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Linux snickers at Microsoft's victory declaration

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Re: Linux snickers at Microsoft's victory declaration

#31

Post by recoiledsnake »

justinsb wrote: post #27
recoiledsnake wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't tried a Chromebook yet, will try to get my hands on one. >Just like with Apple, there's possibly a price premium at the moment, but the scary thing for Microsoft is that - unlike Apple - there's no inherent reason for a price premium with a ChromeBook. Google could actually subsidize the price. That's what the speculation was before they set the price, that it will debut at around $150 to $200. But it didn'…

I definitely agree that it isn't an obvious choice at the current price point, but perhaps that's because Google knows that it isn't ready yet (needs better hardware, offline support in Google Apps, a more sensible approach to managing files). It's definitely worth borrowing one to try it out though - you do get a good sense of what a cloud-orientated machine will be like. I suppose if you're going to try out a Chrom…

Since you were wondering about Microsoft's strategy for tablets/netbooks(especially ARM based ones), I was asking if you had seen the demo videos.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p92QfWOw88I&hd=1

http://allthingsd.com/20110601/microsofts-windows-8-demo-fro...

Re: Linux snickers at Microsoft's victory declaration

#32

Post by cageface »

mrb wrote: post #29
macco wrote: post #9

As a great Ubuntu fan I must say: It's strange why mobile plattforms are always a example for the success of Linux. Android may be using a Linux kernel, but it has next to nothing to do with traditionel Linux distros, that are developed in colaboration.

Why restrict yourself to traditional distros? The biggest advantage of Linux that its supporters have been explaining for a while is that because it is open source, it can be modified to suit your needs and build whatever cool product you want with it. Google did just that with Android. Therefore it is a perfectly valid example for this article to claim rightfully that Linux is winning.

And it'a perfect example of the kind of innovation that OSS enables. Thanks to Linux, instead of wasting time building a new kernel from the ground up Google was able to spend that time building something entirely new on top of it.

Re: Linux snickers at Microsoft's victory declaration

#33

Post by riffraff »

justinsb wrote: post #20
recoiledsnake wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>it was that Windows had already lost (largely because their competitors changed the game.) Competitors no longer compete only with Internet Explorer, they now offer an alternative to the entire Windows OS. Linux on the desktop (GNOME/KDE) didn't win per-se, but the browser did win, and Windows isn't a necessary choice for a browser-first system. Is that reflected in sales figures? They do acknowledge competition fro…

It's reflected in (my reading of) Microsoft's statement. Sales figures are retrospective; this section of their 10-K is forward looking. Also, if you define the market to include smartphones and tablets, I'm pretty sure Microsoft doesn't have 85% market share. The open question is whether that broader definition represents the future of "the computer market" or whether it should remain a separate category. Of course,…

would you care to share data sources for your confidence?

I am not arguing they are wrong, I am just unable to google concrete data for PC and smarthphone + tablets usage in a recent time period.

Re: Linux snickers at Microsoft's victory declaration

#34

Post by justinsb »

riffraff wrote: post #33
justinsb wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's reflected in (my reading of) Microsoft's statement. Sales figures are retrospective; this section of their 10-K is forward looking. Also, if you define the market to include smartphones and tablets, I'm pretty sure Microsoft doesn't have 85% market share. The open question is whether that broader definition represents the future of "the computer market" or whether it should remain a separate category. Of course,…

would you care to share data sources for your confidence? I am not arguing they are wrong, I am just unable to google concrete data for PC and smarthphone + tablets usage in a recent time period.

A few sources... I wouldn't put too much faith in the details, but in terms of rough magnitude they're probably pretty accurate.

Gartner says PC sales in 2011 will be http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405274870330090457617...

iPad sales looking like 40 million (or more) for 2011: http://blogs.computerworld.com/18550/apple_2011_ipad_sales_h...

Smartphone sales were 100 million in Q2 alone; Windows share of that was 1.6% (!): http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9219112/Gartner_Smart...

Re: Linux snickers at Microsoft's victory declaration

#35

Post by justinsb »

recoiledsnake wrote: post #31
justinsb wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I definitely agree that it isn't an obvious choice at the current price point, but perhaps that's because Google knows that it isn't ready yet (needs better hardware, offline support in Google Apps, a more sensible approach to managing files). It's definitely worth borrowing one to try it out though - you do get a good sense of what a cloud-orientated machine will be like. I suppose if you're going to try out a Chrom…

Since you were wondering about Microsoft's strategy for tablets/netbooks(especially ARM based ones), I was asking if you had seen the demo videos. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p92QfWOw88I&hd=1 http://allthingsd.com/20110601/microsofts-windows-8-demo-fro...

I've seen some of the previews. I don't put too much stock in them - Longhorn looked pretty awesome as well, until it shipped as Vista.

My concern is that once every faction at Microsoft has had their say, you end up with this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUXnJraKM3k

Re: Linux snickers at Microsoft's victory declaration

#36

Post by TheCondor »

dredmorbius wrote: post #24
iamelgringo wrote: post #14

I've been interacting quite a bit with with Microsoft people in the last couple of years. I was shocked to meet a bunch of people within Microsoft that have recently migrated there from Sun. Joel Franusic, the BizSpark evangelist for Silicon Valley has roots as a php/perl/linux Admin, and has been a Super Happy Dev House organizer since the early days. They are working really hard to change Microsoft's attitude towar…

That's all well and good. But. But: I've been hearing this for well over a decade. "Microsoft's attitude toward Linux is changing." Again and again and again and again. And then some new instance of FUD emerges, or a legal attack on a Free Software / open source advocate or company, some trumped-up performance benchmark, chairs in low-earth orbit. Whatever. The behavior has always failed to match the rhetoric. I'm su…

It'll take a management change and some serious actions.

Let's make no mistake, the company has been compeltely and 100% opposed to Linux for a very long time now. What exactly would it take to constitue a change of heart? Seriously? I would think they could extend patent amnesty to all Linux distributions. They could embrace the Mono project. They could acutally release some software on Linux. How about media player codecs? When they come up with something like JPEG-XR or VC1, how about an MIT or BSD or GPL licensed reference implementation?

Short of porting a major application to Linux (Office?) I think a sizable contingent would never believe them. As others have mentioned, if you're building web apps, how do they even matter other than having a crappy browser that you have to code for?

Re: Linux snickers at Microsoft's victory declaration

#38

Post by mebesilly »

jff wrote: post #19

"Supercomputers, the fastest of the fast, run Linux almost exclusively." And it's so disappointing. Consider the Blue Gene series. Great new architecture, custom networks, custom hardware. Initially, they put Linux on the I/O nodes and a custom kernel on the compute nodes, because you want a minimum of OS noise (see the FTQ benchmark for more info on this). But everyone clamored for Linux on compute nodes--so now we…

The only real competitors to Fortran on supercomputers are Chapel http://chapel.cray.com/ and X10 http://x10-lang.org/ ( the proposed language Fortress died an early death).

Toy languages like C, C++ and Java that microcomputer developers play with simply are not suitable for supercomputers. Among other problems, those joke languages simply do not scale to 64,000 heterogenous processors.

Re: Linux snickers at Microsoft's victory declaration

#39

Post by selven »

movingahead wrote: post #15
gvb wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mark Shuttleworth says Ubuntu is making inroads on desktops and is poised to take off: http://www.markshuttleworth.com/archives/738 FWIIW, IMHO there never will be a "year of the linux desktop." Linux on the desktop is an infiltration, not a blitzkrieg. As such, it will only be recognizable in retrospect.

Even as a passionate Ubuntu follower, I don't see the possibility of Ubuntu going main-stream. The OS may match or even exceed the capabilities of Windows, but it is more important to have a diverse number of generally used apps. I feel Chrome OS has a very good chance of getting mainstream popularity. It does what it intends to do pretty well.

The apps are all moving onto the web these days anyway - Ubuntu can run anything Chrome OS can.

Re: Linux snickers at Microsoft's victory declaration

#40

Post by shriphani »

justinsb wrote: post #35
recoiledsnake wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since you were wondering about Microsoft's strategy for tablets/netbooks(especially ARM based ones), I was asking if you had seen the demo videos. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p92QfWOw88I&hd=1 http://allthingsd.com/20110601/microsofts-windows-8-demo-fro...

I've seen some of the previews. I don't put too much stock in them - Longhorn looked pretty awesome as well, until it shipped as Vista. My concern is that once every faction at Microsoft has had their say, you end up with this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EUXnJraKM3k

That was an video made at Microsoft. It is an example of a personality trait called "taking a chill pill and being able to laugh at yourself". Source for this info : http://www.ipodobserver.com/ipo/article/Microsoft_Confirms_i...

BTW, Microsoft's packaging of its hardware products is very sleek and futuristic.

Disclaimer : I'm an MSFT intern (and in a week I won't have to type this anymore phew).

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