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What's up with Lindows?
A reader writes "In this editorial at DesktopLinux.com, commentator Malcolm Dean questions whether Lindows is any sort of linux at all, and suggests that the world might actually be better off without yet another proprietary/commercial Windows wannabe (that runs Windows apps, no less). Dean asks how it is possible that, as Lindows.com founder Michael Robertson manages to claims in his latest newsletter, Lindows' ten million lines of code include a Windows Compatibility Module that somehow works better than anything else available today. "Has Mr. Robertson's team accomplished in a few months what took WINE years?" Where is the substance to back the hype? Besides, what if Lindows does succeed: do we really want to perpetuate the use of Windows software on a linux platform?"
How does this relate to the Wine project? Is there any chance of Lindows ever releasing any code back to them?
It's hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightning.
What's wrong with this? I haven't used it, but I think the real test should be "does it work"? IF so, then great, he did something that WINE couldn't. If not, then so what, don't use it. Simple. And the reason to perpetuate windows apps is that they are currently the dominant standard. The same reason you don't see many web pages with embeded corel draw vector images.
Touch everywhere, even when inappropriate.
The problem of Microsoft's monopoly will not be solved by making Windows emulating layers over Linux. Their monopoly is based on the "double" monopoly they have on Office and on Windows. If Office runs on Lindows or on Wine, you can trust Microsoft will find ways to make it runeable only on Windows, as complete compatibility is unpossible with all the undocumented features there is in Windows. IMHO the only way to break Microsoft's Monopoly is to break it on the 'Office' Apps, not on the OS layer.
I guess we now know happened to all that stolen M$ source code.;-)
You feel sleepy. Close your eyes. The opinions stated above are yours. You cannot imagine why you ever felt otherwise.
In fantasy terms:
No, Mr. Robertson. If you breed an angel with a demon, you don't get an angel able to cast death magick.
In my book, Lindows is not any sort of Linux at all. If it is commercial, then even if it runs Linux software, has a Linux look or even if it is somehow related to a true Linux, it ain't Linux.
Linux is not the penguin. Linux is the smile on the penguin's face.
// Ego sum Nucivorax, me clamare audi.
Why would anybody want to be able to run fewer programs than there was the potential for? There are thousands of extremely useful Windows programs out there (believe it or not, it's true!) and being able to run them on Linux can only be a good thing.
Programs are tools. Why would anybody choose to limit the amount of tools in their toolkit, when some of the forsaken tools could help them get their job finished much earlier?
Good luck to those who would add to the functionality of Linux!
The Windows Monopoly is because, YOU DONT GET TO CHOOSE.
No one and I mean absolutely no one had the chance to choose Windows, it simply came with every computer.
You didnt have the CHANCE to choose OS2 because it wasnt an Option.
The same reason everyone uses Internet Explorer is why people use Windows. Because its already there, and it works.
If Lindows can manage to get OEMs to pack it into their computers, This will be the beginning of the end of the Microsoft Monopoly.
At this point people will be able to say, "Hey Lindows runs Windows software and Linux software, I dont use Linux but my friend whos a technician seems to keep telling me about it. hmmm"
This is the reaction Lindows will make, and from here its up to the open source community, and Lindows to get people to switch over.
IF Lindows has a nice OSX style GUI (I doubt it but its a nice wish)
And if Lindows can use most Windows software, Lindows will be a hit.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Why are we debating this? I hate to be so skeptical, I hate to sound like a troll, but Lindows sounds like vaporware to me, at best. At worst it sounds like snake-oil -- since you have dish out $99 for a preview release. Let's wait until this thing comes out before we get into these little stupid debates.
A couple of years back Gatway baught the rights to all of the Amiga patents. They promised a new Amiga computer. They put up a website with designs, talked about how it would work, how it would change the world. The website said Amiga was comming back in a big way and promised to release a new computer within a year.
As a member of the Amiga communitiy I participated in fierce debates about things like: Should the new amiga use USB or Firewire? What should the main processor be? If it doesn't run the same Amiga OS is it still an Amiga? And more importantly how will the new Amiga affect current software venders? How difficult will it be to port programs? etc. etc.
In the end, Gateway sold off its patents, never released anything, and I wasted a bunch of time.
The author of the above editorial obviously didn't read the page too well... No wait, I take that back. The page has changed.
Here's the quote, from a Wired article. It's a doosy. Apparantly Lindows has taken Wine, under the ever-so-exploitable modified BSD licence (there has been talked of changing to the LGPL soon, to ensure people like this DO feed changes back into the main tree...) and (rumor) stuck some chinese developers behind it to hack on the functionality Wine has been missing.. DCOM (supported somewhat by Transgamings WineX) and some extended Shlwapi functions. Woop.
Lindows achieves Windows compatibility by using pieces of Wine, which is software that allows Windows applications to run in Unix that has been in development since 1993.
Wine is only a part of the overall Lindows compatibility layer, Robertson said. The rest will come from software developed in-house. .
The only real desktop market at this time is for Windows desktops. So how to you compete in that market? The most obvious answer is: Run Windows apps as well as Windows, and do something that Windows doesn't do. In this case, they're trying to achieve that by taking Wine on Linux, extend it and package it as a Windows clone.
They get to benefit from all driver work and performance enhancements done by the open source community for Linux and Wine, and add to that to be able to put out a Windows environment at far lower development cost than Microsoft. Leveraging open source is quite possibly the ONLY way to compete in the Windows market, considering the immense sales revenues Microsoft has to fund their development.
This is a good thing, regardless of whether you like Windows or not: If Lindows succeeds, Microsoft will be forced to cut prices to compete. If you like Windows you will benefit from lower prices, if you hate Windows you will benefit from having Microsoft busy spending their resources on a more direct competitor as well as with less money to spend on squashing competitors, as being forced to cut prices will have a very real effect on their earnings.
do we really want to perpetuate the use of Windows software on a linux platform?"
Face it. There is no way in hell all software will be available for Linux, and if a company cannot run that mission critical app, then they won't switch to Linux.
Let me give you an example. I'm from Norway. Companies tend to want programs where they can do their accounting - which has all norwegian tax-rules, and so forth ad nauseum programmed into them.
In norway we have some software called 'Guru Software' or something like that, and surely others too. Its windows applications.
Now, a company which has done its accounting in that software for a couple of years is quite locked down. Its not an easy task to just switch to Linux. The windows-software _needs_ to run on linux, so that previous years accounting information is easily accessible. Of course, one could always hope that the company would make a linuxversion of the software, but that isn't always easy.
Now, microsoft 'owns' such companies as long until Linux can run this kind of windows software perfectly. And the answer is 'yes' -- we want the ability to run such software under Linux. If not, well then we're not gonna get such companies as users.
Take another example. I'm currently doing civil service in Norway, in part of a city adminstration. We're 'locked in' on using Windows, as a lot of proprietary solutions we are using is windows-only applications. They run on windows servers, and the clients only exist for windows.
These are products in the health and social sectors, with highly specialized use. Its not very likely that the free software movement will produce software that less than 20 relatively small institutions worldwide will use, which is of this enourmous complexity.
The answer is that we _need_ the ability to run windows apps, and yes, it is something we _want_. IF not, we've lost a _LOT_ of potential users, which are 'locked in'.
"Rune Kristian Viken" - http://www.nwo.no - arca
Besides, what if Lindows does succeed: do we really want to perpetuate the use of Windows software on a linux platform.
... people aren't just going to switch from Windows to Linux because there's no software, and there will continue to be no software if there is no people to sell/give it to.
... a solution to which would be a benefit to us all, whether we'd like to admit it or not.
What kind of comment is this? Software is software, and right now some of the new, great software is a heck of a lot easier to write for the Windows platform.
The community's way of dealing with that should be to create a way to run all of this software on the Linux OS. It is doing this well, IMO.
The problem with some of these anti-MS advocats is that they think they can take over the market in one fell swoop. Well, I'm sorry it's just not going to happen that way
Making Windows software run on Linux is a perfect bridge here, even if Lindows is not free, it still solves a problem
----- rL
Comment removed based on user account deletion
If something isnt broke, why fix it?
Its not that people dont care, they dont know any better.They arent knowledgeable enough to know theres something better than windows better than IE, and so on and so forth.
They use AOL because they believe AOL IS the internet, not a client to access it.
They use Microsoft Windows because they believe Windows IS the computer, and that theres nothing else to use.
You see, if people arent given a chance to choose in a store when they go to buy their computer, they automatically assume that because Windows is all thats being sold, that Windows is all there is.
Proof- Not so long ago, people believe that in order to buy a PC, you had to buy an Intel Pentium, people even called PCs Intel Boxes, or Pentiums. When a person wanted to buy a Video Card before Nvidia arrived, People went for a Voodoo, not because Voodoo was the only card but because thats all that people saw in the stores, sure there were other cards but what card did all games seem to support? The Voodoo cards.
Sure theres always been choice, but if every corperation, every store, everywhere you go, you dont see any choice, you just see one product, eventually in your mind thats it, theres nothing else to choose from. After years of only computers packed with Windows, it will be quite a shock to see a computer packed with Lindows, but if Lindows can prove to the user that its better than Windows,
Like Nvidia beat Vodooo, and AMD beat Intel, Lindows may beat Windows.
However, IF Microsoft forces OEMs to only use Windows from Microsoft, and people like Dell dont even sell you a computer with anything else, well, what do you expect to happen here?
I'm happy to see Lindows stand up to Microsoft and give them serious competition, the problem with OS2 is, it wasnt competition at all, it actually helped sell Microsoft Windows because OS2 sat in the backround, no OEM sold OS2 computers, not even IBM the makers of OS2 sold OS2 on their own Machines.
Just like Mozilla and Netscape cant catch up to IE because AOL wont use Netscapes browser on their own software.
So what do you expect to happen when Linux users dont support Lindows?
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
In all seriousness, I think it's been painfully clear for a long time that there's an enormous double standard in play in the OSS field. Everyone claims to want to improve Linux and make it more useful, but as soon as someone claims they have a way to remove the biggest single barrier preventing the 95% of desktop users currently running Windows convert to Linux, then everyone gets pissy about it.
My suggestion: Quit your damn whining and wait and see what Lindows delivers. If it works, it will end MS's monopoly faster than you can say "Ralph Nader". If it doesn't, then we can make fun of it and move on.
Haven't we learned anything from OS/2? Without Windows compatibility OS/2 would have failed miserably. Oh wait, it did fail miserably. Sorry, I must have been thinking of something else...
People seem to forget the true way for Linux to compete... instead of maybe spending so much time on WINE, prehaps a better investment is to work on fast Java Virtual Machines..
They are getting faster, in fact Sun plans to release JDK1.4 soon, and it is MUCH faster than JDK1.3.
Now, once Java is comparable fast to native applications, (which in some situations it already is), developers can start writing applications in Java commercially.
Once this happens, any OS that supports Java can run those applications. Example:
Lets say some day down the line, 20% of the programs you can purchase in the store is written in Java.. well, that means ANY operating system can run those programs if they elect to run the OPEN java specs.
So in summary, the true way to open up the opearting system market is to get developers to use Java.
The problem with some of these anti-MS advocats is that they think they can take over the market in one fell swoop.
You're forgetting, or failing to mention, that people advocate GNU/Linux for other reasons than toppling Microsoft. If software freedom is your goal, then migrating proprietary software from one OS to another doesn't really accomplish a thing.
--Lawrence Lessig for Congress!
Of course we do. Just think about it. If a console system somehow played games from the PS2, GameCube, XBox, Super Nintendo, Genesis, and ROMs downloaded off the internet for any of those systems AND Mame... wouldn't you buy it? If an HDTV set somehow came with built-in VHS player and a built-in DVD player that could play VCDs, any music format you wanted on a CD or CD-R, AND burn both CDs, CD-Rs, and DVDs, including off another DVD... wouldn't you buy it? Of course you would. These things would do anything, take up less space than several different consoles/players, be much easier to setup, and would probably cost less.
The point? The thing that does everything, does it right, and does it at an acceptable price is the best thing out there. If Linux could run just about any program you wanted, no matter what operating system it was originally meant for, it would be the perfect operating system. It would be the operating system equivalent to a Swiss Army Knife, and would be a perfect alternative to the system that most computer users have to put up with now: Use Windows alone or have Windows on one partition and Linux on the other. Because of the limitations of work, school, and gaming, most people NEED to use some Windows programs. To make it more accessable to those people, Linux should definitely run Windows programs, and if possible flawlessly.
Wroot
Proprietary software has a right to exist and people deserve to get paid for their work.
Fiat doesn't make it so. Sorry, but pick any economic theory you like; none of them say you "deserve" to get paid for your work. If I collect a bunch of sticks and buy a bunch of yarn and busy myself making god's eyes twelve hourse a day, do I "deserve" to get paid for it? Of course that's nonsense.
Personally, I prefer the capitalist take on this issue. I'd like to let the market decide what the effort that goes into programming is worth. And I'd like the market to decide what the value of mass producing digital content is worth. But we don't get to see that happen, because these industries are propped up by government regulations that circumvent the proper operation of the market.
If people want free software, they'll choose it on its merits.
Not necessarily, given the current anti-competitive market in which it has to compete. Moreover, if you consider freedom in and of itself the most important "merit", your statement evaporates in a tautology.
I would love to see the "market dictate succcess or failure of a piece of software". Not the US patent office. Not the monopoly owners of copyrighted proprietary de-facto standards.
Given the sordid state of the software industry, it's about time we do away with notion that proprietary software deserves a seat at the table. The only reason it has a seat at all is because we, as a society, invited it. It's time for the boot.
And let's never stop having this "endless debate on freedom".
--Lawrence Lessig for Congress!
I'm not sure why your posting was rated as "funny," because it's right on the money.
Take my mother. (Please! No, not really, but I couldn't resist.) A few years back, she wanted a computer. I, being the evil scum that I am, concluded that she would do better on the Mac than on Windows 95. I was right. She's had a couple of PowerBooks. She does a lot. She uses email (not through AOL), can get to the web, does finances on Quicken, writes up test papers and letters, manages addresses, and uses the spreadsheet. She is, if anything, above average as a home user. Every time I visit her, she has questions for me, usually trivial matters, and she's very afraid of making changes. (I bought her a Palm, and she was afraid to synchronize it, because she didn't want to "break anything.")
So, a few months ago she calls to say that some of her games aren't working. A conversation like the following ensues:
I: What changed?
She: I had to upgrade Quicken.
I: Just Quicken? Was there anything else?
She: Yeah, I had to get another number.
I: Another number?
She: Yeah, wait a minute. Here it is. 9.1.
I: You installed a major operating system upgrade without calling me first? That can cause a lot of stuff to break!
She: That's what I'm finding out.
People who are not geeks or computer scientists simply do not know what an operating system is. A minority of them know the phrase "operating system," but it has no more intrinsic meaning to them than "geegaw" or "rang deedio." If they know at all about it, they just know that it has to be there and has to work.
Nor should they, in an ideal world. The whole role of an operating system is to facilitate use of the computer and not get in the way. In the user model the operating system is the computer is the genie behind the screen. When they buy a computer, they buy a computer, and everything they get in the box that says "computer" is the computer. They may understand keyboard, monitor, and mouse as parts, but they don't understand, at all, that the OS is a fungible part of the system. There may be a disc, but they ignore it until something breaks.
The same thing is true of user interfaces. Well-meaning people like Jef Raskin and Donald Norman, as well as not-so-well-meaning people like Alan Cooper have been advocating for clean user interfaces that are invisible to the user for years. They're right, from a technical standpoint. They're all of them totally wrong when they try to explain why user interfaces are bad or how to make them better. The reason that user interfaces are not as good as they are is that the more invisible a component is, the less people are even aware of it when making purchase decisions. As a result, while really terrible user interfaces may result in some bad word-of-mouth, really good interfaces also suffer, because by definition, most people don't perceive them as elements. Beyond a certain level of frustration, market forces don't work on user interfaces and may even work against good ones, because mediocre interfaces have more visible features.