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Linux Five Years Away From Mainstream
wellington wrote to mention a ZDNet blurb about a Gartner group study. Gartner indicates that 'mainstream' use of open source in IT environments may be 5 years away. From the article: "Gartner's latest Linux 'hype cycle' report shows that open source is halfway to maturity but warns the biggest test will be whether it can demonstrate the necessary performance and security to function as a data centre server for mission-critical applications. Leading-edge businesses are generally still in the early stages of Linux deployments but Gartner expects increased commercialisation and improved storage and systems management for the operating system by the end of 2005, with Linux being used primarily for WebSphere and infrastructure applications on mainframes and web services on blades and racks."
Did you know that nuclear fusion is only 20 years away? Just like it was in 1950! (No, I'm not skeptical. Not at all.)
When I wrote my article and its follow-up on directions I think a Linux Distribution could take, I expected that there would be some controversy. However, I hardly expected the shear number of responses to the effect of, "Linux is great as it is! Never change it!"
Which is surprising, because the very point of the Linux design is that different distributions were supposed to be able to explore completely different tracks. There shouldn't be any "one distro to rule them all", yet many of the respondants demanded exactly that! (Amusingly, they couldn't agree on *which* distro to rule them all.)
When I pointed this out to many responders, and mentioned the fact that I'm merely attempting to suggest a Desktop environment that would help Linux adoption, I got another surprising response: "Who said we wanted regular users? Linux is for the elite. If you're too stupid to recompile your kernel or read all the scattered HOWTOs, you're too stupid to use Linux!"
I understand that the Linux community is wide and varied, but this sort of attitude is not helping anyone. In fact, this sort of attitude causes Linux to take two steps back for every one step forward it takes in the market.
It's normal that Linux users will disagree. That's why Linux is just a kernel, KDE/GNOME are just desktop environments, and the GNU System is just a collection of Unix utilities. It's so the end distributions can build the OS necessary to meet their users. But such a design DOES NOT require that users berate each other! Rather, Linux users should understand that "idiot" users using an "idiot" distribution is okay. Gentoo users can still recompile Gentoo to their hearts content even though Ubuntu exists. Ubuntu users can still use Ubuntu workstations even though Fedora exists. Fedora users can still a have 100% "Free as in socks and gun ownership" OS even though SuSE exists.
There's no reason for this OS bigotry. It's causing confusion in the marketplace, and generally turning the public off to Linux. Just pick the distro you like, and be happy for other people who use something that works for them. K?
Javascript + Nintendo DSi = DSiCade
Linux was mainstream five years ago.
Must we hear the same spiel before it becomes the truth?
- to the tune of "Blowin' in the Wind"
Post-rock/Ambient/Drone and other noise.
How come every thing is "5 years away" but never seems to get here. I'll bet the writers for the Jetsons anticipated space cars in 5 years too.
Gartner Group was reported to be five years away from becoming a credible news source for the IT industry.
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Hasn't Linux for the desktop been 5 years away for the last 10 years?
Tea and kung-fu. Life is good. Rising Phoenix
..they want their article back.
Maybe John Titor can help.
Curiosity was framed. Ignorance killed the cat.
Five years to mainstream Linux -- I'd say they were being optimistic about desktops. But servers? When is this report from, 1997?
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Apparently, 'Running the majority of web servers worldwide' doesn't count as mainstream.
When Linux supports the full range of hardware that is currently under NDA's and vendors that refuse to "support" Linux other than supplying tainted binary kernels; then and only then will Linux be ready.
I personally have moved to a mac because I couldnt wait any longer. Will revisit Linux on the desktop in maybe 3 - 5 years.
After a quick google search, I've uncovered that:
1. Iran at least five years away from producing nuclear weapon
2. CIA five years away from terror readiness
3. Scotland: Independence 'five years away'
4. Cancer cure about five years away, British scientists claim
5. Dog returned to owners after being lost five years ago
6. Infants' gastro vaccine may be five years away
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Mainstream? Well, I was into Linux before it was cool. I totally dig their older stuff so much better... then they sold out to the man
</indierock>
that by 2005, Linux would occupy about 1-2 % of all web servers, and would not even make it in the enterprise. This study can only mean that Linux has made it in the mainstream.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
In spite of the title, the article does not state 'Linux Five Years Away From Mainstream'. In states that 'Linux is five years away from mainstream use in Enterprise IT infrastructures. This is all about high-end data-centre stuff - a niche use. This article is confusing a very specialised use of Linux with it's general use as, for example, a mid-range server where it has proved it's successfulness for years. There is further confusion where the article mentions that 'many are re-evaluating Linux use' (many turns out to be 5 CIOs out of a panel of 12).
I don't know whether this article is deliberate FUD, or just a confused mess. I suspect the latter.
Depending on whom you ask, Linux is already a major player in the desktop.
It au pair with OSX in raw number of desktops installed in a lot of places, and was pushed in a lot of countries to the desktop. Ubuntu Hoary / Fedora Core are every bit as easy to install than W2k/XP, and work equally well. Choose your desktop environment for your users and you're set.
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
Statements like these always remind me of the old Tom Hanks movie The Money Pit. "How much longer to finish the house?" "2 more weeks." "You said that 2 weeks ago!"
You are who you are, let no one tell you different. But, never close your mind to a new point of view.
I think it's really important to distinguish from Linux the server platform and Linux the desktop platform, as you say. I run GNOME from an Ubuntu distro on the desktop, and it's.... pretty good. But it's not XP. No Quicktime or WMV plugin means a lot of websites like CNN and Yahoo don't really work well. Xine is ok for DVD content, but overall it's a bit slow and uses more resident memory than what I consider an equivalent XP system does.
Linux as a server has arrived, and has been here for awhile.
researching, designing and implementing (smoothly, including migrating your data to your new environment with no impact to the business) a change to a new operating system *always* takes a long time. here, we're not moving to XP from 2000 as it's not worth it: we're moving to longhorn as and when it emerges. it'd take just as much planning (probably more, in fact) to shift to linux. think upgrade cycles. think win2k going off support as a driver to change. 5 years doesn't seem all that long to me...
Assuming that this has been reported correctly (there is no link to Gartner's actual report), it shows just how far out of touch Gartner is when it comes to technical matters such as this.
I won't disect what they've said because probably everyone else reading this knows the flaws in both their arguments and facts, but if an organisation can make money producing unsubstantiated and just plain incorrect claims like this then I am clearly in the wrong job.
So, here's the plan: we set up our own global organisation, just like Gartner, and we issue our own PR, which by contrast will contain no factual errors and will not only contain details of the present situation but also predict how much better the situation is becoming (and how quickly). These reports can be distributed within the community who can then go to their customers/partners/PHBs and say "Hey, there's this great new report out which says that Linux is running on 10 million desktops worldwide and this market share is set to treble in the next 12 months". That way, coming from an authoritative source, they will naturally acknowledge that it is true.
I'm not entirely joking here - who's up for it?
Burns: We're building a casino!
McAllister: Arrr. Give me 5 minutes.
Just like Fusion is always 10-20 years in the future for commercial usage.
It depends on what your definition of "mainstream" is, of course. Right now, more people are using Linux than ever used Microsoft's DOS. Or Windows 3.1 for that matter.
Define your own reality - don't let others define it for you, with metrics based on the sales price of the OS, or the net revenue from OS sales. Linux strength is it's low cost, so it will never win at that game.
But right now, many people worldwide use Linux, or even BSD, even if it's what runs on their cell phone or inside their networked self-repairing robot-dog-feeding fridge.
And, to paraphrase Martha Stewart, that's a good thing.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Until you can get the easy things doable by the masses, then you have a chance at taking the desktop.
Storm
The Executives here try to wave these "studies" in our faces here in IT/IS about how we should back off linux migration.
This one prompted a "see it's not ready to handle enterprise/critical applications.
Until we let the CTO know that we have been depending on Linux for 3 seperate ultra critical apps for over 5 years now. and that tiny companies like GOOGLE use it exclusively for it's servers/backend.
He did his typical "suprised" look and then left us alone once again. The key is to keep your Executives informed so they become immune to the FUD and lies these "professionals" like to spread about.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
It would be easy to blast Linux for not automatically doing everything and retreat to M$ land, except that Windows 64 bit doesn't even have drivers out of the box for my SATA hard drive
You hit the nail on the head. People hold Linux up to different standards than Windows. If you try bring Linux into an organisation, even the smallest hiccup will be met with criticism and "told you so"s that you 'shoulda stuck with Windows'. But the Windows server can crash several times a month and nobody even blinks, because, well, "that's just normal" ... the "server down again guys" routine. The fact that so many other people on the planet also have problems with Windows somehow "validates" its crappiness in the minds of its users - managers often don't really understand computers, so they probably subconsciously reason "as long as everyone else has these problems it must be normal" right? Meanwhile you're bringing in Linux because it's presumably better, so people automatically look for flaws, especially if you're basically trying to "prove the managers wrong" for their decision to use Windows ... managers who like to think they know a lot do not like people who know more than them about something questioning their decisions. (This pretty much describes the situation at my last job.)
I tried Linux *FIRST*
I tried SuSe, Mandrake and one other I think. Problem was, every time I read a HowTo or other document, right after discussing how to do something, it always added "your distribution may do this differently." And surprise, surprise, they did. So I tried FreeBSD. I got the book "Absolute BSD" and went through that. And every example worked as published. Yes, I understand that this is due largely to the "FreeBSD is an operating system, Linux is a kernel" thing, but the problem I ran into was a lack of distribution-specific information for any given linux distribution.
FreeBSD was simply easier to understand for me. I do recognize that is a highly personal choice, though.
Merde, il pleut encore!
"warns the biggest test will be whether it can demonstrate the necessary performance and security to function as a data centre server for mission-critical applications."
e mber_2005_web_server_survey.html
That statement has to be coming from the completely clueless.
I'd say that this happened 5 years AGO:
http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2005/09/05/sept