DreamWorks Switches to Linux

tal-home writes "Newsforge has a story about the decision Dreamworks made to port ALL of their front-end servers and workstations to Linux. Their new movie, called 'Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron' which will hit the theaters in late May, was created in a 100% Linux enviroment, unlike older movies like Shrek and Lord of the Rings that used IRIX servers as a rendering farm. It's a good time to mention that this move by DreamWorks also includes porting the artists workstations to Linux, in addition to the servers. Redhat and HP helped out in the switch." Word has it that Adobe may be pursuing unix versions of it's toolset as DreamWorks isn't the only shop switching.

Comments

What are they thinking?

[CmdrTaco (editor)]

I want to know, why on earth would Dreamworks want to switch to Linux. Yeah, it's a free (beer and speech) OS and all, but what are the other upsides to using it? They're going to have to switch to non proven software, and just because something runs on IRIX doesn't mean it will run on Linux. Plus, most of the software used in IRIX and other Unices for rendering video and SFX is proprietary and just as expensive or even more expensive than Windows or Mac equivalent. Of course, it is a major step for the Linux community, because where there is a demand for good software, there will also be an increase in production to fit that demand. So from where I see it, this will either be a successfull move in bolstering the Linux community, or it may just end up seriously hurting Dreamworks. I mean, if they had good results from what they were doing before (with the exception of SW-Ep1 of course) and can continue to afford it, why switch to something that is obviously going to be inferior?

Re:Adobe!

[supabeast!]

Apps won't happen until the Open Source community gives up in X as a desktop GUI. Open source coders need to realize what Apple did; that X is great for running GUI apps across a network, but as far as the desktop goes, X still pretty much sucks, even with high-res anti-aliased fonts and the nice 3D support we have been getting from Nvidia. Programmers don't have time to dick around with an XF86Config (I know more than one great programmer who has no idea what video card is in his machine.), or to restart X any time a USB mouse accidentally gets disconnected while moving a running laptop around.

To really succeed on the desktop, the open source world needs to do what Apple did- take a wonderful UNIX/Open/Free subsystem and, create a GUI meant just to be a gorgeous, easy to use, desktop environment. Apple did it, and developers love it. UNIX users are flocking to OS X in droves. The Linux world needs to take a hint and try doing something really innovative, instead of trying to attract users by creating unstable knockoffs of Adobe and Microsoft products and appending "Gnu" or "K" to the name.

Just my .02...

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[Carly Fiorina]

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[Grunjnak]

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