>The only places that can really migrate to Linux en-masse are places like call-centers where computers are used for specific and rigid purposes.
Yes. And when 50% of the company is on linux, then what?
The key is to make your applications fully web-based and be os-agnostic. There are three main reasons companies even look to replace their existing systems: * Cost, short term and long term. * Increased functionality. * Effective staffing.
Right now linux provides visible short-term cost. Also, it can provide some long-term cost saving but that's more fuzzy.
On functionality, the gaming world will tell you going away from windows is a step back. I think you gain some and you lose some, so wash.
Staffing: You need fewer people but you have to pay them more. My horrible analogy: 400 day laborers with pickaxes or 1 highly paid driver in a Komatsu D575A-2SD.
> The places that have successfully transitioned to Linux (federal labs, Burlington Coat Factory, City of Largo, small companies) were either established Unix shops already or started with small or completely disorganized IT organizations.
Most companies have completely disorganized IT organizations, so that's actually good for future open-source adoption prospects:)
I think that if microsoft was making a gun, it would be a bad, all-purpose gun that takes all the types of bullets ever made, misfired once in a while, and you'd have to disassemble and reassemble the fireing mechanism (reboot) once in a while.
It shoots ok, and you only need that one.
Unix on the other hand, makes lots of different types of guns, each with a different purpose and different caliber. But the unix guns would each be exceptional, never misfire, and be more accurate, reliable, and cheaper.
The downside is that you need more, so you need to know all the different types of guns in order to be effective.
But once you have, you would be much more effective that the windows guy with his windows gun that still misfires.
Sorry for the bad analogy.
As far as the sexy stuff: I can tell you there's plenty more to do.
For example: Please create a distributed, heterogenous, fault-tolerant system that will take data in and out of databases, automatically deploy consumable generators from metadata, and be clusterable, load-balancing, and self-deploying. Also, it should not repy on the jvm, be language-independent, os-independent, and employ network self-discovery for automated scaling. Furthermore, it should support multiple protocols and be able to self-optimize traffic, handle disconnected latency, and have no single point of failure. Also it should implement non-dns communication, have built-in security, encryption, ssl, and man-in-the-middle foiling. It needs to be robust enough to run on 50,000,000 computers without using more than 3% of network or cpu, and be simple enough to run on just one. Oh, and it needs to be able to handle data primitives (dates, int, etc) as well as files, and unicode.
But Microsoft is much bigger than yahoo, so along the same line of reasoning, the MS code must be spotless.
And yes, because I run debian.
It's amazing what you can do with a machine that you know you don't have to actually reboot anytime soon. Of course, it takes a little extra work, but it's quite rewarding.
11. GFinance - Your stock portfolio manager, with search! 12. GPrint - Generate PDF documents of entire website, printed, hard-bound, and home-delivered.
Even if you bought it, you don't own it. You own the media on which it is, and you have a license to view the media in your home. So what was stolen? The media. The license has zero-cost replication. The media bears all the costs.
If you copy the media from bought-DVD to burned-DVD, and destroy (through various means, incuding children) the original, you still only have one media and the exact same license.
Could you not make the media pricing separate from the license? Meaning, if you want to d/l the movie, you are registering a personal viewing license. Is this license transferable? Of course (proven in court). So if I buy a DVD, watch it, then upload it to my friend's PC in New York via FTP, and destroy my original copy, and relinquish the licensed rights to him (I don't want to watch the original crappy movie), why would I be in violation? Why would he be in violation for watching it?
I have T-mobile. Motorola. I can go 4 days on a charge.
Last year I went to vegas, and I was in the elevator of the Mirage hotel. In the center of the hotel. I had full reception. Then I made a phone call, from the hotel room on the 12th floor, down the hall, down the elevator, throught the lobby (the long ass lobby) and into the parking garage. The call didn't even crackle once.
By the way, some vendor called me while I was in vegas with a question about some asp code and a uri. He wanted me to help him debug something. He said: "Are you in front of a computer?" I replied: "No." The he asked: can you get to a computer right now?" And I quietly replied: "No, I can't. I'm in a gondola at the Venetian hotel in Vegas with my wife and her her sister." There was a relatively long pause as he was absorbing the information. And that was very funny to me, as I imagined him in a cube under neon staring at a crt.
By the way, many programmers at Health Net (myself included) just went to hourly.:)
Nah, actually, the first 10% is the hardest. Once 10% of the people (and that's a 60 million people or so out of 600,000,000 computer users) know about a product, it becomes mainstream enough for most people to feel confortable trying it. most people are sheep and don't want to get in front where the wolves are. (nothing wrong with this strategy by the way)
But the GPL allows use in a commercial environment. So can I use the free, GPL version in a commercial environment if I don't release code to the public or sell it to customers, just use it internally within my organization?
Please elaborate on why the scenario makes this not Open Source. They bought the software. I gave them all the source code. They have everything in their hot little hands to run the software on one or 100 devices. There was no restriction on what they could do with it. They can resell it, modify it, enhance it, customize it. They don't need me at all. I can win the lottery and never speak to them again, and they have all that they need to keep running the software in any way they choose. Heck, it's not even GPL'd. They can release it in the public domain if they so choose.
Could the Qt people clear that up: If a for-profit company wants to develop in-house, never-ever to be sold or released to the public, custom applications, do they need to get a license from Qt?
Yes, absolutely. I want people to get off the Commercial=proprietary bandwagon.
I sold $10K worth of software I wrote last year to a small company. Gave them ALL the source code. The application is heavily customized for their need. They can't easily repurpose it. I didn't even GPL it. They can do whatever the heck they want with it. I got my money.
So it was open source, and it was commercial (I spent the money--well, my wife did:)
My point is that for shrink-wrapped software, the Qt Proprietary license makes perfect sense. But not in all cases of commercial software sale and development.
>>Have you even read the philosophy behind the GPL? That forever-libre thingy is intentional!
Yes, of course I have, and that's my point.
How can they stop some guy two years down the road from selling a GPL'd 80 million dollars heavily customized system (say truck fleet management system) to a large company that has no intention of selling it, since they use it as a competitive advantage.
Answer, they can't, because it's GPL'd. No money for Qt.
It's sort of like an interview I heard in 2001 or so about one of company owner buying Red Hat packaged cds at the store because he felt bad for redhat, because he had successfully installed it on thousands of servers and had only paid $100 for one copy. The company in question was google.
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>The only places that can really migrate to Linux en-masse are places like call-centers where computers are used for specific and rigid purposes.
:)
Yes. And when 50% of the company is on linux, then what?
The key is to make your applications fully web-based and be os-agnostic. There are three main reasons companies even look to replace their existing systems:
* Cost, short term and long term.
* Increased functionality.
* Effective staffing.
Right now linux provides visible short-term cost. Also, it can provide some long-term cost saving but that's more fuzzy.
On functionality, the gaming world will tell you going away from windows is a step back. I think you gain some and you lose some, so wash.
Staffing: You need fewer people but you have to pay them more.
My horrible analogy: 400 day laborers with pickaxes or 1 highly paid driver in a Komatsu D575A-2SD.
> The places that have successfully transitioned to Linux (federal labs, Burlington Coat Factory, City of Largo, small companies) were either established Unix shops already or started with small or completely disorganized IT organizations.
Most companies have completely disorganized IT organizations, so that's actually good for future open-source adoption prospects
>integrating linxu with AD actually works pretty well...
Ok. You sold me. Can you point me to the HOWTO?
lol!
Oh shit I can't be laughing out loud in my cube...
I think that if microsoft was making a gun, it would be a bad, all-purpose gun that takes all the types of bullets ever made, misfired once in a while, and you'd have to disassemble and reassemble the fireing mechanism (reboot) once in a while.
It shoots ok, and you only need that one.
Unix on the other hand, makes lots of different types of guns, each with a different purpose and different caliber. But the unix guns would each be exceptional, never misfire, and be more accurate, reliable, and cheaper.
The downside is that you need more, so you need to know all the different types of guns in order to be effective.
But once you have, you would be much more effective that the windows guy with his windows gun that still misfires.
Sorry for the bad analogy.
As far as the sexy stuff: I can tell you there's plenty more to do.
For example: Please create a distributed, heterogenous, fault-tolerant system that will take data in and out of databases, automatically deploy consumable generators from metadata, and be clusterable, load-balancing, and self-deploying. Also, it should not repy on the jvm, be language-independent, os-independent, and employ network self-discovery for automated scaling. Furthermore, it should support multiple protocols and be able to self-optimize traffic, handle disconnected latency, and have no single point of failure. Also it should implement non-dns communication, have built-in security, encryption, ssl, and man-in-the-middle foiling.
It needs to be robust enough to run on 50,000,000 computers without using more than 3% of network or cpu, and be simple enough to run on just one.
Oh, and it needs to be able to handle data primitives (dates, int, etc) as well as files, and unicode.
Get to work...
But Microsoft is much bigger than yahoo, so along the same line of reasoning, the MS code must be spotless.
And yes, because I run debian.
It's amazing what you can do with a machine that you know you don't have to actually reboot anytime soon. Of course, it takes a little extra work, but it's quite rewarding.
11. GFinance - Your stock portfolio manager, with search!
12. GPrint - Generate PDF documents of entire website, printed, hard-bound, and home-delivered.
Yeah, plus it's windows only... wtf is hidden in there? I want to see the source code.
Even if you bought it, you don't own it. You own the media on which it is, and you have a license to view the media in your home. So what was stolen? The media. The license has zero-cost replication. The media bears all the costs.
If you copy the media from bought-DVD to burned-DVD, and destroy (through various means, incuding children) the original, you still only have one media and the exact same license.
Could you not make the media pricing separate from the license? Meaning, if you want to d/l the movie, you are registering a personal viewing license. Is this license transferable? Of course (proven in court). So if I buy a DVD, watch it, then upload it to my friend's PC in New York via FTP, and destroy my original copy, and relinquish the licensed rights to him (I don't want to watch the original crappy movie), why would I be in violation? Why would he be in violation for watching it?
I'm using python you insensitive african sparrow! Ni!
Nothing at all, but your assumption was that you need pager in addition to cell. I say cell is enough for me, since it is everywhere I want to be.
Yes about the casinos. But vegas is pretty flat, and the hotels are relatively new.
I have T-mobile. Motorola. I can go 4 days on a charge.
:)
Last year I went to vegas, and I was in the elevator of the Mirage hotel. In the center of the hotel. I had full reception. Then I made a phone call, from the hotel room on the 12th floor, down the hall, down the elevator, throught the lobby (the long ass lobby) and into the parking garage. The call didn't even crackle once.
By the way, some vendor called me while I was in vegas with a question about some asp code and a uri. He wanted me to help him debug something. He said: "Are you in front of a computer?" I replied: "No."
The he asked: can you get to a computer right now?" And I quietly replied: "No, I can't. I'm in a gondola at the Venetian hotel in Vegas with my wife and her her sister."
There was a relatively long pause as he was absorbing the information.
And that was very funny to me, as I imagined him in a cube under neon staring at a crt.
By the way, many programmers at Health Net (myself included) just went to hourly.
Just so you know,
I don't print anymore.
I use blank paper to write on, then edit it, then move the stuff to the wiki.
Images? To the wiki.
Screenshots? To the wiki.
Documentation? to the wiki.
In the wiki can search it, link it, audit it, and annotate it, and that from every machine in the company.
And yes I work for a fortune 500.
Using mediawiki (the software that powers wikipedia)
Things are shifting in the business world where toner goes. It's not about the cost of toner, it's about the limited use of paper.
How hard do you think it is to go from 4 users to 60 million? 99.99 percent of all project never make it.
The 10-40% might me hard, but the failure rate is less than getting the first 10%.
Nah, actually, the first 10% is the hardest. Once 10% of the people (and that's a 60 million people or so out of 600,000,000 computer users) know about a product, it becomes mainstream enough for most people to feel confortable trying it. most people are sheep and don't want to get in front where the wolves are. (nothing wrong with this strategy by the way)
That's my point exactly. They say: GPL, and in the same breath they say "Commercial License". There's something not fully explored in that thinking.
But the GPL allows use in a commercial environment. So can I use the free, GPL version in a commercial environment if I don't release code to the public or sell it to customers, just use it internally within my organization?
Ok, true.
Please elaborate on why the scenario makes this not Open Source.
They bought the software. I gave them all the source code. They have everything in their hot little hands to run the software on one or 100 devices. There was no restriction on what they could do with it. They can resell it, modify it, enhance it, customize it. They don't need me at all. I can win the lottery and never speak to them again, and they have all that they need to keep running the software in any way they choose. Heck, it's not even GPL'd. They can release it in the public domain if they so choose.
I dont' recall. It might have been in print.
Unless of course that it might be protected as a trade secret, and the employee having signed an NDA would still be in trouble.
The GPL allows me to sell my app for money, as long as the code is made available in source form and is also governed by the GPL.
I agree there.
Could the Qt people clear that up:
If a for-profit company wants to develop in-house, never-ever to be sold or released to the public, custom applications, do they need to get a license from Qt?
Yes to all.
I was slamming their use of the word "commecial" to denote "proprietary".
Yes, absolutely. I want people to get off the Commercial=proprietary bandwagon.
:)
I sold $10K worth of software I wrote last year to a small company. Gave them ALL the source code. The application is heavily customized for their need. They can't easily repurpose it. I didn't even GPL it. They can do whatever the heck they want with it. I got my money.
So it was open source, and it was commercial (I spent the money--well, my wife did
My point is that for shrink-wrapped software, the Qt Proprietary license makes perfect sense. But not in all cases of commercial software sale and development.
>>Have you even read the philosophy behind the GPL? That forever-libre thingy is intentional!
Yes, of course I have, and that's my point.
How can they stop some guy two years down the road from selling a GPL'd 80 million dollars heavily customized system (say truck fleet management system) to a large company that has no intention of selling it, since they use it as a competitive advantage.
Answer, they can't, because it's GPL'd. No money for Qt.
It's sort of like an interview I heard in 2001 or so about one of company owner buying Red Hat packaged cds at the store because he felt bad for redhat, because he had successfully installed it on thousands of servers and had only paid $100 for one copy. The company in question was google.
Yeah, I'll second that. Why pay the Microsoft software license (you do use your software legally don't you?) in order to run KDE that's free on Linux?
Shucks, you should work for microsoft marketing!
Slogan: "We support open source! We love linux! Use KDE with Windows XP2!"
No thanks.