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A first look at the OS the Chinese government wants to replace Windows

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Re: A first look at the OS the Chinese government wants to replace Windows

#41

Nobody uses it in China. Dell installs it on computers just because a computer without an OS is not allowed to sell in China.

Shh... youre ruining the "MS and the NSA will pay for their crimes" circlejerk here.

The reality is that MS is not going anywhere. MS sold 200m copies of Windows last year. Its difficult for organizations to move off Windows, and especially Office and IE, considering how much infrastructure expects those things to be available. The 10 year Munich linux migration wasn't much of a crowd pleaser either, considering that city is thinking about going back to Windows:

http://www.zdnet.com/article/after-a-10-year-linux-migration...

MS still knows how to play this game well and arguably the desktop is something of a natural monopoly.

Re: A first look at the OS the Chinese government wants to replace Windows

#43
post #23

India has one too: http://www.indiatimes.com/news/india/indian-government-is-la...

This might be a long shot, but I wonder if the now-well-known Telemetry of Windows 7,8, and 10 created an incentive for foreign governments to avoid using Windows OS

Are they moving off home-grown Lenovo hardware because of superfish and other spyware? Governments disable all this stuff anyway.

Re: A first look at the OS the Chinese government wants to replace Windows

#44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see what you mean, but I don't think it's the implied 'that' that's problematic. The subject of the second clause is 'the Chinese government', the verb 'to want to', the object 'replace Windows'. This whole thing qualifies the first clause, 'the OS'. But the semantic relation between these two clauses ("with") is not established. It's like saying "A detailed look at the mountain John wants to dance with an elephant…

On the aside: You are right that the sentence is ungrammatical if you take the object of "want" to be "replace Windows" and the subject of "replace" to be "the Chinese government". But it is grammatical if you analyze it as an instance of the construction "X wants Y to Z", where Y is (semantically) the subject of the infinitive Z. To a first approximation, relative clauses in English are formed by taking a sentence a…

Ah, I see it now. I wasn't reading it the way the author intended. The Chinese governments wants the OS. With the goal of replacing Windows.

Excellent explanation, thank you canjobear! (And jameshart).

Re: A first look at the OS the Chinese government wants to replace Windows

#45
post #18
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hello, I'm the author of this article. From what I can tell it appears that both NeoKylin and Ubuntu Kylin (a collab between Chinese state actors and Canonical) have simply adopted the Kylin name purely for its familiarity as meaning "Chinese OS." The original Kylin was a government project based on FreeBSD whereas NeoKylin:Fedora::UbuntuKylin:Ubuntu

"That’s pretty ironic, given how similar it feels to a product made by Microsoft, long the enemy of open-source Linux evangelists." You're a few years behind the times ;-)

I'm a Free Software evangelist.

Microsoft has been my enemy for a long time.

Please be specific: what has Microsoft ever done that has significantly improved end users' ability to run Free Software?

Re: A first look at the OS the Chinese government wants to replace Windows

#46

It seems quite logical that the Chinese don't want an OS that shovels data to the NSA. They want an OS that shovels data to their own agencies.

While this is likely true, do you think they can't get that data another way? I would speculate that with pre-installed root certificates and total network control they could get a lot of data. This wikipedia entry estimates that in 09 ~80% of chinese software sold was pirated. Pirated versions of windows and chrome are distributed on the black market. This software may have changes for the cracking program so the hash will mismatch the authentic software. Placing spyware on chrome and windows copies and distributing them would allow them the ability to harvest this data anyway. I agree with your appraisal. As a cynic, I assume they are trying to control data flowing out of china and this is one of many ways to control data, especially the type of people who would use this operating system which I would assume could be gov't controlled institutions like schools and research labs, as well as party officials.

Edit: forgot to cite source: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_operating_sys...

Re: A first look at the OS the Chinese government wants to replace Windows

#47
post #11
post #10

The article mentions that NeoKylin may be based on a recent version of Fedora, which has me confused. Isn't NeoKylin derived from Kylin, rather than Fedora?

Hello, I'm the author of this article. From what I can tell it appears that both NeoKylin and Ubuntu Kylin (a collab between Chinese state actors and Canonical) have simply adopted the Kylin name purely for its familiarity as meaning "Chinese OS." The original Kylin was a government project based on FreeBSD whereas NeoKylin:Fedora::UbuntuKylin:Ubuntu

Ubuntu Kylin for China looks better http://www.ubuntu.com/desktop/ubuntu-kylin

Re: A first look at the OS the Chinese government wants to replace Windows

#49
post #45
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"That’s pretty ironic, given how similar it feels to a product made by Microsoft, long the enemy of open-source Linux evangelists." You're a few years behind the times ;-)

I'm a Free Software evangelist. Microsoft has been my enemy for a long time. Please be specific: what has Microsoft ever done that has significantly improved end users' ability to run Free Software?

Allowing multiple generations access to an simplified UI & OS,and providing opportunity for those that thirst for knowledge a stepping stone into the world of open source. Yes, free/open source *nix distro's allow this as well, but the barrier to entry is higher when you are a young kid without even basic knowledge (providing that your hand was not held during the process).

Without Microsoft and Apple, how many of the generations that have contributed to open source, be were they are now??

Edit: Just playing Devils Advocate here - I hold no special regard for MS - but rather appreciate the symbiosis that has developed within IT in general.

Re: A first look at the OS the Chinese government wants to replace Windows

#50
post #45
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"That’s pretty ironic, given how similar it feels to a product made by Microsoft, long the enemy of open-source Linux evangelists." You're a few years behind the times ;-)

I'm a Free Software evangelist. Microsoft has been my enemy for a long time. Please be specific: what has Microsoft ever done that has significantly improved end users' ability to run Free Software?

They fund the Core Infrastructure Initiative [1], OpenBSD [2] etc. They release free software themselves. [3]

[1] https://www.coreinfrastructure.org/

[2] http://www.openbsdfoundation.org/contributors.html

[3] https://github.com/dotnet/core

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