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Ask Mark Shuttleworth Anything
In addition to founding Canonical Ltd., the Ubuntu Foundation, and funding the Freedom Toaster, Mark Shuttleworth is a space enthusiast. In April 2002 Mark became the second self-funded space tourist and the first African in space. He spent eight days participating in experiments on the International Space Station as part of his $20 million trip. Now he's ready to answer your questions. Ask him anything you like, but please limit yourself to one question per post.
Once Steam for Linux comes out on Ubuntu, what is the first game you will download and play?
sudo make me a sandwich
I heard a story of you sitting in on a LUG dressed in a Darth Vader mask so people wouldn't recognise you until the end of the talk. Do you find that people treat you very differently now that you are famous, and seeing that a lot of people take exception to the direction you have taken Ubuntu? How do you deal with this, and what steps do you take to make sure you stay grounded in reality?
Help I am stuck in a signature factory!
Dude. Really. WTF?
"Can entropy be reversed?"
Dude. Really. WTF?
Although it doesn't fully address "WTF?", he has spoken about this in prior interviews:
DM: Ubuntu has adopted a new user interface called Unity. That seems well suited to tablet devices. Is this part of a plan to extend Ubuntu on tablets and other mobile computing and touch-based platforms?
MS: We haven’t said that, and it’s not the right time for me to say any such thing. [Laughs.] But if you look at it, Unity is born of an era where touch is important, and we’ve done quite a bit of work around touch generally and it brings a level of clarity and device-like simplicity to Linux desktops that just hadn’t been there before.
DM: Unity has attracted a fair share of criticism.
MS: Sure, it created something of a storm. The idea for us was we wanted to bring design-led engineering to the Linux desktop so we followed a fairly rigorous process of design. That meant testing assumptions and evaluating each little change on the basis of some realistic test of how people reacted to change. It is a fairly radical shift from where we were previously but we can see a fairly clear roadmap of where we want to get to over the next few months and years and not all of that is evident in the release so far.
[Unity] has raised the bar for usability on the Linux desktop. That’s not to say it’s without its issues. There are some quite definite issues in that first release, but when we did a detailed review of that versus the alternatives, it came out well ahead. It was the right one for us to ship at the time.
My work here is dung.
Hi Mark! It seems based on your blog and other sources that an Ubuntu tablet is definitely planned and should be in the works at least sometime in the next year. When do you think consumers will be able to walk into any decently-sized electronic store and pick up an Ubuntu-based tablet?
"What lies behind us, and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us." Ralph Waldo Emerson
Since you like to comment on both government interaction with businesses and seem to be interested in space travel, what is the appropriate level of the government's role in space? Can you define what is too little and what is too far? What, if anything, should each nation regulate? Are nationalistic programs and races good for space travel or should it just all be privatized and given a sort of 'international waters' anything goes freedom?
My work here is dung.
Will Ubuntu ever be a certified platform for running Oracle databases?
You're a temporary arrangement of matter sliding towards oblivion in a cold, uncaring universe
who do we blame for the Unity UI?
(Insert my standard question for all ask /. tech people)
Describe a hack that you personally participated in that you find cool. Not you paid someone to ... or I once saw someone else ... or you bought something cool that ... I mean traditional hack like "identify problem" "flash of insight in ur brain" "minutes to days of sweat using techie tools" "something cool now exists, lookit". I don't care about the subject as long as its vaguely slashdot style technical and you think its cool and the slashdot audience would think its cool. The coolest hack is not necessarily the biggest or most famous, either. Maybe you have a hobby where you personally programmed the worlds coolest christmas light display on your house, or you handmade a truly elaborate model railroad fully articulated draw bridge, I donno, whatever floats your boat. TLDR just tell your hack story, and make it cool.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Do you feel that Ubuntu might be losing its way amongst the more technical users with some of the decisions that are being made? For example, forcing a beta-level UI onto users for 3 versions of Ubuntu from 11.04-12.04, integrating paid search results from Amazon etc. Linux Mint, which is rapidly growing in popularity, would seem to be a backlash against Unity and is a splintering of Ubuntu (in fact the vast majority of packages are identical to Ubuntu). Do you therefore feel that Ubuntu's popularity has reached its peak and is at risk of stagnating or declining?
SURELY NOT!!!!!
Linux is a huge success in mobile. Linux is a huge success in servers (and Ubuntu in particular seems to be doing very well in servers, congratulations).
But Linux on the desktop seems to be going nowhere fast as far as market share is concerned.
In your opinion, what would have to happen in order for Linux to start gaining ground in the desktop?
Can you tell me which computer to buy so that Ubuntu upgrades won't break? (arguably the question most people who have been raped by ubuntu upgrade breakages want to ask).
Lots of distributions are moving to systemd. Why not try to merge some of the upstart functionality into systemd, as it looks like a superior design, and use it rather than developing a parallel but incompatible alternative?
Over the last several years, Microsoft has done much to close the gap in terms of performance, stability and security. What do you see as Ubuntu/Linux's primary selling points on the desktop now, as opposed to the early years of the Ubuntu project when Windows had significant problems in these areas?
Ubuntu has made decisions that have been less than popular with the Free-software only crowd. Personally, I benefit from these decisions, for example, via easy access to Nvidia and Broadcom drivers on my laptop, but I also see the importance of the other side of the argument. What is your short- and long-term perspective on including restricted drivers and non-free software in Ubuntu? Is your approach simply pragmatic, do you hope to bring long-term change in industry practises by making free software a viable and important desktop platform, or something else entirely? Thanks!
Indeed. I know a white South African who is now a US citizen. He annoys HR guys.
HR: "So, it says here you're African-American."
Him: "Yup."
HR: "...but you're white."
Him: "You never asked my skin color. My parents are South African. I was born in South Africa. I grew up in South Africa. I spent much of my adult life in South Africa. I've since immigrated to the US and am a US citizen. How could I be anything other than African-American?"
HR: "..."
Ask him anything you like, but please limit yourself to one question per post.
What part of one question per post did you not understand?
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
I used Linux for over a decade as my main OS, eventually ending up on Ubuntu. When I started using Linux, it had a reputation for being rock-solid and about as stable as you can possibly get, and I was happy with that. Newer hardware wasn't supported very well, but older hardware support was unparalleled. This was also reflected in the beginning of Ubuntu - I seem to recall you had a push to make sure the hardware on every laptop model was supported as best it could be.
However as the years progressed, I found Linux becoming more and more buggy and unstable. The final straw was when I tried to upgrade Ubuntu, and not only had I lost hardware support for several things, but there were even crashes upon loading the LiveCD installer (this was solid hardware that lasted for a couple more years). I bounced around trying to find the stability from years ago, but never found it. Today, I'm using OS X, which is far more stable than Linux in the last few years I was using it.
What happened?
Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
Have you talked with Adobe about bringing the Creative Suite (or parts of it) to Ubuntu? Please don't point to open source alternatives in your answer.
two parter:
1. Do you think the touch screen interface already the standard on phones and tablets will replace the traditional standard of keyboard & mouse interface on desktops/laptops in the next 5 years, 10 years, 20 years?
2. On a desktop/laptop, do you think a touch screen interface would be as functional/productive/efficient as keyboard & mouse?
thanks
Why doesn't Ubuntu include Android emulation so people can run their vast catalog of Android apps on their laptop, tablet or the like?
Now that Ubuntu's kernel & GNU tools run Dalvik, PulseAudio has an AudioFlinger API, and Ubuntu creates its own notification system... if a few other libraries gain some APIs then an Ubuntu tablet would natively run Android applications. This could easily push a native Linux userspace into the mainstream. Do you think it should be done?
Science & open-source build trust from peer review. Learn systems you can trust.
except that Unity presents the user with the same ilk of garbage UI that windows 8 has. Follow the leader as they auger into the ground.....
Actually, that is not true. Real world studies show that Windows users don't have too difficult of a time with Unity. The "lens" button needs to be more prevalent and it would be better if the menus didn't disappear but overall, the interface is fairly useable for the average desktop user (which may not mean the average linux user). Windows 8, on the other hand does not test so well.
but here goes...is Canonical financially solvent? If it is why did you burn so much good will that you had with the users by allowing the Amazon search which doesn't even have an adult filter that works so that kids can be exposed to inappropriate, in violation of Amazon's own rules which state you have to be 18+ to use their market?
And if Canonical currently isn't in the black, how much will it take to make it a cash positive company? did the Amazon deal bring in enough, or is there gonna have to be MORE ads and MORE revenue making apps baked into Ubuntu to make the company solid financially?
Watch me get modded down for daring not to ask the cutesy ass kissing questions like what are being modded up here, but when one has the head of a company on the horn, and I don't give a damned WHICH company it is, one ought to ask the hard questions and use the opportunity to get some real answers.
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.