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350,000 Linux (Virtual) Desktops Land In Brazil
xufem writes "Millions of Brazilian schoolchildren will soon be 'brought up right' running Linux on over 350,000 seats each using PC sharing hardware and software from Userful and KDE. This is world's largest virtual desktop deployment and probably also the world's largest Linux deployment, and seems to have been selected over OLPC by Brazil. Definitely a moment to celebrate — and just in time for Brazilian Carnival which starts tomorrow!"
I am known by my friends as a UNIX bigot, but I need to inject a little sanity here. Running Linux on the desktop is not a precondition to a good upbringing. We all know it's the editor you use that determines that.
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The Brazilian government is really good in announcing things, but not really good in making them happen.
Ethanol.
Linux, you magnificent bastard, I read the fucking manual!
The place to look would be Extramdura in Spain, they have been using Linux for a long time. They claim very, very low costs. I don't have any recent posts but LWN wrote about it in 2003, and last time I heard it was still going strong.
I live in Brasil. This kind of things are announced from time to time, and the implementations varies. But they are mostly done. See for example the conversion of the government's computer to Linux. It was slow an irregular, but it was done, and it is working for some time know.
This is an issue that has been on media for quite some time, and it would be quite shameful if it failed again. I really think this time is for real.
The thing that really worries me is how these systems are going to be administrated. There aren't exactly a lot of Linux sysadmins here. If they aren't very careful about it (and they seldom are), we could end up with a huge expensive system badly misconfigured, that would just harm the kids and Linux's reputation.
Let me give you a real example. In my university, there are countless computer labs, and two of them run linux. One of them is run by be central administration of the exact sciences department. It is a bloody mess. They couldn't even get the user accounts working well, and its a heroic feat to get anything to compile there. The other lab, is run by the physics department. Mostly physics students that are hired to administrate it from time to time. Runs tighter than a duck's ass.
That said, it is really wonderful to get that mindshare, and for the first time kids won't be trained to think that windows is all that is.
entropy happens
But Gasoline is more cost-effective than Ethanol where I live, for instance.
Because:
1. While Gasoline is about 42% more expensive than Ethanol, the mpg is lower on Ethanol. So, to correclty compare prices, you have to multiply the gasoline price by 0.7. When I do that, Gasoline ends up being 5% cheaper.
2. There is no control over ethanol tampering in Brazil. Quite a few gas stations add a bit of water to the tanks, and the flexible fuel cars won't stop working because of that. You just get lower mileage.
3. The temperature in our region is lower (Hey, 25ÂC is SMOKING HOT for me). We actually have a bit of snow during the winter... and Ethanol doesn't play nicely with cold temperatures. The engine deals with it by adding gasoline to the mix.
Unless you live in Sao Paulo (where ethanol is 45% cheaper when comparing prices vs mileage), it's just not worth it.
Diesel cars, the ones that are truly efficient, are not allowed in Brazil. That is because while Brazil doesn't depend on others for heavy crude oil, we have to import ALL of our light crude oil... and diesel cars would screw up the import/export balance. What about biodiesel, you say? We barely have enough volume to replace the diesel used in our trucks, nevermind fueling cars.
350,000 virtual desktops is as meaningful as "The equivalent of 421 CD burners." Nowhere in the article does it actually give meaningful numbers like the maximum number of concurrent users, or the actual amount of server hardware, or what sort of workstations will be hosting those virtual desktops.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
This reminds me of the Apple ][ in school. Apple had a huge education discount back then. In hopes that kids will grow up with the Apple ][ and Macs and then will purchase them when they grow up. But the reverse effect happened. When they grew up they remembered all the problems they had when they were a kid and linked issues of the past with Apple (B&W screens (Most people I know still though well in the late 90's that all Macs were in Black and White), Incompatible floppy formats (Apple cant read IBM Disks, IBM Cant read Apple Disks), etc...) So using a PC seemed so much more modern, as the ones they used in schools as they were so budget conscious that they never updated their product line, still having Apple II well until the late 96 when they finally went with Windows 95 where the new PC's were so much better then the Apples.
This could have the same effect as well... Being a Virtual Desktop on a massive server over the Network it will seem slow and clunky to the kids especially once they are shown a modern Windows PC that their parents my have for work, or when they start to go to work. Also because Linux has much better security, when exposed to windows they will feel that it could do more.
So this could have the reverse effect on Linux Adoption.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
I disagree. Back when I was the sole IT guy for a factory, I figured about one fourth of my time was spent figuring out what licenses we had, which ones we needed, etc. The actual license costs are easily identified, but the admin time wasted dealing with licenses is not.
Let us not become the evil that we deplore.
The schools I attended from the late 80s through mid 90s had 5 to 10 Macs for every PC. In spite of this, there was usually a wait for Macs but never for PCs.
After we graduated, we found that the business world was 99% PCs, as it had been from day one, never having given Apple any serious consideration at all.
Most then went on to get the same kind of computer at home that they used at work because, as much of a pain as it is to use Windows, it's more of a pain to have to use both.
Then school boards started making noises, with some merit, that kids should learn in school what they'll be using in the real world. This caused many schools to switch to PCs.
This has nothing to do with technical merit and everything to do with first-mover advantage in the right market (personal computers for business).
Also, running virtual desktops over the network is not necessarily slow and clunky. Have you tried it? I've been doing it for years.
Well, an anecdote does not make a pattern. Ethanol is cheaper than gasoline on almost the entire brazilian territory. Except for, it seems, where it snows (You realize we are talking about some 2% of the territory here, and some very unusual 2%, don't you?). Now, did you take into account that gasoline also lacks quality control, and is some times mixed with kinds of solvents that, differently from water, damage your motor?
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PP said:
Wonderfully understated. But in this case, taking it further is interesting. So here I go...
Brazil's government has achieved a bunch of really aggressive goals in recent years. Let's start with the ones in energy independence...
* Ethanol is a viable fuel, being based on sugar cane and not corn. It's been that way for a while now.
* New cars in Brazil are now sold with engines that are equally happy burning gasoline or ethanol or a mix (or, with a conversion, natural gas - see below)
* Natural gas, originally imported via a pipeline from Bolivia, and now with big reserves found in Brazil, presents another alternative fuel with environmental, financial, and geopolitical advantages over petroleum. The pipeline was announced and then successfully executed. Exploiting Brazil's own natural gas was a new challenge. The programs were announced and then successfully executed.
* Over 95% of Brazil's electrical energy comes from hydroelectric plants. Hydroelectric projects were announced and then executed successfully.
* Total independence from foreign petroleum. Planned, announced, done.
Changing from energy, there are other things, like the...
* massive migration to FOSS going on since the early days of the Lula government (2003-present). I saw with my own two eyes huge numbers of Linux desktops at ITI (Information Technology Institute) and other government offices in 2005-2007. This one is still in the process of happening, and faces very well-funded opposition (from MS and friends), but despite that, it's been successful. Announced and made to happen.
* A more stable (and, not coincidentally, better-regulated) banking system than the one in the USA
* Health care policy that has basically done away with the black market for transplant organs, maintained the viability of what is widely considered the best AIDS policy in the world, and brought the benefits of generic drugs to the Brazilian people. All planned, announced, and executed successfully.
* A GROWING middle class. Tens of millions of people have joined the middle class of Brazil in the last several years. Growing the middle class is often a stated goal, but rarely achieved as spectacularly as it has been in Brazil in recent years
* I would also mention that the Brazilian government paid off close to $20B in loans early just in the year 2005, meeting the goal of reducing foreign debt, which the previous governments seemed to love, and saving something on the order of 10^9 dollars in interest payments. Goal announced, goal achieved.
Every place has its advantages and disadvantages, and wherever you go, the deal is the same: you've got to try to make the most of the advantages and minimize the effects of the disadvantages. Brazil's advantages and disadvantages are different from those of the US. But to say the Brazilian government isn't good at making things happen is just wrong. I hate to pull out a mean word, but here it is: saying the Brazilian government, especially in the last several years, isn't good at making things happen, is just plain ignorant.
In early 2003, the US invaded Iraq to save the world from Saddam Hussein's supposed stocks of weapons of mass destruction, and to fight a war against terrorism and bring peace, stability, and democracy to the Middle East. I remember the announcements. I also remember announcements of how the economic policy would continue US economic dominance into the 21st Century. I'm a US citizen, so I know the answer to this question as I ask it: how are those goals workin' out for ya? Is terrorism down in the last several years? Was the haul of WMDs worth the multi-trillion dollar cost of the stupidest war ever, plus the destabilization of the region? I guess by mentioning the destabiliz
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