Even if you don’t run Linux, chances are good you’ve heard of Ubuntu. You’re probably also familiar with its official cousins: Kubuntu, Xubuntu and the like. But there’s another subset of the Ubuntu ecosystem that gets less play — namely, the medley of unofficial spinoffs built by third parties. Although little discussed, the trends surrounding these distributions that hide in Ubuntu’s shadow reveal a lot about the open source channel more broadly.
According to DistroWatch, there are 118 Linux distributions based on Ubuntu. These include both the official variants like Kubuntu and a wide range of lesser known spins created by community members. It’s this latter group, comprised mostly of operating systems that are not so well-known, that I’m interested in here.
Going through the DistroWatch list — which is not exhaustive — one finds an impressive variety of different custom versions of Ubuntu, many of which I didn’t even know existed. Most of them cater to specific tasks: there’s Ubuntu Studio for multimedia production, nUbuntu for security testing, Ubuntu Rescue Remix for (you guessed it) rescuing broken systems, and so on.
At the same time, there are also several spins dedicated to specific groups of users: gNewSense and Trisquel for those who want to run only 100 percent open source software, Vinux for the blind and visually impaired and even distributions dedicated to followers of particular religions, specifically Ubuntu Christian Edition and Sabily (for Muslims). (Not on the DistroWatch list is Ubuntu Satantic Edition, which I’ve yet to determine to be either a joke or a serious project.)
Community Spinoffs and the Open Source Ecosystem
Granted, it’s not too surprising that there are so many variants of Ubuntu. After all, if there’s one thing open source users are known for, it’s forking software into myriad different spins to align with everyone’s peculiar personal preferences. In addition, tweaking Ubuntu into a new distribution is very easy from a technical perspective, thanks to tools such as Remastersys, which makes it so easy to create custom live CDs even I can do it.
What’s more interesting to consider than the number of Ubuntu variants is the role they play in the broader channel. Viewed from one perspective, they’re an affirmation of the extensive choice and personalization that open source software makes possible. On the other hand, though, one might conclude that they detract from Ubuntu by drawing followers away from the mother distribution, by making it harder to support users who are basically running Ubuntu but whose versions have been tweaked in unpredictable ways and by spreading the Linux community’s finite resources too thinly.
Personally, I don’t think the collection of custom distributions is doing any harm. Most of them have small followings, and although they theoretically could fracture the broader Ubuntu and Linux communities in a negative way, they clearly haven’t done that so far.
One trend worth noting, however, is that many of these Ubuntu spins are no longer being developed. For example, gNewSense, Ubuntu Christian Edition, EasyPeasy, gOS, and Linspire — all of which were once notable distributions, some even of commercial importance — have gone dormant or been officially discontinued. In all, only 80 of the Ubuntu-based distributions on the DistroWatch list remain actively developed.
What does it mean that these spinoffs have reached their ends of life? Without a doubt, the specific story of each one is different. But more broadly speaking, it seems to me this relative decline in the diversity of Ubuntu’s sub-ecosystem could signal broader consensus around Ubuntu itself. People are no longer spinning it off because they’re happy enough with the base distribution. And that’s good for Canonical.
On the other hand, maybe this trend just means Ubuntu is no longer as popular as it once was, at least as a platform on which to build newer spins. That would align with other indicators suggesting that interest is growing in different distributions relative to Ubuntu. But I doubt that’s the case, since the proportion of active remixes based on Ubuntu is significantly higher than that for other distributions including Fedora — meaning that Ubuntu remains more popular as a base distribution.
Either way, even if some Ubuntu variants are going dark, and whatever that might mean for the larger ecosystem, don’t expect users to stop remixing Linux distributions altogether. It’s a pretty safe bet that as long as open source software exists, there will be someone wanting to fork it.
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I don’t think the number of derivative distributions means much of anything.
Ubuntu is doing just fine.
What it’s enjoying right now is a little bit ubiquity. This would be the worst time to abandon it.
I think that the different distros are kinda polishing the Linux offerings.
I think that the different distros are kinda polishing the Linux offerings.
I agree with ForensicPenguin2,
Just look at Pinguy OS.
Question is what added value these spinoffs brings to market?
Some certainly do add value but the bulk don’t. Some spinoffs generates risk. Because they don’t have the number of devs/builders required to maintain consistency over time. If they loose a few (or even one) dev, the users are left in the dark.
How many distros or spinoffs are actually 100% focused? Mint used to be slightly focused before wandering off with more DE’s and soforth.
Are there really any 100% desktop focused and fully evolved distros out there? Where the obvious server stuff is gone and all efforts are orientated towards a classic desktop user?
I’d say there is in the range of zero 100% focused desktop orientated distro out there. Every distro is hedging. Gnome, KDE, LXde, XFce, Unity -you name it – its there in virtually any distro. All the server stuff is there.
Truth is – just about all distros are for Linux enthusiasts. Not for the consumer or OEM.
Linux enthusiasts don’t really want consumer grade distros. They want consumers to become Linux enthusiasts. That’s the utopia that keeps Linux below 1,5% on desktops failing to reach it’s true potential.
Jack was right on when he said:
“Linux enthusiasts don’t really want consumer grade distros. They want consumers to become Linux enthusiasts. That’s the utopia that keeps Linux below 1,5% on desktops failing to reach it’s true potential.”
Mark Shuttleworth is the only person on the horizon with the commitment and the resources to move Linux up into the mainstream.
In open source, spinning off means someone has other ideas or has a targeted idea (media, apache server, or whatever). I think what we are seeing is convergence instead of divergence.
There used to a an Ubuntu Christian Edition which targeted safe web browsing with DansGuardian and some sort accountability to what sites the desktop browses to.That one seems to have died out….
I think that big part of it that pre-Unity releases of Ububu were much easier to re-spin. Just add/remove some packages, add a “custom” gnome theme, and that’s it. Only a few were really adding/developing their own packages and tools. It would take a while to learn new tricks with Unity.
Some distributions chose a different path without Unity shell, but it requires a lot more effort. Look at Mint, they decided to do their own fork of Gnome. Smaller (or more amateurish distros) simply do not have enough man power to pull it off.
Give it another release or two and once Unity or others would mature, then re-spins would be back.
Do Fewer Spinoffs Signal a Waning in Ubuntu’s Popularity?
Short answer: No, it signals a saturation in Ubuntu Spinoffs.
I guess almost everybody can find a *butu version of his liking, there’s just not much room for doing it still a bit different.
gNewSense was sponsored by the Free Software Foundation, which prompted a small explosion of similar “pure” distros. FSF now promotes them all equally.
Ubuntu Christian Edition was always a distro in search of a reason to exist, as Christianity lacks the strict lifestyle discipline that makes a lot of custom tools helpful. The web has all the resources the devout need (e.g., biblegateway.com).
EasyPeasy focused on netbooks, and the netbook market simply collapsed.
gOS was a commercial Linux that failed to bring revenue.
Linspire was, too, but was notable for winning $20M from Microsoft in a series of lawsuits across the globe over the validity of the Windows trademark. Terms of the settlement were not disclosed, but the company shut down immediately thereafter; draw your own conclusions. It was unfortunate, really, because their Click’n'Run Warehouse was an excellent app store for several Linux products long before Apple claims to have invented the concept for the iPhone.
None of these products shut down recently, but span a 5 year period.
In other words, in a vast and thriving ecosystem, some critters die for various reasons. That’s what happened with your list… for various reasons.
@Kerr:
Shuttleworth/Ubuntu has a coupple of problems to solve in order to become “consumer grade”:
1: Abandonment of older versions (bugfixing) as soon as they start working on the next new.
2: Repos with serverstuff and several DE’s doesn’t really help consumers at all.
3: Like it or not – Unity is still a problem, and users always want the latest edition. They only want LTS when LTS is the latest.
4: How well does upgrading from one version to the next REALLY work?
@Jack: “1: Abandonment of older versions (bugfixing) as soon as they start working on the next new.”
Total nonsense. The current stable desktop version is 10.04, released 29 April 2010, and it is guaranteed for support through April 2013. Version 12.04 (coming April 2012) will be supported through April 2017.
The bleeding edge releases hit every 6 months, and are supported for 18 months, or 3 product cycles.
You’re just making stuff up.
@Jack: “2: Repos with serverstuff and several DE’s doesn’t really help consumers at all.”
Nor does it hurt them. It does help some users, though – our current corporate image includes packages from both server and desktop repositories of Suse. A unified repository is a feature, IMHO.
What’s really nice in releases leading up to 12.04 is the integration of the launcher and installer. If I type e.g., “office” in the launch bar, I have a row of installed apps and a row of apps available for installation with a single click (no annoying wizards or manual download / run / reboot cycles). Great feature!
@Jack: “3: Like it or not – Unity is still a problem”
Yes, for quite a few people. Glad us Linux users have a choice!
@Jack: “4: How well does upgrading from one version to the next REALLY work?”
In my experience, no better than upgrading Windows. In both cases, I always recommend that my clients reinstall rather than upgrade between major releases. The corporate world re-images rather than upgrades both Windows and Linux machines in my experience, as that is less expensive than even a 5% problem rate.
Is this really the best FUD you can throw?
Jack, you’re wrong. Every distro provides server packages, but distros like Mandriva, Mageia, and PCLinuxOS, in particular, are heavily aimed at the desktop. PCLinuxOS, which is my distro of choice, even cuts down the repository setup to be just about as simple as it can be. You setup one repository, not 10, and even the choices are limited. There aren’t 25 different kernels, for instance. This is very prosumer.
I just want to say that, IMO, Shuttleworth has a vision, and it’s not for the user. Shuttleworth sees a time where he can be the next Steve Jobs, or Bill Gates. He does this on the back of FOSS developers. It has been widely documented about how little Cannonical/Ubuntu participates in any project that isn’t squarely directed right at Ubuntu. KDE? Gnome? Kernel? Very little support from Ubuntu. Even parent Debian has complained about how little help they get from Ubuntu, who’s mostly leached off of Debian for years.
Many of us that have not been using Ubuntu (I was a former user and still fire it up occasionally, usually in the form of Kubuntu) have seen this day coming. All of this time, when Ubuntu could have been leading the charge at KDE or Gnome, they’ve been doing very little, all while Shuttleworth has lambasted them in the press. As everyone jumped on the bandwagon, Ubuntu has been making moves to commercialize itself further and further. As that has happened, there have been complaints about the quality of Ubuntu, about the stability of it, and now about the usability of it. The fact is, Shuttleworth doesn’t care about the users. He cares about patching the hole that drains his finances and possibly making money. He’s throwing darts and hoping something will stick.
It’s not that I hate Ubuntu. It’s not that I hate Shuttleworth. However, the entire community bought into his vision, and he abandoned them. Shuttleworth and his followers have even tried to supplant the word Linux with Ubuntu. That’s how brash he is. Shuttleworth spent millions upon millions basically promoting Ubuntu within the Linux community, yet it’s still very obscure outside of Linux. Instead of investing an improving his product with his money, and taking it to the public as a real contender, he was content on stealing users from other distros – distros that once charged money for boxed sets and used that money to fund real FOSS development in KDE, Gnome, the kernel…
It was estimated a few years ago that Shuttleworth pulled about $10 mil out of his pocket annually to fund Ubuntu. I’m sure it’s a bit less, these days, as he has made some inroads to get revenue going. However, just think: Pixar was purchased for $10 mil and Jobs invested another $20 mil before it became a huge success. So what has Shuttleworth got for his investment? From all reports, Ubuntu still loses money and Shuttleworth still has to come out of his own pocket to keep it afloat.
@Ricegf:
I monitored “the old version” of Ubuntu a coupple of times – and they’ve moved on to the next – and open bugreports moved too. It’s not something I just make up. They are supported, but the priority drops like it’s toxic.
If enthusiasts are the audience a million packages is fine. If the audience is consumers it is clutter. In SUSE they even keep KDE 3 in the same repo thus picking the wrong version a “inexperienced user” will install KDE 3 libraries and so on. SuSE never was and most likely never will be a distro for “consumer type desktop users”. It’s a distro for the enthusiast. A good one too.
A consumer will benefit from separating relevant from irrelevant. Put it in a different repo and make it available IF they deliberately want to.
Canonical earns their dole with the server bits. That’s fine. But it’s not there because it’s needed by the consumer type users.
My arguments is not about removing choice. It’s about focused distros that becomes REALLY good at their thing rather than being mediocre in everything.
WRT upgrade to next version: Most Windows users don’t upgrade. They replace their machine with a new one that has a new version of Windows. For Linux having the latest version is a part of the concept. Listen to the Android users who bought a phone that didn’t receive the latest and greatest.
Your arguments are the ones of an enthusiast. The consumers needs are totally different.
I am not presenting FUD. I’ve been using Linux for 11-12 years. I belong to the enthusiast category. But I give you that: Critisism is always construed as FUD.
As I said before:
Linux enthusiasts don’t really want consumer grade distros. They want consumers to become Linux enthusiasts. That’s the utopia that keeps Linux below 1,5% on desktops failing to reach it’s true potential.
@LinuxLover:
I’m well aware of the content of these distros. None of them are of “consumer quality”, and the server stuff is good for the enthusiast. But not for the “regular Joe desktop user” who has no need for it.
PClinuxOS is not really a good example. What happened when Tex vanished for a long time?
Mandriva? They announced a potential bankrupcy 16th january unless they got all shareholders in for 4 mill Euro, and delayed it 17th january because they are evalutating an offer made. They are not financially stable and cannot be offered by OEMs to consumers.
Mageia? They have only 1 release under their belly. Not Commercial.
I appreciate what Shuttleworth want to achieve and the tons of cash he has spent. He has always been clear about the commercial objective with Canonical and Ubuntu. My (perhaps not so) humble opinion is that they are not there.
I don’t really care what distro it is. My point is that to succeed wrt OEMs and consumers some distros have to be 100% focused on that – and not on people like me. Linux enthusiast users. We can always pick an enthusiast’s distro type SuSE or Fedora.
OK, Jack, so your problem is with Canonical’s business model. Got it.
Just curious – you make a lot of strong statements about what consumers and “regular” users want. What are your credentials? I’m curious, because 20 million users seems largish for a product isolated to “the enthusiast market”, particularly given its 50% annual growth rate.
“Critisism is always construed as FUD.” Not at all. I can criticize Linux fairly on a number of fronts, e.g., insufficient FPS game support, not enough vendors sell Linux pre-installed, or multi-monitor support isn’t as elegant as competing technologies yet – though it’s getting much harder than even last year. FUD by contrast consists of statements that are inaccurate and intended to scare new users away from trying a product: “Just about all distros are for Linux enthusiasts” and “No Linux distros are of consumer quality”, to pick a couple at random.
Otherwise, let’s agree to disagree. Linux’ rapid gains in all market segments is pretty encouraging to me, and I’m having more fun than at any time in the past 12 years. More popcorn!
Again. Your arguments are the “enthiusiast” arguments.
No. I’ve got no beef with Canonical’s business model. At all.
I don’t own Canonical. Owners do whatever they want with Canonical, and whoever keeps the control over Ubuntu does whatever they want with it.
Nobody really knows the growth rate of Linux on Desktop. And yeah – I’ve seen the digits floating around.
Do I need credentials? Can regular Joe walk into any store selling laptops and buy one with Linux? Is it widely available in webshops? Can you select a spec and pick up a machine with Linux everywhere?
Don’t think so.
I don’t really care about the enthusiast users. They will always find something they can make use of. Thus so do I.
“given its 50% annual growth rate”
50% annual growth? May I ask where this number is coming from? And what exactly it includes: server market, desktop market, mobile devices?
Canonical / Ubuntu has contributed to Linux by creating a distro that is easy to install and use. The money that Mark Shuttleworth has put into Linux more than compensates for the shortcomings others see.
Before Ubuntu came on the scene all of the distros were for hobbyists except for Red Hat. I was ready to quit on Linux because I was tired of bleeding edge distros breaking the stuff that I spent so much time fixing. This would often happen after a new upgrade.
The early editions of Fedora had the community and support that we take for granted today with Ubuntu.
Debian was a real pain to install. Ubuntu fixed that.
As long as Ubuntu can be downloaded for free, and the software remains free as in freedom, I do not care what Mark Shuttleworth does. If he finds a way to make money, great.
But lets get back to the original question regarding what do the fewer spinoffs mean? I think that it means that Ubuntu has it right. Besides we do not need another distro (you can almost write a song with that title couldn’t you) ((Thunderdome anyone???)) At this time we need less time devoted to doing another spinoff [YAS] and more time devoted to improving many of the programs. No, I do not see that as a contradiction to what I said earlier.
@John Kerr:
Partially agree, and Shuttleworth is by any means free to make as much money as possible out of Canonical and Ubuntu. I don’t mind paying for a distro.
If 75% of the derivates were gone I wouldn’t mind at all.
But does Ubuntu really nail it? If so – why isn’t Ubuntu available from major OEMs in the shops? Sure – it can be found here and there, but generally available?
Let me be clear: I believe that Linux on desktop is on par with the very best out there. That’s not the issue.
I just don’t believe that any distro has put everything together in to a package/concept that consumers will go for.
Spinoffs are only useful if they add something of particular importance to the table, and most of them don’t.
@Jake, Linux’s 50% growth was in the 2011 desktop and laptop market (it was far higher in tablets, of course, but Linux holds so much of most other markets that such growth would be unlikely).
The most commonly quoted free source is Net Applications, though all of the professional services to which I subscribe also noted the unexpected surge:
http://marketshare.hitslink.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=9&qpcustomb=0
Since you claim no credentials, and I’ve dealt with consumers professionally for 30 years, I’ll take your inability to refute my arguments except with plaintive cries of “But you’re an *enthusiast*” as conceding the argument. Geesh.
@Jack, there’s a classic difference between “highest quality” and “sales success” – VHS vs. Beta is the canonical (pun intended) example. “Highest quality” doesn’t win the market – what wins the market is “good enough with great marketing”.
Thus Android (a Linux distro) outsells iOS in smartphones, even though most analysts claim iOS is a more refined product. Remember when Android phones suddenly begin to sell? When Motorola used incredibly high-tech bombers to drop Droids in the famous TV commercial. Same OS as before, but now with *marketing*.
Android also grew rapidly in tablets to a 20% share last year – not because the product suddenly became an excellent tablet environment* (most of the tablets sold ran Android 2.3!), but because Amazon constantly featured the Kindle Fire at the top of the front page of their web front with a very aggressive price. Marketing.
And Windows far outsells OS/X and all Linux products combined, not because it’s better or easier than the alternatives, but largely because it is so well marketed.
And part of that marketing campaign is the huge opportunity for major OEMs to upsell – they get most of their income from pre-installing trial versions of legions of applications that nag the consumer to pay post-sales subscription fees, and then get added income from selling malware protection, utilities that are built into other OS products, extra technical support to get Windows working correctly, printers and other peripherals with rebates… (My son just bought a new Windows 7 gaming PC yesterday, and we were laughing so hard at the barrage of upsells that the very nice saleman finally gave up the ruse and began laughing with us. It’s ludicrous, but it’s incredibly profitable to the distribution chain.)
Thus I believe that Canonical will become profitable and take double-digit desktop share only if and to the extent that they become better at marketing. (Of course, they are now targeting the mobile and embedded market, but that’s a different essay.
)
*My wife requested and received a Fire for Christmas, and loves it dearly, so I’m not asserting it’s a bad product at all – only that it’s the same old Android 2 smartphone OS as has failed so often to win tablet market share. The OS didn’t change, the marketing strategy did.
Took it for granted that it was the desktop segment. The measured increase gives absolutely no reason for euphoria. Someone figured out that ONE “analysis” had a positive output – then it gets picked up and presented as fact. It is not.
Credentials? Flipping burgers for 30 years matches “I’ve dealt with consumers professionally for 30 years”. Doesn’t matter and I don’t care.
I got a pretty good idea of what’s going on.
Lack of marketing is just an excuse – Linux desktop is hardly for sale. Because the OEMs don’t have Linux distros of required quality to do the marketing for. A few hyped jippos – that’s all.
The distros do what ever they want – but the recipe doesn’t sell the cake thus the recipe needs change.
@ ricegf in #20.
“I’ll take your inability to refute my arguments except with plaintive cries…”
At which point of time you were thinking I am in the middle of your argument with Jack??? Jake and Jack are two different names.
All I did I asked for source of “50% growth” claim…
@jack
jack wrote:
“But does Ubuntu really nail it? If so – why isn’t Ubuntu available from major OEMs in the shops? Sure – it can be found here and there, but generally available?”
Let’s take a look at recent history. Up until about ten years ago we had to spend extra money for RAM to run a free software operating system (Free BSD, Linux). It was about ten years ago when computers that had enough RAM to run Linux started showing up on the curbs or the used computer discount piles. So until then Linux or Free BSD did not have much traction. Plentiful and cheap RAM opened the door for Linux.
Once Linux got more traction, it attracted more development, but as much as I enjoyed using it, I knew that it is a hard sell, and perhaps an even harder OS to support for a small one man shop. The problem is that you did not know when something is going to go wrong during an upgrade to mess up a customers’ computer.
Ubuntu changed that, it has got better with the LTS. But there are still a few problems.
1. Too many small shops make their living from fixing damage done by viruses. — They do not make much money on the sale of a system.
2. The big box shops may make a bit more on the sale of a system plus the sale of shrink wrap software.
3. Don’t forget the repeat business from anti-virus software sales.
4. I wonder who pays for the ” recommends Microsoft ” that you see on the printed paper advertisements?
5. We can get printers and scanners to work, but often it is not a download and click proposition.
Having said that I believe that a small shop could do well by installing Linux on systems and charging for the service and installation of printers etc.
I would like to know how many copies of MS Office does a local shop really sell and is the monetary return really worth “selling their soul”.
Linux is doing very well under the circumstances, it could use an advertisement during the Super Bowl, but I am not holding my breath for that.
Best regards,
John Kerr
It might very well do fine under the circumstances, and marketing is no doubt advantageous.
But the challenges the shops faces doesn’t really matter unless there are useable products out there.
It doesn’t really matter whether it’s Ubuntu, SuSE, Mandriva or a brand new distro. Any distro may do whatever they like.
They do, and they prefer to deliver generic distros. That’s what they want, and I got no problem with that.
But generic distros will never get success with consumers and OEM’s. If the Linux community REALLY wanted commercial success on desktop they’ll have to provide “pure desktop” products.
Less packages to maintain for the distro, less bugs, less compatibility issues, more resources to optimizing functionality, better user experience, more focus on applications, performance, consumption, compatibility +++
Desktop Linux has been trying to get mainstream acceptance for years. But the recipe of “everything for everyone” did not work. One of the reasons were that any move in that direction instantly caused the Linux enthusiasts to throw their full bashing capacity into the equation (Ubuntu received more than it’s fair share of bashing). Linux enthusiasts simply don’t want it.
Let’s look at Linux for smb/home servers:
I presume it could be agreed that Linux got all the bits and pieces required to set up literary any home or smb server.
But are there any distros that cater for the “no knowledge plug’n play” home/smb user? That know nothing about security, routers, firewalls and so on?
Novell’s SMB package? Linux MCE? Zentyal? Clearos?
I’m well aware that a huge chunk of this market is about to get killed by cloud. But where are the “virtual “plug’n play images for cloud”?
This part of the server market is suffering from the same thing as Desktop Linux does to the extent that the market hardly exist.
“Smb/home” server Linux is generic, and don’t address the needs of the “no knowledge plug’n play user” at home or in the small businesses that cannot afford in house expertise.
Why mentioning this? It’s the flip of the coin. With pure desktop distros you also would get pure smb/home server distros.
@Jake: My sincere apologies for the misdirected comment. I wrote both replies in parallel, and somehow added the comment re: “enthusiasts” to yours instead of Jack’s. Mea culpa.
The reason for the recent interest is that Net Applications has historically claimed about a 1% share for Linux, with no significant growth in many years. Six months of solid and persistent growth on that metric (questionable though its validity may be) is more than a statistical perturbation, it’s an actual trend – though why such a trend should appear *now*, when Windows 7 is being so well-received, rather than during the Windows Vista debacle, is hard to fathom.
I’m wondering if the press over the controversy over Unity and Gnome 3 is raising awareness of Linux options? *shrugs*
@Jack
Perhaps you and I would both agree to this:
In order to succeed on the desktop Linux needs a distro with:
1. A link to a repository limited A few home/office/media programs that are rock solid. (consumers are free to add others at their own risk but they probably will not bother to).
2. A partnership with a hardware company where everything that they have made in the past 5 years is plug an play. (Brother would be a good one to start with).
3. Plug and play secure smb server.
I think that this is doable. The sooner the better.
Best wishes
John Kerr
@ John Kerr:
Quite a few distros have most things in place and it’s a question about whether any distro (or “heavy” spin-off) is willing to alienate some (potentially many) of their users in order to become a 100% desktop distro.
Will any distro be willing to rid themselves of the server stuff and all but one DE – consentrating all their efforts towards “plain desktop users”?
It’s about accepting that “plain desktop users” are not really interested in Linux. It’s much easier to get them to use Linux than convincing them to become Linux enthusiasts. If some/many/all becomes interested and then enthusiasts at a later stage – fantastic.
I don’t believe “Linux” can convince Brother. New printers from HP and Lexmark will probably have to do for now. If Brother believe they will make money out of Linux support (or loose money if they don’t) they will come around.
I never buy pherperials or services ++ that doesn’t work with Linux, Windows and OSX. I don’t want to replace everything just because someone in the building prefer something different than the rest.
In other words:
Brother will never be able to sell anything to me even if I chose Windows. The requirement is still that pherperials must support Linux and OSX.
I agree, and strongly believe it’s feasible. There’s really nothing much technical that prevents it from happening.
The challenges wrt consumer distros are ideological/strategic, not technical.
The hows and whats and whos is for others to decide, but I’ll support any distro who is willing to do that job and is serious about it.
Now, I’ll cross my fingers for Mandriva who might pass away today – after a week in resuscitation.
@jack
Brother has always been a supporter of Linux. We may have to dig into their website and do considerable cut and paste into a terminal window but we can get most of their stuff to work. Some Brother printers are PNP in Linux.
I do not know about OSX but I thought that Brother did support it.
Years ago when my wife and purchased our first computer (Mac SE) Brother was the only company that had a laser with support for both Windows and Mac as standard. I have been a loyal customer ever since.
Cheers
John
Misunderstood, thus my bad John – apologize.
Fedora Project slash Red Hat did a great job with printer identification (system config printer) for PackageKit. If drivers are available and the printer’s ID and profile is entered into the base, it should be plug’n play. Assume not every compatible printer is in the list though.
I’ll remove Brother from my nonolist ;o)
When asked for advice about hardware I always recommend the cross platform alternative anyway.
Another week in resuscitation for Mandriva – they extended to 27 jan. If it’s not dead – it’s alive.
@Jack
No Problem, Jack. Think of our conversation as spreading the knowledge around that we both share. Sharing is what it is all about.
for everyone who is just hanging on for every word of wisdom
Website for Brother Linux Drivers: http://welcome.solutions.brother.com/bsc/public_s/id/linux/en/index.html.
Be sure to read the instructions, (and You can cut and paste from the web site into a terminal window)
Cheers Everyone
“The reason for the recent interest is that Net Applications has historically claimed about a 1% share for Linux, with no significant growth in many years.”
If ‘desktop linux’ really did grow that much it would be considered a major break through. Linux media (and the fanboys) would have been claiming a “Year Of Desktop Linux” all over the place…
The graph here represents “Usage Share Statistics for Internet Technologies” (not actual sales or ‘official’ desktop installs). Each monthly row adds up to 100% (give or take 0.01%). It is safe to assume that iOS/Android are bundled together with “Mac”/”Linux” respectively. What you see here is a steady stream of sales of iPad and Android Tablets (perhaps cell phones are included here as well).
In the beginning of 2011 Android tablets did not have much to brag about. They failed to make a dent in iPad sales. So, during the 2nd half of the year we saw some significant price reductions for Android tablets (and some fire sales – HP pad). As result, sales started to pick up (combine that with “Back To School” and Holiday sale events)…
I can’t really find find another explanation for this. What we see here is a change over to internet browsing from mobile devices at expense of traditional desktop computers.
If you think otherwise I am ready to listen…
@John Kerr:
I am carrying out some testing of the daily build of Ubu 12.04 now, and they have done VERY impressive work on Unity. As far as I can see, they also have done some really good work on the software center.
Further, plug’n play has been taken to a higher level.
I believe that the software center now (12.04) circumvents a lot of the issues wrt repos thus it’s a step in the right direction. Still believe that separation has to happen though, and I think it will. Sooner or later.
Early days, but the impression wrt quality of the alpha, the 12.04 release might very well be LTS-material.
I believe 12.04 will more or less kill the Unity debate even though personal preferences might keep users away. If the regular Ubuntu users embraces Unity, I believe it will increase the possibility of separating Ubuntu from it’s derivates. Thus different Desktop environments moved into separate repos maintained by sub-communities.
If Ubuntu manages to become a clean “Unity distro” it becomes more likely that other distros goes for single desktop environments too.
@Jack
Yo said “I can’t really find find another explanation for this. What we see here is a change over to internet browsing from mobile devices at expense of traditional desktop computers.”
I think that you are right on. Looking at the graph it could be said that the Number of Linux users stayed the same. It is just that the former Windows users have dropped the desktop (Windows) in favour of a hand held device. This could result in an increase percentage wise in Linux.
OR
People who have tried Android and knew it was Linux based are now taking Linux for a test drive.Perhaps liking it.
So People are complaining about Blackberry’s 4%. All this complaining about it; hell, if Linux hit 4% we would be breaking out the bubbly.
Cheers
John
BUT WAIT THERE IS MORE!
Microsoft’s Loss (1.38) is almost the same as the gains of Linux + MAC (1.39)
Perhaps it is a real gain after all.
Lets break open a bottle of beer!!!!
John
@ John Kerr #34.
I have a very slim hoper for the 2nd part of your “OR”. The thing is that Android does not associate itself much with Linux . If you go to Android web site you’ll have hard time finding any reference to Linux or word “Linux” itself.
I recently purchased a brand new Android phone. I went into setting “About Phone” and there is nothing indicating that it related to Linux. Even “Kernel Version” section does not have word Linux in it (only lnxdroid in version number which is not enough to make a connection to Linux).
What I’d really like to know is how they collect the data. There are many moving parts. I am just going to put myself as an example: my laptop is dual booted Win 7 / Mint 11.
* Do they count me twice (once in Win + once in Linux)?
* When I take my laptop to work do they double count me again because my laptop is connected from different IP/location?
Also, I have seen another graph produced by Net Apps (I guess representing Jan or Feb 2012). In that graph they provided stats for Android separately (along with Xbox, and other devices). Over there Linux “dipped” to 1.3% while Android claimed 1.25% of market share. iOS claims 4%. Windows Phone is not even close…
“Lets break open a bottle of beer!!!”
Totally agree. Cheers !!!