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Linux Can't Kill Windows
nberardi writes "Infoworld is running an article in which the author claims 'Linux is established and has a niche that, as various pendulums swing, will grow and shrink. Show me charts and stats and benchmarks that prove Linux superior to Windows in every measure and I'll not argue with you. But no matter how much money and dedication is poured into Linux, it will never put a dent in Windows' mind share or market share because Linux is an operating system, a way -- and probably the best way -- to make system hardware do what it's told. But you can't turn Linux into a platform even if you brand it, box it, and put a pricey sticker on it.'"
In the sense that GNU/Linux is not a platform.
-if at first you don't succeed, stay the heck away from paragliding.
Let's start with the unsensational headline of "Linux Can't Kill Windows", follow through the article to no rational arguments as to why this is, and ending with a "Stay tuned; I'll tell you all about it."
Seems like a well-thought out article that certainly wasn't created for the purpose of increasing impressions or generating clicks to advertisers on the site.
I'm a big tall mofo.
I didn't read the article.
But history has shown that the short term impact of most new things tend to be over-estimated, whereas the long term impact tends to be under-estimated.
Who knows where Linux will be in 20 years? I sure as hell don't, but I have a rather optimistic view.
.: Max Romantschuk
It's the mindset of most people that keep them from using Linux. They've been using DOS and Windows for YEARS, and they're so familar with how things are, that changing that even slightly is very confusing for most people. If Linux had been in Windows place, and had 90% of the market, people would LOVE Linux and HATE Windows. Simple as that.
For example, my dad is a Windows person, and his SO has a Mac with OS X. He can't seem to understand how OS X works, so he dissmisses it and claims that Windows is better (on the fact that he knows how to use Windows).
It's not that Windows is "special", it's just that that's all most people know. And half those people don't know much, if anything, about Windows anyway, so it's no wonder Linux has a difficult time trying to enter the mainstream market.
This is just sensationalism. If you look at for example the server market, or the governments sector, linux is already beating up windows.
My long term projection would be, that Linux will push Windows into a third of the market, something like 1/3 linux, 1/3 windows and 1/3 else.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
Will the /. editors stop posting flamebait articles?
Simon.
"But you can't turn Linux into a platform even if you brand it, box it, and put a pricey sticker on it."
What does branding it, boxing it and putting on a price tag, have to do with a tool doing a job?
what
Very poor indeed.
Last week I gave a class about Linux to 4 people who haven't used it yet. They were blown away because they didn't realize it had a desktop and all the fancy programs that Windows has. I think what really is hurting Linux is just myth. That myth is that Linux is just a text interface for servers or something like that.
A way to fight network effect is to have platform independent applications.
The web is a first step.
XUL and other technologies like thsi is one step is the right direction.
Open and RF standards are also a key in this process.
What kinda trollish article is that?
Linux is a very broad platform - in fact, if you looked at Windows, what's common between Windows 3.1, 95/98, ME and XP?
Hell, most programs can't even inter-operate. How the hell is this different from the variety in Linux?
Linux is a VERY broad platform and that will be the reason why it WILL become THE platform, not just A platform.
-2, Troll, Flamebait.
Mod me insightful..
Linux Can't Kill Windows
One fundamental difference guarantees that Windows will continue to dominate
By Tom Yager
April 13, 2005
You can quit proclaiming Linux the Windows killer.
ADVERTISEMENT
Linux is established and has a niche that, as various pendulums swing, will grow and shrink. Show me charts and stats and benchmarks that prove Linux superior to Windows in every measure and I'll not argue with you. But no matter how much money and dedication is poured into Linux, it will never put a dent in Windows' mind share or market share because Linux is an operating system, a way -- and probably the best way -- to make system hardware do what it's told. But you can't turn Linux into a platform even if you brand it, box it, and put a pricey sticker on it.
Businesses and organizations of all sizes need consistent, predictable, scalable, self-contained platforms for server solutions. Windows wins. Linux doesn't lose, because it can continue the legacy of another nonplatform, namely Unix, that needs to be refreshed and extended.
The practical need to keep Unix around isn't rooted in nostalgia or misguided conviction. There may be times when you're convinced that the solution you need doesn't exist as a whole. The total solutions that exist might be too confining or expensive, or -- as is sometimes the showstopper for me -- simply closed. Open source Unix, in which category I place Linux, BSD, and Darwin (the OS layer of Apple's OS X), is a 500,000-piece bag of Legos that comes with some drawings and a few models you can use, build on, or tap into as references for your own creations. On paper, an OS is an ideal place to start building, because you get to choose everything that sits above it and presumably you know just what belongs in each of those gaps between your hardware and your application. You see, while developers can write to an operating system's default API, they'll spend most of their time encapsulating and abstracting low-level system calls to create what is, in effect, an application platform.
No one is so foolish as to make what can be acquired cheaply or free; it's wiser to pick one from among hundreds of platforms and modules that fill in the holes between open source Unix and your applications.
In contrast, Windows fills in all the blocks between the hardware and your apps. It does it in ways that you can't alter, but which you can use in different ways. You can code with the tools of your choice and in the programming language of your choice, and unless you stray too far from the rule book, everything you create will interoperate with everything others write for Windows. An operating system is a rack into which device drivers and APIs are inserted. A platform is a rack into which applications are inserted.
Linux and Windows don't compete. Sun Microsystems (Profile, Products, Articles) sees this as an opportunity and has struggled mightily to position the combination of Solaris and Java as a platform. It almost makes it. I'd choose J2EE and Solaris over Linux for nonuser-facing server applications in shops that have expert administrators. But, similar to Linux and other flavors of Unix, Solaris is a nonstarter on clients, and that's enough to hurt its capability of competing with Windows. There is only one platform that can stand toe-to-toe with Windows, and that's the combination of OS X and Java.
Stay tuned; I'll tell you all about it.
Linux isn't really about killing Windows off.. whoever thought that the primary idea behind Linux when it was created was to make MS go bankrupt and for no one in the world to ever use Windows is a bit dilusional. Linux is an alternative. It's a choice. The same thing could be said in reverse: Windows Can't Kill Linux.
There's too many people who are interested with tinkering.. with having something being totally customizable if they take their time. With being free and able to run their computer the way they want. Is this the majority of people? Not even close! But it's enough that Linux will sustain itself in spite of any FUD MS and crew would throw at it.
Who cares if Linux never overtakes Windows? I know before I discovered it in '98, I thought I was doomed to the endless update/virus/adware world that everyone else was in (except those crazy mac people.. which now due to the mac mini I am one as well.. side tracking....)
Anyway, the point being.. Linux is strong due to it's following, and has great potential to do quite a few things Windows has troubles with. The choice is there for anyone to pick up that option if they so choose. What's the big deal?
From the article:
Businesses and organizations of all sizes need consistent, predictable, scalable, self-contained platforms for server solutions.
I thought Windows was winning on the desktop? Isn't that what we're always hearing?
Linux and Windows don't compete.
Ok, so the whole "Get The Facts" campaign was done just for grins?
Open source Unix, in which category I place Linux, BSD, and Darwin (the OS layer of Apple's OS X), is a 500,000-piece bag of Legos that comes with some drawings and a few models you can use, build on, or tap into as references for your own creations.
Also wrong. There are distros that are like that, but there are distros that aren't. Linux offers choice, and not just the "bag of Legos" kind.
And, just in case the article author reads this...ever hear of Wine? As soon as Wine gets DCOM working correctly and Installshield working right, it won't matter to Joe User if the OS is Linux or Windows, just so long as he can install TurboTax and Doom3. Check back in a few years, and we'll see if you're singing a different tune.
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
Linux has a geekey feeling to it. Probably, Joe sixpack will never have means to replace his PC with a Dell packaged linux, either due to his lack of geek-ness, or due to penetration of windows in his (and everybody else's) mind (unknowinlgy).
Its upto Windows now to kill itself - by exposing itself to hacks, viruses, trojans. If the situation reaches to a point where windows is *completely* f*cked-up, then may be linux will see more and more interest - being the only cheap alternate to ship somehting to Joe.
Linux cannot make a dent??? I'd say it already has, else why is M$ running "Get the facts"?
That said, there is an important point here: Linux probably won't "kill" windows, it will be RedHat, or Mandrake, or Debian, or even Linspire :/
Linux at it's heart is nothing more than a Kernel, it's a GNU/Linux distro that people ultimatly install (mostly anyway).
Linux as a brand cannot compete with Windows, because Linux is not a brand, not a product. There is not even a single definition of what "Linux" is, except a bunch of software running on top of a specific kernel.
Even the concept of "competition" is a straw man.
Linux represents a total, brutal, and unstoppable commoditization of technology that follows the same rules which drive "Moore's Law". When you remove the costs of improving a technology, its marginal cost will fall to zero as people compete to be the key suppliers.
Software is basically becoming free, and this is what will kill Windows, whether or not it's something called "Linux" that takes over.
Most likely, "Linux" will never become more than a niche OS, excellent for servers but rare for desktops. But what it represents - unlimited and perfect software at no cost - will, inevitably, rule the desktop as it will rule every single computing platform, for the simple reason that no amount of lock-in or marketing is going to get people to keep paying more than the going rate for a commodity.
Apple's strategy - where the OS and a bunch of software is basically thrown in for free - is the trend of the future.
I hate to say it, because I truly love using Microsoft's well-engineered products, but between the commoditization of their core markets and the parasites eating their way in from the internets, they are dead, Linux or no Linux.
Sig for sale or rent. One previous user. Inquire within.
His first sentence is right on the money - "Linux is established and has a niche". So the question is - what is holding it back? And here, he misses the bleeding obvious - every single one of his points (from TFA - the reasons to keep unix or windows around, the cost analysis, etc) is flatly wrong or misses the mark. The answer is, I think, obvious --- Linux is the OS designed by geeks, for geeks. It's the classic example of overengineering the wheel. The problem is, I have yet to see an interface for *nix that does as good as job as windows does of 'packing everything under the hood' and making an operating system that (as a friend of mine, the chief sysadmin for Connectiv would say) "protects users from their own stupidity". When someone can come up with an interface that is as intuitive and user-friendly as windows, then (and only then) can linux hope to compete in the desktop market.
To make laws that man cannot, and will not obey, serves to bring all law into contempt.
--E.C. Stanton
Platform is the new brand buzzword. Windows is a Platform. Anything that does not have rock-firm foundations is a platform - ie what used to be called middleware before. By that standard, the GNU utilities are a platform, Linux is not.
This is not a signature.
I regularly use three platforms; Windows, Linux (Fedora) and OSX. Conclusion? I cringe at having to use Windows. I find that once you learn UNIX it is faster to get anything done. Albeit you have to learn UNIX.
Now having said that, what I see more off are peacock articles. All fluff and very little facts because the three operating systems are TOO similar. Compare it to cars. These days all of the cars are good enough! They will last four years without too many problems. So then how do you distinguish yourself? Write articles like a peacock struts its feathers, all emotional.
The easiest way to illustrate this peacock argument is to take a bushman from the jungle and get them to figure out what a computer does. Without helping them. My guess is that the bushman will have a hard time figuring out what the mouse is for. Most likely they will use the mouse as a slingshot and head back into the jungle. I am not saying that bushmen are dumb. I am saying that computers require some upfront learning time regardless of the OS used.
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
I watched windows kill itself on my buddy's laptop twice tonight.
Note to self: No more arguing with the faithful.
Step 1. Run Bochs or VMWare.
Step 2. Install Windows on [Bochs|VMWare] environment.
Step 3. Run it.
Step 4. kill -9 `ps ax | grep [bochs|vmware]
Step 5. Sing "tadaaaa".
Step 6. Skip the question marks and profit.
He believes Linux isn't a "whole platform", and I can see where he gets that idea-- Linux isn't very unified (Do have KDE or Gnome? [0]) and anyone who hasn't dealt with a modern package manglement system has dealt with Dependency Hell.
So let's imagine some company, we'll call them Red Hat, to pull a bogus name out of thin air, and let's say they were to take this Linux thing, and make a nice standardized platform out of it. People ship you an application, you take your server, we'll call it a "Red Hat Enterprise Server" or something like that, and you can simply load the app on it and run it. They wouldn't say their app runs on Linux. They'd say their app runs on Red Hat.
To him, _that_ would be a platform, and that would have a chance at taking on Windows. It would be Linux behind the scenes, but it's more that just Linux.
Too bad nobody's ever going to do something like that.
-JDF
[0] Thankfully, even if you generally only see one of these, you can still have the other behind the scenes and run stuff intended for either...
To most end users, a consistent look and feel, that works right out of the box, is really important. So it's a very good thing that Linux distributions are improving in this area (which the article conveniently forgets to mention).
For the same reason, I also think it's good to see Open Source applications adopting user interfaces that are more similar to their Windows counterparts. It may annoy some old-time Unix or Linux users to find "Options" under "Tools" rather than under "Edit" in the Firefox browser.
But for Windows users that are looking for a safer alternative to their present browser, the chance that they'll make the switch increases with every item that works as expected when they first try it out.
And it's only by convincing today's Windows users to switch, that Linux can avoid the fate that the article spells out.
Christian Engström, Former Member of the European Parliament 2009-2014 for The Pirate Party, Sweden
Linux Can't Kill Windows
I see someone didn't try to dual boot Fedora Core 2
Snowden and Manning are heroes.
Yes, precisely. As 'easy' as apt and rpm are, installing things in Linux is still a mystery for many people. The idea of "there is no C:\ drive, Neo," usually brings out the glossed-over eyes as their mind crashes and displays the native blue screen of d3th.
Many Windows dependents are so jacked in that permissions and the file hierarchy of *nix are more than they will ever understand about computers. (people are still on the fence about switching to Firefox!)
But I like it that way! It keeps us enthusiasts shrowded in mystery. And what Americans (wait, I mean people in general) don't understand, they fear. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, he's only writing a shell script.
Who's your user, program?
For pity's sake - this 'article' has also been plugged on OSNews. Users there have sensibly concluded that this thing is either straight FUD or a complete troll.
The writer uses no statistics, data or representative sampling. He cannot point to a single concrete example of his central thesis. He seems incapable of understanding the developmental changes which have enabled Linux in the past few years to 'fill the gap' between a user's desire and results. In short, the article bearly passes muster as opinion piece, never mind journalism. Many would say that all of the above marks it as a Troll, with timeshare rights under the FUD-Bridge.
Dupes are bad enough, misleading headlines are even worse. Putting this type of troll-crud onto the front page is a serious dereliction of editorial control by /.
Show me charts and stats and benchmarks that prove Windows superior to Linux in every measure and I'll agree with you.
/. readers, the rest of the world) will not. For my Windows machines I can drive ten minutes down the road and find almost anything I could possibly need (including compilers). This is why Linux may never displace Windows.
I do not believe that proving that Windows is superior to Linux is the issue. As the result of marketing, timing, and a possible deal with Satan, Windows has 90+% of the market and people, like energy, tend to take the path of least resistance. Until you can walk into your local consumer electronics store and find shelves of Linux software and computers with Linux pre-installed people will continue to use Windows.
As a user of OS X I make the special effort to locate stores that sell software and peripherals for my Macs, and usually have to travel about 45 minutes to get there. Most people (not
What someone needs to do is produce a bunch of those $5-$10 CDs in the software section containing Ubuntu, Knoppix or any of the other live versions containing OpenOffice or something similar and a bunch of other stuff ready to go from the disc. Then someone needs to create some more of the $5-$10 CDs with a bunch of Linux software that can't fit on the live CDs so the general public can try it without risk (minimal financial, no risk of destroying their computer) and make up their minds. Keep in mind that most people stick with Windows because it came with the computer and they could not install most versions of Linux themselves and, even if the install is bullet-proof, they would not believe that they could install an OS. It has to be made as easy as possible or they will not even try.
--Kolisar
or to have a good alternative? The author misses the point. Those of us who choose to, don't have to be forced to use Windows. And that's the point.
Except for ending slavery, the Nazis, communism, & securing American independence, war has never solved anything.
Is the real goal to come out with a great OS? Or is it to kill Microsoft?
Ever heard that BSD is for geeks that love Unix, while Linux is for geeks that hate Microsoft?
Pedro
----
The Insomniac Coder
To some extent he has a point, though it was never the intent of Linux (if one can name it as an entity) to 'Kill' Windows. Linux's performance offerings are known and overtly apparent to the computer consuming world, but the "Windows came with the PC" | "I don't like changes" renders adopting Linux as difficult as a name change for many; even when a distribution like Mepis proves that installing Linux is several degrees easier than Windows itself.
Regardless, performance enhancements pull few punters other than power-users and those responsible for large mission critical deployments. The curious are simply an exception (myself included). This of course is statistically proven to be changing, but will happen most largely at the enterprise level, where people just simply find themselves working with Linux one day, and perhaps even decide they like it enough for home use.
Perhaps another thing worth mentioning, on the level of branding is the Repitition-Produces-Comfort factor - people see WinXP at the boot promp and thus can project their workflow as a continuation of work done on another machine. I see that alot here at the university, which has both Fedora and XP on all machines. With Linux comes a strange kind of noise, for many; a class of noise called 'Choice'. Linux, as a self-defying entity (in the public imagination) cannot be summarised in the mind.
Linux has a poor image precisely because it doesn't have one.
It also needs to be said that Linux is fairly young, and so attempts at branding are even younger. Perhaps the weight of Novell can change that with a little constructive meme production. I disagree however OSX will have any real foothold, sitting at about 2.9% in desktop share it's as 'niche', or even more niche than that of Linux. OSX has a thick glass ceiling that Linux doesn't have, a brutal dependency: OSX requires not only a certain build, but a certain vendor of hardware. There is a reason we aren't seeing an uptake of OSX in offices and enterprise operations. This is one area Linux is making great headway.
What will pull people over to Linux are Linux exclusive third party applications that lead people by the nose of their own creative and productive ambitions. And yes, I wouldn't discredit the possibility that proprietary apps could seed the swell of change in this regard. Imagine what a Final Cut Pro or powerful multi-track hard disk recorder (perhaps ) could do for the adoption of Linux in Universities for instance. It certainly worked for Linux in Hollywood. Naturally this requires alot of development capital ultimately justified against an isolated, and quantifiable target market. Linux users as it stands are certainly far from that. Chickens and eggs perhaps.
Linux does not exist to compete with Microsoft Windows . Repeat that to yourself 10 times over please.
Many vendors who package Linux in various flavors are attempting to gain a larger userbase by making their version of the Linux operating system packaged with their components work better for end-users, but Linux was not created to supplant Microsoft Windows.
I would venture to guess that a good 80% (a rectal approximation) of Linux developers and many users don't care how many Microsoft Windows machines Linux can replace. That's not the point. The point is to provide a Unix-like operating system for inexpensive hardware. It just so happens that Linux runs on something like 32 architectures, from embedded targets to PDA to 128-way (or more) CPU machines.
Can Microsoft Windows run hardware in a 2-meg footprint? Linux can (and does, happily).
Linux has already beaten Microsoft Windows if that is the metric that we're measuring it by.
If you're measuring "sales" of Linux vs. sales of Microsoft Windows, of course Linux will not compare, because more people download Linux (and burn copies to give to dozens of their friends or hand out at LUGs) than those that purchase it in a boxed-copy with a printed manual.
Linux will succeed, and already has far surpassed Windows in hardware, driver, and application numbers. Linux supports more chipsets, more peripherals, and more applications than Microsoft Windows itself. Sure, many of the applications aren't "pretty" or polished, but put a million dollars behind each project, and you'll see some major improvements.
Does Microsoft Windows support that 10 year old video card in Windows 2003? Linux does.
Since most developers aren't getting paid or funded (or supported by the vendor) for their applications, it evolves at the speed of their free time and motivation to improve it. "Pretty" interfaces are the last thing on a developer's mind. Fixing the last bug or adding the next feature are much more important than a graphical installer and a pretty icon.
So we've already won, despite how the media likes to contort the matter.
Oooh- and then we can get mad at the OS and make them remove all of those components.
But realistically, that's what Linux is. A base install of RedHat will give you everything from graphics libraries, to video codecs, to a word processor, to a spreadsheet.
As with windows, for better versions (OpenOffice, etc) you start buying/downloading.
How is Windows better? If anything Linux has more applications put there by the vendor
-M
when you see the word 'Linux', drink!
No, the problem is that you aren't being sufficiently proactive in shifting your paradigm to thinking outside the box like the author clearly has. What does scalability mean? I don't know, but I saw an IBM commercial about it during the Super Bowl, so I figure that qualifies me to write an article about it.
You know, I honestly don't care if this is true or not. So what if Linux can't kill Windows? Windows can't kill Linux, that I'm positive of. And that's really all I care about. Sure it'd be nice if enough people abandoned Windows in favor of Linux to "kill" Windows, but whether that happens or not, I can still use Linux to my hearts content. If other people continue to use & support Microsoft, that's up to them, and while it will have some effect on me, I doubt it will be a significant enough effect for me to really care.
Join moola.com, play games to earn money.
1991 : Linux? A plaything for college students. It'll never work like *real* Unix.
1996 : Linux? So it makes a simple web server. It'll never scale as an enterprise server.
2001 : Linux? Yeah, it's nice for my enterprise servers, but it'll never give end-users any satisfaction.
2005 : Linux? So hackers have pretty desktop. Didja see the effort they had to go to make it work? It'll never be easy enough for our secretary Jane Typist.
Nope, Linux will never compete. Not even that Novell Linux Desktop that has proliferated our workplace and made every desktop look the same (but secure). It'll never happen.
H0ek
Think you're smart? Prove you've got brains!
I think what's needed is a good bridge between the two operating systems. You can get people to walk over to the dark side (mouahahaha) without giving them a bridge. The bridge between Windows and Linux is cross-platform apps, like Firefox and OpenOffice. Get everyone using these apps, and then point out to them that "hey, you could actually use the exact same apps on linux, why are you paying for windows?"
.. like... ONE person using OpenOffice. Since everything's working fine they have no need to switch OS, but if their Windows installations ever got totally bunged, I might suggest Linux.. and since they're already using these apps, I think they might be more open to it. Of course, they're using Firefox now so spyware isn't much of a problem for them... so the chances of them needed to switch OS is down about 90%... ah the irony..
You have to take things one step at a time. First the apps, then the operating system. Change everything at once and it won't work.
I've gotten a couple of people using Firefox, and
This is certainly true. However, we must also look at the fact that in any market, it's rarely the best (whatever we define that to mean) product that ends up the most dominant. Just look at motor vehicles, food, music and entertainment for examples. In some cases there is a price issue to look at, in others not.
Microsoft have designed a system that the mass market is comfortable with (whether those of us use other systems like it or not). People are now starting to see that there are alternatives, whether from the Open Sector or from places like Apple. Their behaviour may change over time, but if any change happens it will not do so overnight.
Windows is the white sliced bread of computing: adequate but not wonderful; filling but not necessarily the most nutritious of choices. We also have to accept that in some cases, that is all people want. I think that is perhaps what the orignal author's thrust was, judging by the article, even though he could have been a little less peevish in saying so.
PS: I'm a heavy user of XP, Mac OS X and Fedora
It's not you: I'm just this horrifically socially awkward with everybody.
At first I thought it was some guy who just wanted to spread some FUD about Linux but check out the last paragraph:
Linux and Windows don't compete. Sun Microsystems sees this as an opportunity and has struggled mightily to position the combination of Solaris and Java as a platform. It almost makes it. I'd choose J2EE and Solaris over Linux for nonuser-facing server applications in shops that have expert administrators. But, similar to Linux and other flavors of Unix, Solaris is a nonstarter on clients, and that's enough to hurt its capability of competing with Windows. There is only one platform that can stand toe-to-toe with Windows, and that's the combination of OS X and Java.
Now this guy is making sense.
Carpe Diem: Seize The Day!
It's like combat: the force with the superior size and resources is going to be unbeatable until they make a major tactical or technical mistake. Use the Iraqi War if you want an analogy: the US is cleaning shop, and it's because of superior technology, tactics, and sheer size (of the establishment, not the deployment). Training, too: Windows (say, all the futuristic military tech) is damn easy to set up and install, and everyone knows how to use it, so anyone can use it. Linux, on the other hand (say, a trial-and-error mortar system) is difficult to use for someone unfamiliar with it than Windows is, and it's not always as straightforward to get a system up and running.
The Vietnam War would be a good example of how the superior force (size and resources) can still lose. Shitty M-16 rifles, poor coordination, and the disadvantage of not being on home ground (ie, the other side had "home team" advantage) all made things difficult for them. If Linux were to get a wide corporate install base, I think things would slowly start to get away from Microsoft.
Also, I think RedHat (the company) is a big problem for Linux adoption. Their support is pretty bad, and they tend to still have a very "non-corporate" software attitude. Bug in your kernel? "Here, try this beta kernel." It's not a very corporate-friendly attitude, in my opinion. Are there any other good corporate options out there? No, not really, unfortunately.
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
10 years ago IT was only beginning to look at Windows and did not seriously thought of Windows for most of their server infrastructure.
Now people say the same thing but about Linux.
Why did Microsoft succeeded ?
1/ network integration with personnal computers
2/ marketing
3/ ease of use
4/ price compared to Unix systems
5/ drivers & software
Points 1 and 2 are Linux weakness.
Point 3 had a lot of improvements.
Point 4 : Linux is at advantage (until you dont buy Red Hat Server that costs more than W2003 SRV).
Point 5 is improving for linux.
Some experiment in our corp. We wanted to use Linux to host antivirus repositories & Windows Update Service & hardware+software inventory tools. None of the tools we selected work with Linux. Therefore we have to pay a W2003 for each box... hardware : 1300 euros, system : 700 euros, software : free or licenced per user. We plan to have tens of such computers.
The lack of software compatible with Linux costs a lot of money. And slows down the propagation of Linux.
The world belongs to those who get up early. - I'm far from being the king of Earth then
The big reasons beta lost were shorter play/recording time and the fact that manufacturers had to pay licensing fees to Sony to use it. VHS was the free and open standard that won. Also, as the above poster pointed out, beta came first.
I understand the point you're trying to make, but the analogy was the wrong choice.
I think you're on the right track here, but look forward a little further. Where has Linux been? It's been a hobby OS with a single programmer, then a complicated but efficient hobbyist server with hundreds of developers, then a reasonably solid but still overly complicated server and desktop OS with thousands of developers, now an enterprise-class OS with big corporate development and support and millions of other developers. It's evolving, and at a much faster pace than Windows. The community has to play catch up for a while just to get to the same level as the marketing folks in Redmond and to be able to say to the world "Hey look at us, the transition is easy and we're getting better all the time." We're still in catch-up mode, but we're not far behind, and the momentum is still building steadily. Once we get to that point, the innovation will continue because critical mass has been reached, and then you'll see things heading in the direction you're hoping to see. Interfaces will be improved, services will evolve, and Linux will hit its heyday. Don't give up! Join the fight. The best is yet to come. Seventy or eighty years ago, the author of this article would probably have said something like "There will never be a need for more than 11 computers in the world." His statement is inflammatory because it makes people click on the link and increases advertising dollars. Don't equate fame with insightfulness or intelligence because you won't find either from that guy.
to quote "it will never put a dent in Windows' mind share or market share"
Hasnt linux already largly DENTED windows mind and market share, how many governments moved to open source and nix from windows systems, those XX,000 Systems dont count as market share?
Linux wont ever replace windows but, your a fool to think windows will remain uneffected.
Linux is the manifestation of Ayn Rand's 'rebellion of the intellect' projected in Atlas Shrugged. Computer professionals were constantly being knocked back to square one whenever management decided to change the company IT structure. Since the early 1950's it was normal to expect programmers to master a dozen languages and systems, all theoretically similar but with arbitrarily different structures. It was the modern equivalent of the Greek myth of Sisyphus, who was condemned to push a boulder to the top of a hill, only to have it roll down again, forever.
Linux changed that. Computer professionals are telling management that they will work with one standard OS. Their OS. Designing and building it themselves and distributing it freely is a brilliant strategy to counter management's claim that some other OS was cheaper.
All this happened concurrently with the widespread introduction of powerful inexpensive desktop computers into the workspace. Office computing adopted the Windows OS in order to maximize the productivity gains that could only be achieved by having the entire world adopt a single standard. An incredible stroke of luck for the company selling that standard. The price went to the company that was the most relentless and focused on forcing the world to adopt their standard. That company was also flexible and intelligent enough to integrate huge positive feedback loops into the process of getting the world to adopt its product. The astonishing success of the company in selling a product that the world was desperate to buy doesnt mean that they can do it again with another type of product.
The widespread introduction of powerful inexpensive desktop computers was predicated on the condition that the performance/price ratio of the PCs would double every few years.
The current problems that result from the conversion of all other Operating Systems to Linux are temporary. They are being addressed; they will be solved. The widespread introduction of powerful inexpensive desktop computers was predicated on the condition that the performance/price ratio of the PCs would double every few years. The entire next generation of desktop computers may find their doubling of power completely dedicated to transition from Windows to Linux. In other words, it may take a doubling of computer power to make Windows applications run on Linux with the same speed and efficiency that they currently run on Windows OS. This will be denounced as a complete waste by IT professionals. Theyre correct, but it will be a necessary step anyway.
I typed the above message into Microsoft Word 2000 in order to use the integrated spelling checker.
When I cut and pasted the text from Word to the Slashdot message text box, none of the apostrophes transferred correctly. All the "don't" and "won't" became "dont" and "wont".
Any operating system that makes its users look illiterate is doomed. It's just a matter of time.
You have particular, personal requirements for which this level of choice is useful. However, for the proverbial Vast Majority of users (i.e., all those people who simply want to get out from in front of the monitor as quickly as possible while devoting the minimal amount of brainpower to the appliance they have to use), all of that gets in the way.
Put it another way: it is not an upgrade to ask users to make choices among things about which they should not have to care at all.
Save Maine's economy: write stuff down. All comments are exclusively my own, not my employer.
Not to mention the large number of corporate desktops that have been switched to Linux.
I think too many people only look at what OS people buy with their Dell or Best Buy computers, and assume that's the way all computer are.
look around you when you are at work. Count how many people have even the most basic computer hardware knowledge. Then count how many have the free time to spend to reinstall a whole operating system and update all of the patches.
Here is where you make your most important point and the one that the Linux community fails to grasp.
97% of the world's users do not have the comprehension required to do a
emerge
make buildworld
apt-get update
etc
and deal with broken dependencies, etc that inevitably happen.
OTOH, OS X System Update works flawlessly. And Apple doesn't put barriers to updating your machine with incessant checks on your serial/cdkey/license/etc. MSFT should realize that it's in their best interest to patch ALL Windows installations and not just legally licenced ones.
If this was true, a majority of computer users would ALREADY be using Linux, since for the individual home user, it's free. You might argue that most people get Windows "free", because it's pre-installed. But in fact, it's already possible to buy computers (at least from your local white box outfit) that have Linux or no operating system installed. Without the MS tax, they go for significantly less money than those with XP pre-installed... but most people don't buy them.
People will take the path of least resistance, even if it costs them money.
I have no problem with the rest of your post.
Sean
Linus creates a kernel, nothing more. Package management is the responsibility of the distro.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
It has killed the main thing that made Windows immortal. It destroyed the perception widely held in the early 90s that everything would eventually move to Windows. As a result, people are willing to consider alternate platforms, and those who take them up are more often than not finding advantages.
I love the work Apple has done with OS X, but without Linux having broken the "Windows everywhere" mindset, OS X wouldn't be getting much attention.
Increasingly, computer experts are seeing a OS monoculture as a bad thing, which is a huge change from the early 90s. And it was Linux that made that possible.
... I'd be a lot more worried about GoogleOS than Linux.
But I'm not Microsoft, so instead I'm looking forward to both GoogleOS and future versions of Linux.
In the course of every project, it will become necessary to shoot the scientists and begin production.
The real killer app for widespread acceptance of desktop Linux would be Microsoft Office (or a 100% work-alike). Openoffice.org and Evolution have come a long way, but they're only (IMHO) about 85% there in terms of replacing MS-Office.
The other thing which would drive acceptance of desktop linux would be the availability of games. If Joe User could walk in to Best Buy and see that all the popular games are available in Windows and Linux versions, he might consider switching. As it is now, even hard-core Linux geeks usually have a Windows partition for gaming.
As an aside, Given the success of live CD distros like Knoppix, I'm suprised that game makers haven't considered releasing their products under a custom bootable Linux distro.
Why is it that the proponents of "one nation under God" are so eager to get rid of "liberty and justice for all"?
I'm sorry, am I the only one who sees the words "never" and "no matter what" in a article about technology trends and just passes it by?
Will someone please tell such authors that to say "never" gives them away as having:
a) no sense of history, tech-related or otherwise
b) no imagination
c) no clue
d) all of the above
Yeah, we'll never need more than 640k either, right? Riiight.
No sig.
Windows has the advantage that there is lots of it. My wife doesn't really like computers but has learnt to use Windows so she can do stuff she wants, e-mail her friends and so on. When she visits her sister she can leverage those same skills to use her sister's computer, since that also runs Windows.
The same situation would be unlikely in a Linux world - if my wife had Ubuntu with Gnome and her sister had SuSE with KDE I just don't think things would work out.
"Don't belong. Never join. Think for yourself. Peace." V.Stone, Microsoft Corporation
What OS do you have running in that nifty engine management system in your car?
What's running on those firmware chips inside that neat little broadband router you just bought?
What's driving that new VoIP PBX system in your office?
Why does an OS that is free to use need to tell you what its name is?
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
"guaranteed to be available on 100% of Windows systems (sic)"
/correctly/. Win 9x and ME are emulated within XP, so parts of their functionality don't work. Also, there must be a reason why the "application compatibility wizard" exists.
1) Win 3.1 is not supported by WinXP.
2) Just because it is available, doesn't mean it will work
Note: Linux does have problems with things working properly, too.
"A set of APIs and an ABI for writing graphical programs"
You got me here, I must say. Linux doesn't have any stable graphical APIs and ABIs.
Oh, wait. I forgot. There are several that run on it though. GNUStep, Qt & KDE Libs, Gtk/2, and (if you are insane) you can even use raw X11. (And the spec for that hasn't changed, and is still supported, for over 15 years).
Now, it is true that there have been several changes within many of the APIs listed above. However, whenever they break binary compatibility, the major release number is changed. And -- get this -- you can run several versions of the same libraries on the same system. And you don't have to go through DLL HELL to locate the right one. Imagine that. So, yeah, the support is there...
I'm not saying that Linux is perfect; I'm not even saying it's better. I am saying that you really should know what you are talking about before speaking.
I think the one thing that's really slowing Linux on the desktop uptake are all the dependency nightmares and package inconsistencies. Yeah, things like yum, apt-get, emerge, et al have made things a lot easier, but they are not perfect. Last night I was trying to apt-get (I hate yum with a passion) proftpd on my FC3 box and no matter what I tried in the config, users could not authenticate - I kept getting "bad password" in the logs. I ended up compiling from source and guess what, it started working. Apparently the binary package had something funky going on with its UNIX auth module.
And then there's this thing that happened yesterday. I'm experimenting with groupware and picked up Conflux. My boss walks in and sees me looking at the demo site they have, and says "that looks cool, install it". It was winding down to the end of the day, and I say "Eh, I'll do it tomorrow", to which he says "You just can't click on the "Install" icon?"
That's when I told him the tale of how I had to get the following operational on the system first: apache2, python, mod_python, postgres, and a smattering of other libraries. Then I had to write the config files to make it all work together. And I've never worked with postgres, so I don't even know how to define users or a database in it yet.
The moral of this story is that installing software on any flavor of Linux is still a royal pain that Joe user won't tolerate. Without a unified base distro and a universal package management system, that will never change.
-R
Many comments so far criticise the article with a technologician's understanding of the words "scalability", "consistency", "predictability", and "self-contained." However, we have to realize that this article is targeted to businesspersons. These words have a different understanding in a business sense. I try to point out the "business meaning" here and reassess Linux on those merits.
If you don't care about businesses using Linux, then what I say here is a waste of time for you, and you can skip the rest.
Scalability does not mean excatly if a computing cluster can scale from a few nodes to a huge number of nodes. But rather, in a more general sense, can I scale the system from one solution to another solution? In particular, if I change my business model, can my solutions scale with me?
This also includes scalability in size as one factor. As the business grows, the solution must also scale in size, therefore the underlying platform must also scale.
The problem with Linux here is that there is a high initial cost of deployment in labor, though justified by the software being free and low maintenance thereafter. However, the high cost of labor in deployment must be paid again whenever a new solution is deployed. So Linux is not scalable for new deployments. The fact that many businesses, especially those migrating from Windows, need a pilot program already says that Linux costs too much.
Windows by itself also has a similar cost of labor for deployment, but asset management solutions exist that lower that cost. (OpenCountry is selling software for Linux asset management though, but don't accuse me of putting a plug here. You did not read this text inside the parentheses.)
Consistency, in the sense that if I learn one thing about an application, then it also applies to another application. People in business do not have time to learn everything over and over. Training only makes sense because supposedly you learn everything you need to know.
The difference in distributions is only one minor factor to inconsistency in Linux. The problem is that user experiences are different for applications like OpenOffice.org, Firefox, GNOME desktop environment, KDE, etc. A trick or two that you learn to do is not "portable" to another application.
There is no hope for consistency if open source developers only care about programming for their own itches. Fortunately, many developers are willing to stick to a certain guideline if it means more people can benefit from the program.
Predictability is the ability to answer for "what if" scenarios. Although systems crash unpredictably, but it has become a general expectation that all systems fail at some point. One must be able to tell "what if that happens?" Who do you turn to in order to get help? For commercial products, including commercialized Linux distributions, you turn to the vendor from whom you bought support. If you reaped a free version of Linux distribution, all you can do is search the web for an answer. It is unpredictable where you get your answers, how much time it takes to get it, or if you'd even get your answers at all.
Self-containedness, if you take that to mean all-in-one packaging, then Linux distributions are much more feature rich than a Windows installation CD. However, it should be taken to mean "what solutions can I buy for $10,000?" You may say "infinite" because "Linux is free." But that also means you can't buy a free Linux solution with money. An ideal business is that you invest in some money, you get profit from it, then you reinvest the money for growth, which earns you more money more quickly. Money is self-contained; Linux is not contained in money.
Again, commercial Linux distributions come close by pulling Linux into the circle of money. Linux vendors should go further to sell prepackaged solution to business. Heck, they should even sell a business model if they know how. Notice that Microsoft actually
I once had a signature.
First: Exactly what things break up when you do anything to your kernel (except binary drivers, but then the problem is binary drivers).
Second: Do you really think that it could do so well in the "server niche" if any modification in the kernel broke things?
Third: What has gui consistency to do with the kernel?
1) This can be solved by holding down the Command Key and M. It's OS X's standard stroke for minimizing.
2) Not sure what you mean by this. Command-Tab shifts apps and Command-` shifts windows. Albeit, the later is more obscure, but it is used consistently. Therefore, on OS X, it is standardized. In addition, you can use Expose to that purpose as well.
3) Sure you can. Open up System Preferences, Keyboard and Mouse, Keyboard Shortcuts Tab and check "Turn on Full Keyboard Access".
4) You can. Just click the arrow to the left of the save dialog. You'll see your hierarchy. It's sort of like "simple" save vs. "advanced" save.
5) Au contraire. In the Finder (first off, set the thing to Column view, if you're really into efficient directory browsing) you can Command Click the window title to see the directory tree leading to your current location. In addition, there's the "back" button, which is more a list of previous directory locations browsed, but if you tunneled in to get to where you are, it'd work as you want. In addition, you can drag any directory from the Finder onto the save dialog and have it instantly jump to that location.
6) There is. It's called "TinkerTool" and it's a free download. However, this one's a valid point. The option should be included as part of the Finder's preferences.
7) Since 1984, the Mac's used Command-C for copy, Command-V for Paste and Command - X for cut. I'd say that's pretty consistent. Apple's really been strict about functional consistency and I think if an app is built against Cocoa, the copy-paste functionality is included by the library, functioning as described. You'd have to name the manners in which you see it as inconsistent, since it's never been a problem for me.
NBC Can't Kill ABC
AMD Can't Kill Intel
The question, of course, is, "so?"
A product doesn't have to kill its competition in order to be successful. In fact, they have a word for that...
If those who are as technically literate as this don't get Linux, how will the "average consumer" ever get it?
Easier than you might think, precicely because the average consumer doesn't have the preconceptions of someone who considers themselves "technically literate" based on a limited world view. It's better to be ignorant and humble than half-smart and prejudiced.