Linux on the Desktop: More Balls Through Windows 471
doom writes "There's a story up in the free area of The Economist site about 'Linux on Desktop PCs' called:
More balls through Windows. Pretty much the same old stuff, but if you wanted something new you wouldn't be reading slashdot, eh?" Cynic.
The Year of the Linux Desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
As Bill Gates himself says, we often over-estimate the impact of a given technology will have in 5 years time, but we tend to UNDER-estimate its impact over 10 years. I think that the Linux on the desktop is similar: it will gain marketshare, but MUCH more slowly than people on
Let's stop measuring progress in years, and start measuring it in decades-- only then will we see the impact that Free software is having. Revolutions take time.
Oh... and balls through windows? Could you have come up with a weaker punn?
--- JRJ [jrj.org]
Re:The Year of the Linux Desktop (Score:2, Insightful)
Start of a Migration (Score:2)
penguins migrate... A few have been popping up on shore lately to breed. I expect that more may be lurking off shore evading the SCO and M$ sea lions. I have a feeling the whole beach may be covered in the little critters in a matter of days.
Re:The Year of the Linux Desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
1997 - 2000 were just the "Year of Linux" in general.
Re:The Year of the Linux Desktop (Score:2)
Re:The Year of the Linux Desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
We're read about several large organisations taking it up recently, and many small companies are turning to it as a cost-saving measure. As it's more prevailent in working life it naturally follows that users will use it at home.
If you use Linux at work, then it's simpler for you to switch at home. There's no need to learn two systems if you don't need to.
I'm aware that this sounds glib, but in my experience a lot of non-techy end users have enough difficulty getting used to Windows. As such if they want a home PC for e-mail and typing etc then they'll stick with what they know.
Re:The Year of the Linux Desktop (Score:3, Funny)
Hello,
Your comment, though excellent in it's own merits, would not be complete without the use of glib. As glib is a product of GNU, we're requesting you change your account name to GNU/ideatrack. Without glib, your post was nothing more than words. The inclusion of glib made it a complete comment, therefore the change in account name reflects the combination of your work a
Re:The Year of the Linux Desktop (Score:4, Funny)
Who is saying it? (Score:5, Insightful)
Who made these announcements? The 1998 article on a Linux "e-zine" is not quite the same thing as an article in The Economist. One audience consists of geeky hobbyists; the other includes the intelligent, wealthy, and powerful. The message might not have changed in all these years, but it is reaching increasingly important people every day.
===--===
Re:Who is saying it? (Score:5, Informative)
They've been running this exact story (Dell! Sun! HP!) for at least four years. The new article even starts by acknolwedging that.
For me, the era of Linux on the desktop has passed (Score:5, Interesting)
Switched to OSX, now I've got two OSX systems, and a single lone Linux box running my e-mail. That may go the way of the dodo if I can actually move the 300+ meg of e-mail I've got on there into a gmail account and actually find things.
I was a Linux desktop user for nine years not because it was free but because there was nothing better out there. Now there is. It'll be a long time before Linux can regain that spot for what I use computers for.
Its about two things -- apps and polish. OSX's interface disappears when you really know it. Its totally consistent, and becomes nothing but an interface to the tools you're using. Linux's UI's are too inconsistent, and the best apps in each category use too many different UI toolkits. Its a distraction to have to switch from one UI to another when switching between applications.
Until *all* the applications I need on a day-to-day basis use the same toolkits, have identical hotkeys, consistent menu organization then those applications waste my time.
Free software is good in concept and ideals, but its really got a LONG way to go to get people to use it for its quality not its price. Companies think of switching because of their bottom line, not because its going to make their employees jobs easier.
Re:For me, the era of Linux on the desktop has pas (Score:2)
How is the situation different from Windows? Windows is *clearly* ready for the "desktop", with 95% market share, however, it has a large amount of different behaving toolkits.
Take a typical company like Microsoft for example, on a modern version of Windows: XP. Old Microsoft Windows apps have one toolkit: open up MS Paint and stare at the w
Re:For me, the era of Linux on the desktop has pas (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:For me, the era of Linux on the desktop has pas (Score:3, Informative)
> each and every app. ctrl+x has been cut. ctrl+v
> has been paste. Windows have three icons in the
> upper right hand corner for minimizing,
> restoring/maximizing, and closing. There's a
> "File", "Edit", "Tools", and "Help" menu in almost
> every app. I don't know how you get more
> consistent than that.
I'm in KDE and I have about 7 applications open: Acroread, Kdevelop, Netscape 7.1, Limewire, Konqueror, K3b, and OpenOffice - all their
Re:For me, the era of Linux on the desktop has pas (Score:2)
I _hate_ OSX (Score:5, Insightful)
From what I understand, those files, .DS_Store and ._filename, hold metadata. Why OSX insists on creating these files on network shares is mind boggling. That's like walking in mud and not wiping your feet before entering someone else's house.
Anyway, for some reason, OSX creates these files, obtains a lock, and for some reason over samba NEVER RELEASES those locks. So often when one user edits a file, then closes it, other OSX clients can't access the file because they can't obtain a lock on the goddam metadata files. Yay!
$ smbstatus -L | wc -l
1679
All ._ and .DS_Store files.
I have googled up no solution so far, just thousands of other people who have the same problem.
That is just the most irksome of the numerous riduculous problems OSX has at the moment.
If anyone has a solution, please let me know. Is it something obvious? Am I just stupid? I don't fucking care, I just want this shit to work goddammit! I have spent hours googling, and if somehow I have just missed the blindingly obvious solution, then I'm sorry, but please let me know :)
Note, I don't _really_ hate OSX, it's more of a love/hate thing.
Re:I _hate_ OSX (Score:5, Informative)
find . -name .DS_Store -exec rm "{}" ';'
At least it gets rid of the damn files.
Re:I _hate_ OSX (Score:5, Informative)
Try the veto files directive in Samba
veto files =
in you smb.conf files.
I used veto files before to geep you the pesky "My Music" folder that windows plops down when it thinks a smaba share is a "My Documents" folder.
Re:I _hate_ OSX (Score:3, Informative)
The Win98 boxes do leave a lot of Desktop.ini files around. Win XP-2000-Me leas a lot of thumbs.db files when it finds images. Strangly RECYCLER directories pop up in the weiredes places from Windows.
Re:I _hate_ OSX (Score:3, Informative)
hide dotfiles = yes
You might try some or all of these options, read the man page for smb.conf if you have questions.
fake oplocks = yes
strict locking = no
veto oplock files =
Re:I _hate_ OSX (Score:3, Informative)
I'll be continuing to experiment next week...
*grumble*
NeXT had this too! (Score:3, Interesting)
The modern freedesktop.org d
Re:I _hate_ OSX (Score:3, Informative)
Given that OSX must support many legacy applications that rely on resource forks, I see no other option for Apple. Perha
Re:For me, the era of Linux on the desktop has pas (Score:3, Insightful)
When I'm on task I proce
It's about three things: (Score:3, Informative)
Linux will NEVER be ready for the desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
I got into Linux late (1999), because I was scared by the voodoo magic and demon sacrifices I was assured were necessary for such a step. What I found out after a (somewhat tedious) installation, is a KDE 1.1.2 desktop which looked much like Windows, much software that did the basic things, and a completely usable system which replaced windows on my computer from that point on. I had a browser (NS 4.7), a word processor (WP 8), and MP3 player, I was go. Much of the criticism aimed at it was correct, but it was a usable system nonetheless.
Fast forward a few years. We have two killer browser engines, each one kicking the crap out of MS's offering. We have an amazing (let's face it) office suit in Open Office 1.1, which is an excellent solution even for business use. In 1999 you could forget multimedia, now we have the two BEST video players out there, period (MPlayer and XineLib). Burning DVDs? Graphical frontends. Watching DVDs? Check. It's amazing how far we've come, but the same people keep repeating the same silly arguments (the button has the wrong shape! The users will be confused!) based on 4-year old Linux experience.
Linux might never be the ultimate desktop for all users. Hell, I don't think it should be. But it's ready for many users right now. I don't buy the 'average joe' arguments, here's a real example. I have a guest user set up for people who use my computer when I'm gone. I showed my girlfriend where the important programs were and left for work. While I was gone, she browsed the web, wrote emails, played some games, watched DVDs, listented to some of my MP3s. Then she (wait for this!) downloaded the images from her digital camera and transferred them to her portable hard disk and organised them in separate directories, based on the date they were taken. She had never used Linux before. Too difficult my ass.
Linux is ready for many users right now. It might never be ready for the 'typical' users some self-proclaimed experts always bring up in their condescending tone, but maybe it shouldn't be. It's ready for me, thank you very much.
Re:Linux will NEVER be ready for the desktop (Score:4, Insightful)
Collectively, all the alternative browsers remain flat-lined on the Google Zeitgeist [google.com]. Moz showing a pulse only when compared to IE4. There is nothing here to suggest that browser technology will drive users to Linux.
We have an amazing (let's face it) office suit in Open Office 1.1.
OpenOffice isn't a Linux exclusive and it doesn't provide a solution for the SOHO market which needs a stand-alone database like Access. There is a reason why Microsoft uses a jigsaw puzzle piece as a logo for Office, whatever you need for the office you can get from Microsoft or it's partners as a plug-in component.
now we have the two BEST video players out there, period (MPlayer and XineLib)
But are both these players street-legal and free of dependencies on the Windows DLLs?
Re:Linux will NEVER be ready for the desktop (Score:3, Insightful)
The setup will/should be handled by the OEMs as not many people install windows on their own anyway, not without the help of somebody more knowledgable. The driver thing is sadly a question of acceptance. When we are more mainstrea
Re:Linux will NEVER be ready for the desktop (Score:5, Insightful)
You're assuming that every app someone could possibly ever want to use is packaged in the particular format that your distro uses. Depending on your needs, there will most likely be a time when you have to fall back from packages.
These are really great, but not standard across linux distributions. I don't see why they should be, though.
Because maybe it would lead to a situation where every software developer can be sure that every Linux distro, at the bare minimum, has one particular package manager? Having a million different possible ways to package up software is a pain. Have you ever seen how some software downloads look? Links for DEBs, RPMs (separate Redhat, Mandrake, and SuSE versions), Slackware TGZs, regular old
The setup will/should be handled by the OEMs as not many people install windows on their own anyway, not without the help of somebody more knowledgable.
And what about the people who consider themselves knowledgeable about computers, but not Linux?
The driver thing is sadly a question of acceptance. When we are more mainstream, we will have drivers.
That, and some way to resolve the kernel breakage nightmare. I've never understood why binary drivers break with every single minor kernel change, i.e., it works with 2.6.1, but breaks with 2.6.2. Surely there must be some way to make a standard driver interface that keeps drivers from breaking whenever the kernel is upgraded, save for sweeping kernel revisions, right? Linux DEFINITELY needs that before the average hardware company takes releasing Linux drivers seriously. Why should hardware companies have to constantly update their drivers every few weeks just so the driver doesn't break with the latest and greatest kernel? And what about those who stay a few revisions behind? The company has to keep those versions available to DL too (and inevitably, there will be a group of users demanding 2.2 or 2.4 kernel drivers). And then there's those guys who have unofficial kernel versions (2.x.yac-17 or whatever) clamoring for binary drivers compatible with their forked kernel. It's insane, and it's keeping hardware companies away from Linux like crazy. Linux needs STANDARDS or else we're going to be hearing "is 2024 the year of Linux on the desktop?" on Slashdot.
Re:The Year of the Linux Desktop (Score:5, Funny)
Anyway, I have to admit, the article was a slightly fresh recapitulation. I'm ashamed to have looked at it. Since I only did due to my misreading of the title.
(currently compiling a new 2.6.5 kernel for a DESKTOP hehe) (Well, it's a backup server too, but it's mostly just a desktop.)
Another journo that can't use Google (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:2)
Ironically, the only project there that even begins to approach iPhoto is -- an OS X application!
I guess the Linux developers are still trying to figure out where devfsd put the camera.
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:3, Informative)
Assign keywords and meta data
Organize into albums and sorted by roll and date
Allow one to easily share albums/photos via CD, email, websites, prints, printer services, and books
Create slideshows with music
Import photos from a variety of sources (cameras and stuff)
What I use mine for:
One click import (plug in and hit import)
One click organize (album, date, roll)
One click export (album, email)
Export to slideshow (good for the sen
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:3, Informative)
The one useful thing people mentioned is a web gallery, and that could be a cool feature, though it certainly doesn't belong in a file browser
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:5, Insightful)
Call me back when GNUcash can:
Oh, but GNUcash is free -- and it has a web browser built right in. Nice.
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:5, Insightful)
- A 401(k) plan, whatever that is, is in use in one of the countries where the GNUCash developers live.
- There is a common tax system in use around the world, or when governments start approving free tax software implementations for filing.
- Your bank switches to HBCI, the Home Banking Computer Information protocol, in use in Germany, where many of the GNUCash developers live.
- Quicken exports to an open, or at least non-obfuscated file format.
- More Americans start contributing to the development of new features for GNUCash.
GNUCash is free, and it does what many of its users want. It just happens that many of those users live in Europe, and for now, they seem to call the shots.Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:5, Insightful)
Fix it yourself
Right. This is so typical of open-source philosiphy. Believe it or not, you typical user *does not* want to hear rants about *why* GNUCash doesn't do what they want.
That's why commercial software remains more popular. Intuit doesn't tell its users that the features they want are trivial. They don't tell their users to "do it themselves". Their product has to *sell*, so they can't tell their users to bug off.
Sorry, but Linux is not ready for primetime if this is what the software situation is like. Someone was stating that the accounting software was severely lacking in Linux. Someone else stated that GNUCash might be a solution. Evidently, it isn't a very good one. Particularly not if the developers have an attitude anything like the parent.
The Open Source movement would rather change the world than their software.
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:5, Insightful)
GNUCash does work for lots of people, even in the US. But not everyone. But guess what - Quicken doesn't work for everyone, nor MS Money. So keep on using what you're using, if it works for you.
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't develop for GNUCash, but I do spend much of my own spare time developing other Open Source applications.
I'll tell you want is wrong with Open Source, and it isn't the "fix it yourself" attitude. It is the attitude of people like you who expect something for nothing, and then bitch and moan when they don't get what they want. Most Open Source projects are developed as a hobby, started to "scratch an itch" of the developers. Odds are that the project meets the needs of the developers at least, plus some other group of people that use it. If the software doesn't do what you want, you have three options:
In case you weren't paying attention, that is two more options than closed source software.
Big-name Open Source projects like the Linux kernel, Gnome, KDE, Apache, etc. all have commercial backing. When you buy from RedHat or Novell/SuSE or IBM or Sun for example, you are helping for them to pay the developers that work on these projects - in effect "pay someone else to fix it". RedHat or IBM doesn't tell it's users that the features they want are trivial or to "do it themselves" either.
But most projects aren't Gnome or KDE, so stop treating the people that run them on their spare time like they are RedHat or Novell (or Intuit). You can be thankful that you have the option to acquire the software for no charge and "fix it yourself" via coding, documentation, packaging etc. or you can pay your money to Intuit and get what they have to offer. The choice is yours to make, but don't go confusing one for the other.
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:3, Insightful)
meaning I can:
a) pay $50 for commercial software package
b) recruit and hire a programmer who is also a licensed CPA specializing in retirement planning
c) go back to school for parallel degrees in both computer science and accounting to do the job myself
choices not grounded in reality are not choices at all
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:2)
Re:Another journo that can't use Google (Score:3, Informative)
This is from their contact page:
Contacting us
Letters to the editor
Send an e-mail to letters@economist.com [mailto] to comment on any article you have read in The Economist. Unless you state otherwise, e-mail to this address will be considered for publication in The Economist. Don't forget to include your postal address and a daytime telephone number. Please do not use this address for general correspondence.
Alternatively, you can fax your comments to:
+44 20 7839 2968/9
or post them to:
Letters
The Economis
Gnucash? (Score:2)
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Windows is not longer an easy thing to install (Score:3, Informative)
At this point, everything was OK but a worm exploiting a vulnerability in Windows XP infected him at his first use of the Internet. Wow! This is a slam in the face for an average user!
He brought his computer to my home. Since there was no easy solution for his problem, I had to forma
more balls? (Score:4, Funny)
If you want an OS with more balls, try Amiga [amiga.com]!
Ever the optimist at heart (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Ever the optimist at heart (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Ever the optimist at heart (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Ever the optimist at heart (Score:3, Informative)
That, I'm hoping, will draw enough complaints from everyday people
Never underestimate the apathy of everyday people.
If there isn't a popular uprising and they don't complain, then the net result is: a large corporation has used the current legal system and intellectual property law to keep the barriers to entry for competitors high.
Here's an interesting though: without the development of Linux and FOSS on the x86 platform Microsoft would not have been able to make quite as strong a case during its ant
Re:Ever the optimist at heart (Score:3)
Momentum building (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Momentum building (Score:3, Insightful)
I think there has been alot of progress, but there is still a very big difference between the business desktop and that of the Joe Shmoe home-user.
Re:Momentum building (Score:2)
Re:Momentum building (Score:2, Interesting)
Heck, this year I get to go to the Linux Users & Developers conference in London next week as a 'work' day rather than having to use a days holiday to attend.
What is interesting here... (Score:5, Insightful)
Some of the most important managers, CEOs, CFOs, etc all read The Economist. Therefore, this article may be an important introduction to Linux for many of these people.
On the other hand, this is not the first Linux-positive article in The Economist, so everyone should know by know that Linux = good, Microsoft = bad, etc.
Re:What is interesting here... (Score:5, Interesting)
Cynic (Score:5, Funny)
Best. Editorialization. Ever.
Re:Cynic (Score:2)
> Best. Editorialization. Ever.
Cynic.
Stupid statement (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm surprised people in charge of any reasonably sized company can still say this classic idiocy:
Yes, there's not real market for consumer-grade Linux desktop, for the good reason that the market doesn't exist yet, and someone needs to create it, and whoever will take the plunge stands a fair chance to reap huge benefits from it.
Remember, investors said the same thing to Jobs when he tried to get backing to produce the Apple.
Mr. Fink, if I was your boss and I really wanted to push Linux, you'd be fired...
Re:Stupid statement (Score:3, Insightful)
Dell temporarily sold their home desktop line with Red Hat 6.x preloaded. IBM Also sold Thinkpads with Red Hat 6.x preloaded. Both got canceled due to poor sales. Both companies still offer Linux preloaded on servers. And current offerings make a far more viable home desktop than Red Hat 6.x did, but the geek crowd alone could not make that particular market an e
Re:Stupid statement (Score:4, Insightful)
How, exactly, does one *create* a market? there's zero demand. Windows works fine. There aren't millions of users clamoring for something better or cheaper. Only geeks are interested, and geeks alone do not make a market (as we've seen countless times in the past... take the PDA "market" for example). Linux is filling a non-existent hole in the market. Anyone who has even an ounce of business sense (rarely will you find that amongst geeks... Gates was an anomoly) will tell you that trying to fix a non-existent problem will get you nowhere, fast.
Re:Stupid statement (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Stupid statement (Score:4, Interesting)
In Thailand, Linux is now preinstalled on 60% of computers. The market was created by the government (Yeah, I know, those evil communist bastards) building a cheap computing platform.
Of course a Linux market can be created, but just with any other product you will need to invest something first.
Re:Stupid statement (Score:5, Informative)
The way I see it the key factor for getting Linux onto the desktop as a consumer OS is that I should be able to walk into a high street electronics shop, buy a digital camera (or printer, scanner, video digitiser, graphics tablet &c) and have it just work when I plug it in to my PC. At most I should have to put a CD in the CD drive which will automatically start up the driver installation program which will require no more than clicking next a few times and deciding whether I want an icon put on my 'Start Menu', Desktop or both.
People are used to the Windows way of doing things. Whilst the Linux drivers for a lot of devices are becoming more common that level of ease of use is not currently available with any distro I've come accross.
Fortunately there is a project (Project Utopia) [ximian.com] aimed at providing that. Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a huge amount of publicity about it outside the blogs of the authors and a few forum posts and geeky website articles [google.com]. Last night I atteneded a Linux user group meeting in Birmingham (Eric Raymond [lug.org.uk] was due to speak but got called away at the last minute so someoneelse delivered the talk), of the 70 odd people in the room only two or three had even heard of this project. Hopelyfully this will change as one of the developers [ximian.com] will be speaking at OSCON about it [oreillynet.com] this year.
Stephen
What version is he using? (Score:4, Informative)
Gnucash pretty much has Finace wrapped up, whilst for organising digital photos, you can't go wrong with gkam and gphoto2 to get the images from your digital camera, gimp to touch them up, and the rather excellent Nautilus to view thumbnails and organise.
Or am I missing the point here?
Re:What version is he using? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:What version is he using? (Score:5, Funny)
But that's not Windows-only (Score:2, Funny)
Re:What version is he using? (Score:2)
Re:What version is he using? (Score:2, Informative)
You mean something like kimdaba [kde.org], which you can get for free and comes included in your good ol' Mandrake 10 distro?
No need to go to best buy, fork over your money, etc.
Re:What version is he using? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What version is he using? (Score:2, Insightful)
Subtitle (Score:4, Funny)
No.
Next article, please.
I'm waiting for it, I'm hoping for it, but (Score:2)
bogus separation (Score:4, Interesting)
the article introduces a distinction between "information worker" and "transaction worker", and says the latter is more likely to find a linux box on their desk since it can be locked down more easily.
i find this distinction artificial. in any environment where maintenance of the box is done by dedicated staff (bofh or ilk), what is more easily locked down will be more easily deployed, whether the end user is "information", "transaction", "creative", or whatever oriented. (training costs for unimaginative curmudgeons ceases to be an issue as those people die, retire, or get sacked.)
sure, there will be many hold-outs (and subsequent banter and frivolity on sites like slashdot), but that's fine too. w/o dinosaurs there would be no comfortably large rib cages for the smaller creatures to eviscerate and inhabit. nature is a mother, like they say...
Not So Bogus (Score:4, Insightful)
To me, this difference was basically given terminology by this article. The people who need their Excel Macros and aren't ready to switch over are the Information Workers while the ones who just need to type a few emails and memos are the Transaction Workers. It basically clarifies the fact that some people will do just fine with a Linux desktop while others aren't ready. We all know this, but no one's given names to define this distinction before.
To me, it's incredible to see this distinction finally being raised because 5 years ago you couldn't really say that Linux was ready for either. Progress is happening.
GNU/Linux (Score:3, Interesting)
Linux is a nice kernel. It can be used to make a nice Operating System, but the fact of the matter is, even as a computer programmer, I DO NOT WANT a Unix as my desktop system. The people that do, I question their sanity. Rather then worrying about X, and GNOME/KDE to pull users in, I think for Linux to be part of a friendly, usable operating system, things like the ambiguities in the file system (/bin,
This is all, of course, opinion. I now feel compelled to prove what kind of OS that Linux can be used to make... other then "yet another unix ".
Re:GNU/Linux (Score:2)
I agree with this poster. I do not understand the obsession to get Linux onto every desktop. Server side, yep, works great. Buisness apps, yep, they work great too. Embeded devices ? Yep, works great there too. Secure? Yep. Linux is all of these. Home user desktop ? I don't see it happening for a long time. Geeks like us will choose
Re:GNU/Linux (Score:5, Insightful)
> "E" and go on the interent. They can't be bothered
> with config files, man pages etc. If,and when
> Linux gets to that level of ease of use, maybe
> we'll see a Penguin in every pot
Agree that most home users just want to "get on the Internet", but why is Linux a bad choice for those users today? I've set up Mepis for users with this experience level in the past, and they work with it just fine; I'm sure there's other distributions that work just about as well.
There are several Linux desktop distributions now that make "getting on the Internet" as easy as it is on Windows. In functionality terms, one browser is pretty much like another these days; Mozilla or Konqueror are perfectly worthy substitutes for IE for both "power users" and novices.
Ditto for email clients. Evolution looks and acts almost identical to Outlook, and Thunderbird (my personal choice) is extremely capable as well. If you put Outlook on a pedestal as THE email client for the home user, then I'd claim Evolution is its equal in every way.
OpenOffice is a perfectly good substitute for MS Office; remember that we're talking specifically about home users here, so the lack of compatibility with Excel macros doesn't really enter into it.
An experienced user (i.e. the family techo, or even a worldly Linux desktop distributor/vendor) can lock down the Linux desktop to the point that your typical dumb user problems can't occur. It's far easier to lock down a Linux desktop than a Windows desktop. That's a big deal when it comes to supporting home users - stop them from being able to hurt themselves.
And that's before I play my 2 anti-Windows trump cards - viruses/security and cost of software purchase.
In all seriousness, I can't see why Grandma and Grandpa couldn't use Linux to get on the Internet just as easily as they use Windows. My parents, both in their mid-60s, use Mepis just fine; they can deal with Firebird/fox and Thunderbird, and it took almost no effort for them to switch from Windows. They don't get virus infections, despite opening every email they receive, and simply use their computers as tools in much the same way they use the phone and car - they don't know how it works, but don't care and have no reason to care. There's no reason for them to use man pages and config files, any more than they would use the Windows equivalents; a well-structured desktop pretty much eliminates the need for those mechanisms for the average home user. Yep, you could build a case that maybe they couldn't run a 100-user business entirely on Linux desktops, but a home user Linux desktop is perfectly viable and has been for a couple of years at least.
Already better (Score:4, Insightful)
Right now what is needed is a number of great applications that have no equivalents on Windows. This does not refer to Word, Powerpoint, Excel, etc. Most of those can come. Imagine if a Napster and Netscape both came out at the same time, and the ONLY place you could get it was on Linux. I don't know how long that could last before MS created a copy on Windows, but even then it would be in the reverse position that Linux is in now.
In my estimation Linux may need several rounds of applications like that. Then, Windows application developers will start writing to WINE as a compatibility layer and will actually improve WINE themselves to be able to have their Windows legacy apps supported, and MS is absolutely sunk at that point. Still, it's not just parity with Windows applications. It's the perception that the best and greatest new applications are only available on Linux, even if they eventually show up on Windows.
More Balls Through Windows (Score:2, Funny)
Just install Windows - not only will you have a bigger penis, but you'll have more balls, too; and it even cures warts. We'll extend your embrace.
The desktop is fine, it's the apps that suck. (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd go as far as to say that Linux is about 95% there in terms of 'ordinary' desktop things like browsing, e-mailing and chatting, typing a letter, clipping a photo, playing an mp3, etc. The problems start when you are a professional that needs the last 5%:
- Open Office is great for plain text and layout, but it messes up horribly if you have a document with fields or tables. This is not something you use everyday, but people that use it for their work need to be able to fill out a form without having to deal with an address field that runs off the window for some reason.
- The Gimp is phenomenal, but how about those fonts? Sure, you can do lots and lots of cool things with just images, but graphics pros _need_ those slick fonts.
- Pro audio: sure, Ardour looks like a nice digital audio workstation on paper, but in practice you have to deal with a segfault every ten minutes and quite a few usability issues. Same thing for Muse (great sequencer, sloppy timing), Glame (nice, impractical GUI), Jack (fantastic idea, too bad it still locks up systems), etc.
- Your profession here.
Point being: I think and hope that Linux will be all that on our desktops someday, but 'good' is not good enough when it comes to application software. For Linux to take off on the desktop, it needs to have 'excellent' apps. Apps that, at the very least, should be as good as their commercial counterparts, preferably better. For some reason, we see a lot of this quality in server type apps, we see this quality in the actual desktops (KDE and Gnome are prettier than windows XP if you ask me), but the applications are still lacking.
Innovation instead of Imitation (Score:3, Insightful)
Everytime we see a new article about Linux desktops, they always tout how it has all of these features that Windows or Mac OS X has now. This is fine, but for someone who has Windows already, what is the incentive to move, I am using a system that has all of the features of Windows already.
Everytime I have made an excursion into the Linux desktop, I have found it to be missing one or two things I really need, then boot back into Windows and find it. If Linux is always following Windows in features, they there is no incentive to swtich.
I think Linux could have a chance at the desktop market, it just needs to innovate instead of imitate.
Re:Innovation instead of Imitation (Score:3, Insightful)
This is common - what you are not doing is taking the time to learn the new and different features that Linux provides. You are using Windows as your yardstick, and anything that fits outside that shape, any features, or ways of doing things that aren't equiv
Wow (Score:5, Interesting)
SSDD, folks. Every major news source and all the minor ones from InternetWeek to Kumquat Digest are speculating on what Linux will do. You know what? I have a new revelation. Linux will come to the desktop when and if it feels like it, when and if it wants to, and you WILL NOT NOTICE IT. You know how I know this? Linux appeared on the scene in the first damn place in a manner so quiet that very few read the newsgroup posting. It grew and distributions started so subtly that most people didn't hear about them until several versions later.
The Angel of the Lord(tm) did NOT appear to me with RedHat install CDs one evening. I got a small email from my roommate saying, "Hey, you ever heard of this Linux thing?"
Linux has never been and, I suspect, will never be the sort of software and/or community to burst into a room, prancing on a stage like a monkey on crack, and shouting to the audience because he "loves this company". We'll be the dude in the back, sippin' a cup of java and poring over the light board while talking to the theatre technician. 'Cause you see, we're not all about fanfare, but we're still running the show. Someday you'll look down and you'll have been running Linux for a year and go, "Now, where in the hell did THAT come from?"
Longhorn / Palladium & lock-in ?? (Score:3, Insightful)
YADLA (Yet Another Dumb Linux Article) (Score:4, Insightful)
No! It already did.
Microsoft is finally facing real competition and what happens? Windows gets cheaper and they finally start paying attention to security and stability. $40 Windows XP lite, a huge new focus on stamping out viruses worms and gigantic security holes in their products. If there were no competition, Microsoft wouldn't care about these things. Microsoft is already being pushed around by Linux*.
Free software is already forcing Microsoft to work harder for it's money. Everyone who uses computers, whether they use free software or not, benefits from the competition it introduces into the market.
(* note: by Linux I mean the kernel and all the free software that runs on it most often including some GNU software and lots of non-GNU software)
They still don't grok FOSS (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:They still don't grok FOSS (Score:3, Interesting)
2) Most people don't have the time to wait around for an app. It either exists or it doesn't. If it doesn't, they won't switch.
That part of FOSS most people grok pretty well.
Respectfully (am not a coder)
Let's not make the same mistakes again (Score:5, Insightful)
Many programs were designed and built by people who took "personal computer" to heart and never bothered to learn to think in terms of a computer that might be used by several different people, perhaps even concurrently. These ignore security, don't handle separation of user and system storage or configuration gracefully, etc. Let's do better this time.
Other products suffer from the fallacy that computer==desktop. They assume that they're always run by someone who can just barely find the power button, and that they're always guided manually by someone sitting right there ready to respond to trouble. It ain't so; some of us actually care enough to spend time thinking about how best to use computers, and some of us want to script regular processes and get away from all that manual drudgery (which is what we made computers for in the first place).
If "the rise of Linux on the desktop" means I don't have to fight so hard for a non-MS solution in the server room or the laboratory, hooray. If it means I'm stuck with a choice between MS Windows and something that's just like MS Windows only not from MS, then in my view there's been no improvement -- in fact, an improvement we had for a while will have been taken from us.
We have a chance to do it right this time. Let's seize that chance and run with it. All computers should not be alike, because all computerists are not alike.
"More Balls Through Windows"?! (Score:4, Funny)
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Once more to the breach... (Score:4, Insightful)
What's needed for UserLinux...
As far as the desktop and general experience goes...
I think you're about halfway there, or three quarters.
- Now find a way to "hide" some stuff like directories,
- have a nice user/not root routine like the OS X way of asking your password to install stuff,
- a good point and click install mechanism that does away with dependency hell and
- a stupid simple updater/security patcher.
This to ensure that the desktop is a moderately secure place where people on the one hand can't do too many things wrong and on the other hand experiment and expand - why shouldn't a user install programs? Why shouldn't he/she install the latest virus definitions or security patches? After all, who else is going to do it...
All of that could be borrowed from OS X. Most of it is as far as I know already in discussion or development. Thing is, it should start to appear in the most popular distributions and be adopted as standard.
I'm not saying "go the mac way", not at all. These are basic things. There are an incredible amount of opportunities to go above and beyond. But Linux and OS X share the same set of challenges, since they share common ancestry and philosophy if you will. And OS X does solve these problems very elegantly. You would overcomplicate by going the windows way on these issues.
That takes care of the desktop (or the general user experience if you will). All other issues (consistency, naming of apps,
Another thing: killer apps. You need just a few. You may already have them, but they still need a fair amount of polish - not only nice looks, but good, consistent results.
OTOH, there's a shitheap of proprietary apps looking into Linux. Be nice, invite them over. These are the apps 95% of the people use today.
Just to get this out there... (Score:3, Insightful)
*WHY*THE*HECK* do they overwrite the primary clipboard *EVERY*TIME* I accidently drag a bit of text. It makes it impossible to copy a link somewhere and simply overwrite the URL line. Combine that with no clear option on the URL line, I find myself relexively selecting the current URL and then pasting. Oh, but Mozilla thinks I must have wanted to take that URL I just nuked *TO*THE*FREAKING*MAIN*CLIPBOARD*. Bah and double bah! Anyone used to windows conventions is going to think this is a useless clipboard, and anyone used to any *other* gnome/kde application will realize it is broken, and be forced to use a clipboard manager.
This is absurd, and contributes is one of the few major annoyances left on my Linux desktop. Hey Mozilla guys: you are *NOT* the only application on my desktop, so stop nuking my primary clip, mkay?
Gah... venting complete.
Re:colinux rocks? (Score:2)
Re:Spell Check? (Score:3, Informative)
So, you really just made yourself look like an idiot.
hmmm... flaming really *is* good for hangovers...
Re:It is a long way off! (Score:5, Interesting)
Seriously, installing apps in Linux is actually easier than Windows. It just doesn't behave like Windows, so people get frustrated because they foolishly try and do all the work themselves.
The model you use in linux is different in that your distro provides a whole library of programs for you to download and you go through them. If you do, it should work flawlessly the way you describe. It's just a shift in mindset from the download.com way of doing things.