Linux World domination (was Re: [NCLUG] PC for Linux (Ubuntu))

[Jim Hutchinson]

On Fri, Sep 19, 2008 at 1:10 PM, John L. Bass <jbass at dmsd.com> wrote:

>
> I do disagree that it's "vanishingly small percentage of the total number
> of paid developers", and I've never seen any stats anywhere to support such
> an argument, and walking thru any shrink wrap isle suggests otherwise. Can
> you please cite?
>
> One of the problems with advocating Linux on the desktop is quite the
> opposite ... all the good titles are shrink wrap


I'm not sure I agree with that. Granted, there are a handful of biggie apps
that certainly dominate the market and will be found in any store selling
software - microsoft and  Adobe products certainly come to mind. However,
aside from the game aisle, whenever I walk through a software aisle I'm
amazed (and frustrated) at all the garbage that is for sale when for most of
it there are "freed" alternatives. The reason they are not shrink wraped is
because they don't need to be. I just sudo apt-get (Ubuntu user) them.

In addition, even for many of the biggie titles there are freed
alternatives. Sure, they are not alwasy as robust or fancy as the shrink
wrapped titles but they exist and are not on the shelves for the same reason
stated above.

Now, a more interesting question is what percentage of the software commonly
used (now and in the not too distant future) doesn't even exist in shrink
wrap form becasue of a changing tech world? The Internet is going to be the
next OS. We will simply use a basic OS to get our hardware connect to the
Internet and go from there - at least for a large percentage of the "average
computer users".  There are already a fair number of web based apps that can
replace the shrink wrap options and while they are still limited it is an
industry in its infancy. Zoho offers quite a few, there is Google Docs and
there are photo editing sites like picnic and others. Some are free
(both/either meaning) and some are not.


and are not ported to Linux because some in the FOSS movement are very
> hostile to proprietary binary only products. This creates a chicken and egg
> problem, which slows Linux progress on the desktop. Ditto with servers,
> where a lot of core business application are developed only for Microsoft
> Servers, and they refuse to port to Linux. Browse the shrink wrap software
> section, and look for titles that install on Linux. Nearly all MS PC, with
> some Mac.


Not finding Linux apps on store shelves is not really a valid test of
anything since most Linux apps are not distributed that way. That's kind of
like pointing out the lack of vegetables in a butcher shop.

-- 
Jim (Ubuntu geek extraordinaire)
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