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Could Microsoft release a desktop Linux?

zdnet.com

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Re: Could Microsoft release a desktop Linux?

#221

Post by overgard »

DylanDmitri wrote: post #29
overgard wrote: post #19

I see a lot of “why not” but no actual “why”. Microsoft loses strategic platform control and gains: ... crickets

While desktop platform control is important and probably has a positive ROI, the article argues that desktop OSs are already "good enough", and that Microsoft can probably find more profitable alternatives for their engineering effort. This is the same motive behind the switch to Chromium, that browsers are "good enough" and that the marginal gains of platform independence aren't worth the heavy investment.

I get a little uncomfortable when people talk about "engineering effort" like it's just some sort of power stream you can just repoint, because to me it belies a lack of understanding of what programmers do and the challenges they face. (I'm not accusing you personally of that, just that's what pops in mind when people talk about refocusing engineers. I always hear inexperienced project managers talk about having engineers "swarm" a problem, which is a dead giveaway that they're extremely naive). You can't just take a bunch of kernel devs and all the sudden have them work on sharepoint or web frontends or something. Not just from an experience standpoint but a lot of them wouldn't want to do it. Really "refocusing" tends to involve layoffs and rehiring.

Re: Could Microsoft release a desktop Linux?

#223

Post by kartickv »

kerng wrote: post #182
kartickv wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even shared source would be great. You can see the code, you can audit it for security or privacy issues, disable parts you don't like and distribute modified versions to people who already have a licensed copy of Windows. That won't dry up Microsoft's revenue stream, and is a great middle ground between open and closed source.

Thats been true since early 2000s. Microsoft shares the Windows source code since over a decade, I don't understand why some claim it's not available and entirely closed down. It was 2002 when I first read some of the Windows code via official Microsoft channels (Shared Source license) to unterstand some of the quirky behaviors.

Can you give me a link where I can read the entire Windows 10 source code, make changes I want, and create a build, and redistribute it to people who already have a license?

I only came up with https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/sharedsource/ which has specific categories like enterprise, government security, OEMs, etc. I'm looking for something available to everyone.

Re: Could Microsoft release a desktop Linux?

#224

Post by halbritt »

zapzupnz wrote: post #202
Zardoz84 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you know that everything that unity was doing, can be donde indica KDE if you take 20 minutes to configure it? Try to not call it "amateur"

> you know that everything that unity was doing can be done in KDE […] Please re-read what I said. I said that I was hopeful that Ubuntu would create something that would make KDE and GNOME seem like amateur hour. I never said Unity was the thing for which I was hoping, merely that it was Ubuntu's attempt (which, to my mind, was a failure), and I never said KDE or GNOME __are__ amateur — although, you forced my hand…

I totally agree with your point.

At some point, my threshold for irritation to run a Linux desktop dropped low enough that I was willing to make the jump. My threshold for irritation for Mac also went up.

I was only willing to do so if I could install a stock standard distro and get to work without having deal with a bunch of configuration hassle. That's pretty much true for Ubuntu. However, there are a couple of issues that one may need to address that I didn't mind so much, but I readily admit, I'm not an average user.

I switched when Unity was still a thing and was surprised to learn that it was pretty good with only a little refinement needed. I was pretty disappointed when Canonical dropped Unity settled on Gnome and here we are two years later at precisely the same place, with the aforementioned refinements still needed.

Like you, I was hopeful that Canonical would produce a generally usable Linux desktop, but that still remains to be seen.

Re: Could Microsoft release a desktop Linux?

#225

Post by sho »

zapzupnz wrote: post #202
Zardoz84 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you know that everything that unity was doing, can be donde indica KDE if you take 20 minutes to configure it? Try to not call it "amateur"

> you know that everything that unity was doing can be done in KDE […] Please re-read what I said. I said that I was hopeful that Ubuntu would create something that would make KDE and GNOME seem like amateur hour. I never said Unity was the thing for which I was hoping, merely that it was Ubuntu's attempt (which, to my mind, was a failure), and I never said KDE or GNOME __are__ amateur — although, you forced my hand…

You hit the nail on the head, I agree completely. But:

> Try thinking like a regular user, who just wants everything to work properly out of the box, rather than a technical user

I'm by any measure a technical user, with over a decade in software dev and a decade before that in network admin and corporate IT, and I absolutely insist on things working properly out of the box. Anything else is Work™ and I'm simply not going to do it for personal devices. Sure, I'll spend hours tweaking a server to get it behaving exactly the way I want. I am almost OCD about reliable, robust, version controlled environments. Just the other day I spent literally hours massaging some stupid nginx config file so it did exactly the right thing, all of the time, in exactly the right way. And all was right with the world.

My personal stuff though? I have zero, and I mean zero tolerance for any of that shit. My personal stuff better work perfectly first time, every time, or I will be taking it back for a refund or throwing it in the fucking river (regretfully this is not a metaphor). At work I am all linux and open source. At home I am the biggest Apple whore you ever met. I just want things to work.

I am also disappointed in Canonical, who I thought might do as you suggested and create "MacOS for Linux". I think such a thing is sorely needed. They haven't succeeded, though - perhaps MS could. I'd like to see that if they did it, and I'd give it a solid chance.

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