Red Hat to Enter the Desktop Market

head_dunce writes "It looks like Red Hat is going to release their Global Desktop Linux in September and give Ubuntu a challenge for the Linux desktop market. Red Hat Global Desktop 'would be sold with a one-year subscription to security updates.'" It looks like another choice for the proverbial Aunt Tillie. The release is being delayed in order to provide greater media compatibility, "to permit users to view a wide range of video formats on their computers."

Comments

A day late and a dollar short.

[gumpish]

Red Hat Global Desktop 'would be sold with a one-year subscription to security updates.'

Hmmm, let's see... on the one hand I can start paying for updates after 12 months.... on the other hand I get free updates for 18 months (or 36 months for LTS releases).

Maybe the execs at Red Hat need to update their hat size as whatever they're wearing appears to be cutting off circulation to their brains.

Re:A day late and a dollar short.

[rudegeek]

Hmmm, let's see... on the one hand I can start paying for updates after 12 months.... on the other hand I get free updates for 18 months (or 36 months for LTS releases).

Yes, but maybe, just maybe, you'll get some form of support except packages update? You know? Ability to call call center or whatever? I was never a RH follower but I say, give them a benefit of doubt in their desktop market reapperance.

I want to see more good offering on Linux desktop. And RH has muscle to push some changes. They have quite a good brand and following of loyal customers in a business setting.

Maybe the execs at Red Hat need to update their hat size as whatever they're wearing appears to be cutting off circulation to their brains.

I invite you to do grep -r "@redhat.com" . in few bigger FOSS projects. Yeah, I bet they are all stupid. Running so big FOSS-based company. How do they feed them self? Amazing!

Re:A day late and a dollar short.

[mikael]

Hmmm, let's see... on the one hand I can start paying for updates after 12 months.... on the other hand I get free updates for 18 months (or 36 months for LTS releases).

Business people like accountability, and the ability to see that a problem is under control. Being able to
tell them that you have arranged for a field engineer scheduled to visit, or that the support team is working on the problem, is more reassuring to them than saying that that you have sent out an E-mail to a discussion group to see if anyone else has had a similar problem. To them, either you are the person to fix the problem or you can't.

Re:A day late and a dollar short.

[squiggleslash]

That's right. We should all try to price everything identically and then somehow end up with choices of different products and services that cater to different needs despite all of that.

Well, maybe not. Perhaps we should see what RedHat plans to produce that justifies the expense. Me, personally, I've subscribed to pay services in lieu of free services because I felt the pay service was worth spending money on, it wasn't excessively priced, and I'd rather support an organization dedicated to providing me with a service than one that ultimately is responsible only to itself, or to a myriad of advertisers with their own agendas.

I'm not knocking Ubuntu, and without seeing RedHat's product, it's impossible for me to judge as to whether it'll be worth the money, but the notion that we can make that judgement right now purely on the basis of cost per month of service is ridiculous.

Re:A day late and a dollar short.

[init100]

Canonical has done a great job of building a community that is loyal

A community that happily piss on other Linux users because they are not using Ubuntu. That is quite a strong turn-off.

It would be one thing if they were few and far between, but every time there is a story about a non-Ubuntu distro, there are a whole lot of comments like

Are they still alive? Why the heck are those users not using Ubuntu instead? Ubuntu FTW! Ubuntu, Ubuntu, Ubuntu!

and

The problem with <distro XXXX> is that it isn't Ubuntu.

More choice

[bvimo]

Another quality distro for the desktop is good news.

Re:More choice

[ettlz]

The only people stuck in RPM Hell are those too ignorant to learn how to use rpm or yum.

Re:More choice

[rudegeek]

RPM is not a distro, for fuck sake. It's a package format. You know? Files and metadata? Can we stop this 'RPM is bad, think about children!' stuff?

Old RPM tools had problems, sure. But new package manager was developed past last few years. They do mostly what APT do. Yet, you're still confused abut APT/Yum(or whatever) and .deb/.rpm

/. should be filled with people aware of difference between package format and package manager, or am I wrong?

Re:More choice

[free space]

[rant]

The last desktop version I used for RedHat was 8.0
It was horrible. While SuSE and Mandrake were becoming more and more desktop friendly, RedHat was still stuck in the late 90's era look and feel.

The problem? RedHat was the defacto Linux standard and every Linux advocate I know recommended it instead of the more friendly options. I believe this drove a lot of potential Linux users away and gave the idea that Linux was ugly and unusable.

[/rant]

I haven't used later versions of RH or Fedora so all this might have changed. But if RH want to get back to the Desktop game, I hope they learn a lesson from all the other user friendly distributions and provide something more than a sever OS disguised as a desktop OS this time.

Re:More choice

[KingSkippus]

The only people stuck in RPM Hell are those too ignorant to learn how to use rpm or yum.

Because, of course, average computer users who just want to check e-mail, write a few letters now and then, and browse the web should be proficient at using a tool that, although created with the best of intentions, is still pretty onerous even to more experienced users in order to install and update software...

With attitudes like this, it's no wonder Microsoft is still the desktop leader. Say what you want, but except for DRM, at least when they see a usability problem in their software, instead of sitting back and talking about how ignorant the users are, hoping that someday maybe the users will be more motivated to learn something they shouldn't have to, they actually work to make their software work the way people expect it to.

RedHat Panic

[Anonymous Coward]

This has "OMG Ubunutu is getting so much press, we need some of that action quick or they'll own the market!" panic written all over it.

Re:RedHat Panic

[Anonymous Coward]

Agreed. And it's sad in a way.

The diversity and chaos of the Linux scene is a great benefit for people who know how to deal with it, but a major obstacle to adoption for people who don't. With Ubuntu, it seems for the first time, a lot of factors are coming together that makes the choices a lot easier for the wanna be Linux user.
Instead of complicated discussion weighing the pros and cons of all the distros, the community has started to speak with a single voice. Just try Ubuntu. (I say it all the time, though I don't use it myself.)

This is good. It shields to noob from the chaos. When the noob has grown used to linux as such, the diversity will be there waiting to be exploited.

So, if it is as you say, that red hat maybe wants to get in on it before Ubuntu completely captures the noob-distro of choice position, it will hurt adoption rates (if they are successful anyway) because the difficult choices have resurfaced again.

Wake Us Up When...

[Anonymous Coward]

Redhat, when you actually sit down and do the real work to bring Linux up to the level of commercial desktops and not just another halfassed repackaging of your existing Linux distro people will actually give a damn.

Here you go Redhat:

http://www.fayerwayer.com/archivo/2005/03/tiger_sc reen.jpg

* Perfect desktop acceleration right out of the box with the user having to touch NOTHING to get it to work

* Application packages in /Applications or something similar

* Full drag and drop application installation and removal

* OS X level or font rendering support right out of the box

* IB equivalent complete with auto spacing and hints so developers can finally make Linux apps that aren't jarring to the eye

* Complete set of iApp replacements - same visual polish and features sets as Apple has - plug in a digital camera, it just works

* And the thousands of other things that make buying a commercial desktop worth the money

What's that Redhat? That would actually require work and lots of hard choices?

That's what we thought...

Re:Wake Us Up When...

[MrHanky]

Application folders and "drag and drop installation" won't work on Linux, as you can't know which libraries are installed on the computer, and in which version. Say you want to install the Kword 2.0 beta. This depends on the kdelibs 4.0 (beta) and the Koffice libs. With an app folder approach, the Kword 2.0 beta would have to package those libraries as well. And so would all the other apps depending on those libraries. Or, of course, they could all be one huge package with lots of stuff you don't need.

There is another approach, of course, which is that of Apple: You know mostly which libraries are installed on the system, since they are all part of the OS, but when there is an application depending on a newer version of the libraries, you have to pay Apple for a newer version of the whole OS as well. This is easy enough if you have a monopoly on that particular platform, but then you also have a proprietary platform. Red Hat doesn't have that privilege.

What you want is obviously a Mac. Then get a Mac.

Re:Wake Us Up When...

[ciroknight]

"Application folders and "drag and drop installation" won't work on Linux..."

I think what you meant to say was "that won't work across Linux OSes." It'd work perfectly fine for one distro, or one distro-family based on one common repository that is in lock-step for API/ABI compatibility. It'd work perfectly fine in the Ubuntu family of OSes, for example, but take that same package and try to install it on, let's say Red Hat, and it all goes out the window.

Believe it or not, we've already solved this problem with Package Management. Whether we dress up the package as a nice little icon, or we put its name in a list with hundreds of others, or allow you to install it through the command line just by knowing its name, it really doesn't make any difference at all. Synaptic could have just as easily worked by adding icons for each of the programs it allows to be installed, and letting you drag them over into some "Applications" folder, and have it in the background run all of the necessary steps to install that application. It doesn't really matter how you present it to the user, just as long as it's friendly and very easy to use.

Not necessarily

[KingSkippus]

This isn't necessarily true.

As an extreme example, look at all the choices in Microsoft's lineup. I've said it before on here, but as "the computer guy" that my friends and family turn to for advice, I wanted to kill them when they had out two versions named Windows 2000 and Windows Millennium Edition. Sure, I know the difference, but I'm paid good money to know these things. I had friends who were actually considering "upgrading" from Windows 2000 to Windows ME until I told them what a hideous idea that was.

I'm all for choices for the educated public and competition to keep the desktop Linux market on their toes, but for typical non-gurus, I'm really hoping that one distribution makes it as the clear desktop distribution leader.

(And personally, I hope and think that it will be Ubuntu. It's a lot more intuitive to use than RedHat, IMHO, and I have a lot of respect for Mark Shuttleworth.)

Beyond the average user

[HangingChad]

The release is being delayed in order to provide greater media compatibility

As much as I like Ubuntu, getting some of the media types working was a royal pain. The average user would have difficulty and they certainly don't understand the legal reasons for the exclusion.

Proprietary file formats are from the devil.

Re:All I want in a linux distro is...

[siride]

Talk to the patent owners or the legal system, not the distros. They're just doing what they have to do.

Uh oh

[DogDude]

This isn't a good sign. They just got finished dumping their desktop version, and now they're making another one? Sounds like their management is starting to flounder. Either they're a desktop software company, or they're not. They've already left the market, and only a few years later, they're re-inventing the wheel to get back in? That's crazy. It reminds me of Sun "The network is the computer. No it's not." Microsystems.

Excellent News

[ratboy666]

This will be accepted as a "tier 1" supported platform by ATI, nVidia, and other "binary only" vendors immediately.

Basing on Redhat/Fedora/RHEL means a lot of stabilty. Having "legal" video support in a different branch means that Fedora can pursue the free software goal without being distracted by critics calling for non-free features. "Fedora sucks - it doesn't do MP3 and DVD out of the box" goes away (hopefully). The answer becomes "If you want non-free, go Global".

I hate the name, though. Indeed, Global will be a competitor to Ubuntu, but I would much rather have a "hat" name. From the summary, I would recommend Tilley.

Re:They better hurry

[__aajwxe560]

Of course it doesn't help with the Apple-like secrecy the company seems to be putting around the product (an attempt to try and drum up interest?). I work with their products everyday, and this is the first I have even heard of this. Their own web site only seems to have a single press release from back in May (http://www.redhat.com/about/news/prarchive/2007/g lobal_desktop.html). For an open source company, no alphas, no betas, no hints as to what sets it apart from their new Red Hat 5 Linux Desktop (http://www.redhat.com/rhel/desktop/)? I suspect it includes Mugshot and a few other consumer'ish goodies, but with so little info, who really knows.

Deja Vu

[spiritraveller]

I seem to recall Red Hat already being in the desktop market at one point.

Didn't they basically throw it away already?

Isn't the reason why Ubuntu was able to take the lead was because Red Hat left a huge gaping hole in the category of "Most Popular Desktop Linux Distro?"

Re:CentOS

[lordtoran]

These "clones" don't threaten Red Hat's business, because they don't come with these all-in-one support options that businesses love. Plus they have to contribute modified code back, so it's even a kind of win-win situation.

YALD

[wwmedia]

we dont need Yet Another Linux Distro, there are plenty already! we need them developers join a bigger project like Ubuntu and Suse and not reinvent the wheel over and over

Re:CentOS

[Pharmboy]

And how long before RedHat back pedals and screws us, like they did those of us who bought support contracts for RH9? Sorry, we have several servers with paid support that just got stranded, and then given the choice of paying 5 times more, or using Fedora, which isn't ready and had spotty support after a year.

No, I think not RedHat. I got to explain to the owner why you left me high and dry once. Never again. I will keep using CentOS because I was weened on RH, gladly paying for the box set of every major release since 4.x because I wanted to support FOSS and still do. I pay others when I need a second opinion, or just in over my head on a particular want/desire, but not RedHat.

This always hits a nerve with me, and thousands of us who were abandoned by RH the first go around. We were loyal small server users for many years, then was told to 'eat cake', and choke on Fedora we did.