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Rethinking the Linux Distribution?
eldavojohn writes "ONLamp.com is running an interesting article about rethinking how the community distributes Linux and the open source applications that often come with Linux. The author isn't arguing that Linux needs to become a full blown web OS over night but instead, asking if the community should be considering 'Software as a Service' and what he means by that is perhaps many of the open source applications that run on Linux should be available through a browser. The reasons for this are obvious, the code is open so anyone could host it, it would be platform independent so anyone could use it and it might attract more users to the Linux environment. The obvious note here is that many of the enterprise software makers are switching to Software as a Service, shouldn't the open source community investigate the possibility of a Web OS?"
WebOS: Another blathering buzzword for industry gurus in the 2000s. Thank f***ing you, Google.
Isn't that just moving the application from one linux box(the client) to another(the server)? I mean, no sane person would use Windows to host something like that.... But on a more serious note, a lot of OSS developers don't have the money to smack down on bandwidth and machines just to host their projects - where as Google and Microsoft can afford it.
www.isoHunt.com
i really would not like to see this. there have been some attempts at making a desktop run as a service, but in all it's not very fast. the only benefit is that the heavy work, like loading of a office suite can be done in someone else's backyard. don't you just hate it when your network goes down?
Why UNIX?
Is that a good selling point, from the perspective of a potential client? Browser-based applications always bring doubts about security with them, and a lot of people would be reassured in using servers owned by well-known companies, but I'm not sure how many would be enthusiastic about connecting to "anyone"'s server.
write that code so i can host it and make a profit from it. sheesh you just can't get people to work for nothing to enrich other folks these days.
I think it would stupid for the AbiWord or OpenOffice teams to down tools and start working on a web-based version of the software. At the minute, a lot of productivity is wasted on browser incompatibilities and AJAX is still rather clumsy in comparison to what it could be. To get even the fairly basic functionality of AbiWord in to a web-app would take far longer to develop than it would for an equivalent desktop application.
I think the free software movement is doing very well. It's getting somewhere. I've used Windows on every PC I've owned since the Windows 3.11 days. In January I made the switch to Ubuntu on a new PC that I recently purchased. I decided to ditch Windows because I thought that Vista was a downgrade to Windows XP.
I was frankly amazed at just how good GNU/Linux really is. It isn't just tolerable, it's out and out better than Windows XP. After installation, the machine is usable in that it has all the software I need to actually start using the computer. Windows by comparison has a basic 'toolset' (if you can even call it that). The file system layout is far more intuitive than the baroque drive lettering system. The firewall is simple, powerful and non-intrusive - compare that to Windows based firewalls. Windows Update only supports Microsoft products. Ubuntu provides updates for all software packages it distributes. In short, it feels better engineered, more robust, consumer centric and easier to use.
Why should the free software movement rethink its strategy when it's just starting to gain traction in a big way? I say keep up the good work! It is no accident that Dell have decided to sell Ubuntu on their machines. This is no longer a hobbyists OS but a baby gorilla eating its way through plenty of fruit and gaining in size all the time. Watch out Microsoft!
Simon.
Here's what I wrote back when there was still hope for Microsoft:
If I were in Ray Ozzie's shoes I would apply something like the The Hutter Prize for Lossless Compression of Human Knowledge to the entirety of MS's software services suite. This, of course, requires making a rigorous spec for testing purposes.
Make the engine, upon which the winning succinct byte code runs, a new W3C standard browser programming language (or at least virtual machine) and reduce the Microsoft OS CD to those components required to create a web-delivered application platform using the winning engine. Such an engine would, of course, have some features that dynamically encached expansions (and/or "memoizations") similar to the Hotspot optimization technology that originated with the Self programming language (and was later adopted by Sun's Java Virtual Machine). Hence it would make sense to have the OS CD contain a partially pre-expanded/optimized code base.
Then, for delivery of software services to pre-existing platforms, create a legacy port of the services code to pre-existing W3C standards like XForms implemented in a downloadable ECMAScript Client/SOA library in a manner similar to the way TIBET(tm) does. The idea is to go "Live", ie: web-delivered, with a fundamentally new W3C base (whatever engine won the prize) but support legacy W3C environments for migration.
Again, this prize-oriented strategy would, of course, require a rigorous specification of the software services so the testing could be largely automated.
This approach addresses Microsoft's 2 biggest problems deriving from the same fundamental reality: Everyone has needed their OS to interoperate with the bulk of the information industry.
The first problem is ethical and really goes beyond the scope of my professional opinions to my public opinions about the support of property rights. Suffice to say, I have no trouble with someone who goes after a natural monopoly position and succeeds. I have a problem with someone who then refuses to use that position of success to fix the bug in the society that made them inordinately rich and their technology inordinately influential.
The second problem is technical, which is what my argument here is really all about.
Basically Microsoft's code bloat problem derives from its monopoly position. This may seem like a truism since all of the software "profession" suffers from code bloat, but only Microsoft can take this to monopolistic proportions -- proportions that make Ma Bell's monopolistic complexities of yore look Spartan.
So Microsoft has this problem and it has many programmers (contributing to the code-bloat problem). It also has mountains of cash.
So how can Microsoft bust its own monopoly position turning its many programmers and mountains of cash into succinct code?
Monetary Incentives for the Programmers, ala the Hutter Prize:
S = size of uncompressed code-base
P = size of program outputting the uncompressed code-base
R = S/P (the compression ratio).
Award monies in a manner similar to the M-Prize:
Previous record ratio: R0
New record ratio: R1=R0+X
Fund contains: $Z at the time of the new record
Winner receives: $Z * (X/(R0+X))
What happens very rapidly is the programmers first apply their skills to maximally refactoring
Seastead this.
The reason software companies are looking to convert their software to "Services" is becuse they want increased control and with it, increased revenue. As a software user, I hate the idea of software as "service". So what's the point of FS/OS to go there? There's very few applications that are even remotely suitable (like calendars, taxes and couple more). You're not going to see me using the "Services" version of gcc or LaTeX any time soon.
I still work offline often at school. I also don't like the idea of my applications suddenly not working because of a browser update, nor do I like the idea of application developers having to work around browser incompatibilities. I've also never seen an in-browser MSWord like application that could do everything I needed it to. Some come close but google docs comes up short, as does every other one I've tried.
So basically you want to run the apps on the remote machine and just use the local machine for display and storage. Hmmmm. Sounds familiar. Sounds like X11 or Remote Desktop doesn't it?
The only reason for the 'do it in the browser' meme seems to be set up for web this and web that and aren't set up for giving you Windows TS or Unix Shell accounts....
Oh, and X11 isn't that efficient over a network of course!
Software as a service is irrelevant to the distribution of Linux. If you're running apps over the Internet, you're not distributing them. It's just another Application Service Provider who btw, mostly use Linux anyway.
Deleted
No. Next question.
This sig is intentionally left blank
Too many distros try to give the user everything including the kitchen sink. What I miss is a bare metal option that installs a truly minimalist installation in the smallest footprint possible. I gave up trying to strip down a modern distro to the bare metal years ago. One of these days I'll try installing the linux from scratch.
Yes, that is because Microsoft has a MONOPOLY on the desktop.
So don't use Microsoft's desktop monopoly as justification for changing the current approach. Linux has been gaining marketshare. There is nothing indicating that this will change.
Yes, it MAY. But it also has it's own, unique, issues. Such as having to rely upon:
#1. Your machine.
#2. Your network.
#3. Your ISP connection.
#4. The ISP connection of the service provider.
#5. The service providers hardware.
When running the same app locally means you have to rely upon:
#1. Your machine.
Yep, he's citing "Web 2.0". Usually, when someone cites "Web 2.0" it means that they're pushing more fantasy than Reality. And that holds true in this instance as well.
Why trade the reliability of apps installed on your local machine for the complexity of apps hosted somewhere else? Because it's Web 2.0 and it's cool!
This would be ideal, and would exploit the power of the net to its fullest. It could work similar to seti@home, right? Our big problem now is that our service providers, at the behest of big enterprise corps, is trying to kill P2P so as to prevent individual hosting. As we allow them to dumb down the net into that of TV, distributed computing will become more difficult. So web based OS might remain slow and clunky. Geeks of the world unite! And demand a symmetrical connection. Uh huh. My Invisible Pink Unicorn will take me home now.
What?
Why do these "online apps" always have to be delivered "through a browser"? Why not have it delivered "through a network transparent windowing system optimized for internet connections", like say FreeNX? If, for some reason, that's a problem, why not fix the problem at the windowing level rather than keep trying to build everyting into an application that started life as a document viewer. Surely "inside the browser" is the wrong leve of abstractio here?
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
I think OSS already has an excellent form of software as service (stretching the definition, of course): distributed SCM. Thousands of open source projects that produce libraries rather than applications and are updateable, buildable, etc with a quick 'svn update'-'make install' cycle. A major difference between the current OSS model and the traditional service-oriented approach is that SOA is usually based around black-box components controlled externally, but I don't think the OSS community would accept a more opaque delivery system for a myriad of reasons.
Hax-fu?
Why would we ever want to run our word processor in a web browser?
Certain applications make sense on the web. Web search engines, for instance. Even maps, and seeking directions from place to place. Basically, anything that takes large amounts of information and makes it readily accessible. I can understand those being on the web.
But... word processing? Image manipulation? *Why* would I want to do that? What does it gain me?
Nothing.
What do I lose?
Control. If I choose to change applications, or try a new application, I am at the mercy of the host. If the host decides to upgrade, and I hate the new version, I am at the mercy of the host.
The whole idea smacks of, "Let's do it, because we can!"
Corporations like Microsoft and Google want us to go that route, because then *they* get to control even more of our lives. But why would *we* want that?
Collaboration can happen without application hosting. It'd be better if we focussed instead on creating a great P2P collaboration framework, and build that into many applications, such as OOo, or the Gimp, or any other system you might want to use for multi-authored documents.
But the web?
Seriously.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
I am using debian and while apt-get is ok for me, i think that the debian package specific package manager
lowers the level to install new packages towards noobs. Which is great. So if we have such good sw distribution why go back to s.t. server side which scales much worse?
For those people with a specific application, put it in a VMware appliance, with what ever distribution you need. Access can be via a browser, or over the network, nice and hardware agnostic.
Other images can be provided for other virtualization services, I'm familiar with the VMware route.
Linux would be better off reducing the number of distros than working on some hare-brained 'over-the-web' scheme that couldn't possibly work.
I'd rather see an official GNOME distro, an official KDE distro, and a 'server' distro that people can install their own stuff on. After-all, Fedora running GNOME is more similar to Ubuntu running GNOME than Fedora running KDE, as far as users are concerned. It's ridiculous to have dozens of distros, almost all of which use one of two (or both!) windowing systems.
Comment of the year
Javascript might be text but there's no way to audit the and permit each script before you run it, that would also require all script apart from event handlers be stored in separate files. We don't have that granularity and until we do browser based apps are a complete joke.
Aside from which; why would the open source community want to do these 'software as service' providers work for them? I just don't get it.
"Software as a Service" is 100% a marketing term. Trust me, Mr. Newbie Author, the open source community has been thinking of avoiding desktop deployment for a long, long time - just ask the Apache team or anyone who's ever written a web app.
"Linux as a Web OS"? I'm not sure you know what Linux is if that's the best thing that came out of your head the last time you toked up.
Enterprise software makers do this as a way to increase their control, not because it is in their customers best interest.
Control is not a motivating factor for OSS. The best solution is. This will usually _not_ be software as a service.
I don't know why people persist in coming up with this "Applications in a Browser" thing repeatedly, but they clearly have no understanding of the complexity of most software. Most GUI applications that are basically front-ends can be run in a browser, but the vast majority of rich client stuff like office suits and e-mail clients (There's only so much you can do with Ajax) is just too complex to do that. I mean, does he have any idea how bloody how slow VNC actually is? Running applications remotely is also a question of trust, availability and flexibility to do what you want.
I just wish people would stop it with these pointless "Run everything in a browser" or "WebOS" articles, and I wish sites like Slashdot would stop giving them any view time.
What a surprise when I found out it was an article on O'Reilly's site, the usual dumping ground these days for articles with pointless ideas that don't even have a final point, conclusion or punchline as to how it would all hang together.
You can try one of those WebOS already. EyeOS is one of them ...the thing is that OSS community should start working on this kind of software soon. Fear goes away if we can download and change code for this kind of software. It's not about large companies having more bandwidth. It's about this simple question.. Can we install this software ( OSS ) on our own servers on our local network and then use low power terminals for word processing etc from there?
With Web 2.0 and software as a service, you're not just moving the application from the client to the server, or from the server to the client you're doing something far more bizarre. You're chopping the application in half and moving half to the client and half to the server. I have to be honest, I can't really see a benefit from it over more standard thin client architectures other than "it's what everyone's doing".
In terms of bandwidth, you'd typically charge. Say $10/month per seat.
Deleted
On Linux, the thugs can run an OpenOffice spreadsheet to track all the money that they have stolen from the local shops and banks. Linix, OpenOffice, and a 38 caliber revolver are an unbeatable combination.
Linux distributions already depend on centralized servers for software downloads and anything that makes sense are hosted on LAMP stacks. As bandwidth increases, CDs and DVDs will be used less. That trend has been ongoing sense the 75 baud modem was invented.
Excuse me, but please get off my Pennisetum Clandestinum, eh!
That right there will be the biggest single step to making this possible, and cannot be overstated enough. No secrets No licenses to clutter things up. Just put it out there for all to see. It will make many of the other steps easier to get through, like finding prior works and gathering the hard evidence. Very cool piece. Archived locally now. The subject could be applied to many things beyond software. Life in general, for instance.
What?
Everybody seems to be attacking the whole idea of a Web OS, citing issues with security, network downtime, and so on. However, the idea of an open source, possibly Linux-based Web OS is quite intriguing. Everybody seems to be forgetting the "open" part of it. Just imagine, for example, an open source alternative to Google Apps. If you could download it and host it all on your own internal server, it eliminates most of the issues with a Web OS. You could have all your documents, emails, and programs stored in one central location that you have complete control over.
abound !!!!
How is this a good idea? I could totally understand this if server hardware were lightyears ahead of desktop hardware. But, guess what, it's not. Should I really be running my word processor on a machine that is hosting tens of thousands of other users at the same time? Add in network latency and guess what, you've got a useless application that no one will enjoy using. I think the only reason Google has had a little success in this market is novelty topped with a little ease of document sharing. C'mon, make webservers be very, very good at sharing documents/files/whatever then you've got a good platform. Leave the user facing applications on the desktop where they belong.
With Linux, the client and server could be the same box. You could choose whether to install services or whether to use someone else's server.
It is definitely a good idea. That is why I started an Open Source WebOS called AstraNOS ( Astra is Not an Operating System ).
:)
http://www.astranos.org/
You can check it out and see where it could excel. I need any type of help I can get.
Please note that this is a very young project ( 3 weeks ) and already offers a lot of posibilities.
I want to focus on communications but also hope eventually offer some type of desktop integration with E.g. KDE.
I could also think of writing a onlyne GUI for my previous project ( QDVDAuthor ) so that you can create DVD from just about anywhere.
Varol
Where is it? I know I saw a fancy bootup screen for a linux based Google operating system. I'm sure by now they have tons of features. I mean they basically have an office suite thats web based. They have photo-management functionality, they've got a huge user base (not to mention cash like friggin crazy).... so where is my Goonix! I want the iso ready for installation on my 1gig flash drive so i can take my Goonix everywhere I go!
Relocating to San Francisco / Palo Alto... Hire me?
Primarily. The cost of developers and system administrators. You can do away with the overwhelming majority of both.
Deleted
It seems to me there are main driving forces behind moving to software as a service:
In the first case, why would Linux/OSS developers be interested in this? Generally speaking, it is free (as in gratis) software. They're not in it to maximise profits. Of course, Linux/OSS companies (Red Hat, etc) like to make money, but they generally do so via support contracts which are ($n x months) anyway.
In the second case, why would Linux/OSS users be interested in this? Generally speaking, they are the type of people who like to tinker, and opted for Linux precisely because they can "own" / control everything on their box. People who think nothing of compiling their applications from source aren't going to be in a hurry to give up that sense of control in exchange for not having to worry about applying patches!
I realise these are generalisation, and there are always counter-examples. For example, the notion of "Linux for Mom / Grandma" many slashdotters talk about to get them out of virus/spyware hell - this could make sense, as then they'll always get the latest Firefox and OO.o's and whatnot, without the slashdotter having to go round or ssh in to do the upgrades.
The practical impact of that means that if I develop a cool web app and someone (a company?) uses it, suddenly they don't have to give the changes they make back to me anymore, which is the goal of most open source/free software licenses.
I wouldn't like that one bit...
One shall speak only if what one has to say is more beautiful than silence
Software as a service is more of a means of *controlling* software access, not of allowing more freedom. That's why companies like Microsoft have been astroturfing the idea, as it would give them the complete control they want over how the user can access and use their software. And it would be the death of Open Source, as there would need to be government regulations on the mitigation of commerce across international broundries, so a company the size of Microsoft would not have to run app-servers in every different country.
ttyl
Farrell
CAN-CON 2019 - Ottawa's only book oriented Science Fiction Convention! October 18-20, Sheraton Hotel, Ottawa, Canada h
Right now you can run some P2P app on your computer, listen to music and balance your checkbook in between check for new stories on /.
That's because your computer has a LOT more internal bandwidth than external.
Now imagine that you're trying all of that online. All of a sudden your multi-tasking box becomes a single-task box as each of those apps tries to share your limited bandwidth. For most of us, it's easier to buy a faster CPU or hard drive than it is to get a faster Internet connection.
And that's just ONE computer with its own Internet connection. It only gets worse when you start adding more people to your connection.
And the goal is to do what? Get more people to use Free software?
The reason more people don't use Free software is that their workstation already has similar apps installed. Why download AbiWord when 90% of the workstations out there already have Notepad and Wordpad installed?
No thanks. I do not want to depend on other people's servers to run my operating systems [as I run it now - on my own box].
And have everything inaccessible when my network goes down? I think not, thankyou. I'm staying with local applications.
JavaScript is not the right language to write every application in. In fact for some, like sound recording, C++ is still the best unless you want to also listen to your garbage collection. Python sucks as a system shell - for example, you can not run a program by just typing it's name. Not all Linux users lack privacy and security needs of controlling both their data and versions of their applications. In fact, the whole point of open source is that you can customize apps for your own use as well as inspect their source code for security flaws. Any more questions?
Find free books.
Don't jump (again) on the Notworking computer hype, please.
Distribution isn't the issue, "we" have bittorrent for that. Moreover, what's more load on the network? Downloading a bunch of JavaScript each time an application is updated, or share the load with bittorrent?
Moreover, wouldn't it be cool if somehow bittorrent and rsync could be combined? I guess this is more or less already possible if stuff is distributed as a bunch of files in a torrent, not a single massive file.
When system administration is hard, moving it all to a single server and turning the clients into dumbed down thin clients of course can make life easier, but it doesn't fix the problem, its moving it around, system administration still is as hard as ever, only with less machines to worry about. How about instead making system administration easy? Not just a little bit easier, but so easy that installing software is as easy as clicking a link on a webpage. And I don't mean just auto starting 'dpkg -i' once the browser sees a .deb, but ensuring that said .deb runs in a proper sandbox and can't conflict with other programs around. At the moment almost all Linux package distributions fail already at something as simple as installing multiple versions of the same package, while there are historic reasons for this, it really shouldn't be something acceptable.
Instead of wasting time and resources via WebOS people should focus on fixing the problems that exist in the current way software is handled.
Google has a fre service where you can store and create dcuments on their servers. i yhink that this is where it is going to be very aseilly with in the next few years. Wit com puting beeing done on a server centroc basias.
Linux will catch up with Microsoft.
Yes, it's an inflammatory subject, but it's exactly what needs to happen. "Software as a service" is the wet dream of many corporations right now, because it offers a per use pricing model and offloads an enormous amount of control to the vendor. When their machines run everything, it's DRM heaven.
Certain software works well as a service. Anything that is inherently multi-user, such as social chat, collaboration, bulletin boards (including the so-called Web 2.0, which is really not much more innovative than the dial-up bulletin boards of the '80s) - all those things work well as a network service. The querying of large databases can work well too, depending on what the data is. Google, encyclopedias, etc. Certain software doesn't. OpenOffice will always work best on the desktop.
"Software as a service" is a catch phrase the editors here seem to like to push in articles as it riles up those of us who know better and attracts comments. Comments attract more comments, and this pumps up Slashdot. The thing is, this type of behaviour is self-defeating, as while it does churn the butter, but some spills out. Every time you poke a stick into a hornets nest, sure, the hive will get all riled, but some will just get fed up fly somewhere else, and it does nothing to attract new blood.
So, for everyone's sake, please stop posting crap like this.
Don't throw out your hair brained ideas if you can't implement them. If you can implement them, do so and demonstrate why they're a good/bad idea, rather than whining and bitching and hoping someone else will do it for you.
need copycats..
Web apps run on the server. The client used to be pretty 'dump' - kinda like a dump terminal used to me... Then with all the enhancements (ajax and all) we have more interactivity. More code on the client to solve the problem with redrawing the whole screen each time... Sounds familiar? Maybe I'm just old, but to me:
...
Window manager == Browser windows and tabs
X protocol == HTTP layer
X event model == javascript + ajax
So basically, what the author wants is X Window, he just doesn't know it. All around, a web browser with all the 'new' things is nothing more than a sad replacement for a X server... The only advantage you have is that you can do a little more on the client with javascript...
Peter.
Moving to a "software as service" model such as Web applications is a step back to the mainframe days, in which someone else controls the software you use. The benefit of the personal computer was that the software resided on the user's computer, under the user's control. This increased the freedom of the user. The free-as-in-speech software movement further increased the freedom of the user by allowing the user to own, modify, improve and share the software. This can't happen with the "software as service" model.
The free/open source software community in particular should resist this erosion of user freedom. After all, user freedom is what free/open source software is all about. Why should it be lured into giving that up? The question, as always, it who benefits: the company hosting the web applications (who can easily spy on everything you do with their software and even create a EULA in which you agree that they own the material you create with said software; most users just click "OK" and never actually read the EULA) or the user?
Hint: it's not the user.
As far as I can tell the perceived benefit of software as service (or 'web os' as some people cal it) is that it will
cost less. Well how can you cost less than a distribution like Debian or Ubuntu? Granted another benefit is that
you can run software as service on less expensive hardware, but come on, are you trying to tell me that a $250
desktop is too expensive?
News Fash: Hardware is cheap.
It's the software that's the expensive part of business. I don't think FOSS should volunteer bandwidth and server
time like that. Doesn't FOSS already give enough, hosting free software in repositories making it that much more
convenient to use the software you want at any time?
Money is the root of all evil?
You need an OS to run a browser to run applications in....
Change Linux distribution? Make apps hosted in a browser?
Makes perfect sense to me. A discussion that only smart people who know very well what they're doing, will lead. Not just some random Web 2.0 talk, like most of the garbage out there, which sees only nails, since it just sees a browser, pardon, a hammer.
Ok, so. Who's porting the Linux kernel to JavaScript? Anyone? We're making Linux hosted, right?
Guys? Where are you going??
Datacenter costs?
IT support team costs?
Software licensing costs?
What's your cost per seat if you DIY? What if someone will do it for $40/month per seat.
Deleted
Please check your fanboyism at the door
Please take your own advice...
multimedia
Actually, Linux can play all media formats, and convert between them easily. All media players support all formats in Linux. Compare this to Windows, where certain players will only play certain formats, and every player wants you to convert music into their format, and some even require you to pay for the conversion and burning features.
and games spring to mind
On Windows I can't play games from a few years ago, let alone the classic PC games I have. On Linux, I can still play all the old games, and OSS emulators provide methods to play old games from other systems (dosbox, scummvm, agi, qemu). Games that require 3D acceleration just work, and don't require fiddling around and tons of patches. Linux may not have all games running native, but it's clear that when a game is made for Linux, it works superior compared to when a game is made for any other OS.
not to mention a decent-looking UI
Well, obviously that's subjective. But then again, you can customize it to your heart's content on Linux. Not only that but you can choose between different major UIs that are each well supported and tailored to different users. And yes, you can tweak it to look/act just like Windows.
and great desktop performance
I don't recall having to reinstall Linux every 6 months to get rid of system cruft, or having to restart to get rid of dead applications or memory leaks. I've never had to shut down because an application stopped responding. When I uninstall applications, they remove cleanly and completely.
Applications don't try to steal priority over other applications, and don't try to take over each other (i.e., some toolbars that come with applications, applications stealing each others' file associations, applications trying to launch themselves on startup and won't let you turn them off). Applications don't expire without warning and force you to download a new version that may or may not even support your version of operating system. Not to mention that I can even run Linux on older computers that currently supported Windows versions choke on. I can save my home folder to easily back up all my settings and personally installed programs, they're not scattered all over the filesystem. Other users can't mess up my files by default, but I can easily give them permissions to look at, edit select files, or share their own files with me.
I can copy my hard disk install and move it to another computer and it will work fine, and if I upgrade I don't have to reinstall my operating system (the other day I moved one system from an Athlon 64 to an Athlon 64 X2, totally different motherboard, video card, expansion cards, hard drive, audio, etc. I copied the Linux installation over onto the new one and when I started it up, you wouldn't even know anything had changed. Not a single dialog box nagging me that this and that was found, and this is changed, where is that driver, etc). All the required drivers come with my system and I don't need to install every hardware vendor's custom applet to sit near my clock and nag me about updates, promotions, or even just take up space.
If I have a printer, the interface for switching settings and viewing ink levels are the same as every other printer. I don't need to learn anything new to learn how to use my new printer, it just works the same. My sound card doesn't have a billion stupid custom applications that I don't want to use but have to install anyway because the driver updates require that they be there.
Anyway, 'nuff said.
Twinstiq, game news
I suggest the first app to port to the browser to be Apache+PHP.
Once we have the AJAX Apache+PHP, we can run PHP in it, which can generate more AJAX pages.
In those pages, we can host Apache+PHP again.
There are several things that need to change to make Linux ubiquitous. The current "It's free come and get it" concept works for those who want it, but what about those who don't know they want it? I have some ideas for this.
Back when Quake III Arena first came out, the boxed set came with a copy of SuSE Linux, I think it was 6.0. I thought "What a cool idea, you can buy a game and it comes with an OS that can run it for free." Chances are few copies of that SuSE Linux 6.0 were actually put to use, but then another idea came to mind. With most cool FPS games that come out, someone invariably makes a Linux demo boot CD (or DVD these days). What if we were able to influence manufactures, starting with Atari and Bioware who've historically been decent towards Linux, if not exactly head over heals to make all their Linux compatible games bootable? I'm not saying make it where it wont play in Windows, that would be corporate suicide. But the best work around for Windows drivers and memory use issues could simply be "put the disk in your drive and reboot". Sure, there would need to be a bit of hard drive (or even thumb drive) space used for game saves, maybe some for swap space, but seems to me the best way around Windows firewalls, spyware, viri, and Nazi DRM is to not run Windows. We could even expand on this by making an entire desktop (themed towards the game of course) selectable from the DVD Grub menu, and in the spirit of Knoppix, Damn Small Linux, and Ubuntu, make it installable on the HDD from the menu, where of course the package manager can add more from there.
Another idea is to distribute "no install" software in GPL virtual machines. These could be dangled in front of people who are hesitant to actually install software, or possibly people who aren't supposed to be installing software on their work PC's. I could think many uses for a copy of the Gimp or OpenOffice.org running from flash drive or CD in a minimal Linux desktop on a virtual machine. If all it had was the built in file manager (with the ability to access local files via auto mounting of local drives) and the gimp/OpenOffice.org running on an otherwise empty X desktop it would make my day. If you make it clear to the user during Virtual Machine OS booting that this is made possible by $Distro that's advertising.
The game disk distribution method is obvious, it starts with getting existing publishers on board. The individual application method? That's a little tougher. The first idea that came into my head is to put disk in the newspaper like AOL used to, but that takes massive amounts of money, something most open source projects don't have. While cereal boxes and Happy Meals are tempting distribution methods, others are more likely. A big "portable software" site would probably be one of the best ideas going. Get people hooked on the portable applications, as they use more and more of them start pushing Linux as the "home base". "Portable" versions of Firefox, Pidgin/Kopete, OpenOffice.org, the Gimp among a few others would appeal to a broad base of users. The road towards success will begin with those sneaking around the no-install policies or machine moochers.
The preceding post was not a Slashvertisement.
Sans writing something in MODERN Java the browser is NOT a good application platform. The tools are mediocre, the applications are slow, and the security issues are never ending.
The WEB browser was never designed for this. Stop trying to hammer your square peg into the round hole!
Among other things, one of the aspects of Linux which draws me to the application is it doesn't phone home on me, is completely independent of the web (aside from grabbing updates), and no one has any right, real or contrived, to revoke my ability to run the software. I LIKE having it all installed locally, for performance, privacy, and permanence.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Surely having an application in a web browser adds yet another layer of unnecessary abstraction to computing? It should go: mouse click etc -> application -> kernel -> hardware But instead it will go: mouse click -> web browser -> server -> application -> browser -> kernel -> hardware
So this is where Free Software and commercial software finally part ways. Wouldn't have thought it.
Why? Because software isn't a service. Selling access to software is what the commercial software industry is trying because it solves many problems for them, like piracy and how to keep users charging after the first bill. Neither of these and very few of the others are issues Free Software needs to burden itself with.
Because, you know, in the end we need it all. Some stuff is best done as a web app. Some stuff is best done as a network app, but not using a web-browser. And some stuff is best done as a standalone app.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
When someone creates a mechanism to do deployments of just the pieces you need to run an app and installing them in an isolated sandbox - no one will care about the web apps anymore (and by apps I mean apps - word processors, spreadsheets, web editors). The key word here is "just the pieces you need to run". I.e. just the core of the app, 4-5 hundred K of code and relevant parts of libraries. I should be able to literally get up and running within seconds over today's broadband connections and continue working while this mechanism downloads the rest of the app code and data that may or may not get used in the future.
Another key word is "isolated sandbox". I should be able to install apps without the fear that they'll wreck my system. I should be able to remove them at the drop of a hat, too, with no negative consequences. Apps must know how to save both locally and "in the cloud", too, and they must be intuitive with respect to where you save. Once you've fully downloaded the app, you must be able to run it locally.
This just makes sense. You can't run a huge number of apps on the server, because server resources are not limitless. Client resources are pretty much limitless today, though. So no matter how you slice it, apps have to be run on the client and what's missing is a delivery mechanism that would make them as convenient as webapps.
There, I've outlined the strategy for the next 5 years. Now the question is, who will implement it faster, FOSS or Microsoft.
Agreed. While you are at school and see problems with this, it is nothing compared to when networks go out in a large company. In many companies, especially larger ones, if the network goes out for whatever reason, most if not all work stops if it relies on those network resources (it doesn't happen often and you can rail all you want about incompetent admins, but such is life, shit happens). Take large software projects where people can no longer check out code from centralized repositories, or accounting departments who cannot access spreadsheets on network drives.
Networks and/or the internet are not always up. However, a company has greater control of their own network than any part of the internet backbone that they may need to run across. If their own network or server(s) goes down they can fix them directly. It would be insane however to have critical applications hosted on remote machines that you don't have control over, accessed over a network that you don't have control over. The people who maintain them have different priorities than you most likely.
The only way I see centralized application servers being useful in an enterprise is if they are hosted internally to the enterprise. Otherwise this only makes sense for use by people who cannot afford to run the apps on their own machines, don't have the technical expertise to install/run the apps, or don't own a machine and access them from internet cafes (for example).
-- I ignore anonymous replies to my comments and postings.
If someone wants to write a conventional wordprocessor they can choose to give it away for free without taking on any costs or liability. If someone wants to use that wordprocessor they can test it to their satisfaction and be fairly certain that it will then continue working. Worst case scanario - it doesn't keep up with some OS update in the future - and obviously they've checked that it uses an open file format, so that they won't lose their data.
OTOH, a software-as-a-service wordprocessor is as much use as an inflatable dartboard unless someone is going to provide that service and make some minumum level of service guarantee (including data backups). That costs.
Now, it would be great if there were Free/Open Source software-as-a-service SERVERS for people or companies who wanted to run their own "personal" centralised system - but as the main source of applications for a "Free" OS it just ain't gonna fly.
In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
"Software as a service" is mostly about putting ads into applications. Or at least the current version of "service" is. The previous try at this, "application service providers" (remember those) was pay per view, which didn't fly.
The only reason the "browser as a platform" idea is popular is because the process of installing software has become so awful. The original MacOS had approximately the right idea; put an application in any folder, anywhere, and the Finder will find it. What we have now is "Let us run this giant installer program with root/administrator privileges which will change settings all over the system". That's awful, and it's no better on Linux than it was on Windows.
Technically, this can be fixed, but politically, it means changing the way applications are detected and what they can do. That's infeasible in the Open Source world.
That's not a hair question.
So many comments posted thus far, and nothing about Affero. You can't discuss what free software in a "WebOS" (what a horrible term) means without bringing this up. The fundamental point is that the GPL allows anyone modification without no restrictions or obligations as long as you don't distribute the software to other people. Distribution is generally interpreted as different than running it. Basically, if you GPL a PHP driven website, anyone can take it, modify it, give other users access to "running" it without distributing any changes you've made.
As best I can tell, the Affero license addresses this, by a clause partnered with specific functionality in the program. 'If this software came with functionality to give source code to users, you may not remove it.' or something to that effect. I've already seen one or two sites that have decided that it didn't apply to them, and the development community behind it sounded like "so what?" Which is fine I suppose, but it feels strange to me that they were able to make a site for a client based largely on existing OAGPL'd code, integrate the code with existing technology(that is also widely used and would be interesting to many people), fix bugs, and then turn around and declare yourself unable and unrequired to fulfill the obligations imposed on you by the agreement. This is compounded by the fact that generally its much harder to tell when a site is appropriating OAGPL'd code. With traditional software, strings will usually catch hidden strings, debugging statements etc. Web software only has the output to look at.
I am somewhat comforted by the fact their site is already out of date, so either they or their client will be facing increasing costs in maintaining the site.
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
Just my $.02: the only thing that makes SAAS particularly attractive to Users is the ability to use the service from anywhere, from any device. I think home application servers, or paid for hosted application servers (and this is where free software...in a SAAS model can work) will largely defeat many of people's fears with regards to SAAS. Currently such servers are way too complicated for the general user to bother with, but then again...so are most media servers, and until recently so was network attatched storage. It makes much more sense that people would pay a company to host their own private applications (which may be commercially developed, or open source) from their servers than it does for a consumer to get "locked in" to one specific service. The advantage of this approach is that the consumer still owns/controls their applications and data, but does not have to deal with the network administration aspect. I think it's also worth noting that *most* applications of the SAAS model are mainly going to be rather non-intensive applications. Storage, email, small games, word processing, and maybe limited photoshopping abilities, etc. Many seem to forget that the average user-level device is actually getting smaller, and less powerful, cellphones outsell computers by wide margins, laptops far outsell more powerful desktops, and less powerful but smaller and lighter laptops are even more popular. This is overall less power on the machine to necessarily handle all these memory intensive runtime applications. Especially since you add network lag and browser interface memory hogging to it as well.
Thus, I invite you to tag this story with the really undervalued "dumbestfuckingidea" tag.
Really, if you need something to further your agenda, FUCKING BUILD IT! Don't ask a rather large community to change their ways radically to a medium that is one giant security vulnerability.
Fight hunger. Filet a politician and send him to a 3rd world country of your choice.
This sounds like X terminals (ok, web terminals) connected to a powerful server. Not a new idea, and one that has been abandoned long ago. The performance hit is considerable and, most importantly, it does not make much sense unless you can save a LOT of money in the process. Considering the fact that the cheapest contemporary PC (say, the $700 laptop I'm using now) is able to run the toughest Office applications without breaking a sweat, I don't see why I should be tied to a provider for something that can be done locally. OK, I'll admit the fact that maintenance and backups will be remotely ensured, but this does not seem to me a sufficient reason to change the current paradigm. Maybe a different administration policy, maybe better user security, the same can be and should be achieved locally.
P.
While having the option might be nice, id rather have my applications under MY control and not have to rely on some 'nice person' out there in cyberspace to host them.
( sure, i can host myself, even today i do things remotely often, but i doubt many can/will do that so are we to rely on some kind benefactor ? )
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Download a file, maybe 5-25 mb. It has binarys that run on every operating system. It detects all your hardware, and compares it to a database of linux compatable devices. You can tell it if you have any unconnected periferals you want checked as well.. like a scanner, web cam, or digital camera.
The application can tell you if your system will be 100% Linux comptable. If it is, you can go ahead and reboot to the install - with this file comes only: 1. the minimal amount of linux needed to install 2. and every possible network device driver (how much space would this take up?)
Your 100% percent linux compatable computer then goes off to the internet and only downloads: 1. the drivers and minimal software you need 2. the software you want.
Maybe if you only want firefox, blender, gimp, inskcape, kooka, vlc, konversation, kino, open office, audacity, gaim, and nothing else aside from the basics like a terminal, text editor, and system files install you could have linux and all the base software take up no more than 200-400 mbs of space.
Efficency is key.
Analogously, Slashdot could be seen as being a little like a website for other cultural groups using the tag line - "New
I think what is more likely to happen is buying a "main PC" for a consumers home (which would also act as a server) and you can add terminals elsewhere in the house (one in kids rooms, kitchen, etc) since the typical PC doesn't reach its full power in the hands of the typical consumer. The problem with this whole "web apps" approach is that people still have to have a computer with an OS on it somewhere. Microsoft recently developed technology that would allow two users to share a screen, which was discussed on /. last week, so perhaps this sort of thing will be the next step and not this web app bullshit.
There is more to science than physics!
www.iomalfunction.blogspot.com
Uh, does the writer know what a package manager is? Portage, apt-get, yum, pkgtools, swaret, Yast, etc...
I like Python. I'd like more Linux stuff to be written in Python (and Mono), and less in C/C++. I believe in web-based applications and all that, and I'd like more of the local applications to turn in to local web-based services that I can also access over the Internet.
But first build the AJAXy replacements, then move people to them. And this can be done one application at a time. In fact, web based applications and server applications are moving into Linux-based distributions as fast as possible.
I think maybe a good focus right now for development would be Webmin/Usermin (or a tool like it with a somewhat cleaner codebase), and to get distributions to standardize on it.
1. Create SasS Linux 2. Get it up and going 3. ??? 4. Profit!
I think the author makes a huge error when considering how FOSS can leverage the Web to improve their offering. He ignores the blindingly obvious fact that Linux would never have achieved the great things it has done without the Internet, and especially the Web. FOSS people know - possibly better than anyone else - how the Web works and what it's for.
With apologies to Marshall McLuhan, I'd like to say that 'Software as a Service' misses the point completely. For Linux, Software is the Service and the web is how it gets delivered.
Every single successful Linux distro leverages web automation to manage its software. With varying degrees of sophistication, every one of them relies almost entirely on web interfaces (automated à la yum or apt) interacting with client-side processing to handle the extremely difficult and complex task of dependancy resolution and software configuration.
This is obviously not a technologist writing, because if it were, the author might have realised that behind the clicky-clicky of Synaptic, for example, lies a web application.
So the question of whether or not we should use web-based software has, for the moment, been adequately answered: We already do it, in order to deliver applications to their desired platform. The web is not the app, the web is the medium.
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
What if Sourceforge charged for login-only use of their servers (virtualized or in a sandbox) running software of a client's choosing?
The benefits would be many, and drastic:
A user can use any version, any time. Packages are built nightly, and if a minor version provides the best compatibility with any of my older documents, I can travel back in time to whenever. To avoid confusion, a dot or well-known-stable version would be the default.
Script-based languages could have multiple interfaces. A logged-in user could control the software through a browser, through a GTK client tunneled through SSH, or even from a console/terminal.
The popularity of F/OSS would grow dramatically in a short amount of time. "To run this software, you must be running an X11 compatible client or a standards-compatible browser, available for download here." More downloads for Firefox, Cygwin, x.org. Maybe bad for Linux and *BSD (or at least not opening the door to conversion by less knowledgeable users), but maybe not: "To run this software natively, you must be running a Unix-based operating system, available for download (online installation or ISO) here. For a list of additional benefits of using a Unix-based system, click here"
Format incompatibilities? Gone (ideally, of course, but let^H^H^H the popularity of an application will decide). Allow the code of an app to access formatting code for the apps to create similar documents.
Best of all would be the debugging abilities. Since the code storage, app execution and bug-tracking would all be hosted in one place, it should be easier to retrieve relevant information about what works and what doesn't.
Paid subscriptions would lead to money available for more and better hardware, talented coders, and fatter pipe.
Of course, the widespread use of all this will only follow widespread and stable high-speed internet, but with municipal Wi-Fi, lowering DSL and cable costs, and the coming availability of cellular access, the time to prepare is now.
Emacs: for people who just never know when to
I still can't get bloody DSL where i live, so im stuck on dial up.
connections turn to crap 6pm plush regularly.
Not to mention drop offs
Yeah i really want all my apps on the web
Anyone ever heard of X over SSH and VNC??
If you compare Windows Vista Ultimate ($399 on DVD) to a Mac mini ($599 on x64 PC) then it begs the question: why the fuck would you ship an operating system on a DVD? As a technical challenge? To generate a SKU? Certainly not to meet the needs of a typical PC user. By the time you get the DVD it is out of date, however the Mac mini updates itself over the Internet as soon as you plug it in.
... the other 1% are already going to roll their own.
If you are making a Linux distribution you ought to be shipping on a PC, not a DVD. The "technically advanced user" can easily wipe the disk on a Mac mini and install any kind of x64 compatible operating system, however the other 99% of users cannot take a bare PC and make it into a reliable and complete system such as the Mac mini. Therefore, if you are selling Linux as an operating system, it's the 99% who can't install from DVD who are your audience
As the hard disk and DVD are replaced by chips this is only going to become more and more obvious. The iPhone is smaller than a DVD in a couple of dimensions and requires no setup. That is only going to make the average user even less tolerant of the poorly integrated hardware and software in most of the PC business.
Okay, you've got the "driving forces behind SaaS" down. Now let me tell you about the "Brick Wall" that's going to stop those "forces" cold in their tracks: mission-critical applications. Here's an example: I service radio transmitter sites, often located in remote (rural) areas, and these site often have *NO* internet access at all, let alone high-speed connections. Many (actually, nearly all) of the software I use for servicing, installing and troubleshooting the high-power repeaters are proprietary Motorola local apps - meaning there is NO web app equivalent, nor will there ever be. So what happens when the world starts going to web apps? Well, I won't be able to do my job. And that's going to be bad news for both you and I in a very major way because my customers probably include your police, fire, and ambulance services. Imagine your local police department with no radio communications AT ALL because I can't fix it - that's really going to suck when someone's breaking into your house at 3 in the morning. A pretty high price to pay for convenience indeed.
This space for rent!
Offering OSS as Web services would validate the Web-services scheme as a means for commercial software vendors to collect monthly or annual SUBSCRIPTION fees for non-OSS software. That is a prospect over which software publishers have been salivating for years. The whole upgrade-or-else scheme to generate that cash flow and profits never really worked out, because too many stubborn SOBs like me looked at the bubblegum improvements in the upgrades and simply said, "Thanks, but no thanks." So they've been desperate to find another scheme. They've been watching the consistent cash flow and huge profits reaped by "content" publishers and thinking, "Geez, if only we could repackage our software as 'content', we could demand a subscription fee and make TONS of money." If Big Software can manage to "re-educate" people's perception of software, in the same way that, say, Big Pharma re-educates people about how to treat illness so that only their patented products seem viable (making people forget about folk medicine, etc.), then they'll win the war. Re-packaging software as Web services is actually Big Software's latest attempt at doing that, because Web services then "feel" more like content to people, and as we all know people are already indoctrinated to paying regular fees for content.
If OSS providers indulge in the same software-as-a-service route, it will validate that scheme and ultimately be handing a huge monetary victory to Big Software, a victory that will completely overshadow the small gains that OSS has made in recent years. Is that what we want?
The article makes a few interesting points. One thing I disagree with, however, is replacing the entire desktop with a browser. The problem this solution is attempting to solve is valid, however the implementation is terrible. He's got it backwards: It's not, "The Desktop is the Browser", it should be, "The Browser is the Desktop". The desktop has evolved the way it has for a reason. And it should be noted that the desktop is not a series of static tabs that replace each other when clicked. The Window metaphor has served pretty well for the last few decades because it mostly works. It will be enhanced and modified and eventually replaced, but it is still pretty solid. Case-in-point is the Symphony distribution's Mezzo, a Mozilla-based desktop environment. The entire interface is built in Javascript and XUL. The desktop would be able to fetch applications online and cache them in an Applications directory for re-use, meanwhile displaying them just as any other native resident application would be, in a way that is consistent and familiar to users. In a recent interview Mitchell Baker, Firefox's CEO, claimed the company is expecting to support offline web application usage. This means something similar to the WHATWG Web Application 1.0 spec where web-programs can save local sessions. The browser is already moving in this direction, we just need a better way of tying and presenting it to the desktop and users. The trend of web applications and dev technologies such as Microsoft's recently introduced Silverlight and Adobe's Flex--and of course Mozilla's Application Framework that has been using XML-based UI markup languages for almost a decade--are moves that support this idea.
"Progress comes from the intelligent use of experience."
Distributing a bunch of free software for use on any platform, both free and non-free, hampers the adoption of free software by providing less incentive to use a free system to access said software.
The current RIAA-controlled version of Napster has been using the slogan "Own nothing, have everything". Here's how an RIAA-controlled "linux" would work, when implemented as a "service".
/.
1) you'd get a very thin client that would resemble a cable-TV STB (Set Top Box) with a keyboard.
2) all data, including downloads, would reside on the central server.
3) all data, including downloads, would be periodically scanned for "copyright compliance".
4) all data, including downloads, would be periodically scanned for "homeland security compliance".
5) the client would *NOT* be able to
- download "your data" to a local device
- connect to an "unauthorized machine"
- run "unauthorized programs",
- make "unauthorized changes" to any config files, let alone to source code. That would actually be pointless, because compilers would be "unauthorized programs".
7) all "licenced video" would only be allowed to be sent to "authorized goggles" with HDCP DRM
8) all "licenced audio" would only be allowed to be sent to "authorized headphones" with HDCP-equivalent DRM
9) if you didn't pay your monthly bill, your access gets cut off. After falling behind 30 days, all of "your data" would be wiped
Oh yeah, since this is
10) Profit
I'm not repeating myself
I'm an X window user; I'm an ex-Windows user
I owned a 1981 Datsan 200SX. I could change the oil, filters, spark plugs, and (had I needed to) could have swapped out various components as needed without any degree of mechanical training, by reading the service manual (available at any auto parts store) and applying the simple lessons passed down by dear old Dad.
I own a 1998 Chevy S10 pickup. Changing the oil is still a pain, the filters, plugs, etc? Good luck. It's as if "they" decided to design their cars so that the average person couldn't service their own vehicles, but instead would be bound to take the thing in to an "authorized" service center for pricey servicing.
I have little desire to buy a new car these days, despite improvements in safety, fuel efficiency (haha) and whatnot. I won't be able to service it myself, even simple repairs will require a "specialist".
Why would I want my software choices to be so limited?
This idea seems a waste of time to me.
They would basically have to re-write the GUI/interface and network parts of the application in order for this to work.
Also, what about security? I don't want my spreadsheets of embezzled funds and my documents outlining my plans for world domination on someone else's server if it's not secure. I mean, any Hero hacker could look at my plans, and then it would be Ruined! RUINED I tells you.
It seems to download the entire apps and libs. That's something we should avoid. You don't need the entire app to run it. You need bits and pieces of it. Treat it as remote file and read it in blocks as they're executed or requested. That way you'll get better startup time and will be able to download the rest of the app later on.
Zero Install would be a huge improvement over the current state of affairs, though.
Web OSes, software-as-a-service, it all sucks. Why would enterprise software makers offer software-as-a-service? So they can have complete control over the software, completely lock it down, make you pay to lease it forever. I don't want my apps on some server somewhere I may sporadically fail to connect to, I don't want to send packets clear across North America just to read a fucking text file. And it's not like we've got some dire shortage of computing ability to force the centralization: my seven year-old computer has more than enough power and storage to do everything I need a computer to do.
Browsers suck for UI. They are made for viewing HTML, and any other purpose is strained at best. Why a crippled, slow Web OS through shitty UI when you have a modern, fully-optimized, local operating system already installed on your machine?
Tenemus pyrobolos atqui jacimus cognitiones.
....is "Why?"
as in why would anyone want to swap fast native apps running in local memory out of local disk for slow, bloated web apps running on a remote server over slow internet bandwidth, possibly on an overloaded server?
just as significantly, why would anyone want to store their documents on someone else's server, outside of their control?
What is the point of WebOS-es? You need an OS to run a browser, and then a browser to run an app. It sounds pretty bad. Just keep it the old fashioned way - your apps are on your disk, you access them whenever you like. Another thing is, with a web os, do you have web storage? And in that case, do you want the host of your app to be able to look at your data?
"If Linux distros disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would only have four years of life left."
-Albert Einstein
Um, "software as a service" is hardly revolutionary. Also hardly worth the bother.
The open-source community has had the infrastructure for "software as a service" since about 1993. It's called X11 and there are lots of applications for it. Since about 2003 No Machine's NX protocol has made it feasible and secure to deploy X11 applications over the Internet (even on a dial-up modem -- put that in your web browser's AJAX pipe and smoke it).
The only part that is "missing" is a "service" which you can log into that hosts and runs X11 applications. I'm pretty sure everybody knows why this is "missing" -- who would want to give up control of their data to use such a service? Not I.
However, if OP can identify a market that is willing to pay to access the services of open source software on your server infrastructure, and can pay for a server farm to host the services on, then no-one here will stop you. Good luck.
“Our opponent is an alien starship packed with nuclear bombs. We have a protractor.” — Neal Stepnenso
What Linux needs is not software as a service or using the browser as an interface. Linux needs automated network-transparent software distribution where modules are lazily downloaded and automatically updated.
Imagine wanting to install Open Office, for example: instead of downloading and installing the software, or (even worse) compiling it, you hit a button in some form that says 'run' and the OpenOffice main window appears almost immediately, and you start typing. When you first hit a button or a menu action, there is a slight delay, because the required module is downloaded, if it does not exist, or it is updated...but only the first time.
Installation should be completely automatic. The user should not indicate where to store the downloaded modules, the system will take care of that. The system will also keep versions of libraries so as that there are no conflicts. The system will be responsible for downloading modules updates lazily, when the user is not looking or when required. Integration with the host environment should be automatic, as well: the system will create start menu entries, shell actions and everything else required for the software to run.
Distribution would be automatic too: the developers should simply post the software updates to one or more software sites, where users can connect to and get new software.
Even compilation should happen automatically: the user should choose to run a package from source code, and the system takes care of compiling, storing and managing the result.
where would packages be build for people downloading packages in source, would that mean many people building the package for their system or multiple versions to cater for variations. What ideas do people think of for creating binary packages from source. Developers have a build environment to build and test their applications ... what about server setups and end users how do they use a suitable system. I know about rpm's requirements system which provides ways of making packages available. Would others please comment.
A sig is only as good as it's creator, that doesn't mean it is as good as it's creator.
If you got your internet service from "BS" Dot Com you wouldn't have wondered about Online Apps. You would be wondering daily if you could connect at all... Which does identify a serious problem with Online Apps. What if "online" isn't? Doh!
Hey world,
While I'm sure there are other reasons touted for moving to a software as a service model, is the primary reason not for these companies to adjust their business model to have a ongoing subscription-like revenue stream since people aren't upgrading applications like they use to do?
Later,
-Slashdot Junky
.
Landfill Mining Co.
Managing the (Un)natural Resources of Tomorrow
I think part of the problem with WebOS, is the desire to have everything hosted in a browser. While this may be a good-intended goal, the browser simply has too many limitations to let it really take the spot of a full-featured desktop application. Sure, people can try - but at the end of the day, unless heavy use of plugins start to come into play, it's not going to work.
.NET pro, I do recall playing around with a way of hosting an application on a webserver. I could run the exe on my desktop - it'd download everything as needed from the server. Later on, I could swap out the DLL on the server, re-run the desktop application - and I'd get a new interface/application/features/whatever.
Why not separate WebOS/software as service away from a browser-based OS, but simply thin-clients where the interface/data/logic is hosted on a service, and the client simply downloads the information as needed / when there are updates.
While I am no
This would allow for richer UI's, more responsiveness, while still leading to the benefits of Software as Service. Get the browser out of the picture and I can see a future in this, otherwise it's just a buzzword that's going to fall flat.
What a brain dead idea. Now I can run OSS on a nearly free old pc box for the price of a cheap internet connection (or even without it). Who's gonna pay for hosting those services? Me? Nah. And I'm not gonna look at your stinking ads either. That's a lame solution in search of non-existing problem. Guys who plan to sell your services are thinking about a)getting regular income from you b)fighting piracy in a more effective way. Well, they've got to live somehow. Why whould OSS community inflict that horror on itself?
ignore this fool. look. WE can host it anywhere we want. and by any means. as long as its legal. if you want vanilla, you know where to go. you want bleading edge or binary ONLY versions, you know where to go. THEY are trying to stop OUR way of thinking.... so learn to read the between the lines
Anyone remember Inferno and the IE Plugin they made for it? http://www.vitanuova.com/inferno/plugin/index.html
This is a full OS as a web plugin. Quite small and fast. If you want to "web-icize" linux, I'd suggest making a port of the linux kernel to a mozilla plugin, then write a console/X11 driver, and you're set. Now we can take advantage of all Linux tools in a browser, and we might finally have something better than all this Java / AJAX nonsense.