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Windows Interoperability in A Linux Distro
Magenta writes "There is a review of the Desktop OS Version 3 Business Edition from Xandros. This operating system is meant to allow users to easily move from Windows XP to Linux without the problems that can arise. Xandros not only can use Window's file system but it is able to run a great number of Windows programs using its CrossOver Office tool from CodeWeavers. This is one of the most accessible distros to come along in awhile and it marks a big step forward in the progress on Linux on the desktop."
From Crossover's website:
CrossOver Office currently supports more than 30 of the most popular windows productivity applications
Well, that's quite an acheivement but 30 productivity apps isn't "a vast number of Windows programs".
Lets say that it succeeds and you get a few hundred thousand moms and pops pulled over to Linux to run their Windows apps on this distro.
That is a few hundred thousand people who will eventually run into application support issues, driver issues, printing issues etc that they won't be able to turn to friends for help with.
That is a few hundred thousand people who will tell their friends that they tried Linux and it sucked.
The Linux community needs to concentrate on driver support, end user support and encouraging developers to migrate native applications to the platform. Anything else is just inviting failure.
Wow, what a tremendously dumb comment.
/. mods to mod the parent insightful.
So here we have a linux distro that according to the review is very easy to use and on top off that even offers the possibility to run many Windows programs out of the box.
Now what does the average slashbot have to say to that?
But I want to run my Windows(tm) games. As long as my Windows(tm) games don't work on linux, linux isn't for me.
Finally, as if this comment hadn't been dumb enough, he tells us that linux has to become more user-friendly in order to gain more market share, so that more games will be available for linux.
The funny thing is that just before that he told us that linux wouldn't gain any market share even with a userfriendly distribution (remember the review?) that runs many windows programs out of the box, because he couldn't play Everquest on it.
Needless to say that it only took seconds for the famed
Impressive...
I don't get this. Firefox and OpenOffice and the OpenCD and running Apache or MySQL or whatever from Windows are universally considered to be Good Things, because they encourage people to run free applications on an unfree platform, and hook people onto free software from the application end.
However, allowing people to run unfree software on a free platform using Wine or Winex or Crossover Office or whatever is Evil and Wrong and encourages people to forever be trapped by Bill Gates.
How come you guys think that people can only migrate from the applications downwards, rather than from the OS-up?
I'd have thought once you got people to switch the Operating System, your job's mostly done, and getting them to switch applications would be relatively easy - people install and uninstall applications all the time, compared to their OS, after all....
I can't really see what's different between this and major distribution from a commercial entity. I run SUSE 9.3 and it's got everything but crossover office (and Wine is fine for most tasks).
So:
- Four-click install with automatic disk partitioning [SUSE's just about got it]
- Industry-leading hardware detection & configuration [SUSE's got it]
- A single control center for all your settings [SUSE and many distros have got it]
- Shield your files from prying eyes with automatic home folder encryption [ok, it's not automatic in SUSE or most distros, but do you really want your mom and dad to encrypt their files?]
- Acquire images through the USB scanner support [sounds like most distros]
- Support for new nVidia and ATI PCI-Express video cards [sounds like nVidia and ATI]
- Recursively change properties of files in selected sub-directories [Sounds like Konqueror]
- New! Synchronize your system clock with a network time server [Holy shit, computers do this...wow what a novel idea]
- Xandros File Manager [ie konqueror]
- Xandros Disc Burner [ie k3b]
- Full server-accessed Windows networking [ie samba]
- StarOffice 7 with full commercial support [too cool for open office]
- Special Xandros edition of CodeWeavers CrossOver Office 3.0.1 [don't see the major advantages over a well setup version of wine]
- Xandros Networks updates [sounds like most distros]
- Get notified of updates immediately with the Xandros Networks panel applet [sounds like many distros]
- Startup and Trouble-shooting Guide [weee!]
- 380 page User Guide (PDF with download version) [sounds like they cheaped out...SUSE still gives you two solid books in addition to the PDFs].
- Access to a huge inventory of free Linux software [ie the Internet]
- 90 days e-mail installation technical support [ie we don't want you to call and talk to us, oh yeah and screw you that you may have hosed your system when ntfsresize failed and now you can't get online]
The idea that making Linux more compatible with Windows will make it "more ready for the desktop" is just plain wrongheaded. Linux as it stands is more than ready for the desktop. I use Debian on my desktop at home, and have never needed to boot into Windows to get anything done. Neither has my far-from-technophile wife. I actually find Debian to be much more user friendly than Windows and have been able to show several nontechnical people how to use it without problems (once it is set up and installed). Sure, people might miss the ability to play their favorite first-person-shooter, and openoffice.org or the gnome office tools might take a little getting used to for a Windows user, but this is a minor (and passing) inconvenience. The general feeling I get that making Linux act like Windows will make it ready for the desktop just makes me scratch my head in wonder. Are you all idiots? Linux is better than Windows. That's the whole point. Why try to make it act like an inferior system? Why even bother switching to Linux at all if you're just going to turn it into a poorly behaving Windows wannabe?
You've hit the problem right on the head! The users have come to expect (in the Windows world) that everything they buy that "fits" in their PC, will "work" in their PC, at the highest level of performance and optimization.
They've grown comfortable in their propritary softwareship. The problem here is that these same vendors are PROHIBITED (by contract in many cases) from opening up their APIs to non-Microsoft partners if they wish to continue to use the "Certified for Windows" stamp of approval on their hardware.
Do you go out to Sears, buy tires that "look like they'll fit", and then complain when you bring them home to find they don't fit on your Mini-Cooper? No, you find out what kind of hardware your Cooper takes, you bring those specs to Sears and you ask them which tires meet those specifications.
In Linux, since vendors refuse to support the hardware or software through proper drivers (ATI, NVidia, 3Com, etc.), you find out (via the Linux HCL) which hardware is supported by which vendors, and you support THOSE vendors with your wallet.
But I stand by my statements. None of this is a Linux problem. There is more than enough code, talent and time in the Free Software community to write perfected drivers for every single piece of hardware out there that fits in a computer (embedded, PC, workstation, server and mainframe). The problem is that the vendors don't provide docs or APIs, or the ones they DO provide are incorrect, false or just plain wrong.
Trust me, I've been on this side of the fence, working for a Linux company that 3Com approached to ask us to write drivers for their WinModem in Linux, because IBM insisted they "fix it" for their Thinkpad line of laptops (this was back in 2000/2001). 3Com assumed we could just write 100% compatible drivers in a WEEKEND and have a fully-debugged, functional equivalent of their Win32 WinModem driver shipped to them by Monday. No docs from them, no APIs, nothing more than a binary copy of their Win32 WinModem driver.
We insisted they give us docs or APIs or something, and what they gave us... and you'll love this (I still have a copy in my email archives), was a slightly-blurry digital picture of a whiteboard, where their engineers described how they "thought" the Linux version of their WinModem driver would work.
Needless to say, we laughed at them and told them to find someone else. They never did.
So the problem is NEVER on the Linux side when it comes to hardware not functioning properly.
Actually, the answer is yes there.
I have a Brother HL 1020 laser printer, which strictly speaking is a Windows printer. Xandros identified it and set it up correctly right during the installation.
Let's just say I really like this distro. I chose it very carefully, and I have yet to have an issue with it.
Robert B. Marks
Author, Demonsbane in Diablo Archive
>Actually this is universally considered to be a Bad >Thing, if you speak to anyone who writes, maintains,
>hosts or supports Open Source or Free Software.
Gee...is that why there's a Windows version of Firefox?
>Why should we continue
>to spoonfeed them when there
>is no benefit coming back our way?
>They aren't supporting our community,
>they aren't supporting our
>development, they aren't supporting
>anything we do,
Fanaticism's fun, isn't it kids? I can really visualise the foam issuing forth from the mouth of this particular commenter. Of course, in their autonomic fanaticism, it never occurs to such enlightened thinkers as this one that perhaps when using OSS applications in Windows, it might cause at least some users to become curious about these apps' native OS. This also genuinely does happen...Newbies visit the Linux From Scratch IRC server all the time.
I actually can't think of a better way than something like Cygwin for gradually familiarising a windows user with a command line. It's the perfect wading pool scenario...they can get their feet wet to their hearts' content, but they can also run back to the percieved safety of Windows whenever they need to. Then, when the day comes when they feel they've learnt enough in that medium, they can begin to dual boot. Maybe they want to be able to web surf without security risks. Maybe they've grown sufficiently accustomed to bash in cygwin that they want to experiment with scripting/automation more thoroughly. Maybe they want a graphical user interface that is configurable from the ground up. Either way, they can keep XP for games or whatever else they want, while embracing Linux for those individual reasons...then when the day comes that Linux does run the games they want as well, (via cedega etc)
if they're confident enough they can uninstall XP completely.
Migration is a very transitional process...it doesn't happen all at once...and it has to start somewhere. Getting Linux more widely accepted is going to be a very long term, large scale task...and attitudes like the one in the parent article are not going to help us get there.