The Fight Ahead

[bobbybobington]

I was checking out linuxtoday.com and came about thisarticle that i think really describes quite well what linux is facing. Its message is simple, major linux vendors must push for preinstalled linux hardware or face the consequences. There is a problem too that we have created, we dont market linux to the public enough. Most of the time we go to linux conferences and conventions. Linux has got to stop hiding in its community. More specificaly Ubuntu and other major linux distros and vendor have got to pressure hardware companies and "get the message out" at more "linuxless" conventions with a common goal to push linux to the public.

[T700]

Excellent article; I couldn't agree more.

Paul

[Carrots171]

This is true. Another reason why Linux isn't pre-installed is because PC makers are afraid of losing deals/discounts with Microsoft by pre-installing other operating systems. See the link in my signature.

[23meg]

There is a problem too that we have created, we dont market linux to the public enough. Most of the time we go to linux conferences and conventions. Linux has got to stop hiding in its community.

This sounds so six years ago. This isn't the case today at all.

And I'm not really convinced by the point made in the article, which has been made here and elsewhere hundreds of times. No amount of third party pressure will get hardware vendors to act up and provide support; they'll only do this if they feel they're actually losing something. When will they? When the desktop Linux marketshare is 15%, in a few years. And how will that happen? How shall we lure more users in? Not with CEO pressure, not with agressive PR, not with head-on competition with MS, not with large advertising campaigns, not with shiny brand identities, but just by making better distros.

How? Like we always have: by developing free software that makes closed source equivalents look funny, and doing this in a communal way. As long as we've got the goods, new people will keep pouring in, the avalanche will grow.

[kabus]

I didn't even know we were in a fight.
I also think that the importance of the 'general public' for desktop Linux is vastly overrated.

[Johnsie]

I think having the general public has it's good and bad sides. If more people use it then more companies will produce high quality software that supports Linux. I'm tired of playing catch-up when Linux doesn't support things like Flash 9, audio/video messaging over the major networks and lots of other stuff. But if more people use Linux there is more chance of viruses adware and spyware moving over to Linux. The reason why Linux is has less virii, adware and spyware isn't because Linux is invulnerable to it, Linux is probably just as vulerable as Windows, there's just not as many people cosding this software for Linux.

Saying that, I would prfer if most people I knew had the same operating system as me and I would like to see more software for Linux. I think to win the fight you need to get more people usuing Linux by recommending it, showing it to people and pre-installing it on machines that you intend to sell.

[Derek Djons]

I really find this a stupid article and I quite disagree. Since when did became community build Open Source products some 'yet another' commercial application which applied itself to this never-ending race of evolving and being the best.

Now I don't say Open Source products can't be commercial and also you don't hear me saying there aren't commercial Linux variants, but those can be counted quite fast.

GNU/Linux distributions are not that long on the market and it's a totally different concept. It's not about which one of them is the best and rules over others. It's about choosing what you like and being able to customize it to your needs. I don't see shares, stocks or the future of most GNU/Linux distributions and it's developer communities being in danger.

It's also very upsetting finding somebody writing for linuxtoday saying that it's 'hardware support' which is standing Linux in the way to snatch away Microsoft's percentages of the usermarket. 1. This dude should know most GNU/Linux variants are not being made to be competing in some A vs. B market 2. In a world of millions of hardware decives where do you find volunteers, time and rights to hardware specifications. Just look at ATi, nVidia and WiFi cards for instance. We may praise ourselves lucky with them since they don't release specs and backwards engineering those drivers wouldn't quite be easy.

So frankly I find it a really annoying article to read.

[win_zik]

I really find this a stupid article and I quite disagree. Since when did became community build Open Source products some 'yet another' commercial application which applied itself to this never-ending race of evolving and being the best.

What about since Linux has been generating billions in revenue for the likes of IBM, HP, Oracle etc.?
What about since companies like Red Hat, Novell, Canonical, Mandriva, Xandros, Linspire, etc. make up the bunch of the Linux market?

GNU/Linux distributions are not that long on the market and it's a totally different concept. It's not about which one of them is the best and rules over others. It's about choosing what you like and being able to customize it to your needs. I don't see shares, stocks or the future of most GNU/Linux distributions and it's developer communities being in danger.

You know, there's a dirty secret, it's not about anything, or rather, it's about a lot of different things to a lot of different people and entities. I'm sure it's about other things for IBM then it is for me for example.