Modify Colors
Posts in 2008 October
What I Will Be Looking For In Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex
As you know, this Saturday I will be doing a live review of Ubuntu Intrepid Ibex. Today, the day before the review, I wanted to let you know what I will be particularly looking for in this release.
- Artwork. The artwork for this release was a bit of a train wreck up until a few weeks before the release. I will be very interested to see how it comes out in the end. I sharply criticized the original plans, but that was before the last-minute art overhaul. Still, I doubt I will like what I see as much as I like the Heron in the previous release.
- Choice of Software. Last release, Ubuntu included a beta version of Firefox and early versions of other programs in an LTS release. This drew criticisms from many and, although I don’t believe I every wrote about it, certainly annoyed me. Still, without including the beta version of Firefox, Ubuntu would probably not have Firefox 3 yet. This release, particularly since this is not an LTS release, will be interesting. Will early and potentially incomplete software be included, or will this release be more cautious.
- Integration of Private Directory. One of the most talked about features of Intrepid was an encrypted private directory for each user in their home folder. Early reports have suggested that manual configuration is needed to get this working, though. I am going to be interested to see if it is set up out of the box or needs configuration. And, if configuration is requiered, how much.
- Guest Account. This release will bring a special guest account, designed to let someone else check their email or something on your computer. My question is: how is this feature implemented and how useful will this be?
- Overall. The biggest question for me is: do I see a good reason to run out and upgrade my computer to this release. I will most likely be testing it out in a VM for purposes of the review (specificially, so I have the chance to take screenshots if I want) and installing it on my computer later on. Will I see the need to do the upgrade the next day,though, or will I be happy to wait?
These are the main things that I am going to be looking for in this release. If there is anything else you would like me to make a point of covering, please mention it in the comments, or just come and bring up whatever points you want in the live review.
Either way, don’t forget to come! The event will occur on November 1st at 1:00 PM Eastern US time here or at live.linuxloop.com (either works).
Linux To Outship Windows? Will It Happen?
Jim Zemlin, the executive director of the Linux Foundation, came out and made a bold prediction that Linux would outship Windows in 2009, as discussed in Desktop Linux and on Zemlin’s blog. Obviously, this is not a safe claim, but it could be more realistic than you might expect.
The argument made is that instant-on OSs, which are almost always Linux-based, will be installed on almost all computers, thus canceling out the Windows OS shipping on the computer. Once all the WIndows installs are canceled out, the Linux netbooks will then push Linux over the top, in terms of most copies shipped.
The conclusion makes a lot more sense after reading the details of the argument, but I am still not completely convinced.
My biggest problem with the conclusion is that I doubt instant-on will be mainstream until at least late 2009, if it catches on. In other words, I doubt that, even if instant-on OSs become highly popular, they will be included in the majority of computers until late 2009 at best. Right now, instant-on OSs are included on some notebook lines and a very few desktops. That is a long way from being ubiquitous, or even common.
Even if the theory came true, what would it mean? Do people really use instant-on OSs as much as they use their main OS? Even if they do, do they have any idea that they are using Linux?
Zemlin’s conclusion is not impossible, nor is it likely, still, even if users were unable to identify it as Linux, it would be a major step forward, since it would indicate that manufacturers believed in Linux, at least for small tasks.
HP Mini 1000 First Impressions
Today HP announced the HP Mini 1000, the successor to their HP MiniNote 2133 netbook. The new specs are similar to the old ones (512MB, 1GB, or 2GB memory, hard drive or SSD, which is new, fairly large keyboard, etc.), but the look is much improved. It looks great! And that matters when people are going to be carrying it around all over the place.
Plus, they finally did the art model right. The entire machine is colored to match the artwork on the front, which just looks much better that previous laptops with art.
Not everything is great, though. One of the best things about the previous MiniNote 2133 was the screen. Alongside all the super low-res screens, the MiniNote had more pixels per inch of screen than most desktop monitors do. Unfortunately, HP cut back on the number of pixels this time.
However the hardware turns out, the most interesting piece of news is the custom Ubuntu-based Linux distro being offered as an option. We have already seen the Inspiron Mini’s software well recieved, so I am guessing that this will be just as well received, if not better.
If you are interested in one of these, you can buy it right now from HP with WIndows, starting at $400, or you can wait, as I assume you will want to, until January to buy the Linux version, wich starts at $380, just $20 cheaper than the Windows version. I can’t wait to see the real reviews of the Linux version.
Psystar seems to just keep bothering Apple, most recently promising to continue fighting the lawsuit and introuducing Blu-Ray drives into their open Macs. However this turns out, it will be a very interesting fight.
Don’t forget:
A Story About Nothing: Shuttleworth Says You Can't Make Money From the Linux Desktop
The sky is falling! Mark Shuttleworth, the same person who founded what is probably the most popular Linux distribution and has essentially been betting his time and money that desktop Linux can turn a profit, said today in an interview that “I don’t think anyone can make money from the Linux desktop.” Or did he…?
The answer is both yes and no. Yes, he probably did say the words, but no they don’t mean what you think they mean. A ComputerWorld article (not that I am criticizing ComputerWorld or the author, many places did it) on the interview gives some more details, under the eye-catching headline of “Ubuntu’s Shuttleworth: “I don’t think anyone can make money from the Linux desktop.”"
Apparently, Shuttleworth continued to explain his point. The critical part of the article is this:
The point is, Shuttleworth continued, “I’ve never seen selling shrink-wrapped packages of free software as a workable idea.” Instead, Shuttleworth sees “The only way to build business around software is with [added costs] services.”
This is an important distinction. Though this is probably not how Shuttleworth meant it, I, and apparently many others, first interpreted his quote to suggest that he had give up on Ubuntu ever making money. Instead, all he is saying is that you can’t make money by selling free software in a box. OK. I agree. That is nothing new, just a restatement of what he and others have said in the past.
As far as I can tell, the story that is being reported all over the place is a story about nothing. Like, most interviews with Shuttleworth, though, there is a lot of other interesting infromation in it.
Brilliant Brainstorms #33 – Specifically Metadata
Brilliant Brainstorms is a weekly summary of some of the best/most interesting brainstorms from the Ubuntu Brainstorm site.
What The High-Priority Free Software Projects Should Be?
The Free Software Foundation has been heavily promoting their list of high priority free software projects. Given that the list comes from the Free Software Foundation, I understand why the projects that were chosen are on the list, but if I was making a list of high-priority projects, mine would not look like the FSF’s.
The FSF list includes a number of places where good proprietary software exists for Linux, but there are no good free software alternatives. These free software replacements are important, but I consider it more important to improve free software in cases where there are no good alternatives for Linux, even if those applications are not as commonly used.
The key difference here is that the goal should be trying to get more people to run a free operating system, possibly while using some proprietary software on top of the OS, rather than trying to get existing Linux users to use more free software.
So given this view, what would be on the high priority list? Linux still lacks good video editing software, despite a number of projects already existing. People argue about how good the professional photography software is, but I think there is widespread agreement that it needs improvement. Just improving compatibility between Open Office and Office would be a big deal, too. These are things where there is no great alternative on the Linux desktop, free or propriatary. In the end, I would rather see these things worked on.
Open-source DRM may sound like a contradiction, but someone is trying it.Traditionally, DRM has been a technology that restricts freedom, rather than granting it. This open-source DRM is probably more consumer friendly, since it is supposed to be less restrictive, however it is not clear that having an open-source computer helps the cause.
On one hand, open-source DRM is a step in the right direction. It provides a transparent and not exceedingly limited protection, which is better than a tight, proprietary form of DRM. On the other hand, though, no DRM would still be better than even light DRM, which still restricts what players you can use.
The real question is, does having open-source DRM encourage the use of this lighter DRM over more restrictive DRM? Ideally, those that would usually use more restrictive DRM would use this open-source DRM, while those that are considering dropping DRM altogether, would not be tempted by this DRM.
Open-Source Applications Drawing More Attention
Microsoft and Apple have PR people and marketing budgets to get the word out about new software, but open-source projects, for the most part, don’t. They rely mostly on word of mouth (or blog) promotion. Apparently, at least for OpenOffice and Firefox, this works.
As many people already know, in the first 24 hours of Firefox 3’s release, there were over 8 million downloads. More recently, and without any special event, OpenOffice 3.0 got 3 million downloads in the first week. Perhaps people just really like the number 3.0, but I think there is something going on here: people are really getting excited about these major new versions, even outside of the open-source software community.
As I mentioned before, there are no PR companies or advertisements to promote the launch of Firefox 3. People learn about it largely through news articles and word of mouth. This would be expected within the Linux community, but to get 3 million, or 8 million downloads, you need a lot of Windows and Mac users, in addition to the Linux users. So what these numbers really show is that the popular open-source applications are becoming mainstream enough for millions of people, using all the different operating systems, to go out and download them. This is definitely a good sign for open-source software.
From the beginning it seemed like a long shot, but Psystar has only made it clearer and clearer that they are determined to prove Apple’s locking of Mac OS X to their own hardware is a violation of anti-trust laws.
It appeared that Psystar, a small company that started selling computers pre-installed with Mac OS X, had given up recently when they entered out-of-court settlement talks with Apple. More recently, however, one of Psystar’s lawyers has denied that the suit is over, saying that settlement talks are only standard practice and the lawsuit is “very much alive.”
So what happens if they win? Apple is going to have to change the way they do things. The problem is that they rely on the control they have over their hardware. Notice that few people complain about driver issues on the Mac? Apple only has to support 6 or so machines, Microsoft and Linux have to support millions. Impressed by how cheap the OS X software is? I doubt that price could be sustained if Apple’s core business was software sales. In addition to these issues, Apple gets some benefits by only selling premium machines. Want to know why people who usually use $500 Dell computers are impressed when they get a $1000+ Mac? Sure, a lot of it has to do with Apple, but a fair bit must have to do with the experience of using nicer hardware.
None of this is to say that Apple could not survive. They could. They would just need to change.
The truth is that Psystar has little chance of prevailing against a company as large as Apple who has tons of money and lawyers to throw at the problem. Still, they have a chance and everyone should support them. If Psystar wins, Apple may have a problem, but consumers just get more choice.
Now this is a Linux site, so a lot of you are probably wondering why you should care if there are more options for Macs out there. One word: virtualization. Right now (servers not included), you cannot legally or easily virtualize Mac OS X. If Psystar wins, you can go out, buy an off-the-shelf copy of OS X, and run it in a virtual machine. This would let you run every major operating system on just about any computer. That would be awesome.