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Canonical's Troubles With the Free Software Community
puddingebola (2036796) writes "Bruce Byfield looks back at the soured relationships between Canonical and the free software community. Partly analysis, partly a review of past conflicts, the writer touches on Mir and Wayland, and what he sees as Canonical's attempts to take over projects. From the article, 'However, despite these other concerns, probably the most important single reason for the reservations about Ubuntu is its frequent attempts to assume the leadership of free software — a position that no one has ever filled, and that no one particularly wants to see filled. In its first few years, Ubuntu's influence was mostly by example. However, by 2008, Shuttleworth was promoting the idea that major projects should coordinate their release schedules. That idea was received without enthusiasm. However, it is worth noting that some of those who opposed it, like Aaron Seigo, have re-emerged as critics of Mir — another indication that personal differences are as important as the issues under discussion.'"
The second any one party becomes big enough, or popular enough, to start making meaningful changes in the way Linux is implemented in their distributions, the knives come out.
Back when these guys were best buddies with KDE and GNOME, both orgs thought this was a perfectly fine plan. Things have since heavily soured.
... they and Shuttleworth disappeared up their own backsides in a blinding flash of self importance and inability to listen to users (Unity - the OSS version of Windows 8 Metro, need I say more). I'm afraid their We Know Best doesn't tend to adhere them to many people and I suspect they've now peaked in terms of their importance in the free software world and will slowly fade away as the years go by.
yeah.
Ubuntu started projects used to get adopted, as time went on, they went more off the walls, and their projects became tainted.
The Mir thing is really upsetting to me as a user, because Wayland has demonstrated the ability to take feedback and adapt, making the whole split seem like lies.
Wayland really seems like a smartly run project handled very well, that seems to be a huge mistake.
Even if in principal I like the idea of Android drivers working, I think Wayland has been working on that too though.
Upstart vs Systemd I have no specific opinion of (though systemd I think addresses a security risk designed into upstart), but at this point upstart is done, everyone else has chosen, even those that initially used upstart (Fedora).
They need to take credit (even false) for spreading ideas (upstart, actually using wayland, experimenting with what it can and cannot do), and use what gets settled on, unless there truly is something missing.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
Ubuntu is switching to systemd:
http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/1316
Lets hope they'll eventually switch to Wayland, too.
Unfortunately it also remains true that Ubuntu is the most usable Linux distro out there for the "I'm not afraid of computers, but also don't have the time to learn Linux, I just need a working environment and the ability to quickly google stuff" crowd.
'... probably the most important single reason for the reservations about Ubuntu is its frequent attempts to assume the leadership of free software ... [S]ome of those who opposed it, like Aaron Seigo, have re-emerged as critics of Mir â" another indication that personal differences are as important as the issues under discussion.'
Seeing the same critics reappear does not necessarily mean it is a personal difference. It really only indicates that the underlying disagreement remains. Mark Shuttleworth believes in centralization of authority, Open Source is implicitly about decentralization of authority. That is a difference with Mark Shuttleworth's world view; as long as he holds it, and particularly when he tries to be the central authority, he will not fit in the Open Source world. That is not personal in the sense of holding a grudge, but it won't change unless Mark genuinely embraces the decentralized nature of this method of software development.
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And Unity isn't terrible, as long as they keep things easily replaceable (by using Wayland etc. under it), they have real potential I think.
What they are doing with phone has real promise too. They really need to work within the system though. KDE is working on similar things with Plasma (netbook, vs desktop, vs active), it'd be great if at least some of the work between the two is sharable. Not just great, but part of the platonic idea of FOSS.
Wow, sent an e-mail as suggested when clicking on "use classic" banner, and got a fast response that addressed my msg
... I gave a chance to Unity about 3 months ago, with 12.04 LTS. I liked the desktop disposition (Mac global menu with side launcher), and the general integrated look and feel. Use of apt-get is really nice (as in Debian), and with use of PPAs I can keep almost all my software update to date in a global way. Almost all configurations are simple, which helps new users. Driver support is good (I just had to setup the hybrid graphical cards with Bumblebee). In the other side, I thought the fonts were a bit big, and I don't like the dark theme. How to text font sizes? Install third part software. How to install new themes? Install other third part software (themes is one of the most cool features of Linux DEs!). Can I change the duration of notification? Re-position launcher? No, no, only using more third part softwares. But ok, in my mind, all the problems can be fixed in the future. Then I started to look into launchpad to see the bugs opened, and the future plans. Almost all important issues related to Unity are still open, with almost no comments from Canonical (usually in KDE we have an official dsposition after few hours). Most of Canonical efforts then are focused in "convergence", which my question is "who asked for?". As the future Ubuntu phones will not use the same desktop applications, why I need a new Linux based device? I'd love if Canonical works in better integration with Android: the MTP support is a joke (stop to work after few minutes), and would be nice to attend my mobile calls with my desktop headset, read my SMS on systray, etc. I think that offer a better support for the most popular linux based mobile will be a nice flag. And then, I tested the new Ubuntu version. And I saw that I have Amazon over all the places: in desktop search, in the launcher, all activated by default. Why this? In these days of all the concerns about NSA and privacy, why not sell the "you're using an open source product with all the privacy concerns" flag? If they want financial support, why not allow users to donate, like on KDE? (I'm a KDE e.V. member). I remember too, the old Mandrake club, where users have access few days earlier than "normal" users. In my minds, it's a shame that the most talked Linux distribution has enabled, by default, a shareware scheme. And the worst: the dash search do not works well. I have avidemux installed, and if I type "demu", I got nothing. If I want to run the calculator, and I type "calc", I'll get "OpenOffice Calc" as first result. So, I mean, I can understand when Canonical choose the Unity way. Gnome team is out of this planet, removing all basic features from applications, and forcing a tablet/mobile interface too. But I cannot understand why force the shareware behavior, or other duplicate efforts, like Mir, Ubuntu mobile, etc.
No. The idea was to make things easier for upstream. If every distro pulling in for example VLC at the same time, VLC would have less of a problem coordinating all the issues. Problem is everyone is so blinded by their canonical hate that they don't see these good ideas that they come out with.
systemd is from Red Hat. It was adopted by other distros because they believed it solved a problem, not because Red Hat tried to tell others that they must use it.
"I use a Mac because I'm just better than you are."
I think rather quickly, Linux Mint Debian Edition will rise to greater prominence, eclipsing even the Ubuntu-based Mint for the same reasons.
Interesting point on lack of business and video suites buy why blame Linux for that. When vendors look to port their apps, Windows and Mac are considered, forget Linux. For crying out loud, ever tried to use a web app like Netflix! Supported by everything but Linux. Many vendors are scared to death of Linux and open source with other vendors pushing FUD so nothing gets done. Find a way to overcome all the "haters" and may have something.
As for replacements, I agree. For personal use, other than Netflix and Turbotax, I've used Linux for years without issue. Office apps, programming, other uses, all works great. For specialized software mentioned, users will not accept an alternative even if something does exist. Sometimes their are apps, ie Gimp, Blender but not the features or polish. Other issue, try to get your boss to accept running Linux on your workstation. In many businesses, just not an option unless you are IT with a special use case. Sometimes apps other times for a host reasons, much of it FUD from commercial interests who don't want the competition.
I thought that Sun was the de facto UNIX standard. SCO lacked a proprietary hardware platform that could have locked them in, IBM had too many options, same for HP, DEC was more into VMS and NT, SGI was a niche player initially in visualization workstations and later in supercomputing. Essentially, Sun was the standard, until Linux came along.
Don't like software form Canonical? Don't use it. They're a commercial company, so they have to break even ultimately. I understand if, after listening to everyone, they make their own decision. Their Mir project is all about Ubuntu phones: should that platform be successful, they'll take the merit, should they fail, the Free Software Community will still have Android as their reference platform. Even if Google is a commercial company, too, and compared to them Canonical is Candy Candy.
In my limited poking at Linux Mint, it seemed as usable as Ubuntu.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes