I was recently reading this artcle [lockergnome.org] and this article really annoyed me as I am a rather large supporter or open source, free software, and of course Linux. Linux is still of course behind Windows and OS X, but over the past couple years, it has truly become a viable operating system for the desktop and even the laptop.

My main complaint about this is that it's filled with all these half-truths.

It first starts off complaining about application compatibility with Linux. The truth of the matter is that many applications have a very good open-source alternative. And if you ABSOLUTELY need to run a Windows-only piece of software, wine does a decent job of running most pieces of software. Yes, there are some truths in compatibility problems, but the author of this article over-exaggerates the problems to the point where he makes it sound like EVERY piece of software can't be run under wine. I would've really chewed him a new hole if he complained about Microsoft Office not working on wine with OpenOffice gaining stock value in my eyes.

The second thing he complains about is the command line. Yes, Linux is still heavily based on the command line, but at the same time, more and more tasks can be easily done without even opening a terminal. GUIs and point and click functionality has been increasing in Linux distros to make configuration tasks simpler for the novice user to understand and use, and for the more advanced user, the terminal actions aren't removed, just hidden underneath the surface.

He talks about hardware support and lack of official vendor Linux drivers. Hello? Linux has such a great community that many produce great drivers for multitudes of old and new hardware that may very well end up being better than anything the companies could produce themselves. I myself have had very few hardware problems on any of my computers running Linux, most of the time, all hardware was found and installed just fine under Linux.

DRM. One word that pisses off many upon many a tech user. Yes, sometimes Linux has problems reading DRM'ed content, but so do Windows and even OS X. Problems with DRM are the root of an inherent flaw associated with DRM, and one of several reasons why I hate DRM. Saying Linux doesn't work with DRM is like saying Windows Vista doesn't work with my Pentium 2 processor, its absurd because DRM may not work period, with ANY operating system.

He complains about the saying "Ubuntu just works". I can partially agree with him on this one as Ubuntu may or may not work out of the box. But I will say that he again overexaggerated his point. With the exception of my latest desktop, EVERY computer I've tried to install Ubuntu on has worked right out of the box, with the only thing needing to be done is to install the official nVidia drivers which just took a couple mouse clicks. In fact, Ubuntu recognized all my hardware, whereas Windows XP and Vista needed at least a half-dozen drivers to be installed separately. I was even able to get Ubuntu running on my old Dell Inspiron 4000, wireless and all. My latest desktop does show that sometimes there are hiccups, but at the same time, all problems I had with it were solved with Ubuntu 8.04.

Making the switch to Linux is not something that one can expect to do in an hour, but it does not take months to set up either. In maybe a couple of days, I think even a new user could learn his way around. I would reccommend it to anyone, but at the same time, pushing it on someone is not the best way to spread Linux. If you do want to help someone switch to Linux, make sure you help them as best you can, but also let them do things on their own, that's how people learn, from hands on learning and experimenting.

DISCLAIMER: I'm not trying to bash Microsoft or any other operating system for that matter, I just think that articles that spread these half-truths aren't helping anyone or anything.

Tags: opensource, linux, ubuntu

It's been a busy week for me, busy with work and doing internationalization support. It's challenging, although a little annoying that every solution continues to breed new problems, although things are looking much better now, so hopefully that will maybe speed things up a little come next week.

I had a barbeque tonight, burgers came out well, but I got a lot left over...cheeseburgers all week!

I think one of my projects for tomorrow and Monday is going to be a SLIGHT overhaul of my server. I think I'm going to switch over to Ubuntu 8.04 64 bit. I've had good experiences with 64 bit Linux, unfortunately there were a few applications that gave me issues under 64 bit, most notably, flash. Well since its my server, that is a non-issue as I don't need flash to work as I'm not using it to watch the latest YouTube videos, I'm simply just using it to host files, and serve as a web and database server amongst other things. Such is the beauty of Linux, all my data will be safe as I just need to go over the system drive. Yes Windows can do it too, but I always found it to be simpler under Linux.

So far I like where my new project is going, not gonna say much more than that, but when its closer to being finished, I think it will be pretty nice.

Happy Day of the Jedi!

Tags: ubuntu, linux, server, bbq

So many people can get caught up in the operating system war that they may forget that multiple operating systems can coexist side by side. Many times people are so pro-Windows, or so pro-Linux, or even pro-Mac that they believe that their operating system has to be the end-all winner in the computer world.

Ubuntu just 2 weeks ago released their first version of 2008, Ubuntu 8.04 keyed Hardy Heron. I now have it installed as the primary and only operating system on my file server and have it set up for dual booting on my desktop along with Windows Vista. So far I have nothing but kind words to say about it as it has run very smoothly for me. In fact, it's the first version of Ubuntu that installed properly and just worked on my new Desktop hardware that I got back in December for Christmas.

My server since switching over to Linux from Windows has only ever really used Ubuntu starting out with 6.06 and then 7.10 and now 8.04. For me, it is stable, efficient, fast, and properly integrates with my entire home network pretty much flawlessly. It is the only operating system to date that I've worked with that can reach 30 days of uptime without a restart and still work without hiccups. I've even got it up to 100 days before and it probably would've lasted longer had my hard drive not died and my need to get into the box. And now that whatever issue my desktop was having with Ubuntu 7.04 and 7.10, has been fixed in 8.04 so it now "just works" on my desktop too. In fact, as I've said earlier, if it wasn't for games, I'd be booted into Linux a lot more than I am now.

This gets me to my point, Ubuntu, whether you like it or not has catapaulted Linux into somewhat of a mainstream operating system. Yes, it will probably never get ahead of Windows, and with how Mac OS X is growing, it will probably stay behind Apple as well, but does it really matter what percentage of the market share Linux gets?

Open source advocates and the Linux fanboys would say that it does, they tend to want Linux to win completely. They want to see Microsoft pretty much rot in hell. They end up so caught up in things that they fail to see that both Windows and Linux can coexist. And what would these fanboys say to those who want to play the latest and greatest computer games? Yes there is Cedega and Wine, both of which can do pretty decent jobs at running a lot of Windows games, but not all. And to get some of them to work can require a significant amount of tweaking and careful configuration that some users may not have time to do, or simply may not be saavy enough to do.

While I would love to see Linux gain market share, I realize at the same time, that at this point in the game, Linux can be very tricky for many to use. Yes, Ubuntu makes the setup and installation quite simple that a lot of people could have success in doing it, but what about trickier issues that may arise? For the most part, I have had a good deal of success with driver support out of the box for my hardware, but what about those that may have some hardware that doesn't have proper driver support? The "easy" to set up, just got a lot trickier, even on Ubuntu. Sure, the Linux gurus and even those with only moderate experience would probably be able to solve those issues, but what about the "even you mother could use it" crowd? And this is where Linux still has its pitfalls, on the surface, Ubuntu is very easy and very smooth, and a lot of people may never have to get into the nitty gritty of the operating system. Even most configuration will work fine using the GUIs that now exist. But not everything goes that smoothly which is what can make Linux tricky.

Ubuntu and Linux in general need to be able to improve upon its base and allow for those trickier situations to be handled in a more "ease-of-use" manner so that more of the general users can figure it out. Linux has a good group of followers and many I've found when going to message boards and forums for support to be very friendly and helpful to help me solve the problem, but not everyone wants to have to go there because a lot of solutions can require some heavy terminal useage that may scare the non-geek crowd.

In the end, as much as I hate to say it, Linux is not for everyone, at least not yet. It is becoming a better alternative to Windows than it was say 5 years ago, but it is still not completely ready for mainstream useage yet. Us Linux fans can only hope that it steadily improves, where maybe one day, it will truly become a viable alternative to the ever-prominent Windows operating system.

Tags: thoughts, linux, opensource, windows, ubuntu

Some of those that know me could possibly call me a fanboy of both Apple, Linux, or the XBOX (yes, I know the last one is almost a contradiction in terms since its made by Microsoft and I tend to favor Microsoft's competition over its Windows OS). I however take a different stand. I don't consider myself a fanboy of Apple, Linux, or XBOX. Yes, I love my Mac, my iPod, my iPhone, my Linux server, and my XBOX 360, but does preferring one platform over another really make you a fanboy?

So this leads me to my question: What exactly constitutes a fanboy?

I've heard some people say that if you prefer company A's product over company B's, then you are a Company A fanboy. I don't believe this is true. To be a fanboy in my opinion, you must love a product so much that you will jump on any opportunity to badmouth any competition, ignoring anything that the competition might actually be doing better than your product. Fanboys tend to be relatively close-minded on issues surrounding whatever it is that their product or company is involved in. We'll take the gaming consoles for the example. A Microsoft XBOX fanboy would be so into the XBOX that he would be blind and try to find a negative spin on anything that Sony or Nintendo might come out with for the PS3 or Wii, even if what Nintendo or Sony does is better than how Microsoft happens to do it for the 360.

I'll say it first, being ignorant goes nowhere, and fanboism is no exception. Take me for example, I much prefer OS X over Windows, hands down, no second guessing with pretty much no competition. Do I hate Windows? Do I hate Microsoft? No, I don't. I don't like some of the things Microsoft does, I don't like some of the ways Windows does what it does, but that doesn't mean I hate them. And even though I love OS X, I still dislike some of Apple's practices. And this is pretty much the core reason why I don't consider myself a fanboy. I recognize Windows strengths, despite my fondness towards both of it's competitors, OS X and Linux. And the same goes towards Sony's PS3 and Nintendo's Wii compared to my preferred console, the XBOX 360. In the end competition is what drives markets, and operating systems and gaming consoles are no exception. Without competition, there would be less motivation for companies to improve upon their product lines. Can you imagine still working on machines with Windows 98 if Linux or Mac weren't around and Microsoft was less motivated to come up with something new? I'm sure that's an extreme situation that probably wouldn't have happened, but competition drives innovation and innovation leads to improvements. So the next time you immediately want to bash a competing site, product, or company, look at it and see what it is all about. Don't just jump to conclusions and bash it blindly. It may be competing with your sacred product, but it may have its own strengths, and in a roundabout way, may very well lead to improvements for your side of the fence.

Tags: xbox, microsoft, fanboys, apple, linux, ps3

Microsoft today just announced that they will be releasing their latest version of Office for Linux operating systems. Microsoft, probably scared about OpenOffice's rise in popularity among open source advocates decided it was in their best interest to release a version that could run on Linux and presumably BSD. Microsoft is labeling this version of Office "Microsoft Office 2008 Linux Edition". It will have most of the features that Office 2007 and the OS X version, Office 2008 including the ability to read and write the .docx format. Also included is Outlook so Linux users will be able to easily connect to Microsoft Exchange servers.

Microsoft Developer Lirpa Sloof, the lead developer in the move to a Linux version of Office was elated that he could be such a big part of the project.

Despite the fact that I work for Microsoft, and do like the Windows environment, I still like where open source software is heading nowadays and now I'll be able to use Microsoft Office on my Ubuntu Desktop as well.

While there is no definitive pricing information, an insider source has said that Office 2008 Linux Edition will cost $75. Will this be enough to convert people from OpenOffice?

Read about it here.

Tags: microsoft, office, linux, openoffice