2009, Year of the Linux Delusion

gadgetopia writes "An article has come out claiming (yet again) that 2009 will be the year of Linux, and bases this prediction on the fact that low-power ARM processors will be in netbooks which won't have enough power to run Windows, but then says these new netbooks will be geared to 'web only' applications which suits Linux perfectly. And, oh yeah, Palm might save Linux, too." The article goes on to skewer the year of Linux thing that seems to show up on pretty much every tech news site throughout December and January as lazy editors round out their year with softball trolling stories and "Year End Lists." We should compile a year-end list about this :)

Comments

Re:No 2009 is not the year of desktop LInux but ..

[Xabraxas]

I almost forgot. The author says that Linux doesn't have all the available plugins to enjoy the web. What plugins is he talking about? The most commonly used plugin is Flash and it has been available for a while. Java is available too and Silverlight support is close to done the last time I looked. Which magical plugins am I missing on my Linux laptop? Whatever they may be they haven't seemed to hinder me yet.

Somewhat related...

[IANAAC]

... which is to start marching to the tune of the large businesses that design these killer apps. When you convince Adobe to release all their products on Linux, and Blizzard to release their games on Linux, etc., then we'll be getting somewhere. But the community won't, because those companies have already made it clear what their terms and conditions are and we won't compromise.

I'm pretty much a full time Linux user, save for times when I want to do music production. I've spent a ton of money of Windows music software, and feel like I shouldn't abandon it. So last month I happened upon JAD and Ubuntu Studio (two music-oriented distros). Let me tell you, they work. And they were set up by the community, not big corporations. More importantly, they allow me to use all my expensive VSTs/VSTis quite easily. The last time I had tried to manually set up a real-time kernel environment that could actually use ASIO, I gave up in frustration. I just could not get all the pieces working. Now because of these two communities, the install took about an hour, plus the install of all my VSTs.

And I get better latency on this machine than I ever did using WinXP.

Granted, this is pretty niche, but apparently big enough for two different non-commercial developer communities to create specialized distros. And you see it with commercial companies as well - Cedega for gaming, Crossover for business apps.

So yeah, corps are important for mass adoption, but don't discount the communities.

Re:Think Different!

[Gerzel]

In fact XFCE has an entire Unbuntu distro shown prominently on their site as an alternate to the standard version.

There again I suppose actually looking at the website and what you are downloading is too much research.

*continues to brandish herbs and a bar of soap at grandparent*

Re:Think Different!

[kaosfury]

I'm not exactly sure where you got your information on XP, or what your experience is with it, but I would not classify a 1GHz pc with 128MB of RAM a GREAT setup for XP. It is a minimal setup for usability. It will work, but not with any kind of speed. On the other hand, XFCE or fluxbox window managers on Linux will be quite happy with that hardware. To be REALLY fair, no modern system will be blazing with those specs.

Also, I don't know when the last time you did a Linux configuration was, but it is far more simple than it was a year or two ago. I have not had any of the "massive, time-costly research" that you indicated in any of my many installs this year.

As soon as people agree that every OS sucks, we can get on with our lives and forget this petty bickering.

Re:There was a time when Linux sucked ...

[argiedot]

Skype for Linux has had video calls since the beta last year.

Hear! Hear!

[p.rican]

This article is so one-sided it's not even funny:

Of course, Windows XP has shown that it handles netbooks with aplomb, and works with the web best of all, thanks to having all the browsers, plug-ins, downloads and more you could ever want, something you just canâ(TM)t claim with good old Linux.

He obviously has not used any Linux distro within the past 2-3 years. A plain vanilla install of Ubuntu, Fedora or even OpenSolaris can do all of that and then some. For free (as in beer).

Re:Foundations

[Shotgun]

It's frustrating, because you're doing it totally wrong.

You say you've got Ubuntu installed. Look for a program called Synaptic, or Adept. It'll ask for your root password when you start it.

Once it is running, look around for a search bar. Type what you want to do in the search bar. Not the name of the program, what you want to do. In this case, instead of 'firefox' you would type in 'web browser'.

You'll get a list of programs that may or may not meet your needs. Read the descriptions. Choose to install what you think will be interesting. Most programs are set up to put an icon on your start bar menu.

As a new user, your better off only getting programs from the official repositories. Once you've got your feet under you, it's not to hard to stray, but stay where it is safe for the time being. All the dependancies and such have already been worked out for you.

Adept/Synaptic/Yum ARE the killer apps for Linux.