Bob Young says Linux won't rule the desktop

Wee writes "I just came across this interesting Yahoo interview with Bob Young in which he says that Linux won't rule the desktop but will instead focus on replacing legacy Unix systems and enhancing Linux's embedded presence. He makes some pretty good points. The oddest quote: "So our opportunity is not to replace Microsoft on the PC. If you've got a perfectly good working PC, why you would go through the angst of replacing it?". Not sure where to start answering that one. My wife (a dedicated Win32 user) liked his car analogy. I need to get her to read 'In the Beginning was the Command Line'..."

Comments

Alternative

[Evanrude]

I don't think one of the primary goals of Linux should be to replace Windows on the Desktop, but rather to offer an alternative Operating System to individuals and corporations who can't (or don't want to) afford the licensing fees and the cost of upgrades.

Re:Alternative

[humphrm]

I agree with you, but I have to point out that, at least in the enterprise, software licensing fees aren't usually the first thing companies think about. Sure, it's a great consumer benefit (for Linux) but in the enterprise, the more important expense is hardware investment and ongoing maintenance.

This is where Linux is a big win in the server market, and why companies like Dell and (apparently) RH are targetting those markets. It's hard for Sun or HP to compete, when their low-end servers (up to 4 procs) are sometimes 4 times as costly to buy as a commodity x86 server.

But on the other hand, the desktop market is already deeply steeped in cheap, commodity x86 boxes. What OS an enterprise chooses to put on it really boils down to support, since the few hundred bucks for a license doesn't really show up on the balance sheet after the first year. Maintenance, however, keeps going (and it's cost rising) as the box gets older.

It's going to take a strong, stable company that can attract enterprise buyers and managers to sell the Linux desktop into the environment. So from what I see of this, RH is saying "Don't look at us just yet."

Hmmm. Maybe IBM?

Why replace it? simple...

[Marx_Mrvelous]

Complacency leads to regression. If we aren't always striving to make things better, everything will deteriorate. With a strong Linux desktop push, the price of competing software (Windows and MacOS) will drop, features will increase, and everyone will be better off.

not sure the movie...

[Pengo]

Maybe it's the Life of Brian... Yeah, where the mobs of people where following him around, claiming that silly and sensible things he would say where completely something else, in the end not listening to reason? Well.. sounds like the linux community. :) Not that Bob Young is the un-reachable god-like leader, but I see some simularaties.

hehe, RMS could play the guy who sits in the pit for silence. Well, at least with looks. :)

Makes sense

[.sig]

Contrary to popular belief (at least here), Linux is just not ready for the everyday person's desktop. While it's true that it is getting there, why not focus on it's strengths, and let Linux grow as an OS where it fits in and is accepted?

Windows works. It may not be perfect, but it gets the job done, especially when the job is pure entertainment. That's why I have a computer at home, and I bet that's why a large majority of home computers are bought. I also have a linux partition on there, but I haven't booted into linux in over a year. I simply have no need for it, and everything I use my computer for can be done without problems under windows.

Re:Makes sense

[Hostile17]

Contrary to popular belief (at least here), Linux is just not ready for the everyday person's desktop.

I disagree, Windows has only one advantage over Linux and that is games. This may be a problem on the home desktop, but on the business desktop, it is not relevant. In every other area Linux has an free or nearly free alternative. Email, web browsing and content creation all have usable and in some cases outstanding programs. Even Exchange Server can be replaced, to include shared calenders (easy to implement with Apache/PHP) and address books (LDAP). I have helped a few small businesses convert to a Linux Based desktop for all employees, some do complain for a little while, but then they get back to doing whatever it is they get paid to do, especially when the CEO pointed out, it was either convert to Linux or face other budget cuts and possibly layoffs. I have yet to see anyone not be able to figure out how to use StarOffice. Frankly, someone who can't figure out StarOffice is probably not someone you want working for you anyway. With the sole exception of games, Linux is ready for the desktop. As a side note, I am just the opposite of you, I have a Windows partition on my system, but I haven't booted into it since I did the install, about 8 month ago. I am thinking about killing it and using the space for something useful.

Re:Makes sense

[Jason Earl]

Tell that to Oracle. They are replacing their big Sparc boxes with commodity Intel-based servers running Linux.

If Oracle can do it, you can bet that you can too. In fact, you can bet that if you don't use a combination of commodity Intel-based servers and commodity Free Software to lower your costs your competitor will, and his overhead will be that much lower than yours.

The days where big-iron Unix users could afford to laugh at Linux are over.

Desktop.

[saintlupus]

Linux won't rule the desktop

Gee, I don't know how anyone can say that. Between the consistent user interface, the ease of setting up printing, and the huge game library, Linux is a cinch to take over the desktop computers of the world.

*crickets*

--saint
(I'm just bitter -- still trying to set up CUPS.)

Why does it have to be 'answered'?

[SlashChick]

No, Bob is absolutely right. I will say this again and again and again, but no one seems to be listening:

The desktop wars are over. Move on to the next thing.

So Microsoft has won the "desktop" wars. So what? Do you really think that in 5-10 years, people are still going to be using bulky beige boxes to connect to the Internet? No, they are going to be using everything from home entertainment consoles to cell phones to PDAs.

Some of you may remember the days when a "personal" computer was a joke. "Computers" were those giant hulking things that took up an entire room and required their own cooling system. As Bob says, "Microsoft did not convince people to unplug VMS from their Digital VAX systems in 1979. They took advantage of a major shift in technology toward the PC, and they became the de facto standard on the new technology model, being the PC."

The shift in technology now is smaller, faster, wireless, and pervasive. The idea of 'turning on' a computer to 'use the Internet' will become old-fashioned more quickly than you can imagine. By the time a majority of people think that Linux will be ready to rule the PC world, PCs will be the passe way to connect to the Internet. Microsoft is already expanding in this field with the XBox and the tablet PC (which, IMHO, is a natural evolution of the computer.) Anything that is wireless is huge right now.

This whole desktop war is silly. Linux is its best when people don't even know or care what OS their products are running. Look at TiVo. Do I care that it runs Linux? Nope, because it works flawlessly and doesn't require me to know arcane command line tools. TiVo rocks not because it's Linux, but because it does its job and does it well. That's the problem I have with Linux zealots -- they want Linux regardless of whether Linux fits the job or not.

Why is it necessary to force people to relearn something? Instead of parroting Microsoft, let's be innovative. Let's put Linux into the greatest, coolest new devices (TiVo, PDAs, cellphones.) Let's look at where the market will be in 5 years instead of being hyper-focused on beating Microsoft today. Otherwise, Microsoft and the rest of the world will move on, and Linux will be left behind.

(More about this in my journal.)

Re:Why does it have to be 'answered'?

[BlueGecko]

You know what's funny? I've been saying that the desktop was doomed, that it was going to be replaced by specialty devices, for a long time now--far longer than I'm willing to admit. I've now become convinced that we're just not going to see it--entirely. What I think you'll see instead is something not at all far from Apple's digital hub strategy. In 10-20 years, we'll probably use PDAs for many of our documents and our scheduling, we'll use digital cameras for photos, specialized players for audio and possibly movies, consoles for video games, and so on. But you have to make those all talk together some way. This is the whole point of Apple's newer computers, the reason why they're spending so much time on i* software. That's where Linux ought to be headed. And for that, the desktop is still very important.

As for embedded devices, I'd actually really rather not see Linux there. I'd rather see a kernel better geared to embedded devices. Something extremely small, modular and effect, similar to 3DO's now defunct M2: extremely compact, fully reentrant kernel, a unique memory design where applications could read memory everywhere but write only in their own space, a file system similar to the Newton's, etc. Then let Linux be the digital hub. Hell, Linux already makes a good server, and is that not what we're looking at it becoming in the future? Imagine a world where your house is wirelessly networked, and the job of the desktop is essentially to keep everything syncrhonized. That's a server job. It's also one where you still need good desktop software. Sounds like an ideal place for Linux to me.

So the desktop wars may be in some sense over, but we'll still be using desktops for a long time to come, and I think that if Linux wants to compete, it needs to ensure it can go there.

Should Linux even try to dominate the destkop?

[prisoner-of-enigma]

Think about that for a minute before you answer. Think about where desktop computing is and where it's going before you answer.

Today's desktops are stressing ease of use and wide application arrays more than anything else. Stability is in there somewhere, but MS has gotten pretty darn good with Win2K and XP, especially if you stick to their office suites.

Linux is NOT easy to use. Sure, it may be easy for US to use, but imagine a secretary, an HR guy, or (God forbid) the boss trying to use it on a daily basis. Give them XWindows and they'll be somewhat happy, but even the best XWindows setup pales in comparison the features and eye candy you'll find on Win2k and XP. And before you belittle that, remember who the end user is. You and I may not care for it, but the vast unwashed masses out there DO. They will demand it, and they don't give two damns about how configurable your window manager is. They want a box that's pretty and functional. Linux does not currently fit that mold very well.

What does Linux do well? It's an awesome server. It stays up longer than Ron Jeremy and Peter North combined, and a competent admin can tweak and tune it all over the place for practically anything. Trying to force that into the desktop market is the classical definition of fitting a nice, sleek roung peg into a very square hole.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Linux may one day dominate the desktop, but it will not much resemble the Linux we know today. Do we really want that? I'd love to see Linux succeed and trounce MS, but I don't want it to compromise the core principals that make it so good today.

Re:Should Linux even try to dominate the destkop?

[weinerdog]

Linux is NOT easy to use. Sure, it may be easy for US to use, but imagine a secretary, an HR guy, or (God forbid) the boss trying to use it on a daily basis. Give them XWindows and they'll be somewhat happy, but even the best XWindows setup pales in comparison the features and eye candy you'll find on Win2k and XP.

This is a harmful myth that we tend to perpetuate. In the first place, remember that Linux is an operating system. Most users will not interact directly with the operating system; their use will be mediated, typically by a shell for expert users and a GUI for expert and novice alike. Moreover, the novice especially will tend to limit his or her shell/GUI interaction to launching applications. The application interface is the primary interface that most users interact with. Bash presents a very difficult interface to novices. X presents a difficult interface to novices. But so does Windows.

Basic Win32 functions like copying files, launching programs, and locating files are more difficult to many novices than it might at first seem -- just watch a novice or even a moderately experienced person use windows and see how they typically use rote memory to start up their applications, with which they are typically far more comfortable. Watch what features they never use, even when it would improve speed or help keep their computer running longer. How often do they run scandisk? Back up the registry? Customize the start menu to put commonly used programs on the main menu, rather than having to cascade down two or three levels? See what happens when you change the default load/save directory in Word -- many users are not able to find their files if you start them off in a different directory.

Given this, it is far more critical that the application present a good interface than the underling OS or shell/GUI. In point of fact, most applications written for Linux have interfaces that are not well-suited to novices. Applications like MS Office are better, but they still suffer from menuitis and featuritis. I believe that, if you could overcome the natural resistance most people have to trying something new once they have managed to learn how to coax some marginal productivity out of their current applications, there would be a tremendous market for a simpler, more straightforward version of Office that implemented all of the important features in a transparent and intuitive way, while eliminating or at least hiding many of the more marginal or downright dangerous features (like the ability to easily, often accidentally, add footers, borders, and other formatting that can't be equally easily removed, without knowing what they are and how they got added in the first place).

Whether this suite ran under X or XP would probably make little difference to the average user. As long as you set it up for them, show them how to turn it on, turn it off, and start the apps they need, the underlying OS or GUI really doesn't matter all that much.

Most people don't use Windows either; they use applications that happen to run on Windows. While Linux may be a hard sell on the desktop, it could succeed simply by being invisible and letting the user concentrate on the applicaiton. If Linux had a killer desktop app, it might stand a chance on the desktop.

Lies...

[bflong]

I hate it when journalists do this crap.

Bob Young says:
So our opportunity is not to replace Microsoft on the PC.

ZDNet reporter Matthew Broersma says:
Red Hat chairman Bob Young says Windows will continue to rule the desktop!

What a crock! That is NOT what Bob Young said. He said that they have an opportunity to expand their business in new directions. Directions that will be of more benifit to RedHat and their customers then "the desktop".

Bob Young continues to impress

[Ars-Fartsica]

Bob Young continues to demonstrate a good grasp of the market, and the position linux can best dominate in it. Red Hat has been distinguished by better management (from what we can see) than the other linux companies so far, and Young's ability to move to the market instead of the hype is setting Red Hat apart.

Why is this so complicated?

[MythoBeast]

Time to throw a little karma to the wind.

I don't understand why everyone complicates this so much. If you want to capture the desktop market, then you have to cater to what the desktop market wants. That can be summed up in three words: Easy To Use. Here are a few examples of things that aren't easy to use:

- So many configuration options that you don't know where to start, and need a year's education to finish
- A selection of desktop environments, each with a corp of zealots telling you that theirs is better
- A broad base of information that you have to (a) go out and find on the internet, and (b)search through to find your answers.
- Installations with prerequisites that you have to figure out how to find and install yourself
- User account management
- Video, sound, and network card installations that require you to know the model of your card.

If you're attempting to create an operating system with a broad selection of options, you should remember to include the option to not have to mess with these little details.

Unfortunately, this requires the programmers to figure a few things out for the user, and most of us just don't want to do that. Somehow we're always surprised to find out that the user doesn't want to do our work for us.

Mythological Beast

You are fooling yourself guy.

[hackus]

The battle is won, but not the war by any means.

You are obviously not aware of the poor bastards in our faultering economy that have to deal with the license or upgrade taxes from Microsoft.

IT managers had a taste this year of a slow economy, and when things are bad, the Microsoft tax treadmill on say, 200-300 desktops is a significant piece of money employers would like to use to pay raises, bonuses, health insurance and business opportunities to expand upon. Which, I would like to note, their competitors can't if they have to ship that money to Microsoft.

My entire company in fact, BETS that my competitors will buy into .Net and Microsoft. As long as I know my competitors are sending money to Redmond, I know when times get bad, thier customers...

WILL BE MY CUSTOMERS.

The desktop battle, was won by Microsoft, true, but anyone who says the war is over has never worked in a all IT Microsoft shop in a bad business climate.

The server room battle is now going on, and Linux is winning this battle. Once Linux is firmly entrenched in the enterprise server room...

THEN we will turn our expertise and knowledge and better value all around, towards the desktop.

Uncle Bill and Stevey boy are going to wake up one day and find themselves in a world dominated by Java virtual machines that run everywhere and typically more than not, servers, pda's, cell phones, etc are also running some form of Linux underneath them.

It is already happening.

Those companies that refuse to follow suit will not be able to stay in business against those companies who adopt open source technologies and processes.

Ultimately the new business model for IT is based around people and not hardware or software like it has been for the past 10 years. That is what open source is about.

People/technology not a gadget or a widget.

It is comming, be ready for it.

-hack