Ask Slashdot: Whatever Happened To the 'Year of Linux on Desktop'? 417
An anonymous reader writes: Investors, enthusiasts, and Linux distro makers have for more than a decade projected that the upcoming year will be the year of Linux on the desktop platform. But we just can't seem to get to that year for some reason. Windows continues to dominate the consumer market. Apple's macOS X is quickly gaining ground among business customers and designers, and is already ahead of Linux. Do you see Linux getting a significant boost in the desktop market in the coming years?
D'oh! (Score:3, Insightful)
What happened was, we'd already been using it for years so it sounded really stupid and it was only ever a joke where people laughed at anybody who had repeated the phrase.
It was already a great desktop, and it still is.
New users are not really useful to us, either. Please don't switch.
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Kuell. That was the first linux distribution I could effortlessly get working on a PC.
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No, wait, I remember something earlier than Slackware 96. I think it was called Slackware 4....
Re: D'oh! (Score:3, Insightful)
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I've had the same kinds of problems with "strange USB devices" on Windows. I've actually gotten spoiled by how well Linux works with USB devices and dealing with Windows is often a jarring reality check.
Don't pretend Windows doesn't have it's problems.
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That only works until the first time they want to install software or hardware. Then they're back to their local "free tech support guru". Even something as stupid as installing a printer will get you hit up for free tech support.
Plus you can buy pre-installed Linux boxes now.
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You mean I can't install something from the "app store" and run it?
It's actually easier to do that on Linux. Both iPhones and Android are modeled after the way Linux does it.
Re: D'oh! (Score:2)
Re: D'oh! (Score:5, Interesting)
Yet you present no real argument. You just engage in a lot of unsupported claims and insults. Linux desktops and applications use a lot of the same GUI basic elements. ALL of the desktop platforms use "easy to discover" interfaces.
The biggest problem many people may have is that they are simply used to something in particular.
Ribbon pissed a lot of people off. So did Windows 8. Some of the peculiarities in MacOS alienate Windows users.
This isn't about some strange caricature that exists mainly in your head.
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It isn't that we're out of touch, it is just that we really aren't bothered by the fact that it isn't the best choice for everybody. It is OK. You don't have to use it.
And clue up, it is already on lots of desktops. You not caring if we use it doesn't cause it to vanish, or cause us to no longer have a desktop.
The problem with linux isn't the enthusiasts, it is just a thing about linux that it is for enthusiasts.
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You say this like it's a bad thing.
No seriously. I mean that. I've done the fanboy bit before. OS/2. There. BeOS. Yep. Lots of others.
I do NOT recommend Linux to people. In fact, I say to NOT use it. Why? Cause most people want to play games, browse the web, do their email and watch NetFlix.
For
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I do NOT recommend Linux to people. In fact, I say to NOT use it. Why? Cause most people want to play games, browse the web, do their email and watch NetFlix.
For them - use Windows.
Exactly this -- although I don't necessarily recommend Windows. I recommend whichever operating system they are already most familiar with.
Re: D'oh! (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly this -- although I don't necessarily recommend Windows. I recommend whichever operating system they are already most familiar with.
That's eminently sensible. However, if the needs are basic and the prospective user is not a "computer type" --- I might just install Linux for them.
I did that for my wife, who uses Linux and doesn't know it's Linux, and doesn't care, because she can do her browser-based stuff and maybe view some photos or documents off-line, and maybe play a simple game or two.
For basic needs, Linux is certainly no harder to use than Windows.
And when problems pop up (quite infrequent), then this "basic user" wouldn't be able to fix them whether it was Linux or Windows or Mac.
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I do NOT recommend Linux to people. In fact, I say to NOT use it. Why? Cause most people want to play games, browse the web, do their email and watch NetFlix.
You can't watch Netflix on a Mac?
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Except that Windows 10 is failing badly, can justifiably be labeled as malware, and does not allow its users control over their own machine. So what's the alternative? Macs are way too expensive.
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This is the first time I've wanted to mod up an anonymous coward. But you're still more noise than worthwhile signal.
Re: D'oh! (Score:5, Insightful)
What moronic nonsense. There is not ONE thing in that post that warranted your reply. The fact that shit just works for a lot of people is just something trolls can't handle.
It's not 1995 any more. The "steep learning curve" is overblown. It's really no worse than it would be for anything. That includes strange new versions of Windows.
When things go wrong, they are equally ugly on all three platforms.
Re: No std GUI - a commercial minefield (Score:4, Insightful)
Go read Qt's commercial terms [www1.qt.io],
Maybe YOU should read them. You need a commercial license if you want to produce closed-source proprietary products. You can still sell your product / offer support, etc., without a commercial license, you just have to provide source.
And Qt is not the only game in town.
Re: No std GUI - a commercial minefield (Score:4, Informative)
If you dynamically link to the Qt libraries, you can sell your closed-source proprietary products without having to pay for a commercial license or share your source.
If you statically link to the Qt libraries, then you are required to either pay for a commercial license or share your source.
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Go read Qt's commercial terms [www1.qt.io],
Maybe YOU should read them. You need a commercial license if you want to produce closed-source proprietary products. You can still sell your product / offer support, etc., without a commercial license, you just have to provide source.
And Qt is not the only game in town.
Which is not true. I worked for a small company selling close source Qt applications. We started out using the LGPL version of Qt 4.3 and once we made enough revenue we switched to the commercial license so that we could use some of their close source libraries. We used v4.3 through v5.5 and the quality and support was excellent. Going from 4.x to 5.x was painless so claims that the product is poorly supported are bunk.
Duplicate post (Score:5, Funny)
From 2016, 2015, 2014 . . .
Re:Duplicate post (Score:4, Interesting)
What's a desktop? (Score:3, Funny)
Posted from my iPhone
Windows for business. Consumers left the desktop (Score:3)
There is a lot of truth to that. The article mentions business desktop and consumer desktop.
Microsoft is still very popular on business desktops, of course. Windows on the desktop is NOT popular with consumers. Consumers have largely left the Windows desktop, moving to Android. Even if you leave out iPhone, people bought more Android devices last year than the total sales of Windows devices by both business and consumers combined. For consumers, Android and the mobile form factor are three to four times
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Eh?
Consumer have largely left the desktop, period.
Lots of people I know who used to slog around laptops or have a desktop at home now rely entirely on their pocket computer (whatever OS it is running) for everything.
As I see it, it's desktop-vs-pocket, not Windows vs Android: Android is not [intended to be] a desktop operating system.
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Don't you mean "Posted from your Android"?
We skipped the Year of Linux on the Desktop and went straight to the Year of Linux In Everyone's Pockets. Android is Linux, and has the largest market share of mobile devices, which now greatly outnumber desktops.
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I hope not (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't see Linux gaining a significant part of the desktop market in the foreseeable future. And, as an avid Linux user, I think that's a great thing.
I don't want Linux to get so popular. Getting that popular brings two really terrible things with it: more attention from hackers, and a more rapid degradation of the operating system as it tries harder to cater to everybody.
Re:I hope not (Score:5, Interesting)
That's the thing: everyone thinks their pet project is going to be super-popular for some reason, without considering the stakeholders. If you want the whole world to use it, then the whole world is your stakeholders.
Occasionally you see this mentality leak when people mention end users being too stupid to know what's good for them and so sticking to Windows (check out RMS). You also see people try to factor the stakeholders in with things like Wine, XPDE, Steam for Linux, and even the installers that boot from Windows instead of repartitioning your disk (low-risk). Nobody's trying to get buy-in in general.
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That's the thing: everyone thinks their pet project is going to be super-popular for some reason, without considering the stakeholders. If you want the whole world to use it, then the whole world is your stakeholders.
Nonsense! All hipster coders know the formula goes like so:
1) Get VC funding with super cool presentation
2) Use all the shiniest, blingy blingy cool new technology
3) Business functionality? That's so lame
4) Startup goes under
5) Go back to step 1
Don't be lame.
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more attention from hackers,
That's a good thing. It will make linux more secure. (i.e. the opposite of security through obscurity). I would argue linux already gets a lot of attention from hackers, just not from people trying to hack desktops.
more rapid degradation of the operating system as it tries harder to cater to everybody.
Are you sure you're an avid linux user? Did you not notice the million different linux distributions that all cater to every possible individual? There doesn't need to be a one size fits all linux distribution that needs to cater to everyone.
Of all the problems linux has, you managed to cite
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That's a good thing. It will make linux more secure.
It's not a good thing -- security is a constant arms race. That's like saying "getting mugged more often is a good thing because it will make you a better fighter".
Did you not notice the million different linux distributions that all cater to every possible individual?
And why do you think there's such a wide variety? If Linux became a mass-market item, then everybody would start chasing the market, which means that there would be less variety as all the distros converged while competing for those sweet mass-market dollars.
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It's not a good thing -- security is a constant arms race. That's like saying "getting mugged more often is a good thing because it will make you a better fighter".
No it's more like saying, playing a lot of chess will make you a better chess player. The *only* way to become a good chess player is to play lot's of chess. Just like the *only* way to have good security is to have lots of people trying to break it. Other things can help you have better security (e.g. good design, etc). But you cannot have good security without lots of people trying to break it. You can not become a good chess player without playing lots of chess.
Trying to have good security by having
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Re:I hope not (Score:5, Interesting)
It seemed to improve WIndows quality tremendously though over the past 20 years. Windows 7/10 is not WIndows 98/ME by a longshot in terms of BSOD, security, or crashes.
Linux kind of oddly is degrading with SystemD, gnome3, pulse audio, wayland, and so many dependencies that not everyone knows what they are trying to make Linux be the end all be all.
For servers the idea of running FreeBSD is becoming quite popular for this reason.
Most devices from supercomputers to embedded use L (Score:3)
> more rapid degradation of the operating system as it tries harder to cater to everybody.
That would have been a reasonable prediction 30 years ago. For the last couple decades, almost all supercomputers have used Linux, as have many embedded systems, most web servers, and now most phones / mobile devices use Linux, each with an appropriate UI on top. The fact is, Linux does suit a vast array of very different use cases, and that has worked out very well.
One reason that has worked well is new
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1) Linux is not secure enough to withstand "attention from hackers", and
This is a very misleading way of putting it. Linux isn't magic, and security isn't a static thing that you either have or don't. It's a constant process. If an operating system is popular, economics dictates that it will attract more criminal activity, which means that more resources have to be diverted to defend against it, which means there are fewer resources to actually make the OS better.
2) Linux is not well-architected. It cannot be seamlessly extended to offer new functionality.
This is quite a leap. It isn't an architectural issue, it's an issue of what people want their OS to be like. If Lin
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And yet, it's that very "choice" that prevent Linux from ever winning "the desktop". I've been asking for many years for a good resource for me to refer people looking to play with Linux so they can walk through some sort of "wizard" to help them decide which choices are best for their personal needs. It's yet to exist.
Which distro is best for:
Developers
Video Editing
Games
etc.
And then, which window manager is best for:
etc.
Sure, I could just recommend Ubuntu because it's the easy choice, but maybe Mint or S
Re:I hope not (Score:4, Interesting)
Which distro is best for: Developers
Video Editing
Games
etc.
The problem here is that most distros are great for Developers, but there are none that are great for video editing, games, music editing, etc.
Yeh baby (Score:2, Insightful)
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> every android phone runs on a Google-modified linux kernel with Google userland and spyware its fair to say that Google rules the world
There, I fixed that for you.
Well not quite really....... (Score:3)
Also (partly due to that?) Android has the charming feature of updating until the meager memory fills up, and then you,,,, ummm,,, what? Then you go buy a new one. Because the vast majority of people with a device in this state have no idea what to do with the thing a
Android is a bad example of Linux being "popular"! (Score:3, Interesting)
Android is a horrible example to use of Linux being popular. In fact, it shows the complete opposite: Linux can only become a widely used consumer OS kernel when users and developers have absolutely no idea it's there, and it's thoroughly hidden under many layers of abstraction.
Google could silently replace the Linux kernel with some other kernel, and Android users and developers would have no idea it had even happened. That just goes to show how irrelevant Linux is within the Android ecosystem. Yeah, it's
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I can do a lot of things with ease on this desktop that are not feasible on a smartphone.
People around here keep mistaking themselves for the market.
People like you (and me!) are the reason why home PCs aren't actually going away. But the average person doesn't need a PC any more, and if they do, it's just a laptop. Only a minuscule percentage of the potential market actually does anything which requires a real PC. Of those people, the vast majority of home users will never edit a video, or compile a program, or even run a virtual machine unless it's a dosbox from GOG; the vast majority of them
Next Year.. (Score:2)
...will be the year of Linux on the desktop. W8 4 it!
You don't overtake an entrenched product... (Score:2)
.
So it you phrase the statement a little differently, from "Year of Linux on Desktop" to Year of Linux for Personal Computing," that year is in the past due to smartphones becoming
The wrong target (Score:2)
maybe a more interesting question... (Score:5, Interesting)
When was YOUR year of the Linux desktop?
Mine was 1998. I installed Redhat 5.2 and Linux has been on my desktop ever since.
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1993, Slackware 0.x ... (0.9?) ... however it defaulted to Win 3.11 (I hated it os much, but needed it for Symantec C++, I think it was still Zortech that time).
Something like 18 3.5" disketts to install, then a boot loader, I did not dare to install it on the HD, so when I wanted to start linux I put in a floppy with LILO on it. Later however I installed LILO on the HD
Chromebook? (Score:3)
Those are sort of on the desktop. Granted given that the general trend is people are using mobile devices more often than not, and your choices are a Linux kernel or Mach, we've already been there a while.
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Dear god no... My daughter has a chromebook, and if people think *that* is linux on the desktop... Boy they'll never touch Linux again..
ChromeOS is a festering pile of instability and intentionally limited capability. Have had so many glitches impact basic functionality because Google went their own way on so many fundamental aspect, and yet also don't seem to care much about it either.
2018! (Score:2)
And this time, WE MEAN IT!
Seriously? (Score:2)
Whatever Happened To the 'Year of Linux on Desktop'?
You know that's the joke, right?
If you want a serious answer, it's because it still doesn't "just work."
Integration (Score:5, Interesting)
I have used Linux as my primary desktop since ~1997. As a software developer it is a power platform. The shell is critical. However, as a conventional desktop it is just not competitive with Windows. And OSX isn't either. Both Linux and OSX are below 4% market share. Vertical integration is very weak. Windows has an identity management system that allows transparent filesharing, advanced group based access control, sophisticated business applications. Getting stuff like that to work on Linux is too difficult or simply not possible. So software venders focus on the Windows platform. And rightly so. I just tried and application that recently released a Beta for Linux and it was a total fail. I occasionally dabble in engineering related stuff and I have to have a Windows machine for all of the various programs for cad, PCB design, simulation. Yeah, programs like that exist for Linux but they're just not good. And I know people agree with me that the GNOME desktop has actually regressed. It used to be much more usable. But they dumbed it down for reasons that where not entirely clear. My guess would be that when new developers come along, they have a tendency to want to re-write everything from scratch. I'm not diametrically opposed to this strategy but you better come up with something that was at least as good as what you're dumping. And that didn't happen. There are other integration related issues as well. For example, for as long as I can recall there has always been a fight between X and the desktop over who should remember the positions of windows. X says applications should save that information and recall it when re-launching an app. Desktop people think it should be handled by lower level facilities. Now, whenever logout and back in, all of my terminal windows have to be re-launced and repositioned (I run 6-8 terms on 4-5 workspaces). That is something that actually used to work somewhat in GNOME. It worked in WindowMaker IIRC. The Linux desktop has been dumbed way down to the point where it's not nearly as useful as it used to be. At least not for people doing more than surfing the web and email. Might as well just get a Chomebook for that.
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Both Linux and OSX are below 4% market share.
Market share is not interesting.
Both Linux and Mac OS X has an install base far beyond 4%, on the desktop. Considering how many linux servers are out there, I doubt windows is even in the same magnitude.
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Majority of the worlds servers run Windows. PHBs looove Microsoft because they feel it's an integrated platform with what they run on the desktops.
games, duh (Score:2)
The main reason I dual boot is for all the games that aren't available on Linux. Wine isn't a good answer. Even if I can get a game to work under Wine, and can get decent performance, the next update to Wine is too likely to break it.
Plus, decent 3d accelerated graphics is still a pain to get working in Linux. Best chance is to get whatever card from a generation or 2 ago that is the most standard and tested. Without hardware acceleration, a lot of games are unplayable. Too often, open source drivers f
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Wine isn't a good answer.
Crossover does a very good job of supporting Windows games using WINE. It does it better for many games than the newest version of Windows.
It's the only non-free Linux software that I have ever felt was worth paying for.
Linux will become the predominant user desktop... (Score:2)
...when all users move to "the cloud".
There will be no money to be made with standalone PCs with local OSes, and that's when all the businesses will stop putting money into it. Deal with it, bitches.
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The planet has 7 - 8 billion people.
Probably it will take another 100 years till they all have moved to the cloud.
Oh, you did not mean that cloud ... my mistake.
Honestly: why would *I* move to the cloud? I have a laptop. Everything that is essential is on that laptop and on the backups. Why would I move to the cloud? So I have no access to my stuff in a plane, train? In a foreign country with absurd internet costs ... or I have to buy a new sim card first and probably a new phone as my iPhone has no dual si
Downhill Since 2010 (Score:2)
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Windows too I may add. Though Windows 10 is certainly an improvement over WIndows 8, it still is no Windows 7 when it comes to the GUI.
Whatever Happened To the Year of Linux on Desktop? (Score:2)
It's next year, of course.
"Year of the Desktop" has always been BS (Score:2)
From the very first days I ever heard the term, there were only two sorts of people who ever used it:
1) Linux people who were making a joke
2) Linux-haters
It's a meaningless thing.
It's still waiting for the Hurd kernel (Score:2)
Perhaps (Score:2)
ESR Says as PCs Get Cheaper, Windows Will Die (Score:3)
Here is a blast from the past for you:
https://linux.slashdot.org/sto... [slashdot.org]
which linux distro (Score:2)
If I install Windows there is one version of it, Win 10; same with Apple. If I install Linux which distro, or even non-gnu. Until all the Linuxers come together and agree, "I think this distro is horrible but one Linux on a desktop is better than a good Linux" it won't happen.
Similar things need to happen with stuff like Vi vs Emacs.
There's too much infighting.
Controls need to be changed to match Windows or Apple.
As does appearence. Of course it can still be changable.
Being open/free might actually make it
YES! (Score:2)
Linux is almost usable as a desktop right right now. The guy who ran the "linux sucks" presentations just had his last talk in 2017. Year after year, he'd bring up the same problems over and over, but eventually they did get fixed (albeit a lot later than promised). It's not as if every problem is currently fixed, but most have been and the few remaining have clear paths to being fixed. Or to put it another way, enough stuff has been fixed or almost fixed to no longer warrant further "linux sucks" presen
It already happened (Score:2)
Perhaps a better question would be, why does open source suck at making a desktop/mobile platform, while a company which uses the same open source managed to make a platform which displaced Windows as the #1 OS in use. IMHO it's user friendliness. The programmers who make open source projects are notorious for prioritizing their own needs above
Do you use Android? (Score:3)
Do you use Android? Do you spend more time with your phone or tablet than on a workstation or laptop? Congratulations, you're in the year of the Linux desktop.
Meanwhile I've got an XBox One S for movies and some games, several generations of other game consoles, a couple of Raspberry Pis running Raspbian but often used to emulate older console and desktop systems, a WebOS smart TV, a Linux smart TV, a couple of Chromecasts, a Windows desktop for games, a Linux desktop for personal non-game use, a Linux laptop for travel, a Mac desktop for company work that mostly connects to Linux systems and runs Linux VMs, a Mac laptop for company work that mostly connects to Linux machines or to my work desktop, two Android phones one each for work and personal use, and a non-Fire Kindle for reading without interruptions like I get on my other devices. My girlfriend has a Mac laptop, a Linux desktop, and an Android phone.
So... what's the question again?
2018 (Score:2)
Almost there...
Easy (Score:2)
It's on Windows 10 toda! What? You said you Windows on the desktop right??
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Stupid Android auto correct ... I'ts on Windows 10 toda! You said you wanted it on the desktop right?
Its a personal spiritual experience (Score:2)
For me it happened in 2009, where I had this release of reality when I realized there was nothing that Windows had that I couldn't do it on Linux Mint/SUSE. Before that it was a hit and miss and using Virtualbox.
Designers (Score:2)
Linux has plenty of nerds that are software engineers developing software. Something Linux and pretty much the entire F/OSS ecosystem is missing is quality UX/UI designers and engineers. There isn't much by way of decent collaboration tools in this department. Another area of interest is the lack of technical writers to write up solid documentation. Instead, our community is full of forum threads that consist of only two posts: someone asking a question, and that person getting a reply to "just fucking goog
Wrong name (Score:2)
Fallacy of Quantity == Good (Score:2)
Analogy time:
McDonalds serves _billions._ No one is arguing that their quantity is even remotely comparably to quality. McDonalds excels at selling A LOT of cheap, shit food.
Likewise, the analogy to Operating Systems on the desktop is applicable:
* Windows = Quantity
* Linux = Quality
Although I would argue that Linux on the Desktop was NEVER about quantity, but about Freedom. Quality was always an afterthought.
Linux has failed to gain any serious traction on the desktop because:
1. "Windows is Good Enough"
Two Words: (Score:2)
Video Drivers
Chrome OS happend. (Score:3)
The year of the Linux desktop has past mostly unnoticed. And the OS is nothing more than a terminal for services. Just got a Chromebook for 130€ to try out this cloud thing. (I'm a 20 year Linux user and my other portable is a MB Air from 2011). The Chromebook concept is amazing. Dirt cheap, boots in seconds, runs for hours on a single charge with a very small battery (ARM system) and is totally idiot safe, usable but the other 99.999% of the population who aren't computer experts like us. Two-factor auth setup with two mouseclicks.
Given, I have to do *everything* with cloud services now (IDE, CI, Testing, Documents, Storage, etc.) and everything is hooked to accounts in the cloud. But as you know, that's not just disadvantage but also comes with huge advantages. Having Travis and Codeanywhere do the setup work for me lets me focus on coding. If the Chromebook gets stolen, I'll disable it remotely and pick up where I left somewhere else. I don't have to think twice about syncing my Smartphone with the stuff I did on the cBook.
Note that this stuff can be used by some kid in the third world aswell. Which is exactly how Google intended it to be.
You have to hand it to Google, when it comes to enablement, they are lightyears ahead of everybody else, including Apple.
Bottom line: The Linux Desktop is long since here and it will take the world in a storm. It's called Chrome OS.
Marketing and availability (Score:3)
Linux has no exposure in the consumer market. Most people with Android phones don't even realize they have Linux in their pocket.
Consequently, Linux isn't available from PC vendors. They don't think there's a market for it, there's no OS vendor willing/able to make it worth their while, Microsoft aggressively forces OEMs to choose between Windows and anything else, and OEMs know anyone looking for such a machine won't tolerate the bloatware they love to include (which doesn't exist anyway).
Then there's hardware support issues, mainly Video. The Linux desktop needs a breach point into the consumer market, the most likely candidate is a Linux gaming console (looking at you, Steam).
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Linux is way too hard to use for most grandmothers.
This hasn't been true for years. Well, let me rephrase that: Linux hasn't been any harder to use than Windows for years.
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It's actually easier. I've put my in-laws on Linux (Mate as a desktop environment) and it's much easier for them. Windows 10 is terribly confusing (even for me). Mate has a 'start' menu not too different from Windows XP, using Linux Mint means that it practically updates itself. And they love the fact that they are much less vulnerable for malware.
Not to mention the retarded 'Windows is updating' message lasting forever even on a I7 with SSD and lots of memory when shutting down AND starting up. At most Lin
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My 83-years old father uses Ubuntu. Granted, I was the one who installed it and he only uses Firefox.
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For Linux you have three supported products: Ubuntu, SuSE, and RedHat. Of course *none of them* are that eager to play the consumer market game for revenue.
For Windows, how many people in the *consumer* space ever reach out to Microsoft? Generally speaking, they reach out to the vendor (Dell, HP, Lenovo) if they need help, and more advanced professionals engage with MS in their community forums.
The other stuff is just out of date. You can go your whole life of updating an Ubnutu install without seeing a
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No, Corel blew it in 1999. They had Word Perfect and Corel Draw on their distro, and a PC that was low cost and ready to work. They were a year late and a dollar short for what could have been The Year. After that, Outlook became entrenched.
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Sorry... the NetWinder was 2002. Imagine a beuwolf cluster of them...
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The real problem is thinking that it is a technology problem anymore. Users are overwhelmingly apathetic about their OS and different is necessarily scary in that state. There is nothing an OS can do at this point to get the vast majority to reinstall their OS for *any* reason. If they are *forced*, they take it to an electronics store to get it taken care of or just buy a new device. In fact I would say at this point a vendor *could* start shipping linux and 60% of their customers would probably not ca
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Yep, Linux needs exclusive consumer applications to push it ... the OS in and of itself is irrelevant to most people. Unfortunately the only company willing to push Linux with good applications is a privacy raping juggernaut for whom customers are the commodity.
I think SteamOS could succeed if Valve was more ambitious. They need to pay devs to support Vulkan and find a way to do fast switching to and from a VM running windows, with only a single gaming GPU.
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Windows & MAC now automagically update behind the scenes and mostly work.
I don't know about Mac, but if Windows upgrades were so magical, why do I end up cursing Microsoft every time they happen?
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Macs don't upgrade behind the scene.
They ask, you say yes or no.
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You'd expect that if it's pre-installed then everything would work fantastic.
Why in the world would you expect that?
Re: (Score:2)
You don't need to "make a program for linux" anymore. All you need to do is "make a program that is cross-platform", and you get linux support for free. It's easier than ever to do this for most types of applications. It's arguably easier to use a cross-platform SDK (e.g. Qt), than it is to develop a native windows application.
The exceptions are applications that are coupled closely to hardware or OS specific features(e.g. games, disc burning software, etc)
Companies like microsoft could easily make their
Re:Already here (Score:4)
If your "non technical mother" was running a recent copy of windows and complaining about it crashing all the time. Make me wonder what porn sites your dear old mother was visiting.
No, strike that. It doesn't make me wonder. Images of senior donkey porn .com are now filling my head.