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No Wine for Dell Ubuntu Users, Says Shuttleworth
yuna49 writes "News from last week, but still worth noting: Mark Shuttleworth told eWeek in a May 3rd interview that Dell will not include open-source software such as Wine with the PCs it plans to bundle with Ubuntu Linux. Says Shuttleworth: 'I do not want to position Ubuntu and Linux as a cheap alternative to Windows ... While Linux is an alternative to Windows, it is not cheap Windows. Linux has its own strengths, and users should want it because of those strengths and not because it's a cheap copy of Windows ... Often we see proprietary software companies just completely fail to understand not only the motivations of the Linux community, but also the processes. It's very practical, there's a way to get things done, and it's different. The VMware guys have really engaged with us completely and worked to the agenda set by the Linux community, which is not an ideological agenda but a practical one.' Does that mean Wine won't even be listed in the package manager?"
Linux has its own strengths, and users should want it because of those strengths and not because it's a cheap copy of Windows
And one of those strengths is that you can still install WINE after you buy the computer despite the decisions made by a large company or single individual.
Um.. so it's not included? Big deal..
apt-get install wine
done...
What's the problem?
----- The internet has given everyone the ability to have their voice heard equally as loud.. even if they shouldn't be
Every time I read something about Mark Shuttleworth, I become just a little bit more of a fan.
While I have nothing against WINE—indeed, I use it myself for several things—I have to agree that it's just not right for distribution by a company like Dell. There's an art to getting it set up and configured, and while it's good, there are still a lot of applications that either don't work at all or don't quite work right in it.
This is a massive problem, and could seriously backfire on Ubuntu. If people buy a Dell machine with Ubuntu and WINE installed thinking that it will run Windows software, when something doesn't work right (and there will be things that don't work right), the average consumers will get mad at the wrong people: Ubuntu and WINE, not Microsoft. The focus will be on how Ubuntu sucks at running Windows software, not on how Ubuntu rocks at running Linux software.
I see here a golden opportunity for desktop Linux to make major inroads with the public and take a significant step towards advancing free open source software. I also see here a golden opportunity to destroy the reputation of desktop Linux as a viable alternative to Windows and give people the impression that free open source software really sucks. Don't you think for a second that Microsoft is going to be trying their damned best to see that Linux on Dell machines gives people a bad taste for open source software.
I have to give Mark Shuttleworth a pat on the back for seeing the big picture, for sacrificing trying to please everyone for the sake of making sure that this is done right, and that the software that people get is great, not just "it works good enough with a few hours of tweaking."
No, he probably didn't want to include WINE because it will make Ubuntu bad because WINE is too hard for most novice users or a beginner to get working properly...if you make promises that it can run windows software to people, then you have to be able to be able to deliver on that.
In a world of acronyms, the words are the real victims.
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Er... but you're a techie. For the other 99.9% of PC purchasers who want their machine to 'just work' what is, or is not installed by default is quite important. After all, the reason Windows is the most popular OS is because Windows is the most popular OS.
init 11 - for when you need that edge.
WINE isn't even in a default Ubuntu install. With or without Dell, Ubuntu does not ship with WINE. It never has. I hope it never does.
One gripe I have with the community is that we tend to oversell WINE. Even though the WINE team have made a lot of progress lately, I still find WINE to be an imperfect solution, at best. Knowledgeable users know this. But the community insists on preaching WINE to every Windows convert. This is counterproductive.
Rabid WINE advocacy builds unreasonably high expectations of 100% compatibility. This is not yet possible, and it is debatable whether this will ever be possible. New users don't appreciate the difficulty in the project, though. All they know is that NIFTY.EXE won't run. They resent the fact that they've been given "Broken Windows," rather than a "real OS."
This is not to say that I'm against the WINE project at all. Quite the contrary: the compatibility layer gives the Linux community an extra tool. But I cringe every time I see people treating WINE as some sort of panacea, rather than using it correctly as a tool of last resort.
Yeah, like Windows "just works".
I don't think Linux is any different from Windows in that regard, especially given that this is an OEM offering, not a DIY install. Funnily enough, in a curious world, if Dell support "get" Linux, they may be able to better support it - compared to Windows - over time. If they have a standardised distro, then being able to read logs from clients (via email, VNC, whatever) may be more useful than the crap that Windows gives you in guise of error messages & debug information. They could recommend alternative free software, rather than having to continue supporting old apps "because they came with the machine and I don't want to upgrade", etc etc.
Shame the linux kernel took "printer on fire" out though, huh?
Conversion Rate Optimisation French / English consultant
I completely agree with their decision. If you want Windows, buy Windows.
Linux needs to stand on its own merits. Running Linux to use your Windows apps would make Dell and Linux look bad by giving a bad user experience.
Wine as a Windows replacement is hard to set up, largely incompatible and the wrong solution for more than one or two applications.
Let Linux have a fair chance on the desktop without false expectations of running Windows applications. If that's not enough, then Linux isn't ready for mass market adoption.
If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy. - James Madison
Good. Windows compatibility is one of the things that killed OS/2.
I've been running Ubuntu for some time now, I have even "spread the word" my installing it on a few poor students laptops when there windows installation has died and I couldn't be bothered to find the windows drivers for the laptops hardware. Most of the people I have installed Ubuntu for are happy with it right out of the box, once i've added Medibuntu so that it can play DVD's ofc.
However I personally like to play a few Windows games like Half-Life 2, World of Warcraft and Counter Strike and in order to do so i've had to "apt-get install wine". So I don't see how dell not including wine on the machines is a big deal, as it doesn't make there distribution any different from "plain" Ubuntu.
Dell are quite right not to install wine out of the box, as a user who can not "apt-get install wine" or if they have there own partial Dellbuntu mirror, adding the real Ubuntu software sources to apt, will have pretty limited luck getting it working anyway.
What I would find interesting is dell including a way to play copy protected dvd's out of the box, as to be that seems to be the one real problem with a default Ubuntu installation that people are likely to notice.
No wine for Dell users is actually a good Open-Source move so people wouldn't think they moved to Linux just as a replacement.
I have a dream! I have a dream, that one day, Linux users will be more then 50% of the people who use computers
I have a dream that people will not use Linux as a user-friendly OS, but actually use it's command-line, and learn how to use it to improve their performance.
I have a dream, that every new Windows user that had moved to Linux, would not connect to X as ROOT, and actually use the multi-user management like Linux was designed (unix-based).
I have many dreams though, with your help, it's possible. I know I do try to get more people to install Linux and use it correctly.
Spread the dreams!
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Imagine average joe user calling Dell because [insert Windows app] doesn't work in wine. Dell doesn't want that.
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The reason to buy a Dell with Ubuntu pre-installed is not Windows related at all. It's all about hardware. A Dell desktop or notebook PC with Ubuntu pre-installed should work out of the box. The stuff we fight with any Linux distro, wireless drivers (although that's gotten much better with Feisty), suspend / hibernate not working, etc should not be an issue with the Dells.
My wife's XP box is 6+ years old, so I'm expecting it to die soon. She doesn't do anything on it that requires Windows, so her next computer will have Ubuntu on it. I wouldn't hesitate to buy one of the Dells. The market for these (at least initially) is not newbies looking for their first Linux box, it's people that are already at least a little Linux savvy that want a new box with minimum hassle involved.
I have to agree with Mark on this one.
..... teaching a cat to bark will ultimately be a disappointing exercise. If your heart is dead set on something that barks, go and buy a dog. If you go for a cat, appreciate it for its felinity. Embrace the fact that it's not a dog, and enjoy how it can do things dogs can't do. It's really quite rare for anyone actually to need a cat with the ability to bark; most of the time you could get by with not barking, or borrow a real dog.
WINE isn't always easy to configure. I tried it once, didn't get very far, thought "sod it" and looked to native Linux applications instead. And I have to say, they've improved with every version I've tried. (In all probability, so has WINE, so you may have a better experience than I did).
The thing is
Also, what we tend to think of as "native Linux applications" can usually be persuaded to compile and run under Windows precisely because they are Open Source. (Windows applications probably could be got to compile and run under Linux -- if we only had the Source Code. But you don't very often see an Open Source project that started development on Windows and got ported to Mac and Linux -- usually, they start out being developed on Linux or BSD and get ported to Windows. I think that speaks volumes about the mentality of Windows developers.) Firefox/Thunderbird, OpenOffice.org, Gaim and Audacity probably would meet the requirements of 90% of Dell's customers, and of course are potentially available on both platforms. But Microsoft won't be happy at the thought of something taking marketshare from Outlook and Office; and I'm not sure the various advert-pushing IM networks are entirely thrilled about Gaim.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
I have been using Linux exclusively at home for the past 8 years and have found that it's often easier to just find a native Linux program to do most tasks than it is to do with Wine. If some Windows application exists for which there is no Linux alternative I find a real Windows installation to be more practical. I am happier using VM Ware to run my company's (for me free) software than I could ever be struggling with Wine. I do not mean to knock Wine because it does have a lot of good uses, but when trying to help other [new] users with linux, the last thing I want for them to see are their favourate Windows programs running like crap and crashing more than they would under "real Windows". That type of experience can only cause new users to believe that "linux sucks" and drive them away from it. For this very reason I think it's best to not have Wine installed by default. Linux isn't Windows and it's best to keep it that way. If someone really wants Wine bad enough and knows what they are doing, then there would surely be nothing to stop them from installing it.
Logical Fallacy #1: Straw Man. You are substituting a different definition, without knowing the real position
What does a desire for free software really mean then? From a developer's standpoint, one implication is that a software developer's services have little value. Or perhaps it means the specific software under discussion has little value.
Logical Fallacy #2: False Dilemma. Because you start to draw conclusions immediately after these two statements, you give this as an either-or proposition, when both of your suggestions may be false. It is possible that free software is software where the freedom to customize the software trumps all other possibilties. It is also possible that the increased value produced by the free software greatly exceeds the development expense for the software. This may lead to an economic situation where an organization doesn't need to recover the development expense, and the network effect can be used to have others help to defer the expense.
Clearly software has value, particularly in new areas.
Just because a word processor has existed for a while does not mean it doesn't deliver value. It may be commoditized in its *price* and therefore be capable of delivering value at a low *cost*, but you are misinterpreting the concept of value.
So what exactly does he mean? We're in the software development business which requires defining things a bit more precisely kinda like in mathematics or law.
But humorously, you're debating economics, which is a heck of a lot less defined than mathematics or law.
The individual provider of software development services is saying I am a software developer and I am giving away value for free.
Logical Fallacy #3: False Equality Value = benefit - cost - risk. You are equating the lack of cost (a developer giving away their services) with giving away value for free. Without considering the other parts of the value equation (such as personal benefits received from the development, like when a developer "scratches their own itch"), you are not creating a well-formed association between value and cost.
But how can that mode of working produce this top system on par with systems in which the developers are giving their all day in and day out?
Logical Fallacy #4: Confusing Cause and Effect, Appeal to Consequences of a Common Belief, Appeal to a common practice. Generally, you have submitted no evidence that free systems cannot produce results that are on par or better than their commercial counterparts. While the software that surrounds Linux can be challenging at times, the core operating system is widely used in embedded and server environments, thus providing a counter-example to your claim.
[Standards]
Logical Fallacy #5: Red Herring. Development of standards - even ad-hoc ones - is different than software development. While it may impact the total value of free software, it does not undermine the basic economics that lead to free software.
We can go on and on with this kind of analysis
Please don't...
Logical Fallacy #5: False Dilemma. At least you have three choices this time... but the point still stands that the issue is far more complicated than you make it out to be, and value can be achieved in ways that are not considered in your analysis.
Honestly, I think that the decision to not include WINE in the Dell-packaged Ubuntu install is a great idea. As many pointed out already, WINE is really a crapshoot application (at least in my experience). Some applications will work wonderfully (like Internet Explorer or Winamp), while others will not work at all (Microsoft Office, Photoshop, etc). I'm sure that if the application were more mature and had support for most applications, then it would be valuable to include it (and charge for it as well).
Plus, it's not like the option to install it disappears when you get a Linuxed Dell. There are still repos and other outlets that will make the software available, so it's really just up to the user as to whether he wants to try it or not. Then again, in a couple of months or years time when more people unfamiliar to the Linux platform start purchasing these laptops, there is a very small possibility that they would have an interest in using it as supposed to, say, VMWare (free).
On top of THAT, Ubuntu doesn't even install WINE by default so this is a non-issue to begin with.
I have been saying this about Wine for a couple years now. That and Cedega. Not to diminish the ability of the people who write this stuff, but it seems like a time sink project to me.
The average person is going to say "Well I need Office on Windows." Some Linux zealot will say "Just install WINE!" The average person will blink twice and go "Or I could save myself some fucking time and use Windows."
Even if they did switch they STILL use MS Office, which some zealots I know (casually thankfully) seem ok with, but yet bash MS.
Also, consider this. You install Linux but intend on using Windows apps. Ideally you have a Linux native app. However you just bought a Windows native one, which tells that company there is no market for Linux native apps. How does it that further "the cause?"
Why not write software that fills the gaps that keep people on Linux. That's what will make MS shit themselves.
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