The Future of Closed Source Software and Linux

slashy writes "What is the future of closed source software and Linux? OSWeekly.com delves into the subject and emerges with a possible answer. Quote: "I have been struggling with one major problem lately with the Linux operating system and that problem is the amazing lack of new and exciting software. It's frustrating because by the time said software does finally make its way down to the Linux user, the Windows crowd has been using it for nearly a year or longer. Perhaps some of this is because there does not appear to be a clear, simple to follow outline cooperative for companies to design for the open source operating system. Arguably this is because of the perceived need to keep things "open," however, I feel it's time for Linux to grow up and find some kind of common ground with the closed source community. I am a firm believer that both parties could learn a lot from each other; unfortunately I don't see that happening any time soon."

Comments

Boo Hoo

[DeathElk]

Sook Sook Sook.

Cry Cry Cry.

Outlook doesn't work.

Sulk Sulk Sulk

Can't find any decent software.

Bla bla bla. Ra ra ra.

Diddums.

Re:I believe just the opposite

[giorgiofr]

I'd like to know what the 10-years-ahead OSS counterparts to the following software are: Oracle, Opera, Photoshop, AutoCAD.
This was meant to show that yelling "OSS is always teh b3s7es7" is as dumb as assuming that free stuff must be worthless. That's why I use a varied collection of tools at home and at work, and I don't particularly care whether they're OSS or not. When I wanted a graphics package I chose Photoshop. When I wanted a good entry level server I built a box and put Linux on it (I know Linux works well on high level servers too, but my needs were modest). Why can't we judge the merits of software on the basis of its usefulness, effeciency, manageability, security, and support level offered with it rather than by looking at its skin color?

Trolling or just hideously misinformed?

[metamatic]

Samba includes a SMB client AND server for free; OSX (desktop edition, at least) has a bundled client, but no server.

Wrong.

Apache/php/perl/etc have been ported, but seem to run most smoothly on linux.

I don't know why you'd say that, as Apache and Perl come installed by default on OS X. (I don't know about PHP, I wouldn't use that heap of crap if you paid me.) There are nice 1-click installers for Rails too.

As far as user apps, well, the Gimp still seems to be designed for linux.

Yup. That's why I paid $30 for a copy of Photoshop Elements, which blows away The GIMP for usability and has all the functionality I need. Frankly, I wish there was something to compare with Elements on Linux. I use the GIMP, but every time I do it does something weird and inexplicable.

iMovie only lets you save to Quicktime (ugh), and Windows Movie Maker to Windows Media.

False. What you apparently missed is that when you save to QuickTime from iMovie, it's not saving to QuickTime file format—it's saving to the QuickTime multimedia subsystem. From there you can set your output format to anything you like. Hence iMovie can save to MPEG-4 with H.264, DivX, 3ivX, MPEG-1, DV files, whatever the hell you like.

I don't care if iMovie can turn junk footage into pure gold - what good is it if I can only save to a proprietary format?

QuickTime file format is the basis of the MPEG-4 file format. Maybe MPEG-4 is "proprietary", but it's the closest thing to a usable open standard that exists in the world of video. The QuickTime and MPEG-4 formats are both open documented specifications.

I can't open Quicktime movies in any of my windows software for further editing, and I can't open Windows Media in any of my OSX software for further editing.

If your Windows software is so crap that it can't open QuickTime, it presumably isn't one of the well-known movie editing packages like Adobe Premier, which is built on QuickTime for Windows. In which case, export from iMovie to whatever format your software needs. To use Windows Media on OS X, you simply need to install the Flip4Mac WMV QuickTime codec plugins, which you can download from Microsoft's web site. Then you can drag-drop your WMV video straight into iMovie.

As for apps that noone on Windows/OSX seem to use, netpbm is a good example. They are command-line utilities that let you convert image formats, rescale, rotate, crop, etc.

Nobody uses them because you can do the exact same thing with Graphic Converter, PhotoShop or QuickTime, script using AppleScript, and not have to actually write the code. But netpbm and ImageMagick are available for OS X if you'd rather do batch image processing the hard way. (I speak as someone who's done batch processing with ImageMagick and with GraphicConverter.)

I'm not sure how to track down all the dependencies on OSX, or whether Apple made any modifications before compiling.

So download the latest netpbm from DarwinPorts.