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Desktop Linux Survey Results Published
An anonymous reader writes "The Open Source Development Labs has published preliminary results from its desktop Linux survey, which had 3,300 responses. The month-long online survey focused on determining the key issues driving Linux on the desktop, as well as the major barriers to Linux desktop adoption. 'What was most surprising to us was probably the top two reasons given for deploying Linux on the desktop,' OSDL's Principal Analyst Dave Rosenberg said. 'It's not TCO (total cost of ownership), or security, or lack of license fees. It was 'employees requesting Linux (user demand)' and because 'my competitors have successfully deployed Linux,' he added."
I can only speak for the UK, but its already Java software, but its a web app. Sure you can buy Quicken UK etc, which will talk directly to the government gateway, but you can also just point any browser at government website and you can calculate and file your tax there too.
I used it last year for my income tax and it worked a treat. I kept my accounts on excel, followed the wizard (which took about 3 hours, but you could save halfway through) and it calculated my return instantly.
They also offer company tax and PAYE filling software, which is used far more than they ever expected - the assumption was that people would want to use a 'real' application. It turned out that nobody was tighter than an accountant and when faced with the option of shelling out for tax software or using a free, and very usable (if not quite as powerful) alternative they jumped at the web app.
Scared of flying, pointy things snce 1979!
Wine has come an incredible way since it's conception. I am amazed by how well it runs some games (and other Windows software) these days. I think it's safe to say that by the time the Linux desktop is polished enough for average Joe, wine will have advanced to a point where it runs most Windows games/software very acceptably.
I would like to think that one day wine will actually be better at running Windows software than Windows itself is. This is possible because while Microsoft is intentionaly breaking compatability between releases, wine is being developed to run programs from any Windows version. Often programs actually run faster in wine as well, since the linux kernel generally manages things better.
The article says : "Peripheral device driver support was also a hot-button issue. In particular, USB device and networking printing were mentioned as key areas that needed improvement."
For mass consumption, this is the biggest problem I have seen.
I may just have been lucky, but I have found in recent distribution that driver support (including for USB devices) has been excellent. A recent Ubuntu install was the first time I have ever installed an OS which fully detected and installed all my hardware - video, sound system, wireless network, USB etc. with no prompting from me at all. On the same machine, Windows requires additional drivers. I have always found Windows network printing to be far more problematic.
So it doesn't count if the application is deployed via the web?
TurboTax Online comes out in January. Firefox support remains to be seen, obviously, but I'm not overly concerned, given FF's now-relatively-high market share.
I've been using H&R Block Online under Linux for the last four years. Works flawlessly in firefox. They even keep a hot copy your records for three years - a feature I've used a few times now, and I don't need to worry about backing them up, losing the CD, etc. Tinfoil hat wearers need not apply.
This site lists a few more I've never heard of, and, of course, Googling for it doesn't hurt either. Just make sure to pick software for the right country.
No, I doubt there are any Gtk/Mono/Java/Qt/WhizBang clients out there, but who needs them? Installed clients for such things are (or should be) a thing of the past. The web offers a relatively cross-platform, painless deployment mechanism for every OS and distro.
The other obvious advantage of the online approach is, of course, that you don't need to pay for an upgrade every year. You just pay the filing cost for whatever taxes you want to file, plus the vendor costs. I usually end up paying H&R Block to e-file my stuff and to have a human look over them beforehand, just to make sure I didn't miss anything.
Hope this helps.
Working as a "specialist" in printing and printing technologies (see my post history for details), I can't help but wholeheartedly agree.
I've not found anything easier for IPP, LPR or Raw (Socket/9100) printing than a simple CUPS install with a nice frontend as provided by EITHER KDE or Gnome. It even auto-searches the network for port9100 - something Windows is yet to do.
Drivers for "toy" printers can be a pain, but even without vendor support (which I'll plug that we have) any PostScript device is a breeze and PCL devices are only marginally more complicated.
A few months ago I tried to gauge our end user Linux adoption by the number of support enquiries I was asked to assist with (assuming our technicians/first level support couldn't handle Linux) and thought that perhaps there's not so much out there. Then I find out that there's a LOT more than I originally assumed and it just never makes it to me as an enquiry since it "just works". Enquiries about other systems (Windows, MacOS and AS/400 especially) aren't uncommon (especially Windows broken excuse for printer sharing in relation to permissions and device settings causing MANY headaches)
That's just my take on it from an inside perspective of one of the supposed "key areas for improvement". Maybe these users just aren't savvy enough on printing in general, and it's not the OS that's the problem at all (it'd be interesting to give them a Windows environment and check out what printing issues they have...)
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The short answer is yes, plenty of machines built for Linux.
Here are a couple of links :
Servers, desktops etc : http://www.pogolinux.com/
Laptops ! http://www.emperorlinux.com/
The laptops are well-known brands (IBM/Lenovo, Dell etc) with Linux pre-installed and supported, where everything work, including modem, wireless, suspend-to-ram, etc.
And yes Microsoft really does intentionally break compatability between releases, and especially with their competitors.
Any evidence for that claim?
There's plenty of software that doesn't run in later versions of Windows.
Name some. I've only hit one program for a post-3.11 Windows version, either 9x or NT line, that won't run under XP. Hell, most DOS programs still run.
Think Windows 3.11 software
That's over a decade old. Even if they are breaking compatibility with it, I really don't think you can fault them for it.
Windows 98 software and even Windows NT software
Like I said, name some, because I've only ever run across one. (Hasbro's Clue. And a pretty poorly programmed piece of software too. Didn't even run quite right for me in its intended version of Windows.)