenb**ch ( 446380 ) on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @02:39PM (#14149123) Homepage Journal
    This is a real-life case from one of my consulting clients. They are a small construction company with 3 servers (2 file and one email) and about 10 workstations. They chose to convert to Linux based servers and workstations for a variety of reasons. The cost savings on the software purchases were plowed into a one-time expense of employee training and they've been quite happy with the results.

    $189 per seat vs. $50 per seat for the Codeweaver's Plugin
    Microsoft Office = Same price regardless
    ($700 + $35 per CAL) x 2 = $1750 vs. $0 and $0 CAL's for Server
    ($700 + $35 per CAL) x 1 = $1050 vs $0 and $0 for CAL's for mail server

    That's well in excess of $4000 in savings. The employer wisely chose to invest this in training and sent a couple of his people off to class. This cost him about $2000 for the both of them at a local community college. He then had those two train the rest of the staff. After some initial pain, he's enjoyed a $2000 savings just in his first year on the software alone.

    What's not included in this is that they will be able to use the same hardware for at least one additional year. Had they upgraded their operating systems to the current Microsoft releases, they would have had to upgrade their server hardware as well. Some of their workstations would also have required new hardware. Another expense that's not included in this is not having to purchase antivirus or anitspyware products for the workstations. Since 99%+ of these things are Microsoft-targeted, they simply fail to execute in a Linux environment.

    2 cents,

    Queen B

  • Summarized top 10 reasons for switching to Linux (Score:3, Insightful)

    by dtfinch ( 661405 ) * on Wednesday November 30, 2005 @04:01PM (#14149836) Journal
    1) Employees want it
    2) Competitors are using it
    3) Corporate direction (?)
    4) Source code
    5) Vendor independence
    6) Manageability
    7) Total Cost of Ownership
    8) Unhappy with existing OS
    9) Reduce licensing costs
    10) Security

    The grid they gave with the results was a little hard to read, so I tried to make a top 10 ranking out of it. I just figured this using a simple average rank, treating N/A as 8, so it's not as accurate/meaningful as it could be. The top 3 make no sense to me, but they may have just consistently scored in the top 5, whereas some issues are either very important or entirely unimportant.

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