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What Does Open Source Need for Mainstream Desktop?
HesAnIndieRocker asks: "So what will it take to make open source technology a mainstream alternative on the PC desktop? It feels like we've been on the cusp for many years now and the applications available for most common tasks are certainly competitive, but we still hover around a 5% market share by most accounts. I've recently written an article in my weblog about some possibilities, but I'd love to hear what others think."
After ranting for many years about never upgrading past Windows 2000 (mainly due to having to call MS should you need to reinstall, etc) I finally had to put my money where my mouth was when I purchased a new laptop a few months ago (eMachines m6805, AMD64). To make a long story short - I had a buddy help me install SuSE 9.3 on it and I've been on the penguin at home ever since.
What I have seen from a long time windows user perspective is this: functionality and abilities (and stability) is far greater on (SuSE 9.3) Linux then I ever experienced even under Windows 2000. The problem is the "Win95"-esque problems... such as getting my wireless networking card to work. Now fair enough... I had/have these issues with Windows upon an occasion as well, and I can work my way thru them faster then on Linux simply because I've got ump-teen years experience under Win. My gripes come when I have to follow quite esoteric HowTo's to get my gear to work (or to get this thingy to install, or, or, or).
Most times, I'll get whatever widget I need to working thanks to 2-3 of these HowTo's (mainly because 9.3 is a popular distro). But if I were unlucky enough to be one of the first people with problem 'X' I know I'd be screwed. Just the number of widgets and command line prompts and whatnot I had to tinker with to get my onboard WLAN card working was stunning. Then, after it was all said and done, I still couldn't get to websites 'cause the router didn't have valid DNS IP's configured (Linux seems to be a bit "bitchier" when it comes to certain things). Thankfully I picked up on this before blaming the card!
Now... I'm happy with SuSE/Linux and I cannot ever seeing myself turning back, but I'm a nerd that enjoys the occasional hw/sw challenge (something I've not had on a windows box in probably 3+ years). But for Joe Sixpack? We (as in the all of us, or the royal... take your pick) need to bring Linux's usability up past Win95, because in my opinion, that is exactly where (SuSE 9.3) Linux is currently at.
"1984" was ment to be a warning, not a guidebook. You hear that Kim Jong-il!? BushCo?!
A multimillion dollar ad campaign. That's what it'll take.
Now please, for fuck's sake, let's talk about something else. Every couple of weeks there's another damn article whining about how open source is soooooooo close to succeeding as a mainstream desktop alternative and asking what's keeping it from taking that final step, and everyone always answers "consistency" or "usability" or "accessibility" or "pictures of naked ladies", but the real issue here is that Grandma doesn't know what the fuck Linux is because she doesn't see ads for it on TV.
Goodness I'm bitter today.
1) Drivers
2) Drivers
3) Drivers
From a High Level, to convince people to switch systems, you have to offer them something an order of magnitude better than the system they are invested in without giving up any substantial functionality. This means:
The computer should do exactly what the user wants, whenever the user wants, without the user having to think about it. This means extensive end-user testing and brutal simplification. The user should never see anything unrelated to exactly what they want to do. The folder heirarchy they see on the drive should ONLY contain things relevant to their activities. They should be able to re-arrange everything on their disk and still have it all work. They should never have to edit a config file. They should have to wade through "interface spam" of a million options which one in a million users will ever actually use. And yes, this means extensive high level architecting of everything that goes into the system, something OSS isn't traditionally good at doing.
The computer sould be able to replace legacy systems. That means being MS Office compatible, not a small feat. Not just word, but scheduling, and Excel macros must be readable in the new system.
The computer still needs a killer application or usage that makes everone want to switch to it. Apt-Get is pretty killer for me, but command line functionality will never reach the average desktop user. What else can the nature of Open Source provide? How can we use dynamic re-compilation to do something amazing that retail software can't provide?
No offence, but Linux as a desktop OS is still pretty hacky. There are a million unnecessary (to me) files hanging around when I'm just trying to do something, dozens of different ways to try to do something but four or five of which will work, command line still being integral to anything fun on the system (and even some baseline functionality), etc. My feeling is that the current state of Linux isn't the way to get there, any more than Dos should be the way to get to Windows. Perhaps it is time to throw our collective weight behind SkyOS, Zeta, or another upcoming Desktop-oriented OS, and refocus Linux on being the kick-ass server OS we all know it to be.
The ______ Agenda
I think you are missing what's wonderful about Mac OS X.
You get to use an intuitive, easy (and yes, aesthetically pleasing) interface for simple tasks. It saves you time and aggravation. It makes working on simple things simple, like they should be. I'm talking about stuff like printing, mounting an SMB share, synchronizing over Bluetooth with a cellphone, and so forth.
This leaves you more time to spend on complicated, challenging things. And when you need to, you can just start a terminal window and (if needed) an X11 server, both of which come with the OS, and run essentially every application you can under Linux. I use LaTeX regularly on my PowerBook, and emacs is installed by default as well (though I personally avoid it).
For years I thought I wanted Linux on the desktop. That wasn't it. I wanted Unix on the desktop. And that's what Mac OS X brings me. It is the only operating system that doesn't trade power for user-friendliness (or vice-versa). Almost everything you can do in Linux, you can do in Mac OS X. The exceptions are few and far between, only due to proprietary applications or Linux-specific kernel features.
Your complaints are valid for Mac OS 9 and below. But OS X is a completely different animal. I abhorred Macs until it was released, but I switched two years ago and have never looked back. And I'm not some luddite technophobe - I'm an EECS major at MIT.
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An Exchange-killer.
Have you tried Open Exchange? Not that exchange is appropraite to a discussion on the Desktop market.
A definitely legal method of playing encrypted DVDs.
Try xine! (btw Xine is an awesome app!)
For 3rd-party companies (Intuit, Adobe, Autodesk, etc etc ad nauseum) to release either Linux or Wine-friendly versions of their apps.
If you can't find an alternative application in Linux you could always run Windows through VMWare - you can also disable network support for the VM so that you always have a nice clean copy of Windows instead of one riddled with ad/spyware! Further you'd be surprised how fast this can be, I run an AMD 1600+ with 1GB and Windows runs very fast in VMWare.
For companies like Cisco to make it easy to run the VPN Client.
Cisco VPN client for Linux!
A perfect VT220 emulator. There are many in the Windows world.
xterm & gnome-terminal can be used to emulate VT220, for the latter it's as simple as adding a line to your xresources file.
Better wireless support, both thru more drivers from "industry", and better "management" front-ends.
I think you'll find that Wireless support in terms of drivers is just as good in Linux as it is in Windows - just install ndiswrapper and use the windows drivers!
Better looking fonts. Sure, fonts are 100x better looking than they were in 1999, but they are still better looking in Windows.
If font's are so important to you, why not just use the Windows true type fonts in linux??
In my opinion the reason people don't migrate to Linux is because they either think it'll be too hard to use or, like the parent poster, they believe that Linux won't be able to do what Windows can - and don't bother to do any research as to whether they're correct or not.
Haydn.
Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so. - Douglas Adams
To be mainstream it will have to lose many of the features that make it attractive to tech enthusiasts.
If you want a very nice and easy to use *NIX desktop, head down to the Apple store.