Fair... It was never their core business and never skyrocketed. And I'm a heavily user of the service.
Any other good alternative, maybe FOSS, except Dropbox?
Shutting down Ubuntu One file services
101–110 of 209 posts
Re: Shutting down Ubuntu One file services
#102"Today we are announcing plans to shut down the Ubuntu One file services. This is a tough decision, particularly when our users rely so heavily on the functionality that Ubuntu One provides" Ok, so do users really rely so heavily on Ubuntu One? If so, then why do you shut it down? If no, then why do you say they rely on it? I believe they don't rely on it. "The Ubuntu One file services will not be included in the upc…
> Ok, so do users really rely so heavily on Ubuntu One? If so, then why do you shut it down? If no, then why do you say they rely on it? From the article: > Additionally, the free storage wars aren’t a sustainable place for us to be, particularly with other services now regularly offering 25GB-50GB free storage. In other words, they can't compete with Dropbox, Box, SkyDrive, Google Drive, and whatever flavor of the w…
It's funny because the origins of Ubuntu One were a clear attempt at getting some SAAS money. Finding revenue streams has always been an issue for Linux distributions, especially consumer-oriented ones like Ubuntu, and UbuntuOne was yet another stab at the problem. Then they found that it's hard to compete in SAAS against giants like Microsoft and Google, where that sort of service is often a commodity driving profits in other areas. Focused companies like Dropbox can do it, but if your focus is elsewhere, then you don't have a chance.
I wonder what they'll try next.
Re: Shutting down Ubuntu One file services
#103Did the timelines seem awfully aggressive to anyone? (June 1 service stops, July 31 all data is erased) For a service that we were suppose to be syncing our lives to, that seems like a really abrupt, customer unfriendly ramp-down. I would have expected something more like: 1. April 1 - no new accounts. 2. May 1 - can no longer add files to your existing account. 3. May - Dec - nagged/reminded constantly to pull your…
Almost everyone will have at least one completely up-to-date copy of their files. It's just a matter of signing up for a competing service and re-uploading. Four months seems like a long enough time to accomplish that.
It's not only about file storage. Ubuntu One offered a Web service to programmatically access the files. Imagine you've developed an application that interfaces with Ubuntu One and is mission critical for your business.
Re: Shutting down Ubuntu One file services
#104Very awesome that they release the code. I wish all companies would open source code they don't use anymore. I mean it really doesn't cost anything pushing your old code in a github repo or something.
I mean it really doesn't cost anything pushing your old code in a github repo or something. That's not true. The code must be checked for licensing issues; certain parts may depend on components they don't intend to release, or on third-party ones they can't release. It must also be checked to make sure it doesn't have any security implications (credentials, information about internal architectures, etc). Finally, re…
> certain parts may depend on components they don't intend to release
Then hopefully that code isn't in the same repository during develoment, but as a separate library. Everything else makes no sense.
The open source code can be useful even if it doesn't run without the library you didn't release.
> or on third-party ones they can't release.
Again, I hope for you, you didn't check in this stuff in your main code repository.
> It must also be checked to make sure it doesn't have any security implications (credentials, information about internal architectures, etc).
If your code has hard coded credentials you should probably start by firing your developers. As for the architecture part, if you need to do security by obscurity you're doing it wrong anyways.
> Finally, releasing it may expose them to patent attacks of which existence they might not even be aware.
Not for canonical, they're based in the UK and there are no software patents in Europe :)
But okay, that might be an issue for some US based companies.
Edit: IANAL, the situation might be a bit different in the UK than in the rest of europe, so I might be wrong: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_patents_under_United_...
Re: Shutting down Ubuntu One file services
#105Earlier quoted context omitted.
Almost everyone will have at least one completely up-to-date copy of their files. It's just a matter of signing up for a competing service and re-uploading. Four months seems like a long enough time to accomplish that.
It's not only about file storage. Ubuntu One offered a Web service to programmatically access the files. Imagine you've developed an application that interfaces with Ubuntu One and is mission critical for your business.
Then you've learned a valuable lesson about how to design applications that are mission critical for your business.
Re: Shutting down Ubuntu One file services
#106Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Ok, so do users really rely so heavily on Ubuntu One? If so, then why do you shut it down? If no, then why do you say they rely on it? From the article: > Additionally, the free storage wars aren’t a sustainable place for us to be, particularly with other services now regularly offering 25GB-50GB free storage. In other words, they can't compete with Dropbox, Box, SkyDrive, Google Drive, and whatever flavor of the w…
It's funny because the origins of Ubuntu One were a clear attempt at getting some SAAS money. Finding revenue streams has always been an issue for Linux distributions, especially consumer-oriented ones like Ubuntu, and UbuntuOne was yet another stab at the problem. Then they found that it's hard to compete in SAAS against giants like Microsoft and Google, where that sort of service is often a commodity driving profit…
Canonical does seem to have more trouble finding reliable revenue streams. This is probably due to their focus on more end-user-oriented support and features. Among the Linux distro 'major players', though, they're kind of the odd ones out. RedHat and SUSE have been doing pretty well for themselves.
http://www.networkworld.com/community/blog/linux-profitabili...
Re: Shutting down Ubuntu One file services
#107Earlier quoted context omitted.
I mean it really doesn't cost anything pushing your old code in a github repo or something. That's not true. The code must be checked for licensing issues; certain parts may depend on components they don't intend to release, or on third-party ones they can't release. It must also be checked to make sure it doesn't have any security implications (credentials, information about internal architectures, etc). Finally, re…
> certain parts may depend on components they don't intend to release Then hopefully that code isn't in the same repository during develoment, but as a separate library. Everything else makes no sense. The open source code can be useful even if it doesn't run without the library you didn't release. > or on third-party ones they can't release. Again, I hope for you, you didn't check in this stuff in your main code rep…
Yes, yes, companies shouldn't do that. But I'm talking about real life, not spherical cows, and we know that companies do all that and much worse.
Besides, let's say that you're a product manager who's responsible for allowing the release of that code. You know that generally all those best practices are followed, but there were a few dozens of employees touching that code, and some might not even be at the company anymore. Are you really sure that none of them put sensitive stuff in there? Are you willing to bet your job on that?
Re: Shutting down Ubuntu One file services
#108I am trying to install Ubuntu One now. Just to see what happens. It tries to install but then gives a "The application has closed unexpectedly".
Are people who have Ubuntu One installed being notified? I backup with Ubuntu One and haven't got any 'imminent shutdown' messages.
Re: Shutting down Ubuntu One file services
#109Earlier quoted context omitted.
Does anyone else remember when companies were proud that they were the custodians of a file format? No. When was that?
See: Microsoft Word, Corel WordPerfect, Adobe PSDs, WMAs, RARs, etc, etc, etc, ad nauseum.
Proud custodians? Yes, they wrote the format and controlled it, but it was no different that a proprietary protocol; it was just a necessary way of allowing people to send data around. .DOC and .PSD in particular have always been proprietary messes that they wanted you to treat as a black box.
Re: Shutting down Ubuntu One file services
#110Earlier quoted context omitted.
> certain parts may depend on components they don't intend to release Then hopefully that code isn't in the same repository during develoment, but as a separate library. Everything else makes no sense. The open source code can be useful even if it doesn't run without the library you didn't release. > or on third-party ones they can't release. Again, I hope for you, you didn't check in this stuff in your main code rep…
Yes, yes, companies shouldn't do that. But I'm talking about real life, not spherical cows, and we know that companies do all that and much worse. Besides, let's say that you're a product manager who's responsible for allowing the release of that code. You know that generally all those best practices are followed, but there were a few dozens of employees touching that code, and some might not even be at the company a…
> Are you really sure that none of them put sensitive stuff in there? Are you willing to bet your job on that?
If you really want an answer to that: Yes, I would. Even if there are credentials in there, I'd expect them not to be usable from the public net, but only from lan/vpn.
Yes, I'd risk my job for that.