Slashdot Mirror
Linux On the Desktop: 0.24 Percent?
Canyon Rat writes: "According to this story, less than a quarter of a percent of desktop users have adopted Linux. The survey was based on web surfers so it may be accurate." Anne Onymus adds a link to an
interesting reaction over at lowendmac.com.
The problem with a web survey is that websites are targeted, much like television, to a specific audeince. That audience is more or less likely to be a windows/linux user, and as such, the results are likely flawed. Kind of like if you tried to do an OS survey on slashdot. Linux would have a much higher rating, would it not?
01101001 01100001 01101101 01101110 01101111 01110100 01100001 01101100 01100001 01110111 01111001 01100101 01110010
The survey was based on web surfers so it may be accurate
Er, or it may not. Does the web surfing population necessarily represent all computer owners? I would suggest that web surfers are slightly more likely to be tech-savvy and therefore web-surfers will have a higher percentage of Linux desktop use than non-web users. So the figure may be even lower.
I know we are still small on the desktop, but this is even less than i expected. One possiblity pops up, though. Have someone established that Linux users have the same surfing habits as other people? Are we as interested in general news? Or maybe we're all so 31337 that we changed our browser string..
Anyhow, when Linux-based web appliances start taking off (when, when, when), the market share will hopefully start increasing.
Stop the brainwash
Maybe cmdrTaco should post the Slashdot stats of it's users OS
[Insert Pro-Linux Outcry]
[Insert Rambling Out-Of-My-Ass Reasons why Survey Can't Be Correct]
[Insert Attack on Microsoft]
[Insert Short Insult To Silly Un-learned Users Who Don't Know Better]
[Insert Reminder That Survey Can't Be True]
[Close with Name, Followed By Witty Anti-M$ Slogan, Being Sure To Substitute A Dollar Sign For The "S" Because Doing That Is Inventive And Hilarious]
------
Let me give you the lowdown
A survey that does not reveal its methodology. Until you know how they did it, how can you really trust the results? Does anyone how the survey was conducted?
I bet that there will be at least 100 posts saying that you can't trust this kind of data, that it's complete bollocks and yada yada yada Linux is so good it will for Bill to eat Linus used shorts.
Please don't care about that article, it's not interesting really. It's not really news. We all know what we use ourselves (XP and linux in my case) and I suggest that our time should be spent on something better than surveys and such things.
Writing serious and useful documentation for linux for instance, and putting it into XML and making it readable and searchable in different applications (such as the exellent Konqi, the only other browser besides IE I would ever dream of using). Go do that instead of reading all the pointlessness that this news consists of.
I think we can all start from the premise that these statistics are:
a) flawed
b) backward looking
What would be more interesting is some insight into where browsing is headed. For example, there will be some sites which will attract mobile traffic much more readily than others - traffic updates, or train running info, or today's tube (as in London Underground) breakdown. Then we are going to see amounts of traffic from appliances such as set-top boxes.
But then I suppose "We produce rubbish statistics" won't be as headline grabbing as "You Linux folks are all losers".
Dunstan
The last scintilla of doubt just rode out of town
The stat that 0.24% of desktop users use Linux came from 125,000 disparate, largely general purpose websites (i.e. not "WindowsUserFanatics" or "BillGatesFanBoys": Indeed there are extremely few sites that are geared to specifically Windows users): Comparing these general stats against the stats against a technologically biased site is absolutely absurd. And if only fanatics and fanboys use Linux, well then they've proven their point about Linux' low acceptance right there...
Cheers, Andy!
Andy Rabagliati
I tried using Linux KDE as a desktop last year and was disappointed with the speed of the graphical interface. I could watch the dialogs painting and this was on a 900MHz machine.
This is not an issue with Servers.
I, like most users, expect performance to be at least as snappy as on other systems using comparable hardware.
As hardware gets faster, the GUI sluggishness will be less apparent. That along with the advent of more mainstream compatible apps will make it more prevalent as a desktop OS.
--- -- - -
Give me LIBERTY, or give me a check.
revealed that 100% of people own mobile phones.
While I doubt the numbers, I suppose it could be true. At my current company, they insist on supplying *everyone* with a windows box, regardless of need. As a sysadmin, all I use it for is surfing (google searches, sfocus, pstormm slashdot =), since my Linux desktop is where I get all my real work done ;)
Sinepaw.org: Grape Winos
I've got some issues with this... mostly in what sites were used. I mean if it was yahoo, geocities, aol, etc... obviously we know that that .24% was some random newbie who just happened to click the wrong thing in mozilla (slighty kidding). If it was slashdot... than well that .24% is still probably accurate. Look people... linux isn't ready yet. It will be, maybe soon... kde 3.0 looks promising, the kernel gets better overtime, etc. But not yet. People have tried, and people have failed. This isn't a flame, I use linux... but right now, I'm on a win 98 box due to a damn winmodem. But thats the thing... think about it... how many computers do you think are in the world? How many of those are on the internet? How many of those also happen to be running linux? Say there are 200 million pcs in the US (which may be accurate). Now say 100 million are on the internet (close). Now, .24% of 100 mil is 240 thousand, which seems alittle low. By how much? I have no clue... but from what I've seen linux is primarily servers and research machines. Either way, this number is close to the truth, probably with a margin of error of 100 thousand either way. Of course this all comes down to what you consider a desktop machine. I mean if you're using the machine to be dedicated to squid, but you play solitaire on it all the time... is it a server or a desktop? Oh well... i've got 2 linux desktops so you can mark those down.
can't sleep slashdot will eat me
Damn, that's much better then I would have guessed. Think about it, that means, one out of every 400 users is using linux as a desktop system. I'm impressed, honestly, I didn't know there were that many clued lusers out there.
Wow!
On the whole, I find that I prefer Slashdot posts to twitter ones because I don't get limited to 140 chars before
As long as the web is based on open, broad industry standards (as opposed to de facto Microsoft standards), I don't care what most web users are using. As long as the web and websites are based on open standards, I can use whatever the heck I want. Mozilla and some others have enough impetus now to keep up more or less with the basic standards. If I'm in a tiny minority, so what?
I do care, however, if too many sites use this as a justification to create "IE-only" sites. I've seen a few of those, and those are stupid and annoying.
-Rob
The stats from LowEndMac claiming a higher %age of Linux users is probably bias, since it's a techy web site about low end Macs, probably the best techy thing to do with a low end Mac is to install Linux on it. (They even have a special Linux page.)
The stats from WebSideStory is based on the stats from 125000 sites, and so is arguably more realistic.
Windows (all versions): 93 %
Macintosh: 4%
Linux: 1%
Other: 4%
Detailed figures on browsers and operating systems on their site. I think Google can be considered quite representative, not?
(posted with Konqueror / Linux)
I've had some training in statistics, and I see a number of problems. First, the slashdot editors are making the perennial journalists' mistake of misinterpretting statistics. Statmarket only claims to be measuring web client usage, and doesn't make any claims about the desktop market in general (at least from what I saw).
In terms of the study itself, statmarket admits that the sample is "self-selected" rather than randomly selected. This results in a biased sample. In particular, since they are offering a service to business users, the sample is likely biased in favour of business sites. The bias is then against more "arty" or technologically-oriented sites, resulting in lower-than-expected numbers from Macintosh and Linux users. It might also be biased against home users.
That said, while the survey may be off by an order of magnitude, I wouldn't expect it to be off by more than an order of magnitude. Most other surveys don't put Linux usage at more than 2 or 3%
Win 98 80178 (45%)
Win 2000 33183 (18%)
Unknown 17948 (10%)
Win NT 15051 (8%)
Mac 13085 (7%)
Win 95 11717 (6%)
Linux 2459 (1%)
Win 3.x 1055 (0%)
Unix 761 (0%)
WebTV 226 (0%)
OS/2 24 (0%)
Amiga 4 (0%)
The scariest thing is that win98 is still 45%. If not being part of that 45% is wrong, I don't wanna be right, baby!
"Old man yells at systemd"
The other problem that may drive *nix browsing market share is that there is a gazillion browsers who all have different identification strings. Very often, poorly designed stats system will not even notice that a given browser is actually a linux one, and will classify it as unknown.
Also, many poorly designed sites ony lets people with Ms IE 4 or Netscape 4 visit the site. Opera, mozilla, konqueror users have to fake the identification strings to be able to see the site. And, as a matter of fact, I know several people who have set their browsers' id string to be IE like, to avoid troubles.
There's no arguing that Linux's desktop market share is far lesser than that or windows and mac, but I do think and hope it's above 0.24%
!
^_^
I like the answer on lowendmac. Not the article, but the statistics. Beside that, could it be that we're witnessing the same "netscape effect" of the web? The article says that lots of web developers use those statistics to build sites. Translation: they only target IE. I can believe this, since I use galeon and I often have quirks in commercial sites. Now, if your site works well only with IE I'm not surprised that 98% of the visitors use IE.... Just like netscape-enhanced sites used to justify their attitude by saying that "90%+ of the visitors use netscape"....
(Note: I use Windows == IE. I don't know the statistics of Ns/Mozilla/Opera vs IE on windows, am I guessing right that they are a tiny %?).
I will also bet that Linux users are MUCH more likely than other users to reject the cookies which these sort of tools rely on. As a result, we are probably left on the table.
I don't think that a survey of the O/S behind web-browsers is an accurate description of 'desktop' penetration of Linux. I run Linux as my main os, both at work (on a desktop) and at home (on a desktop and laptop). The laptop however is dual-boot to XP. If I want to browse the web and get a 'full' experience then its bye-bye linux, hello XP as none of the browser/plugin combinations in linux can yet compete with I.E. 6 & media player in windows.
This doesn't necessarily make linux a worse desktop OS than windows, it just reflects the fact that most web designers tailor their content to display in I.E. Therefore people (I suspect/hope I'm not alone in this) will ditch linux for windows when they want to surf the web.
I host web sites. Here's a webalizer chunk on User Agents from a piece of November I called up just to see if it was close:
Top 15 of 5486 Total User Agents
# Hits User Agent
1 200870 9.80% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.0; Windows 98; DigExt)
2 169779 8.29% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5; Windows 98)
3 161822 7.90% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5; Windows 98; Win 9x
4.90)
4 73991 3.61% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows 98)
5 72181 3.52% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.01; Windows NT 5.0)
6 70011 3.42% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5; Windows NT 5.0)
7 63082 3.08% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.01; Windows 98)
8 54560 2.66% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows 98; Win 9x
4.90)
9 46702 2.28% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.0)
10 43299 2.11% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)
11 41167 2.01% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5; Windows NT 4.0)
12 37536 1.83% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.0; Mac_PowerPC)
13 33620 1.64% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5; Windows 95)
14 29224 1.43% Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.0; Windows 98)
15 28778 1.40% Mozilla/3.01 (compatible;)
Ok, #12 says it is Mac, and #15 doesn't say at all. I host the primary site for the UNIX Socket FAQ, which you would expect to bring in a significant chunk of Linux users, but it isn't even in the top 15. Maybe users are masking their user agent? Maybe some, but not many.
Take from this what you will, I just thought it was interesting...
it seems to me that headlines and press releases like this are simply Websidestory and Statmarket's way of getting their names in the news.
here's the ploy:
say something inflamatory (even if wildly inaccurate) about linux. get story picked up by web news services. get linux users up in arms. reap benefits of "even bad publicity is still publicity" reality.
slashdot is such a tool...
- Entertaining Bits from the Ancient Kernel Tree
It would be nice if you could make the complete list of browser id strings along with count once in a while (each month :)) available.
And of course, perceived country of origin would be interesting, no matter how inaccurate.
...starts with a single quarter of one percent.
(Sorry, I couldn't resist.)
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
What's the point of posting an article like this to slashdot, where 99.76% of the readers are so rabidly pro-linux that they aren't even reading the article before flaming the author for posting what must be false information. I don't agree with the number myself (I think it should be much closer to 1%) but at least I'll give it a chance.
-Space for rent
You guys probably did not have DMA enabled on your hard drives... this makes a huge difference.
I wonder how many "users" were worms like Nimda or CodeRed?
Is it really supprising to see all the anti-linux marketing going on?
Lawrence Lessig did an interview on vision.yahoo.com this Dec 18th "Who's Killing Innovation On The Internet?"
Of course the stats are biased. It's the only hope the competition has to slow the OSS/GPL/Linux side of the spectrum down.
Let me suggest that this side of the spectrum is going to be attacked by all other sides because ultimately this is where the genuine foundation of computer science and general use is going to settle down to. You can't beat it, but only try and slow it down by throwing distractions and deceptions in it's way.
What has yet to be widely understood is that there is a limit to computing under the corporate model of proprietary control. To go beyond that limit requires open non-proprietary models. IBM recognizes this in autonomic computing directions. But be careful and understand this is comming from the leading US patent holder and obtainer. Do understand that they do recognize the limitations of the corporate proprietary model and intend to corner the open side as best they can.
You can expect more and more distractions and deceptions being throwing into the path of this side of the computing spectrum. Consider what has come so far and that's with what, less than 2% (at best?) of the internet browsing Desktop market...
I never trust these kind of statistics. They can be so flawed as to be practically meaningless.
I saw an article in a UK paper a couple of days ago about the most popular web sites in the UK. About six of the top ten were Microsoft sites. But it included sites like passport.com - come on, who actually visits passport.com? The reason it scores so highly is of course that everytime someone, for instance, goes to read their hotmail email, it makes several accesses to the passport.com server (as well as others). This completely distorts the statistics, and makes them practically meaningless. If you ask a man on the street what are the most popular web sites in the UK he would say something like Friends Reunited (a site for finding old schoolfriends) and man on the street would be absolutely right. Friends Reunited (and loads of other popular sites) didn't even appear in the top ten.
Did you know that one in five new desktop computers have Linux? How do I know this? Well, Google tells us that 4% of its visitors use XP, 1% Linux. We can assume that all of these are relatively new users, so therefore 1 in five of new desktop computers are Linux. Of course this is crap too, but it shows you can distort stats to prove whatever you want, and I am sure that MS are a master of this.
This compares with Microsoft's Windows and Apple's Macintosh operating systems, which hold a combined global usage share of more than 98 percent.
I made my own comparison and found that Microsoft's Windows and Linux hold a combined global usage share of more than 91%.
What's with not breaking out the Windows and Mac numbers? Oh that's right. This is a bash Linux study.
Total sample: 10000 hits
Windows 98 is way in the lead with 46.5%.
ME comes in at 15.9%
95, 2000, MacOS and NT are all roughly equal at 9.1, 8.8, 7.4 and 6.1 respectively.
XP has 3.6%.
Linux has 1%.
(there are a few others, including "Unknown" so those won't add up to 100)
Considering the differences between some of those Windows OS's, that's fairly diverse. What's more disturbing to me is the following:
IE has 81.3% of the browser stats, Netscape has 16.8%. "Unknown" and Opera together have less than 2%. WebTV brings up the rear with a measly 8 hits (0%) and that's it. No other browsers.
Considering that desktop OS is largely irrelevant to the Internet whereas browser is VERY relevant, this points out a disturbing trend: Microsoft Owns The Client-Side of the Internet.
324006
You're wrong. It seems slower than Windows because it's not given a higher priority than other processes as is standard in Windows.
With a low-latency kernel patch and X reniced to -10 it is at least as fast as Windows.
Gnome and KDE are a bit heavyweight, there's no denying, but I don't use that Windows-wannabe crap. Microsoft is better at it ;^) When I use Linux I want straight, ugly, raw, powerful X with lots of terminal windows and virtual desktops, LyX, xfig, xdvi and the Gimp, all the stuff that make UNIX fun. When I want Windows I use XP.
http://www.thecounter.com/stats/2001/December/os.p hp shows Linux below even Windows 3.x and WebTV
Discrimination? Oh give me a break. Tell me a site that would discriminate based upon a users geography or geopolitical location, apart from fringe sites like the KKK.
In any case my advocacy is that the user has complete control over what information is sent, and whether it is sent at all. The truth is that both sets of information can be used to pump billions of dollars into the net to revive the state of content on the net: i.e. Imagine if the state of California could advertise advisories only to people with a geopolitical location of US-CA? Imagine if local restaurants and pool halls could launch an ad campaign with Google for users within 10KM of 43.32635/-79.79426? Such criteria doesn't currently exist and it has barred the Internet from any locality, despite the fact that 95% of our lives are still based upon locality. Local computer stores can easily compete with internet stores when you factor in shipping costs, but they are excluded from advertising on the net because of their local scope.
I seriously see the lack of localization of the net as being a major impediment to its growth.
In fact, the only people I know that use Linux on the desktop are all developers (myself included) except for one guy.
Not that this is a problem. For us developers, Linux/KDE is a wonderful system to use. It all comes down to needs. Does the average user need multiple tabbed sessions in Konsole? No. Does he need to be able to play Dark Reign? Yes.
Unfortunately, the "games" problem is not one that can easily be solved. Most software you buy at the store is only for Windows, and I've heard more than one person say that Linux can't succeed with normal users without it being able to run Windows programs. IMO, making it a requirement of Linux to run Windows software (a la Lindows) is too much to ask. Not only is reverse-engineering difficult, but companies these days are making it harder to pull off. And sometimes, it can even be illegal (see DMCA).
So is all hope lost? What can anyone do? Linux is basically done.. Linus said so himself. Now the focus is on the user. Well, what is left for KDE? It is already more configurable than Windows. Ok, so that's done. Now what? If we're done, but we have no users, there is obviously a problem somewhere.
It's the apps. Linux is not scary anymore. The "one guy" I mention above knows nothing about coding, but uses Redhat just happily. But why can't he play his games? And where is Adobe?
We've done all we can do. I think it's just a waiting game now. I'd like to see some improvements with more general (non-distribution specific) software installation. And for video drivers to be kernel controlled, and have X just ride on the framebuffer. But issues like these won't stop average users from using Linux. Just ask a normal Windows user why he would not want to switch to Linux. It will come back to the apps.
Linux has only become more popular, not less. More companies join in the game as time goes. Sure, some have left, but at the end of the day the number is bigger. The general computer user will get his games and his apps.
In the meantime, everyone just continue doing their thing.
Check our statistics - Linux has been holding steady at about 16-17% of our user base since the end of 1999.
Energy: time to change the picture.
I read this article after I've received about four email messages with strange macro-virus-looking attachments in the past 24 hours (is there some epidemic again)? O sancta simplicitas!
Bush Lies Watch
If thesame survey was conducted with Slashdot's audience, we'd have Linux on 98% on all desktops.
Reading this thread and the KDE3.0 this morning really made me wonder - Is there something that will prevent me from running Linux on the desktop? No, so I do, what's the big rush to indoctrinate the planet?
...
Some of you are acting like these kind of surveys, ZDNet 'studies', and clueless sysadmin students are going to ruin Linux on the desktop.
It's not like KDE and GNOME guys are going to wake up one day and say, "Well geez, 'Computer Expert' on ZDNet talkbalk forums thinks that our stuff is hard to use, we might as well stop development, someone call Mathias!"
Stop for a moment and look at the pace of development that GNOME/KDE have achieved in the last 2 years. It's amazing how far they have come.
People have this twisted perception that because it's Not Windows(tm) that it's difficult to use.
Well guess what, these are the same people that can't use Windows either! For those of us who do desktop support (It's an additional duty of mine which I abhor), how many times have you seen some clueless user do something totally absurd on Windows? Wether they use Windows or KDE, they will find a way to break it. How many times have you said to someone 'right click this' and they look at you like you are from another planet. These people remind me of my mother, bless her soul, but no matter what, she will never be a good driver, that doesn't make cars hard to use...
Personally, I don't care if Linux on the desktop ever makes it mainstream. If you want a toy, recommend XP to someone, if you want a power system, linux comes in. At the rate we're going, it will provide me with what I need, and that's what Linux is about. It fits MY needs, if it met your needs, then that's great to
BWAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH.
You guys are really changing the world, alright. Winning those hearts and minds over, one at a time. GO LINUX!
Brant
Argle. Bargle.
websidestory.com and statmarket.com are basing their statistics on their web tracking technology through the use of advertising. The problem is, they use web bugs (see here, here, and here) to accomplish this. Windows users typically do not take actions to inhibit these web bugs, but Linux, BSD, and even many other Unix users do. There's software out there to help, too. Those who do block these web bugs, or all the hitbox.com sites, as I do, won't ever be counted.
Statistics based on web bugs should never be counted to determine platform penetration. Instead, actual HTML loads from a wide variety of real sites should be used, and the distribution variations show, too. I'm sure Slashdot gets more Linux and BSD just because of what it is.
Find out what other sites that /.ers visit, then get platform stats from those sites, and only for their main page HTML hits (not for images or ads or anything else). Then check the variation of that.
I had to go remove them from 6 different blocks in my network to just to view the linked page.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
HTTP_USER_AGENT: Mozilla/3.01Gold (Macintosh; I; 68K)
MACHTYPE: i386-pc-openbsd2.8
the ever helpful hawk
Slow down your sister in law's computer so it runs maybe 3/4 as fast as today when she runs her applications. Keep the same apps she uses today. Will she have any reason to complain?
You don't have to be a computer wonk to notice fast vs slower.
I feel the apps are already "almost there" for Linux. But as long as the desktop feels sluggish compared to Windows, your sister in law, and my sisters for that matter, will want the snappier Windows configured machine.
They won't know how it was configured or care, but they will care that it is responsive at their level of expectation.
--- -- - -
Give me LIBERTY, or give me a check.
Processer speed, so much as how fast your video card is and your X configuration. With a G400 Max and AGP/DRI set up, my 700 MhZ Athlon has no problem driving the GUI, except when 4 or 5 programs are taking up 50% of my CPU (200% CPU Utilization does tend to have a negative impact on graphical performance.)
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Folks, your grandma won't know how to re-nice various processes!
That's right, it's fuckin' UNIX dude. It ain't a toy. I was just giving you some tips, not claiming that Linux should have higher desktop penetration. Your gramma should use a Mac.
The biggest reason for which I use Linux as a desktop is X-windows. As a home user, MS-Windows is not powerful enough to me. I need network transparency, otherwise my kids coul dnot use the two old 486 computers fof anything useful.
The X-windows network transparency, multiple X-windows on single machine, multiple desktops is what puts Linux years ahead of Windows features.
If it needs something, its smooth installation of DRI and true type fonts.
Petrus.
I don't know how close to the truth that figure is (it could be spot-on for all I know) but one thing I do know: that number could not have possibly been computed in any reasonable way. If their estimate happens to be correct, it is only due to coincidence and dumb luck.
Any time I see "percentage of web surfers" I know that I'm going to see bogus statistics. They're probably checking user agent in http request headers or something. This is very stupid and useless, because
- Minority platforms (in terms of both OS and browser) are much
more likely to intentionally send incorrect user agents, for compatability
with incompetently-programmed web apps.
- Whatever web site(s) you use, will likely have a bias toward some
particular selection of users.
Slashdot should not lend credibility (ok, I know that's a joke, but I hope you get my point anyway) to such poor logic by linking to stories that use it.As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
I believe the survey reflecting the reality. I use W2K for desktop stuffs.
:)
On the other hand, I'm running Linux server at home to serve my families, helping friends' companies to setup inhouse secure email servers with Linux, implementing Linux network at work and taking freelance jobs setting up and maintaining Oracle database on Linux.
It doesn't matter. Linux has already found its home, and we are all happy about it.
Of course, it'd be much better if I could see Linux desktop dominate the desktop market before I die, but nothing is perfect.
It's not like that by default because it's tuned as a server by default.
I don't give a crap about Mom and Pop, I was just giving you some tips. If you really want Linux as a desktop alternative for the unwashed masses then get to work. Most of us aren't getting paid for this, you know. It doesn't do much good to complain.
I use Junkbuster and alter the browser info headers to fool sites into thinking I am using IE 5.5, instead of Opera on Linux. I do this because lots of sites have the annoying practice of thinking that a non-Microsoft browser won't render their pages correctly, but it usually works fine.
--It's Pimptastic!--
Let me begin with the comment that the figure of 0.24% is statistically suspect, and that the Google statistic of 1% is also probably unrepresentatively low. The following is an attempt to illustrate why.
The majority of Linux installations are done in multiple boot configurations.Most mainstream distros, and even some of the more obscure ones presume that and are designed accordingly, and quite a lot of the online documentation and commentary seems to be slanted toward that assumption. I'm not saying that's a bad thing per se, nor am I suggesting that platform interoparability is trivial, but there's a downside.
When I first installed OS/2 here in 1994 I got rid of Windoze. If I wanted a m$ operating system I wouldn't have deleted the damn thing. Getting away from it was the whole point. I installed Linux for the first time at the end of 1999 onto a separate physical drive with much the same motivation. The whole idea was to learn the damn thing, and the only way to learn something is spend time with it. Incidentally - on compatible hardware, installing Linux with no multiple-boot issues to complicate the picture is a lot less effort than installing Windoze on a virgin HDD.
I spend a lot of time on IRC: In addition to discussing beer and girlies, a lot of those dialogs are taken up with details of software installation, includng many first-time Linux installations, and I can tell you of countless times where someone I've been helping comes online, reports the installation successful, collects his l337t haxxor certification and then boots straight back into windoze.
This posting got me thinking about "dormant penguin syndrome", and it's evidently a big-enough factor to be taken into thoughtful consideration for marketing and promotion purposes. (Or advocacy, for those of you reading this who are staunch anti-capitalists) M$ traps are all around - from preloaded bundles, to proprietary file formats, to ISPs like NetZero (and many others who charge steep fees) to websites that won't render right without IE, to games.......I don't want this to turn into an outright rant so I'll just make the comment that there's a lotta Windoze-centric aspects to the present computing infrastructure viewed in macro - and that's not an accident: M$ planned it that way.
Does that mean life without Windoze is impossible? Hell no, but the reason I know that for a fact is that I've been resisting and avoiding it long enough to know how to deal with the obstacles. It isn't usually even that difficult.
Take most of the "Linux isn't ready" postings on this thread and s/Linux/Windoze, or Apple or any other alternative. Ya kow what? The validity of the comments holds. Demand this morning a desktop operating system that's truly intuitive, fast, effortless and crafted to a standard of pure perfection? There aren't any - but why be impossible when you can be totally over the top? Insist on a flawless user installation onto multiple-boot systems m$ spent millions of dollars developing to engineer deliberate incompatibilities into.
Linux is ready - and the applications are ready, at least for those of us capable of writing a letter without an animated paperclip, but it's simplistic to think that a successful Linux installation == marketplace conuest.
Users with Linux installed need to spend more time using it at length, and the Linux community needs to spend more effort encouraging this. How well this all goes will determine the direction of computing in this decade. M$ is already upset enough about the trend to Linux to start whining and mouthing about it. Time will tell.
give me a
is, that the percentage of Linux-users they found visiting the sampled Websites is steady between .2 and .3 Percent since nearly three years. While the sample is obviously biased, the bias has less effect on overall trends, than on the actual percentages.
So apparently there is no overall trend to switch from Windows-Desktops to Linux-desktops, or to be more precise, there is no such trend among the visitors of the sampled sites (assuming they measured correctly) in the past 2.5 years.
Still the whole statistics only tells us something about a biased sample, about which we sadly don't know enough to put the numbers into some perspective.
"By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself." -- Bill Hicks
Considering everything that stops people from using Linux on the desktop and the huge lead that MS has in established customer base and marketing, 0.24% isn't at all bad. It is a lot higher than I thought it was.
Truth is that there are huge barriers to using Linux that can only be blamed on Linux. A simple example. I recently installed NVidia graphics cards on both my Win98 and Red Hat 7.2 desktop machines. The hardware installation was the same of both machines. The software was another story...
Even though NVidia included binary RPMs for linux drivers on the disk those drivers were useless because they were for a different version of the kernel. So, I had to down load the drivers from the NVidia site and install those. Of course, even though they claimed to be compiled for the same RH kernal as the one I was using they didn't work either. So, I downloaded the source tar.gz files and compiled them and the installation went just fine. Then I had to edit the XF86Config-4 file and then figure out that for some reason AGP just wasn't going to work... and most of an afternoon and an evening later I had a working high performance OpenGL monster of a Linux box.
The install of the Windows drivers took about 5 minutes, but since I was at NVidia's site anyway I down loaded the newest drivers, installed them, and started playing games. Total time, counting the down load, about half an hour.
Did I mention that I spent 5 years as an X server developer in another life? So, I have an above average knowledge of the server. Did I also mention that I have several computers all networked so that after I lost my desktop and web browser (no graphical interface == no browser for most people) I was still able to access the NVidia web site and down load drivers and help files? And when they lose their desktop they are completely helpless.
All in all, just the hassle involved in loading an accelerated graphics card made by the most pro-linux graphics card manufacturer in the world (MHO) is enough to keep anyone who is not a hard core geek from even considering using Linux.
Lets face it folks, right now Linux is still actively hostile to the average human being. The fact that drivers have to be recompiled to match the kernel makes Linux actively hostile to all device manufacturers. And, that makes Linux hostile to all software developers that depend on specialty devices.
I'm about as pro-linux as anyone I know, but that doesn't change the fact that a company like NVidia needs to provide a 68 page installation manual with the Linux drivers for a card and doesn't need to provide any instructions for the Windows drivers for the same card.
Like I said, 0.24% isn't bad. On my web site I see closer to 1.3% Linux, 1.9% Mac, and 91% Windows.
Stonewolf
http://www.google.com/press/zeitgeist/zeitgeist-no v.html has it.
http://www.google.com/press/zeitgeist.html
isn't a permanent link, maybe that would explain discrepancy.
If you need text styles to communicate then you don't have a message.
Remember, 75% of all statistics are made up anyway :-)
Come on now, how is anybody supposed to get Linux out on the desktop if nobody worth a hoot can pre-install it? Not even in a dual boot configuration. I've got two friends who went out and bought $1500 PC's to do email and web surfing. Only some of the fringe players like Ellisons company,etc. do Linux such that consumers could use and how do they compete in a Windows-only press world?
Hell, OS/2 had/has a much higher usability rating, IMHO, yet only in one country in the world could IBM get pre-installs, Germany. I'd heard that OS/2 had 25% of the desktops in one year. BeOS was available for free to anybody who wanted to pre-install. They couldn't. Can you say monopoly?
BAD Monopoly?
Linux will remain out of the desktop space as long as Microsoft can hang anybody who lets Linux get close to a pre-installed Windows box. PERIOD. No operating system in existance today or tomorrow will break this strangle hold cause users take what is pre-installed.
IMHO
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Earlier studies showed that most web surfing is done while at work. This study shows that most web surfers use Microsoft browsers to visit primarily non-business sites.
Combine the two results and the only conclusion you can logically arrive at is that 98 percent of Microsoft users are fucking off at work.
I was using Mandrake 7.1 (downloaded through FTP) and let the installer configure it with all the defaults. (This was about a year ago, so I don't recall all the details.)
The graphics card was good (cannot remember the name) but the PC was a high-end Dell Dimension (4100?) with 256MB RAM. Everything in the box came pre-installed by DELL -- originally loaded with Win2000. I had two of them. (No longer have them.)
Not sure how to explain it, but the same Mandrake build was unusable in KDE and GNOME on my home 100MHz machine. (Win95 on the same machine was almost tollerable.)
--- -- - -
Give me LIBERTY, or give me a check.
But it won't happen until either
/etc is your config files, /usr is your programs and so on. Well gee, why isn't your config /config then, or your programs /programs? Ok it's longer, and once you know what it is it's slower to type, just like CLI vs GUI (and just like this is shorter if you know the abbriviations, more annoying if you have to look them up). But most people don't want to learn. They want to instinctively understand what they are doing (or at least what button to push even if they don't know *exactly* what it does), or if not get some good context help. In linux you get to hear RTFM too much. WTHSIHTRTFMTDT? (Why the hell should I have to read the manual to do this?)
1) M$ invents an effective copyright protection. Running off WinXP now, ask me how much I'm willing to pay for it.
2) Windows will only play your DRM approved Secure Audio / WMA / SSSCA files, not your average (= pirated) mp3 / DivX dvdrip.
But what it needs mostly is userfriendlyness. I read a post in the previous slashdot post about the harddisk concept. It went something like: Learn unix, / is root
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
The whole argument about the study being biased leads to a related question of interest: how segregated are the Windows, Mac, and Linux crowds? How much do their web viewing habits overlap? Not only the obvious ones, like Linux folks reading Slashdot and Mac folks reading Mac-related sites. But do e.g. cnn.com and yahoo.com draw similar proportions of Linux people? Do Linux vs Mac people have more overlap in the sites they view than Linux vs Windows people do, or Mac vs Windows people?
It would be interesting to use e.g. some biological measures here. E.g. the Shannon-Weiner diversity index (used to measure species diversity), although that one mainly just measures total diversity, not actual segregation. I suppose even better would be something like the Fst statistic from population genetics, which measures how segregated various subpopulations are.
I'd say that a Linux user is much more apt/able to turn off Javascript in their browser than an IE user.
You can never equivocate too much.
A just as scientific and much more amusing rating can be found at Operating System Sucks-Rules-O-Meter
main(i){(10-putchar(((25208>>3*(i+=3))&7)+(i ?i-4?100:65:10)))?main(i-4):i;}
you can't disrupt you assembly line. Microsoft won't let you. Even if you can make more then $40 on each machine by eventually selling Linux on it. You can't.
Would it disrupt your assembly line to provide a dual boot to Linux OR Windows on your machines? Just a small upfront cost to get the diskimage verified and then there is nothing extra except the customers have a choice. Oh, wait. You can't do that.
Saving $40+ on the Microsoft tax doesn't make economical sense?
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Instead of measuring Linux vs MS in desktop use, lets measure them but the criterea of brain power.
.2% * 200 (IQ) = 100 Points
.2 * 6801 (IQ) = 1360 Points
Lets see:
(Numbers pulled out of me bum)
Microsoft
Windows 98 : 45% * 56 (IQ) = 2520 Points
Windows XP : 3% * 3 (IQ) =9 Points
Windows NT SP 1,2,3,4,5 and 6: 11 * 90 (IQ) = 990
Other
Linux : 1% * 140 (IQ) = 140 Points
Emacs :
Tenet On Port 80:
Amiga, OS/2, Be, Ti/99a, C64: 1 * 201 = 201 Points
Windows Users Behind a Unix Firewall 'cause Windows Has Bugs and Sucurity Holes: 38 * 57 = 2166 Points
Thus, one can see the 'Other' represents more brain power than the Windows crowd.
Moneyed corporations, non-working 'poor' and criminal prisoners are turning productive citizens into tax-slaves.
Web surveys are not a good measure anyway. Linux users may have something better to do than surf comercial websites all day. Consider the number of Sun users reported. Linux is used by the physics community for workstations. I doubt any of those "desktops" got counted. They might not even have a browser (gasp!), or a GUI for that matter.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
If you (a Linux user) masquerades as an IE/NT user, it will just convince web developers to develop *only* on IE.
I wrote two e-mails to ATI because their site didn't support Netscape 6.x. I told them I was a paying customer like everyone else, and that I used Netscape 6 on Linux. They eventually re-designed their site to support Netscape6/Linux.
Do us all a favor: show the developers your true colors.
Anyone who usese IE is a fool. Oh wait, I'm at work and HAVE to use IE.
Let's think about how useful that makes web counters. I spend 10 hours a day at work, 8 hours sleeping, 2 hours getting too and from work. That leaves me with four hours each day to do things around the house, two of which are usually dedicated to eating and grooming. Two hours for everything else in the world. So what browswer is most likely to be used? M$IE by greater than ten to one.
Dreams of MSIE at my house are more like nightmares. That's not where I wanted to go yesterday!
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
So the way I see it, make linux exaclly the same as windows 98 and linux will have much more success?
Oh, and I really would like to see you install Win98 in 10 minutes. Win98 is now 3 years old. Three years ago, I was using something like Red Hat 5.2 or 6.0. If you want to match up windows to linux install times, compare today's linux with today's windows: XP. XP does NOT install in 10 minutes.
Does a multi-boot box count twice or more?
What about vmware? I could count my box for like 5 oses with vmware if I wanted to...
Yeah, the Mac is nice. If I talk to a non-technical user, and I won't make money supporting them, then I always recommend the Mac. Always.
The only real advantage that Windows has is its ubiquity. That's it. The main homogeneities are the name and the processor choice. The other one is that it's difficult to use properly. I do support in an office, and people still call me about the screen bar having moved. (You can drag it with the mouse, but some of these people can't learn that. So sometimes they do it by accident [well, I have too] and then they don't know what happened, or how to recover.)
Now one could say that people shouldn't be that techno-illiterate, but some people are. And this is the MS target audience. The Mac is a much better choice. (But try to tell that to my boss!)
On Linux, what are needed are better tools. Font building tools, e.g. The Mac had those ages ago. This allowed people to build fonts for any special purpose they needed. Perhaps the problem here is that Linux font specs have been in flux? Or nobody's been interested?
Also, Glade is nice, but it doesn't compete with the Screen Builders that MS includes with it's tools. And is there a decent report writer? (Probably not, since it's basically a specialized version of the Screen Builder.)
The Linux philosophy has been to build the tools, and then to use them to build better tools, oh, yes, and also to solve other problems. Now that the more basic tools are in quite good shape, we shouldn't neglect to build the next layer of tools. That's what our users will use to build the fancier applications. And somewhere in that space of "fancier applications" is the next "killer application". You don't design that on purpose. You can design good applications on purpose, but you can't design killer applications on purpose. But if a large number of people design a large number of really good applications, somewhere in there is likely to be the next "killer application". You recognize it because its use grows and becomes the kind of tidal wave that swamps the GIMP.
As to X Window... lots of people seem to not like it. But we sure don't want that in the kernel. It's huge! And nobody has come up with a better choice. (I understand that a couple of projects are in process, but I don't believe that they are useable yet.)
Quick installs: I've never been able to install Windows in 10 minutes. But it is nice to be able to start the installer going, and walk away. Still, this isn't something that many people are going to do very often. At all. Most of my Linux installs have gone as smoothly as my Windows installs. But most people never do an OS install. So that isn't going to affect these people. What affects them is what they buy pre-installed on a new computer. And I don't see any way to change that. So the only point to change is what is available to buy. And the principle way to change that is to insist that you only want Linux installed on each and every computer that you buy. (Other people may have more leveraged ways to affect this, but for people in general, that's the choice.)
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Come on! Linux is about choice most of all.
/too/ bad, and on mac the GUI kicks my ass.
What are my display choices in linux?
X...and...X.
That is a choice?
At least with win the GUI doesn't suck
The closest thing to a consistent GUI in *NIX is CDE...how sad is that?
M-X jihad-against-suckyness
A number of posters seem to be moaning because the figures range from 0.25% (HitBox) to 1% (Google). I see wild theories attempting to discredit the figures and additional arguments trying to justify why the figures should be higher.
Wake up to yourselves. Almost 1% is great! The current estimate for the number of Internet users is 513 million people (according to NUA http://www.nua.ie/surveys/how_many_online/). So even taking the lowest figure from HitBox that's 1.3 million people using Linux as a desktop. It could be as high as 5.2 million people if Google provides a better sample.
But that's only desktop users! I will claim (and I think many people would agree) that the percentage of Linux *servers* is much higher than the percentage of Linux desktops. I can't guess how many machines this equates to (I don't know the relative number of desktops to servers, or the percentage of servers that are Linux) but it's going to be more than zero.
It's brilliant news that Linux usage is this high. Every single person that uses Linux is a success story for Linux. There's no need to have huge marketshare, or be the dominant player. You just need a critical mass of users and several million users is definitely a critical mass. The early years of Linux had just a few 100 users and it was enough to propel the snowball forward. Millions of users equates to an avalanche!
Keep reminding yourself, just by using Linux you are helping to make Linux better. You are another person who can help a newbie. You are another person who might buy a book or CD and thus indirectly fund a developer. You are another person who might find a bug, suggest a feature, write some documentation, or perhaps even write some code.
You are part of the Linux community, and even the most pessimistic figures suggest that this is a community with MILLIONS of members.
You don't seem to get that the OEM's technical support costs vastly outweigh what they are paying on the Microsoft Tax.
Meaning as soon as a user accidentally boots into the wrong OS and has to call support, the OEM has probably lost money on the box. That does not make economic sense.
I understand that you feel burnt over OS/2, but if you are going to talk economics, the 'rational' configuration is the one that is the most uniform and the cheapest to support (has the fewest options). That circumstance created the Microsoft monopoly far more than any dirty OEM dealings did.
It's also rather insulting to think that users are being buffooned into running Windows because the OEMs ship. Users run Applications and are mostly uninterested in OSes. They don't buy "Windows machines", they buy "Excel machines", and if you can't provide Excel (or a facimile), they won't be interested.
It's too bad that IBM missed the mark by inches. If OS/2 2.1 had been a little lighter weight and gotten a little UI touchup, it probably would have been the "supportable" choice over Windows. Linux ain't even close.
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
HA, and the conspiracy threories come out already! I really don't think any one has motive to pretend that Linux has a lower end-user figure than it has, when it is such a minuscule figure - or are you suggesting that the figure is out by 20-50%???
The IDC states that 2% of corporate desktop users are using Linux. This is rouchly 8 times what this survey reported and I would think that there would be slightly more home users using it now than corporate users.
My estimate is 2-5% of users are using Linux. Still small but not as small as 0.24%...
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
As that article said. Actually know someone who got interviewed over the phone for one of these national polls, and they would not accept his answers. Guess a lot of these polls are for marketing purposes.
Matt
X is good technology, IMO. Yes, it is complicated, but when was the last time you tried to troubleshoot a Windows GUI problem?
What X needs is some better administration tools, but those even, are coming.
You are right about the office suite, but it will come. RAD capabilities in Linux are finally becomming really possible, and I am sure that this trend will extend to the office apps.
My 62 year old dad DOES use Linux with few problems, and he was lost with Windows 95. Yes, it is complicated, but try running Windows. That is complicated but the initial learning curve is a little easier (it gets harder really fast, though).
I will concede, though, that troubleshooting a mac is much more simple than Windows or Linux. At least until OS X... I still prefer Linux to Windows in this regard.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
There are a number of people that would do away with proprietary software if it were up to them. Yet many of these same people also take the same attitude that you're taking, that no one has the the right to complain about free/open source software? Well who exactly do users complain to in a purely Open Source world? Who makes sure that their needs are met? No one really.
If there's real choice, then I can understand and appreciate your position. But if you're one that advocates removing choice from the customer (like RMS), then you better at least be responsive to the needs of the (potential) users.
As far as I can tell, you've completely missed two salient points.
1) OS/2. The UI stomped all over Windows (3.1 or later on, 95). It was simply better in all respects. It was also no 'heavier' than Win95--IBM was just more honest about the requirements.
OS/2 failed for the simple reason of incompetent marketing, and nothing else.
2) "...or a facsimile..." WRONG! You're right that people are interested in applications rather than OSes, but something with similar functionality will not convince someone to change--it has to have the same UI and the (nearly) identical usability items. If it works 10x better than Excel but looks utterly unfamiliar, then it won't get used by more than a tiny percent of the marketplace. Maybe three years ago, but not now.
"People who do stupid things with hazardous materials often die." -- Jim Davidson on alt.folklore.urban
I see, it seems that it's cheaper to design new hardware so that they can put buttons on the keyboards so the OEM can get around Microsofts restriction of enhancing the UI. If you don't know what I'm talking about, look at a Compaq PC. You'll see there are a number of button which launch application Compaq pre-packaged on the system. Microsfot won't let any OEM customize the product to fit their customers needs.
If OEM's follow your rule then there is NO INNOVATION. None. Because it costs too much. We'd be using stone and chisel if we follow your rule.
The reason Linux or any OS can't get onto the desktops is because Microsoft can prevent innovation there.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
All in all, just the hassle involved in loading an accelerated graphics card made by the most pro-linux graphics card manufacturer in the world (MHO) is enough to keep anyone who is not a hard core geek from even considering using Linux.
If they were really so pro-Linux, they would have Open Source drivers so that you wouldn't have to jump through the hoops that you did. Place the blame where it belongs -- with NVidia.
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
X11 is good technology. It is extensible and flexible. It is thin, with a low memory footprint, and has layered features, much like TCP/IP (actually, the analogy could be followed here quite well).
The problem is not actually with X at all. It is the office suites which are useful in small settings but are not enough of a development platform for the enterprise (this is where MS rules, security aside).
I remember when the Linux desktop was clunky (that was a year and a half ago) and now it is much more smooth, without getting rid of X. KDE and GNOME have both come a long way in that time. I am waiting for the office suites to do likewise.
The basic thing is that I think that the study has underreported Linux by 8 to 10 times (still a small percent though), but I don't think that the problems are as severe as they used to be.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
What hitbox does isn't necessarily wrong. It is a useful thing to know how much of the web traffic is coming from what users. It's just when this data gets misinterpeted by hack reporters that there's a problem.
Don't label something "offtopic" unless you know the topic well enough to tell what's on topic.
I don't want to get into a OS/2 flamewar, but I did _specifically_ mention v 2.1 which dates from 1992 or so.
+ It needed 16MB of memory. Windows 3 could get away with 4MB. That added $500 or more to the cost of a machine.
+ The default UI was 'featureful', but the execution was terrible. Ugly icons scattered hither and fro in 4-level deep nested folders scattered randomly around your desktop, gigantic ugly oddly-colored dialogs, terrible terrible filemanager, key features like "Shutdown" hidden in obscure places, etc.
If IBM would have hired somebody with a little artistic and usability training, this could have been significantly improved in a short amount of time. However, they didn't, and OS/2 (true to it's name) had a half-done GUI until Warp 4 shipped years later, after the product had been defeated.
Windows 3? Simple. Didn't do much. Obvious options. Therefore, cheap to support for OEMs and a more 'rational' product for economic reasons.
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.
You didn't specifically mention it in your post, but a number of other people droned on about the lack of hardware support in Linux, or about how hard it is to install Linux and auto-detect ann their old cheapo integrated network chipsets or sound cards. Have you ever actually tried to install Winblows on a home built computer, or something that wasn't specifically configured to work with Windows? It's a freaking disaster!! I've seen plenty of hardware combinations that simply will not work on a Windows install, but when I re-install with Linux, the drivers load up without a hitch. The best part is that, if your Windows install fails, you're SOL. No errors. No diagnostics. It just sits there staring at you.
Oh yea, and then there's the, "I once tried to load a document in StarOffice and it didn't work, so SO blows!" And, I suppose the last time you tried it, you were using version 5.0, reading a Windows doc file? Have you ever even tried the latest SO version? Have you ever tried ceating a document from scratch and comparing the features? Have you spent even 0.001% of the time on StarOffice learning how it works, as you have in MS Office? Are you any different from the people who say, "Gee, I used MS Office, and one time it Blue Screened on me and I lost all my work, so Office must be the suckiest software on the face of the planet, and no one will ever want to use it."
Lets face it. Most home users want to surf the Web, write email, and play games. Linux is short on games, but the SO is just as usable as Office, as long as you aren't trying to convert funky MS formats, and the browsers are functional for 98% of the Web sites, as long as they are not specifically tailored for IE. It's a classic chicken and egg problem, but there is no reason why, if you sold a pre-installed Linux based system to a typical user, they couldn't function just as well as they do now with a Windows box.
In summary, if you're going to whine about "Linux Usability", then please at least try to come up with something original, or perhaps back up your complaints with some real efforts. Don't assume that, just because you are to lazy or set in your ways to change, that everyone else has to be like you.
Your Servant, B. Baggins
Fervent Linux fan that I am, I've given up on being able to use it on my desktop for the time being. The main reason is lack of Japanese language capability.
:-(
Linux has come far enough to where Japanese can be viewed on the screen, and with some programs input, but it's currently at about the state that MacOS/Windows was about 10+ years ago.
My home server runs Redhat, but I've ended up even doing web development on it though a Win box, just because the internationalization (fonts, input method, speed of display, etc) is sooo much better.
CC-licensed translations of Japanese fiction: http://tonygonz.blogspot.com/
> Quite frankly, neither XP or OSX offers the
> desktop I want. Both are too inflexible and
> lacking in power.
What's inflexible about Mac OS X? What's not powerful enough?
Moderation Totals: Flamebait=3, Redundant=1, Funny=7, Overrated=3, Underrated=2, Total=16.
Best...comment...ever.
------
Let me give you the lowdown
I agree with your points about IE and the browser companies. I should clarify something: "IE Compatible" simply meant that when I go to a site that uses XSL or Flash (yech!) or Java Applet's -- it should "just work". Also, when you create some HTML/CSS or whatever in these browsers, it displays in them as good as it does in IE. Thats all. Hell, I use Konq, I like it, but there are somethings that I say to myself "wtf, why doesn't that look right...". Then I go over to my Mac or Windows box and sure enough IE looks pretty good.
Its just an observation.
Maybe I just keep up on this stuff more than you do, but I've been doing everything you list above all year with Galeon. Flash, applets, no problem. XSL? Of course. CSS? Better than IE. Rarely do I see a page render in IE differently from how it renders in mozilla. And usually, the reason is a failure of IE to comply with the spec properly.
Now here's a fine example of somebody who Doesn't Get What Linux is About.
- KDE and GNOME desktop's look like crap: I find every GNOME and KDE environment I try, just looks like junk compared to a Mac or Windows experience.
Did you stop to consider customizing the appearance? Me, I can't bear to use Windows. It feels nothing but crude to me. To each his own. Maybe you should stick with Windows or MacOS, you seem to hate everything about the current Linux desktop offerings.
2. Standardize on one API layer for the GUI, much like Win32, we should have a set of API's that are "God" when it comes to writing GUI under Linux.
No, no, no. Nothing should _ever_ be God when it comes to Linux. If I don't like how the God library works, I'm going to write a better one. If we subscribe to this "There can be only one" crap that MS and Apple dictate on their platforms, we'd be nowhere near as far along as we are now. Virtually all great projects in the free software world stand on the shoulders of other free software projects.
> + It needed 16MB of memory. Windows 3 could get away with 4MB. .......
Sorry but I ran OS/2 2.1 on 8MB of RAM running Windows 3.1 apps and the netware client at a very reasonable speed. I went to 10MB for those users who wanted to add TCP/IP and IBM's X Server.
You seem to think you know the story but remember the thread title. I doubt that even if someone paid the support costs for the first 2 call and had an OS 10x bettery then Windows that OEMs would even consider it. They would have to totally give up on shipping Windows and every application vendor that started developing for it would have their existing apps break with the next security patch for LookOut or InternetExplorer.
It just doesn't matter. Support cost or no support costs.
LoB
"Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus
Microsoft had to give away Windows for several years before anyone would consider paying for it. IBM could have done the same with OS/2, but chose to sell it at a premium to enterprise customers. Much like Apple, they didn't properly anticipate the exponential growth in PC users that happened in the early 90s.
/. a few times before, and I find your worldview depressing. You bet on the wrong horse, and your reaction has been to valorize a flawed product and develop a defeatist worldview and an eternal hatred for your product's competitors (and the tendancy to spew offtopic bile about "LookOut"). I encourage you to try to take a fresh look at things and get on with life.
I think that's (part of) what people mean when they talk about IBM's "bad marketing" of OS/2.
"It just doesn't matter." is a terrible lesson to be learned from your experience with OS/2. For one it absolves IBM for a terribly handled product, and for another it implies that all Bill Gates had to was punch the clock every morning to become the richest man on earth. You might not like to hear it, but at the time of the IBM-Microsoft divorce, Big Blue should have been able to rubout those pipsqueaks.
We've crossed swords over OS/2 on
I'm no more happy about a MS Monopoly than the average slashdotter, just making an effort to understand how we got here. Not to mention that if Gates would sold out to IBM in 1990, I'm pretty sure that an IBM-dominated PC landscape would be worse that what we ended up getting.
Business. Numbers. Money. People. Computer World.