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What Will Happen in IT in 2007?
An anonymous reader writes "ZDNet's Paul Murphy has set out his IT predictions for 2007. Featured among the completely predictable, OpenSolaris overtaking Linux is apparently inevitable within one year. From the article: 'By the end of the year the OpenSolaris community will be widely recognized as larger and more active than the Linux community.' Is 2007 the year of the OpenSolaris desktop? Other 'inevitables' include Microsoft's success with Vista, the continuing phase-out of Itanium, and the Cell processor powering most of the world's super-computers."
Ex MacOSX guys won't fuel Vista - Dell, HP, et al will. People won't even know that there's any alternative, that's why Microsoft will be making their billions. Bullshit that OpenSolaris will overtake Linux anytime soon, let alone within the next year. The open source zealots will never go for it, and a lot of people have too much invested in Linux. And how will the Cell processor totally dominate the next top computing list when it's not even worth a mention in the current top computing list?
He then goes on to reiterate much of what's been said every year but never come true, that is the parts that actually made sense. I'm surprised that he didn't say "2007 is the year for the Open Solaris desktop".
What a waste of time.
"'By the end of the year the OpenSolaris community will be widely recognized as larger and more active than the Linux community.' Is 2007 the year of the OpenSolaris desktop?"
I could replace the word OpenSolaris with Linux. Or Mac OS X. Or BeOS. Or Amiga.
Face it, Windows is the defacto standard and will be for many, many years. Until businesses change (from running Windows) every other operating system ever created will be second fiddle to the Microsoft monopoly. You know what? Who cares? Do you think Porsche executives stay up late at night thinking "Jesus Christ, Ford has really got us by the balls. How the fuck are we going to compete againt the new Escort?"
I don't care about Microsoft and what they're doing. If it wasn't for their stranglehold on the computing industry, they'd be 10 years behind the technological curve. Natch. They ARE 10 years behind the curve. They just (currently) have the money right NOW to stay relevant.
It'll change. Maybe not now, but soon.
I like big butts and I cannot lie.
Somebody find this guy a cluestick and beat him with it.
How many trite phrases can you fit in one blog post? "structural convergence" "Web 2" "SOA" "Googlemania" "YouTube"
OK, Here's my set of predictions.
Don't like my list? You do better.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
DRM does not really matter to corporate. You shouldn't be watching movies or listening to music at work anyway. It's probably a selling point.
I'd rather you do it wrong, than for me to have to do it at all.
An anonymous reader writes
ZDNet's Paul Murphy
Anybody else have the feeling that the submitter is actually Paul Murphy?
Seems like Zonk has broken into the New Years champagne a bit early, and the standard for front-page stories went from infinitesimal to nil.
Get real - Linux tracing capabilities are like primitive caveman tools compared to DTrace. Just because something wasn't developed by the "Linux community" (whatever the hell that means) doesn't mean it is worthless. ZFS is a major evolutionary step forward for file systems. Again, just because it wasn't born and raised as a sourceforge project doesn't mean it must be crap. Take off the blinders, zealot. Great technology knows no religion, it can come from anywhere. Microsoft, Sun, Oracle, et al, are not staffed by idiots (well, at least not in the engineering ranks). Just because they work for "the man" doesn't make their contributions to the field of software any less relevant or useful. Judge the tools by their merits, ignore the religion.
Whether or not OpenSolaris "takes over" in 2007 remains to be seen, but to dismiss the contributions of Sun's engineers (or Microsoft's for that matter) is to ignore history and to ignore some truly innovative contributions to the field.
What? XML gets way too much "respect" by all the wrong people.
XML was designed for one thing, blind data interchange. That's it. Not config files, not GUI descriptions, not anything to do with databases. Get over it. Everything else is hype created by idiots that make money selling ads in magazines and on web sites.
I've had enough abrasive sigs. Kittens are cute and fuzzy.
As a solaris guy from way back I say.... not!
Solaris is great, but if you want a FREE unix BSD is your ticket. Hell I even run it on some older Sparc 5 boxes in the basement... Faster and easier than solaris because of it being 100% open.
As for everything else.... nope... IT in 2007 will look 100% like IT in 2006. XP on the desktop in every competent Corperation, not much changes anywhere else.
Change = expense.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
DRM _will_ start to matter to corporate the first time a software vendor shuts down a mission-critical business application due to some sort of misunderstanding over payment terms.
Linux has no good filesystems. You are stuck trying to pick which pig has the nicest lipstick on. And the two nicest made up pigs are both from corporations giving up their unixes and opening their filesystems up. If not for IBM and SGI, linux still would have no usable filesystems at all.
And linux has nothing that in any way comes anywhere even close to dtrace. I know its pretty standard for gnubies to not know anything besides linux, and speak of linux's greatness out of ignorance, but go read up on dtrace before spewing bullshit.
Everything about linux is a half dozen not quite good enough "solutions" that are miles behind solaris's offerings. From filesystems to virtualization, from threads to system administration tools, solaris blows linux away on every front.
You are right about one thing though. Linux will go its own way all right. As always, failing to learn anything from the vastly superior operating systems it pathetically fails to copy.
Ugh. A couple of other predictions for 2007:
/. unabated.
1. Entertainment writers will spend the last week of 2007 wracking their brains for meaningless, top-ten-list, fluff pieces in order to receive their next paychecks.
2. The apparent MS astroturfing campaign will continue on
3. Apologists for the upcoming Vista horrorshow will continue to denounce MS critics as zealots.
4. A new branch of mathematics (VERIZONMATH) will dominate industry calculations, leading to much hijinx, and ultimately, total economic collapse.
5. Richard Stallman will learn to levitate, leading to much hijinx, and ultimately, total economic collapse.
This ZDNet guy is an idiot in search of an audience. Move along, there's nothing to see here other than some pathetic dude trying to keep his ad-clicks up.
I didn't have to read more than OpenSolaris. Overtaking Linux? Yeah right. Even if it does happen it sure has heck won't be in 12 months time.
In any case, comparison with a utility company is not exactly right here, it would imply renting the software - this rarely happens. A better comparison would be with a paper book that contains a chip that monitors how often you read the book, where, and how, and won't tell you what else it monitors and sends back home. And this chip can incinerate the book if it receives a radio signal from the publisher, or if it itself thinks that you are trying to copy the book. In reality you may be just reading under the sunlight. The book costs $500 (or $5,000, or more) and is essential in your business. Would you buy it? Or maybe you'd prefer a book without the chip, the one that is yours for as long as you want (since that's what was promised when you paid the money for it.) Software is very much like a book - you get use rights only, but those use rights ought to be irrevocable, unless you breach the terms of the contract and the judge (if you so choose) agrees that you are the guilty party. You can't allow a dumb machine to be your judge, jury and the executioner; you can't allow your rights to be terminated on mere suspicion of wrongdoing - and that's what the DRM is about, to deny you your rights automatically, based on arbitrary set of rules that you aren't even allowed to know.
I'm sorry, but the reality is that Linux pales in comparison to Windows with regards to user friendliness.
:)
--Okay, I'm a little grumpy this morning (it's early), so sorry folks...
How is using Wine simpler than just using windows?
--Because it's a lot easier and cheaper to spend a few minute setting up wine than buying and installing windows onto another partition to run a couple old windows programs that somebody wants me to use.
Why bother emulating it when it comes standard on most pre-built systems that the majority of computer illiterate will be purchasing?
--Because my system isn't pre-built, and I'm not computer illiterate.
Its pointless for those kinds of people. Don't get me wrong, I would love to see ANY OS properly compete with Windows, but I don't see it happening. What will the computer illiterates do with their computer?
--The same as they're doing today. Not much. The "choice" of OS and GUI have no bearing on someone who doesn't care. They managed (when they were forced to) with DOS, they'll be in the same boat with any future OS.
I'm willing to bet its gaming, word processing (possibly some other apps that come in Office), surfing and chatting, and playing media.
--I'm willing to bet it's probably not even that. True computer phobics will go to familiar programs, have other people set up things and show them how to activate them. As long as someone is there to help and show them how to do the handful of things they need, they'll use any OS. I'd hazard a guess that Linux's myriad of configuration options might offer such people a better experience. Instead of trying to force people into MS's view of user interaction, Linux will work as configured, and won't scare them with "your subscription is about to expire!", "your anti-virus is out of date!", etc.
Yeah its wonderful that Linux is a very secure OS, but its too bad it doesnt play any games.
--You mean games, as in the popular ones that lots of people buy that are typically ported to Linux? Or do you mean the kind of games MS plays with their users?
Games for Windows, no matter how much I despise it, will bring make it even more simple for those who want to game on a PC but have trouble setting up in the current PC gaming world. Windows is on top and it is folly to think its up top without a reason.
--It's folly to base your opinion on one aspect of anything. You're obviously a gamer, and some of your choice games aren't made for Linux. Personally, I'm not into running on the gaming treadmill. I'd like to know a game is good before I spend my cash on it. A key to this decision is to see that gamers like it enough to request a Linux version.
--As you can see, this is all subjective. MS Windows works for you, Linux works for me. Blanket statements either way are useless. However, my choice is a lot cheaper to implement...leaving me with more money for games.
Microsoft has just released their much anticipated hands-free cordless mouse. Warning, it may hurt a little at first.
Well if you were to give my Grandmother a Windows disc she would just be as baffled by it. I assume the same would happen if you gave her a Mac. For people who have never used any operating system it would be just as difficult for them to understand any OS you could give them.
The problem isn't just whether linux is a user friendly OS. the apps must also be user friendly and better than the best Windows apps in order to convince people to drop Windows. That is why I think it is more important to work on replacing their apps with Windows apps that are better and also run on linux. It's very unrealistic to get most people to switch OS but apps are easier. Games...ok that is a big problem but you should still be able to get your work done no matter what OS-that's a realistic but challenging goal.
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