I still don't get it
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| djohnston Aug 13, 2011 11:55 PM EDT |
Linux still has one more chance to "make it" on the desktop, but only as long as Linux collectively "gets its act together". Even so, the desktop won't matter any more. So, why the rush to "conquer" the desktop? What makes all these technical writer pundits believe that Linux users want their apps to "live in the cloud", anyway? Who are they talking to? Did they take a survey? As many before me have said, it's just a new face on an older paradigm. There's nothing "new" about the so-called "cloud". Hey, we have this great new technology. We have these VT220 terminals. All your applications and all your data will "live" in the mainframe. |
| cr Aug 14, 2011 7:56 AM EDT |
If the desktop didn't matter anymore, we wouldn't most of us be setting up a howl about how our preferred and more efficient-for-us desktop environments are being gutted to make room for Disneyland-in-a-screen. Being productive matters, d@mm!t, because it's what we do to survive. Fortunately, as Linus Torvalds has demonstrated by switching from Gnome to Xfce, as long as people are free to improve and adapt what's there and select among alternatives, the Linux community can continue to route around brain-damage. As for "Linux's one chance"... I keep coming back to the "no one neck to choke" argument. Linux doesn't need a big-buzz event because it's not dependent on one company's marketing budget, instead it's like grass growing through the weathered cracks in the sidewalk, popping up everywhere the old monolithic covering breaks down. Thus we won't ever notice one Year of the Linux Desktop, instead we've had something like a slow-moving but ineluctable Decade Or Two of the Linux Desktop happening right under our feet all along. |
| nikkels Aug 14, 2011 8:49 AM EDT |
Can you imaging the year of the linux desktop ?
Hundred thousand Windows users coming over to our camp ?
Asking why they have to run the password ?
Asking why we have that old fashioned Black thing to type in ?
Insisting they want a virus scanner and it has to be Norton or McAfee, or else !
Asking where is the driver disk ?
....
..... No thanks, no year of linux desktop for me. I like it as it is |
| cr Aug 14, 2011 9:55 AM EDT |
lol No Endless September for me either, thanks. My parents are in their mid-80's, and I babysit their Linux computing, in fact I'm driving over there this aft to find out what my mother did (probably clicked by accident) to stop her Ubuntu email from flowing. My kids grew up dual-booting or Linux-only as far back as Red Hat 5.2 (currently we're a MEPIS house); mosttimes I can shell in and fix their problems once and tell 'em what I did. That's it for support load here and I like it like that. |
| Grishnakh Aug 14, 2011 6:07 PM EDT |
cr wrote:Fortunately, as Linus Torvalds has demonstrated by switching from Gnome to Xfce, as long as people are free to improve and adapt what's there and select among alternatives, the Linux community can continue to route around brain-damage. The problem is that there's only so much of this that can happen before people start abandoning Linux altogether and going back to Windows. I've heard many people saying they're already done just this, because they're so sick of the state of the Linux desktop (i.e., being dumbed-down for Facebook-surfing touchscreen users). Xfce might be ok now, but what if its developers catch the same disease the Gnome and Unity folks have, and start dumbing their DE down too? While it'll always be possible (as long as the software is downloadable on the internet somewhere) to just download KDE3/Trinity/Gnome2/current Xfce/whatever and install it yourself, usually these projects are large and have many dependencies, and tracking these all down (esp. if they're deprecated over time; what if Gnome2 depends on some library that's now dead and its website is down?) can be a giant chore. This is precisely why almost all of us use distros: the distros do this work for us, and we just install it. Most people don't have the time to maintain their own custom distro where they hang onto a frozen old DE and keep up with the latest kernel, glibc, browser, etc. |
| dixiedancer Aug 14, 2011 6:13 PM EDT |
I switched to Xfce "before it was cool." If Xfce goes the way of other DEs, no big deal. I'll use LXDE, Openbox, Fluxbox, whatever. Still plenty of choices. This old hand-me-down 'puter can't handle Unity (it barely managed KDE 3) because Unity is a resource hog. But I do think Unity looks pretty cool. So much so that I rigged my Xfce box to "emulate" Unity's appearance and functionality. I'm having my cake and eating it too. |
| albinard Aug 14, 2011 6:24 PM EDT |
@Grishnakh: going back to Windows might not even do the trick for those folks. Have you read what's apparently coming in Windows 8? Looks a lot like all the other iconfests! |
| cr Aug 14, 2011 7:38 PM EDT |
Quoting: The problem is that there's only so much of this that can happen before people start abandoning Linux altogether and going back to Windows. I've heard many people saying they're already done just this, because they're so sick of the state of the Linux desktop (i.e., being dumbed-down for Facebook-surfing touchscreen users). It's not like somebody's going around casting Imperius on all the WM and DE devs or putting hallucinogens and downers in their water supply, is it? That's two desktop environments where the devs are acting deranged, three if you count Cojonical's Unity; that's not all of them by any means. Most of the init-5 layers are still designed as workfaces for computers, not dashboards for Fisher-Price toys. |
| helios Aug 14, 2011 8:34 PM EDT |
It's not like somebody's going around casting Imperius on all the WM and DE devs or putting hallucinogens and downers in their water supply, is it? That's two desktop environments where the devs are acting deranged, three if you count Cojonical's Unity... You do have to admit the stupid planets did seem to align at almost the same time. Unity and Gnome foisting these changes on their users almost in concert. They may not be all of the WM's and DE's but they are absolutely the most popular/most used. It's also obvious that thousands if not tens of thousands of people are abandoning these projects as users. I am one of them. I am extremely comfortable with my 10.04 LTS and then one of two things will happen. Either these projects will have matured to the point where functionality and sanity have returned or XFCE will have taken over as the number one used DE. I can work with either scenario. I'm thinking anyway. |
| cr Aug 14, 2011 9:05 PM EDT |
So, when does 10-4 go 10-7? |
| cr Aug 14, 2011 9:13 PM EDT |
Not arguing that the stupid-pills affected the preponderance of current users. Just pointing out that Linux doesn't even have just one (or two, or three) desktop to choke. |
| Fettoosh Aug 15, 2011 12:16 PM EDT |
Quoting:Have you read what's apparently coming in Windows 8? True, but MS is not abandoning the legacy interface all together, it intends to keep it available along the new one, and for a long time or so it seems. This is where Canonical and Gnome went wrong. They both shouldn't have declared they are dropping the legacy interface, and they would be better off if they quickly reverse their decision and keep the legacy Gnome interface supported and for a long time. If and when they do that, I believe they will have smooth sailing with their users, which I am not one of them by the way. |
| helios Aug 15, 2011 12:41 PM EDT |
This is where Canonical and Gnome went wrong. Absolutely correct. When one shoots oneself in the foot, it is always wise to do so with a small caliber pistol...not the double-ought buck double barrel shotgun they chose. |
| Fettoosh Aug 15, 2011 1:33 PM EDT |
Quoting:not the double-ought buck double barrel shotgun they chose. @Ken, Do you really think the damage is that bad to be irreparable/irreversible? :-) I think they still have a chance, at least if they make a declaration now with the intent to continue support actively in the future. |
| helios Aug 15, 2011 8:11 PM EDT |
Fettoosh, I don't think they've turned the corner into obscurity but like Gnome, they showed great apathy and a lack of concern toward their users. There is the Peter Pan part of me that hopes they spread some Tinkerbell dust on Unity and make it a viable and useable environment. Time and future releases will tell. I don't think they will and I don't think that clapping three times will bring it back to life once they do turn that corner. This is one time I would truly like to be wrong. Now as far as Gnome goes, their staunch and stubborn insistence upon not allowing plugins and extensions into Gnome3 is telling. I mean allowing them on an "official" level. Not too long ago someone from Gnome said that he did not want their newly developed environment "tainted" by user contributions. Fettosh, no matter how much perfume you put on that, no matter how many times you try to rearrange the words of that statement, it stinks of elitism and arrogance. My annual financial contribution to Gnome of 100 dollars halted the minute I read that quote. I will just add it to the amount I send to the Trinity project annually and be done with them. I admire a confident man Fettoosh. I detest an arrogant one. |
| dixiedancer Aug 16, 2011 7:28 AM EDT |
Linux will seriously "compete" on the desktop when developers treat end-users like CUSTOMERS instead of beta-testers. How likely do you think that is? |
| JaseP Aug 16, 2011 9:16 AM EDT |
Linux will take significant (but probably never dominant) market share only by inches at a time. The netbook thing was an anomaly, but one that put Linux on people's radar a little more. The next fronts are in tablets and set-top boxes. Traditional desktop PCs will always be around, but with less of a market share, and in the possession of those who need the horsepower and peripherals that go with them (content producers, number crunchers, power app users, tinkerers, etc.). The other formats will fill many of the niches currently occupied by desktop machines. |
| BernardSwiss Aug 16, 2011 3:49 PM EDT |
The Linux netbooks were only an anomaly in the sense that Microsoft (and Intel) hadn't yet put into place semi-covert, semi-legal and illegal mechanisms to bar Linux netbooks from the market whether or not customers actually wanted them. (I'm not sure whether that's agreeing or disagreeing with you). |
| JaseP Aug 16, 2011 4:58 PM EDT |
Agreeing. M$ was taken by surprise with netbooks. That's why they subsequently got more powerful and expensive, for the reasons you indicated. It's anomaly because M$ totally missed the attraction of the market segment. |
| techiem2 Aug 16, 2011 5:26 PM EDT |
They got more powerful, but at the same time the power was restricted (only certain screen sizes, can't have too much ram, etc.) by the Windows licensing requirements MS put in place to "define" netbooks. The whole thing was quite strange really. |
| gus3 Aug 16, 2011 5:29 PM EDT |
I disagree that M$ missing the attraction of a market segment is anomalous. M$ leading the market with a new product type is what would be anomalous, because that would require them to be, you know, innovative. Q: What has Microsoft brought to market that left people saying, "D@mn, wish I'd thought of that!", instead of, "WTH, we've already had that for N years now"? |
| techiem2 Aug 16, 2011 5:32 PM EDT |
LOL yeah, I think that pretty much every time MS or Apple starts touting some "new and innovative" feature in their OS. I scratch my head and go "uh...Linux has had that for like, 5 years or more...and it works better than what they have." |
| JaseP Aug 16, 2011 6:08 PM EDT |
Quoting: Q: What has Microsoft brought to market that left people saying, "D@mn, wish I'd thought of that!", instead of, "WTH, we've already had that for N years now"? The Kinect,... Which they bought, but still... But my point was not that M$ missed the market segment to capitalize on it, rather they missed it to shut it down. |
| BernardSwiss Aug 16, 2011 8:40 PM EDT |
Ummm... I thought that Microsoft's innovation was the idea of paying for the OS, itself, in the first place? |
| cr Aug 16, 2011 9:22 PM EDT |
@BernardSwiss: Nope. CP/M-80 cost money, Mark Williams' Coherent cost money, Mountain View Forth cost money... In the microcomputer world, in general unless the code was in a ROM on the board you bought, you paid for it. |
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