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OSDL Announces Desktop Initiative

Posted by timothy on from the pleasant-buzzing-noise dept.

rhetoric writes "Earlier today at the LinuxWorld Conference & Expo in New York, nonprofit Open Source Development Labs announced the creation of a "Desktop Linux Working Group initiative focused on greater use of Linux on desktops throughout the enterprise." A press release is available on OSDL's website, in addition to this Register article." It's all part of their non-secret plan.

8 of 230 comments (clear)

  1. Perspective of a Linux neophyte by Sarojin · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I've been using Wintel for over 15 years and have just recently installed Mandrake 9 on an older P2 450. Here are a couple of points I think are worth mentioning (ubergeeks can exclude themselves from the classifications below):

    1. Linux is ready for *some* desktops only, namely ones where users won't be constantly tweaking and installing new software and hardware. You want a computer for grandma to browse the web, send email and view a few grandkid photos? Linux is great! You want to roll out corporate desktops where employees don't really need to be able to download and install the latest version of KaZaA? Linux is a godsend (provided the business software you need is supported).

    2. Linux is *not* ready for the average user desktop. The average user wants to do everything grandma wants to do, but they also want to be able to install or upgrade software and hardware *easily*. In addition, they want a fully functional GUI, with no *necessity* of dropping to a CLI for everyday tasks. They want to be able to go to a third party software/driver website, follow the 'click here for Linux version' hyperlink, download the file, then double-click to install it.

    Needless to say, as long as Linux distributions and desktop managers continue to proliferate, the average user's requirements will never be met. I say this as a *fact* not a *prescription*, so spare me the Linux-strength-in-diversity comments. I just think you can't have your cake (freedom/diversity) and eat it too (Linux on average desktop).

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    1. Re:Perspective of a Linux neophyte by smallpaul · · Score: 5, Insightful

      constant tweaking and installation of new hardware and software is not using a computer productively. using a computer productively means that the computer is operational, in the sense that it doesn't actually -need- anything further to be done to it in order to function as intended. it just works.

      It is classic Linux-advocate style to redefine the user's problem to fit Linux's needs rather than the other way around. Some people like to get a new digital camera once a year. Some people like to install a new game once a month. Some people like to buy the latest and greatest MP3 players, video cards, wi-fi devices, photo printers, hand-held devices and all of it comes with software.

      People want the capabilities of their computer to expand as the industry expands and new things are invented. It's a very closed mindset that says the "computer has a use and once it is set up it is static." My uses for the computer change every day (especially as a I am a progrmmer). Why should my less technical sister be restricted from a similarly expansive view of computing? If I call her up and tell her BitTorrent or iPod is the shit, it should be easy for her to install BitTorrent or an Ipod.

      I'm not saying that Linux is intrinsically worse that windows at supporting dynamically changing systems: but for the average user today it is worse because of the driver and software support. That isn't Linux's "fault" but it is Linux's "problem". Not the user's problem. If you make it the user's problem they will stick with Windows and (frighteningly!) think of it as a more free and open system than the vision of Linux you are pushing.

  2. Linux on the desktop by sql*kitten · · Score: 5, Informative

    Sun recently sent me a CD with their Java Desktop on it, which for anyone who doesn't know, is a slickly-packaged Linux distro with a very user friendly interface, Sun's excellent StarOffice suite, Mozilla, etc etc. I've been having a play with it (I use StarOffice on Windows anyway) and I'm quite impressed. It's all nicely integrated with a mostly consistent look and feel, for the end user there's no messing around, anyone who's familiar with Windows and MS Office could pick this up in a day and be productive. As an old-skool Unix user, I'd personally prefer a NeXTSTEP or IRIX desktop, but as a normal Windows user, JDS is impressive.

    That's the way to do Linux on the desktop - it has to be as near as possible seamless. Someone who knows what they're doing has to sit down and make it all work. Bundling together a package here and a package there as Red hat does just isn't going to cut it. If the objective is to actually get Linux on the desktop, then OSDN should throw its lot in with Sun. But it looks like this "initiative" is just bandwagoneering.

  3. Business desktop vs Home desktop by tr0llb4rt0 · · Score: 5, Informative

    Linux is ready for the business desktop.

    Until the hardware manufacturers put as much effort into Linux drivers as they do for Windows drivers then home Linux desktop pc's will be restricted to the geek community.

    That and the old old topic of gaming support. :-D

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  4. Keep in Mind by tres3 · · Score: 5, Informative
    The thing to keep in mind here is that they are most likely shooting for a corporate desktop where the secretaries will have a very limited portfolio of applications. They just need things like email, web, word processing, and a spreadsheet. Linux is an ideal client for that!

    1. It doesn't catch all of the M$ viruses out there.

    2. If it does catch a virus it will only blow away the user's account and not the whole computer.

    3. User email accounts can be time limited to only send x messages per minute. This will further retard the proliferation of nasty email attached worms. (IP_TABLES LIMIT)

    4. Software that is installed in a user's account runs with limited priviledges and is not going to muck up anything outside of the user's account. (It is also out of the reach of other users)

    5. The installation and applications can be custom tailored to an organization so that there is no super-corporation dictating that ALL computers will have Winblows Media Slayer installed.

    6. Trivial little things, like having the default search page be an internal corporate server, can be setup in a CD image so that everything is the way the corporation doing the deploying wants it and not the way some license agreement with Redmond mandates.

    7. Documents will automatically be protected from other users by being protected in seperate home directories.

    8. Usage of company computers would be limited to those people that have accounts on the computers.

    9. ... etc. etc. etc.

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  5. Re:Working group representing a consortium of vend by pubjames · · Score: 5, Insightful

    We all know how good committees are at deciding things. Compromise usually leads to the lowest common denominator. Do we really want a Linux desktop that's designed by a committee? Isn't that against the whole spirit of free software?

    We are talking about industry standards. Outside of the software industry, they work very well. The software industry is still in it's immature stages - like the engineering industry was before there were standard sizes for nuts and bolts - manufacturers actually deliberately made their nuts and bolts incompatible because it gave them lock-in, just as the software industry does now. Incompatible nuts and bolts seems crazy now, closed/incompatible file formats will seem crazy in the future.

  6. IBM - already doing it by GomezAdams · · Score: 5, Informative

    We're already moving all of our internal desktop users to Linux over the next two years. There will still be dual boot for those that need it but most corporate desktop users not needing another operatng system will run pure Linux for the daily chores of email and document exchange. All my product support work is done in Java, PERL, and scripting so I can be 100% Linux for all my activities now. The default window manager will be Gnome but you can use others as your taste dictates. Most interprise applications have already been ported and the rest will be. The elephant is not only dancing but leading the parade.

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  7. Re:Working group representing a consortium of vend by kfg · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Yes, the engineering world has discovered that it's far more profitable to standardize bolts but proliferate drive types.

    The consumer never feels they're locked in, but has to buy mulitple sets of tools, if only to remove the patented head bolt and replace it with a standard one. Very profitable for the patent holder.

    The software industry seems to be learning this trick.

    Witness XML, a standard for creating standards. You can claim XML compliance and yet extend it in propriatary ways. It is plain text, but the file sizes are truly gargantuan, so you need to compress them, for which you can use your own propriatary compression method. Certain outfits are now even starting to create propriatary XML parsers.

    The bolts are all standard, but you still have to buy the tool.

    There's one essential difference between file formats and bolt design though. Bolts aren't given extraordinary protection by the DMCA.

    KFG