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The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News)
The open-pc project was announced at the recently-concluded Gran Canaria Desktop Summit as reported by KDE.News. Open-pc is an effort to produce a free software based PC, with hardware supported by free drivers, as well as applications that are well-tested to work on the device. "The project was initiated in response to the lack of quality in the Free Software-based hardware solutions currently on the market. As many reviewers and end-users have stated, the pre-installed software used by hardware vendors generated a bad image for Free Software with potentially interested end-users. Much of the software was buggy and not widely tested and device drivers were often unstable, non-free or not available at all."
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With free firmware? Posted Jul 13, 2009 21:42 UTC (Mon) by dwmw2 (subscriber, #2063) [Link]
Please tell me they're planning to use open source firmware rather than the crappy proprietary BIOS code that PeeCees are normally infested with.
With free firmware? Posted Jul 14, 2009 0:18 UTC (Tue) by proski (subscriber, #104) [Link] The survey doesn't even ask that. Either it's already decided, or nobody cares.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 13, 2009 21:56 UTC (Mon) by alecs1 (guest, #46699) [Link]
I took the survey, but found it a bit weird. For example:
- the price ranges are inappropriate, there are 7 or 8 steps of 100$ (300-400, 400-500, etc) and from 800-900 it jumps to >2000. I wanted to choose something more general, like 500-1000. - the possible types of computer where tower, netbook and nettop; normal laptop was missing. I can't imagine myself with a tower anymore (besides mobility the laptop is quieter and has integrated UPS), but I also can't imagine with an underpowered computer.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 13, 2009 22:11 UTC (Mon) by johill (subscriber, #25196) [Link]
Indeed, that's one strange survey.
Never has a "don't care" option either. Why would it matter what music player a user wanted to run on it?!
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 1:49 UTC (Tue) by elanthis (guest, #6227) [Link]
For the same reason that the project exists at all: a complete lack of connection to reality and an irrational belief that there's actually a market for such a thing when run-of-the-mill Dells work perfectly for 99% of people and the other 1% are home-building their machines anyway.
You aren't going to get people to give a shit about Free Software by telling them how ethical it is, just like you don't get people to care about environmentalism or human rights or anything else just by talking about it. You have to make the deal enticing. If you want environmentalism to kick off, you have to make being Green cheaper and easier than being not-Green. If you want Free Software to wipe out proprietary software, you have to make it better than the proprietary software. Wrapping up a bunch of beta-quality buggy apps with bad UIs lacking 80% of the features of the proprietary apps they were cloned off of and then sticking them on an over-priced, under-powered PC limited to the hardware that's supported by Free drivers and cutting out the consumers' ability to run the numerous "legacy" proprietary games and apps that form the entire reason they even own a computer in the first place is a losing strategy, always has been, and will continue to be so.
Proprietary software hasn't continued to dominate the desktop market because of inertia or foul play or anything other than Free Software's horrific presence on the desktop. The desktops are still buggy, the fully supported hardware is still limited to years-old and/or unpopular devices, the UI changes every six months making familiarization impossible to achieve, and the only advantage anyone can offer for using a Free desktop is that it's Free, which is absolutely worthless to anyone who doesn't know how to write software and doesn't care to learn how to write software because they have more interesting things to do with their free time. Being gratis-free isn't worth much either because -- contrary to the average Linux developers' beliefs -- the vast majority of people who would be interested in trying a Free desktop -also- care about playing games, and those games only run on Windows, and a $200 OS that runs the apps they care about is a far better value than a $0 OS that can't even run most Web games out of the box. It is the equivalent of offering people an expensive flying car they can't look inside or a free early prototype steam engine that they're allowed to tinker with all they want. Sure, some of us would love that steam engine, but the vast majority will always prefer the fancy flying car and always will until somebody starts giving away light-speed-capable flying steam engines.
Marketing a PC with crappy hardware that's supported by Linux is a waste of time, because anyone who wanted a crappy PC to run Linux on can go buy or build one already. I've got a $500 Dell laptop that is 100% Linux friendly, and it would have been even cheaper if it hadn't come with Vista. Improving Linux to Just Work on all the latest and greatest hardware, and then either improving Windows game compatibility or enticing developers to target Linux, is the only way Linux is going to be a true market force in the desktop arena. Until then, it's just not interesting or worthwhile to most people.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 2:52 UTC (Tue) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link]
Yes! Very well said, +1.
Apparently we need to learn this lesson every few years.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 4:49 UTC (Tue) by JoeBuck (subscriber, #2330) [Link] At least for laptops, this simply can't be done by small groups of individuals.The right way to do this is to work with the vendors, who have already come a long way. I'm not in the market for a new laptop right now, but when I am in a year or two, I'd willingly pay a premium for a machine consisting solely of supported components (well-supported by in-kernel drivers). I don't care about non-free firmware that runs on processors other than the main CPUs.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 3:00 UTC (Tue) by PaulWay (✭ supporter ✭, #45600) [Link]
Wow - when you go off the deep end, you really go off!
Let's see - overgeneralisation, hyperbole, mischaracterisation, straw men, and a view of Linux that's about twelve years old. You really don't hold back, do you?
It's a pity, because you raise some valid points. There are already 'acceptable' laptops, nettops, netbooks, desktops and servers that have good Linux hardware compatibility, and people don't change simply because a new player enters the scene. The Open-PC project needs to clearly define who it's marketing to and what its objectives are - something I don't think is done well by their current site. The survey was curious - too simple in some places, too detailed in others - which makes drawing conclusions about what people actually want (and why) very difficult.
However, you've basically lost your credibility because you've decided to fly off the handle and become a troll.
Have fun,
Paul
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 4:05 UTC (Tue) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link]
Unfortunately, history tends to fall on elanthis's side, not yours. Every two years someone comes along and says, "like the stuff that exists but OPEN." And they get lots of flashy press and attention and then it never ships or, if it does, it comes nowhere near to living up to expectations.
Indrema
If OpenPC is simply what's on their site and survey they I think a pretty compelling argument can be made that they'll be on this list before long. (of course, I don't know much about OpenPC so there may be more to their project than I realize)
Rather than claiming that elanthis has gone off the deep end and calling him a troll, maybe you'd care to actually produce an argument supporting your view?
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 6:37 UTC (Tue) by jordanb (guest, #45668) [Link]
> Indrema
I don't know anything about that. From wikipedia it looks like a dot-com era vaporware startup trying to ride the "Linux" wave.
> Zaurus
The Zaurus was a popular and successful line of PDAs, which was killed by the death of the PDA. I'd hardly call it a failure.
> OpenMoko/FreeRunner
I heard an interview with an individual from OpenMoko a bit ago. He pointed out that when they started the project, there was no concept of running 'applications' on your cell phone. The bigger phones were running PDA OSes like WinCE but were then being locked down so tightly there was no hope of ever getting anything on them.
Their big 'insight' with OpenMoko was that the phone could be a general purpose computing device. Had companies not figured out how to offer that while retaining control, it might have been successful. But it was hardly "just like stuff that exists but OPEN". It was offering something really new that people wanted. What killed it is that RIM, Apple, etc figured out how to offer that and still retain control.
> OGD1 (though I still have a ray of hope)
It's worth pointing out that the OpenFirmware system ended up being pretty successful outside the PC world, and that video cards are particularly closed components when compared to, for instance, CPUs.
I think the project is doomed though because the main GPU vendors would actually rather not standardize because they see their completely custom architectures as a market advantage. Plus the industry operates as something of an oligarchy and is going to resist anything that smacks of commodification.
On the other hand, who knows? Maybe Intel would adopt it. They certainly aren't afraid of openness in the GPU arena, and I believe they will eventually crush the proprietary GPU vendors with their ability to unilaterally commodify the component.
At any rate, the grandparent *was* an unhelpful troll. His rant was mostly an uninspired regurgitation of old complaints about GNOME and KDE, which might be valid and apropos in some contexts, but hardly in this one.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 8:47 UTC (Tue) by Cato (subscriber, #7643) [Link]
The idea that when Openmoko started there was "No concept of running applications on a phone" is complete rubbish. According to Wikipedia:
- OpenMoko was announced in 2006 - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Openmoko#History
- Symbian shipped on the Nokia 9210 in 2001, allowing apps to be installed - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbian_OS#Symbian_OS_v6.0_a...
There are many other examples too: PalmOS-based Treo phones, many Windows Mobile phones, and even more Java/J2ME based phones. All of these have allowed application installation.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 14:36 UTC (Tue) by jordanb (guest, #45668) [Link]
You can listen to hear what the guy said here: http://twit.tv/floss74
Maybe he ways blowing smoke out his ass, I don't know. I got the impression though that the project started considerably before it was announced, as a skunkworks project at a Taiwanese electronics supplier.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 15, 2009 6:46 UTC (Wed) by Cato (subscriber, #7643) [Link]
I don't have time to listen to this, but it's clear that he's wrong from the facts mentioned above.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 15, 2009 6:52 UTC (Wed) by jordanb (guest, #45668) [Link]
From a stub section on wikipedia, yes.
Apps on your phone Posted Jul 15, 2009 14:05 UTC (Wed) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link] Nope, from just a shallow knowledge of phone history. For example this long article from The Register.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 15, 2009 15:22 UTC (Wed) by Cato (subscriber, #7643) [Link]
The Wikipedia pages are just examples of many I could find to support the facts, which are that apps have been installable on smartphones for a very long time, and in my personal experience since at least 2003.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 15, 2009 16:08 UTC (Wed) by pboddie (subscriber, #50784) [Link]
Be careful about labelling reported information as "the facts", if the assertion about "no concept of running 'applications' on your cell phone" is what you're referring to. I don't remember what Sean Moss-Pultz said now, and I'm totally aware of the ability to run applications even on my 2004 vintage Sony Ericsson, but there are considerable differences in terms of openness and vendor control between the classic Java ME or Symbian deployment scenarios and the kind of thing that Openmoko encourages.
One key distinction is that on an Openmoko-like device (or a cracked proprietary device) it's all about "your" applications, whether you write them yourself or get them from the Internet or wherever, not some provider's narrow stream of "authorised" downloads by "trusted partners" at however many euros, dollars or pounds a pop. Arguably, the assertion - however it was phrased - was about treating applications as applications, not services to be withheld or offered at the whim of your not-so-friendly provider. Attitudes certainly have changed since the iPhone was released and subsequently cracked, which was what Moss-Pultz said, as I recall.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 16, 2009 10:29 UTC (Thu) by Cato (subscriber, #7643) [Link]
I have been installing 'unapproved apps' on my own smartphones since 2003 - first on Symbian (Ericsson P800), then on PalmOS (Treo). Only more recently have smartphone platforms (Symbian, iPhone, etc) tried to limit what apps could be installed, but it's been possible on some smartphone platforms such as PalmOS to install unapproved apps without any hassles.
I was reacting to the statement that OpenMoko somehow introduced the ability to install apps on mobile phones, which is clearly false - and probably not what Sean Moss-Pultz said.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 8:52 UTC (Tue) by k3ninho (subscriber, #50375) [Link]
Your comment about the Zaurus didn't seem to follow the context of the thread: we're talking about projects to make free software for hardware, and you say that the Zaurus (which runs Linux nicely) died because the PDA market changed. But the free software stack for the Zaurus?
>On the other hand, who knows? Maybe Intel would adopt it. They certainly aren't afraid of openness in the GPU arena, and I believe they will eventually crush the proprietary GPU vendors with their ability to unilaterally commodify the component.
Intel are a big company, so big that there are parts which are doing their own thing. One bit bought in a third-party GPU core for the GMA-500 and wrote a closed-source driver for it, while the Intel Open Source Tech Center is working hard to provide a good experience with Intel while running Linux. See: http://mjg59.livejournal.com/111853.html
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 10:50 UTC (Tue) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
I seriously doubt that it was within Intel's power to right open source 3D drivers for the GMA 500. It's not their 'ip'.
It's a very shitastic situation because the PowerVR core that Intel used is the same stuff that is used on desktop-capable ARM platforms. And they are just as closed on the ARM as they were on the Atom.
It's very sad and lack of open source 3D drivers is a huge barrier for ARM adoption on things like Netbooks.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 16:06 UTC (Tue) by jordanb (guest, #45668) [Link]
I installed Familiar on an old iPaq some time ago. It works pretty well. I never tried Linux on the Zaurus although I have friend who did and liked it quite a bit. I don't know how well the Zaurus linux stack is still doing. Considering that the device is no longer being sold, perhaps not well. I wouldn't be surprised if there were still a cadre of enthusiasts who are maintaining it.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 16:39 UTC (Tue) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link]
The only place the Zaurus could be considered even remotely successful was Japan. Sales volume was very low everywhere else, nowhere near sustainability. Yes, it was a fun toy (I still have my 5500) but, according to the bean counters, it goes in the failure column.
Palm and Danger demonstrate that the PDA actually didn't die, it changed form and is better for it.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 16:50 UTC (Tue) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link]
> What killed it is that RIM, Apple, etc figured out how to offer that and still retain control.
No, what killed the FreeRunner is that it never worked well! They kept switching graphics stacks, their boards had layout bugs that should have been caught and fixed in qualification (battery and audio in particular), GPRS was already obsolete, the usability of the UI was terrible, poor battery life, etc.
It was really depressing to watch. And it had nothing to do with RIM and Apple.
FreeRunner not dead Posted Jul 14, 2009 17:07 UTC (Tue) by cry_regarder (subscriber, #50545) [Link]
> No, what killed the FreeRunner is that it never worked well!
FreeRunner isn't dead. New ones are still being sold and until tomorrow old ones can be sent in for free hardware fixes. http://www.sdgsystems.com (in US).
Battery life has dramatically improved and the software quality and consistency has improved tenfold (see FSO/SHR/OM2009 releases). The software quality is still not to the point where I would expect a non-techy to be able to deal with it and expective to have to put some time getting everything to work (but at least you can get everything to work now).
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 9:43 UTC (Tue) by michaeljt (subscriber, #39183) [Link]
> You aren't going to get people to give a shit about Free Software by telling them how ethical it is, just like you don't get people to care about environmentalism or human rights or anything else just by talking about it. You have to make the deal enticing. If you want environmentalism to kick off, you have to make being Green cheaper and easier than being not-Green. If you want Free Software to wipe out proprietary software, you have to make it better than the proprietary software.
Warning: the following is rather off-topic... as far as getting people to be green is concerned, I've always thought that being green oneself is the best way of promoting it. The more other people someone knows who think that it is important, the more likely that they will think so too. The same reason that individuals do count in a democracy. They only have a single vote, but their example affects the way others will cast theirs. But as far as free software is concerned, I have trouble equating it ethically with environmentalism and human rights. I can "promote" free software to someone if I really think it will serve them better overall than proprietary, but not just because I like it myself.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 11:28 UTC (Tue) by pboddie (subscriber, #50784) [Link] You have to make the deal enticing. If you want environmentalism to kick off, you have to make being Green cheaper and easier than being not-Green. This is not necessarily the case. Some people will, if convinced by the credentials of the claims, choose "green" options priced above normal options or which are less convenient than normal options. One can nevertheless argue that non-green options are only cheaper because things like resource scarcity are not priced into those products. ("Oil is $50 a barrel, yay!" but how much would a fossil fuel dependent culture pay in a thousand years' time?) If you want Free Software to wipe out proprietary software, you have to make it better than the proprietary software. Wrapping up a bunch of beta-quality buggy apps with bad UIs lacking 80% of the features of the proprietary apps they were cloned off of and then sticking them on an over-priced, under-powered PC limited to the hardware that's supported by Free drivers and cutting out the consumers' ability to run the numerous "legacy" proprietary games and apps that form the entire reason they even own a computer in the first place is a losing strategy, always has been, and will continue to be so. Is this a rant about netbooks? It's interesting to see how the pundits were all wrong about this: nobody wants anything other than a "full fat" laptop, but why are netbooks the fastest growing market segment? Proprietary software hasn't continued to dominate the desktop market because of inertia or foul play or anything other than Free Software's horrific presence on the desktop. The "Windows tax" and exclusive or "promotional" deals have obviously passed you by, then. There wouldn't be an obstacle to selling computers with no operating system, but how many are there for sale in the major retail channels? Perversely, in the highly locked-down mobile phone sector, there's a lot more attention to bundling and price transparency than there is in the "consumer IT" sector. The desktops are still buggy, the fully supported hardware is still limited to years-old and/or unpopular devices, the UI changes every six months making familiarization impossible to achieve, and the only advantage anyone can offer for using a Free desktop is that it's Free, which is absolutely worthless to anyone who doesn't know how to write software and doesn't care to learn how to write software because they have more interesting things to do with their free time. I've used KDE 3.x for many years and it has generally been stable in terms of reliability and in terms of the interface. My system hardware works without significant faults because the vendor wasn't acting like some kind of junior spy putting his hand over the "secret blueprints" in order to stop his peers from copying them. And stuff that I plug into my system generally seems to work, mostly because - once again - the vendors don't try and pretend that their expertise lies in super secret proprietary drivers for super secret proprietary silicon that don't/doesn't work. You have a point about being able to buy a cheap PC and run Linux-based stuff on it, and there are certainly usability issues with Free Software, but your remarks about the value of software being free/open miss the mark: that people might not see the point of such qualities is merely a matter of them not being aware that they too have some control over the things that they acquire. And this isn't ivory tower philosophy, much as labelling it as such would bolster the "from the gut" arguments about the man in the street: anyone whose favourite software doesn't work any more, whose licence code won't transfer to their new hardware (or won't work because they added some hardware to their computer), whose pictures or music are inaccessible because they were stored in some proprietary fashion by an application which thinks that it should be the gatekeeper to all those things, or whose operating system can't be fixed or upgraded has learned that it isn't just about getting new stuff cheap which looks new and shiny. As people increasingly whine about, for example, Apple's App Store policy and other examples of arbitrary assertion of control by entities that reserve such privileges for themselves, perhaps "most people" will start to be more aware of such matters and make more informed purchasing decisions. Sadly, for many it will be through bitter experience that they learn such lessons.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 15, 2009 12:12 UTC (Wed) by pboddie (subscriber, #50784) [Link]
The whole "segmentation" thinking with regard to such surveys is ridiculous: "Yes, I'd like to pay no less than $400 but no more than $500, please!" Is it so hard to have "up to $400", "up to $500" and so on? One gets the impression that too many marketing reports have been studied and that the results of such reports (which probably are "segmented") are thought to just pop out of the raw survey data (which shouldn't be).
What's more ridiculous, though, is that a lot of comparison and classified Web sites have similar flaws, and they're supposed to be designed to help you, the user: "Yes, my washing machine must have a spin no slower than 1200 RPM but no quicker than 1299 RPM!" I could go on about this - it's just so awful!
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 3:12 UTC (Tue) by PaulWay (✭ supporter ✭, #45600) [Link]
My two cents: I can see a clear market for machines that are built with the purpose of having everything on the device work well with Linux and have good drivers. This is the only real pressure chip manufacturers feel - if it drives sales, then they'll be in it. While it's possible to shop around and buy compatible parts yourself, it's still difficult: it's often difficult to match what the various Linux hardware compatibility pages say with what's actually on offer, and you can't 'mix and match' parts with things like laptops. Having a manufacturer that can do the work of getting the parts, matching them together, and putting pressure on upstream hardware manufacturers to support Linux and FOSS is a Good Thing.
The question, though, is whether the Open-PC project is approaching this goal the right way. If it doesn't really cater for what people want out of the hardware, it won't matter at all. The survey as many questions in the minds of its subjects as it asks them: why is the type of music player relevant? why the strange choice of price ranges? what about Open BIOS? is Open-PC intending to release its own distro or use an existing one? why did they not talk about graphics chip? why no desktop or server options? and so forth.
The survey gives the impression of someone who hasn't really thought through what they need to know. Basic surveying theory says you set up the parameters of your project and then ask questions which scope those parameters. Likewise, don't ask a question if you aren't interested in learning the answer.
I hope this starts heading in the right direction, or it'll just be another casualty and similar ventures will be put back.
Have fun,
Paul
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 3:39 UTC (Tue) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
This is a wrong approach to do a online store. It's probably a good thing to work on hardware and software quality integration issues, but doing a online store is a shitty idea.
Why?
Because your stabbing the people that DO support Linux on their hardware in the face.
AND
Your choosing a very inefficient approach.
There are people that are struggling to make a living by supporting Linux on their hardware. Besides the folks like Asus, Dell, and a few other larger OEMs thare are a multitude of smaller players like System76, Shuttle, ZaReason, PogoLinux, and so on and so forth.
If the Open-PC succeeds then only the best thing you could do is put your own partners out of business.
So it's nothing but a LOSE-LOSE situation. Either it does shitty and it looks like your a bunch of morons and makes LOTD less viable then it already is... OR you succeed and put the people that do support you out of business.
So that is what we call a _bad_idea_. It's just really bad business to compete against your most valuable partners.
What is a good idea is to make specifications and standards for Linux compatibility and testing. Providing tools for OEMs to provide good hardware integration.
Microsoft works with other people to create things like ACPI and whatnot. There is no reason why Linux folks can't do the same thing and work on OpenBIOS or decide some Linux-specific power management features that hardware manufacturers could do or something like that.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 7:10 UTC (Tue) by kragil (subscriber, #34373) [Link]
I call BS.
Asus supporting Linux? Not in the world I live in.
And all the other vendors don't offer a really open platform. No Coreboot etc.
A really Open-PC (OpenMoko open) has not been done before. I am sceptical, but there might be a market for a really open platform. Not sure they will deliver it, but it is worth to try.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 7:49 UTC (Tue) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
> A really Open-PC (OpenMoko open) has not been done before. I am sceptical, but there might be a market for a really open platform. Not sure they will deliver it, but it is worth to try.
It's not whether there is a market or not.
It's whether it's worth it to try to compete against people like Zareason or System76. Computers are computers. It's very, critical actually, that people support companies that support Linux.
So if you do a Open-PC and start selling hardware online then your competing against other companies that do the same thing.
So... is it better, long term, to take a shit all over the profits of people that sell Linux PCs?
A Open PC online store would be basically telling them: "Yeah, thanks for all your hard work and sacrifice you put into making your Linux oriented businesses... but right now we are going to do our best to cut your legs off at the knees because your currently unable to match our particular definition of 'open'"
Or would it be better to work with them and trying to their stores, their resources, and their expertise to make available more 'open' PCs?
USE them. They want to be used, they want to make money, they want to attract customers. You DO NOT compete against your partners if you want to stay in business.
And 'staying in business' for Linux means being able to have Linux friendly hardware and pre-installed Linux PCs widely available for people to use.
You help your partners. You do your best to try to make them grow and flourish. So you work with them.
If they refuse and they don't see a market, then fine, do a open pc online store. But you need to give them a chance first. Contact them, work with them, let them know what is going on.
With OpenMoko there was not a vendor that had a phone which you could install a OS to like you can with PC. It was effectively trying to take the PC 'commodity hardware' approach and apply it to phones. Whether or not they realized it that was what they were doing. But that's not like anything that is going on in the PC market. The x86 PC and notebook market is a completely different ball game and there are already vendors and hardware that comes close to meeting the 'open standards' and there are already vendors that support things like 'openbios' to a limited extent. We just need to expand on that.
Certify then promote the good vendors. Posted Jul 14, 2009 8:50 UTC (Tue) by Cato (subscriber, #7643) [Link]
Indeed - it would be better to develop an "Open PC Vendor Certification" whereby this group evaluates Linux support by vendors, and grants them a 1 to 5 star rating.
Then, for the 4 to 5 star vendors, start an online promotional / marketing program (think like the Spread Firefox campaign, which is hugely successful) that helps to steer people who are interested in a non-Windows PC to consider these vendors.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 15, 2009 10:19 UTC (Wed) by krake (subscriber, #55996) [Link]
> It's whether it's worth it to try to compete against people like
> Zareason or System76. Computers are computers. It's very, critical > actually, that people support companies that support Linux. > So if you do a Open-PC and start selling hardware online then your > competing against other companies that do the same thing. I am not sure I understand what you mean. It is OK if Zareason and System76 compete with each other but not OK if a third company competes with them?
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 14, 2009 12:34 UTC (Tue) by nye (guest, #51576) [Link]
>Asus supporting Linux? Not in the world I live in
It saddens me that as soon as Microsoft allowed Windows XP on netbooks, it became impossible to find them with Linux on (with the side effect that you can't get a netbook with more than 1GM RAM).
I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that the only reason for using Linux was to force Microsoft to give them what they really wanted.
>Dell? Ok, here in Germany I can buy the cheapest Mini with Ubuntu. NOTHING else
Indeed, the same is true in the UK - the one Ubuntu option is the weakest machine they sell, which can be found on their website only through fairly extensive effort, and it's no cheaper than the Windows version.
I've been looking to buy a netbook but it's disheartening that I'd either have to buy a Windows one then add extra RAM and install my own OS, or go with Dell's abortion.
>And all the other vendors don't offer a really open platform. No Coreboot etc.
The coreboot compatibility page is useless, but are there actually any modern (Core 2 or equivalent) chipsets supported? I guess it's hard to get that many contributors to a project with the potential to brick your motherboard - I know I wouldn't be too enthusiastic about testing experimental BIOS code.
Actually it's true Posted Jul 14, 2009 18:48 UTC (Tue) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that the only reason for using Linux was to force Microsoft to give them what they really wanted. I've talked with guy who tried to offer netbook producers their OS and its exactly like that: they produced these nice toys and it was impossible to run Windows Vista on them and even Windows XP was problematic (first netbooks had 4GB of RAM and 7" LCD, remember) so they took any operation system they were able to find. They knew people want the Windows XP and they really wanted Windows XP, but... they were unable to afford it. Margins were too tiny and future of Windows XP was uncertain (and Vista is not an option). Thus 2008 became "year of Linux on netbook". They were ready to continue with Linux indefinitely if and only if Windows continued to be beyond their reach. Once Microsoft dropped price for Windows XP to the floor and gave "an Ok" to use that in netbooks their interest to the Linux evaporated. They still like to have some backup plan (that's why they took an interest in ChromeOS), but preferable not from tiny players. They like Chrome OS not because it's new paradigm or anything like that but because Google is big player and it does not go away any time soon. Indeed, the same is true in the UK - the one Ubuntu option is the weakest machine they sell, which can be found on their website only through fairly extensive effort, and it's no cheaper than the Windows version. Why should it be cheaper? Microsoft dropped price for Windows XP to the floor and logistic difference is enough to offset this difference... The fact that Windows-based netbook has less support calls is very real phenomena, you know...
Another point of view Posted Jul 16, 2009 9:20 UTC (Thu) by man_ls (subscriber, #15091) [Link] (first netbooks had 4GB of RAM and 7" LCD, remember)You mean 4GB of hard drive and 512 MB of RAM. Actually mine has a 2GB SSD. But this does not mean that they really wanted Windows XP -- perhaps they didn't care what OS to install as long as the things sold. (Even if, as you say, they prefer to have a big supporter behind.) If you have read the first chapter of "The Innovator's Dilemma" we can gain a new perspective of this situation: a niche opens, a new player enters, and the old player has to struggle to compete. In this case Microsoft won because they adapted, but it is easy to see what would have happened otherwise: people buying Linux in droves and everyone else adapting to it. In other words: it was not the Evil Empire which crushed the little penguin, but the smart player that adapted to the situation. (And Linux which failed to deliver comparative benefits.)
Other attempts: Openbrick, iUnika Posted Jul 14, 2009 13:03 UTC (Tue) by ber (subscriber, #2142) [Link] Good hardware for Free Software - good idea! It seems difficult to do, though. One attempt in the past had been the Openbrick (as small universal box, usable as "nettop", outdated). A new one in the category environmental friendly netbook is iUnika (website in Spanish).
Dell and Linux Posted Jul 14, 2009 15:20 UTC (Tue) by edmundo (guest, #616) [Link]
It's not that hard to find on the web site. All I did was go to dell.co.uk, click on FOR HOME -> Laptops & Minis, then select "Ubuntu Linux" as the Operating System under Narrow Your Selection. Yes, there's only the Inspiron Mini 10v (from £199), but there are a few options to customise it, such as a choice of solid-state or real hard drives and the option of a bigger battery. By the way, the £199 includes shipping, so it's quite good value. A colleague bought one recently and is happy with it.
Dell and Linux Posted Jul 14, 2009 16:03 UTC (Tue) by nye (guest, #51576) [Link]
Indeed, it's not that hard from the home section. I'm usually looking from the small business section however. In this case, having found the Inspiron Mini 10, it seems reasonable to assume that all of the types of Inspiron Mini 10 are available, but here it allows you to choose only Windows XP. I *think* the only way to find Ubuntu is to start again and head straight to the home section.
The Open-PC Project Announced at GCDS 09 (KDE.News) Posted Jul 28, 2009 23:09 UTC (Tue) by wolfgang.oertl (subscriber, #7418) [Link]
Experienced users would probably appreciate an accurate and comprehensive list of hardware that works well, like mainboards, graphic cards and such, and then order the parts and assemble the machine themselves. No need for an online shop, a specialized distro or whatever. No luck for laptops and smaller devices, though...
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