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Remote desktop vs. remote displayRemote desktop vs. remote displayPosted Feb 14, 2013 22:09 UTC (Thu) by khim (subscriber, #9252)In reply to: Remote desktop vs. remote display by daglwn Parent article: LCA: The ways of Wayland
How many times do people have to tell you? It's NOT rare. It may not be the majority, but it's not rare. Sorry, it is rare. As drag put it: All you have to do is look at the success of things like 'Gotomypc' and such things to realize that there are probably more Windows users using remote desktop applications in a single large city then there has been people that used X11 to remote applications in all of time and space. If one case is used by tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands users while alternative case is used by tens (if not hundreds) of millions then the first case is rare and obscure one.
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Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 14, 2013 23:48 UTC (Thu) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
by that argument, all of Linux is a 1% niche and we should stop wasting our time and just live with what Windows provides us.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 0:33 UTC (Fri) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
By now probably... yes. "Just use Windows" has been my recommendation for the last 4 years. Battle of the classic desktop is lost.
Non-classic desktops, however, are quite alive. I'm very glad Google is pushing both Android and Chromebook.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 0:37 UTC (Fri) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
so if you think everyone should just use windows, why are you hanging out on a Linux forum?
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 0:42 UTC (Fri) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
For me Linux is a nice way to develop Linux software (for cluster computing, embedded devices and Android). It really excels at this purpose.
But at classic desktop tasks? Fuhgetaboudit.
I've tried it a couple of times in large organizations (my company even provides migration services). It works, but not much better or cheaper than recent enough Windows.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 0:52 UTC (Fri) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
so why are you opposed to people using Linux for use cases like yours (I'm assuming that you have some sort of Linux desktop that you develop on)
that may not be Linux desktops for the masses, but it's still Linux desktops
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 0:58 UTC (Fri) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Opposed? Certainly not. You're free to use whatever you like - it's free software, after all.
It's just that in my opinion it would be better to focus development and improvements on areas where Linux can be a serious contender. But that's just my personal opinion.
PS: I'm actually using Mac right now to develop Linux software. I'd switched after a random Ubuntu upgrade broke things yet again.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 16:34 UTC (Fri) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
The first step to get the most out of a Linux desktop is just to ignore what most people are telling people to do on the Linux desktop.
The amount of misinformation and bad advice out there is staggering. I appreciate it when people are able to help set the record straight, even when they gave up on the desktop a while ago. :)
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 2:33 UTC (Sat) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] But at classic desktop tasks? Fuhgetaboudit. This is FUD. At my company, we all use Linux on the desktop. Even the non-technical staff, because I'm the boss and I make them. People seem pretty productive to me and they don't have any problems doing typical desktop tasks. What's a "desktop task" that is a problem under Linux? I'm really curious to know what everyone at my company seems to be missing.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 3:50 UTC (Sat) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Sure, you can mandate Linux within an organization. My company even provides migration services for that.
However, in the course of migrations and subsequent support we found out that it requires more hand-holding than Windows. Some required apps don't work on Linux, some programs break after updates, there are still problems with hardware (even very common, like AC97 sound cards). Localization support is still poor (not everyone speaks English). There's still little support for centralized management and so on.
In short, it's simply easier to pay $100 per year per user - that's the price for corporate subscription for Windows + Office + Windows Server.
For home users it's even more clear cut - not much games on Linux, no Photoshop, no decent video editors for beginners, etc.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 4:05 UTC (Sat) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] However, in the course of migrations and subsequent support we found out that it requires more hand-holding than Windows. Anecdotal evidence. My experience is precisely the opposite. The Linux desktops were dead-easy to set up. Everything we need Just Worked. And ongoing maintenance is a breeze. For home users it's even more clear cut Again, precisely the opposite of my experience. I gave my (very non-technical) parents a Linux machine. I could not imagine the nightmares I'd have to endure trying to maintain a Windows machine for them. Yes, if you need specific Windows-only tools, then obviously you need Windows. But my kids are reasonably content with the games they can play on Linux (my 10-year-old daughter is a bzflag fanatic) and Gimp instead of photoshop. And my middle daughter wanted to edit videos badly enough that she learned Cinelerra and became pretty adept at using it. All of my kids, without exception, do not like using Windows. They grew up with Linux so a lot of your complaints have to do with what you're used to and not with any real deficiencies in Linux.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 5:28 UTC (Sat) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>Anecdotal evidence. My experience is precisely the opposite. The Linux desktops were dead-easy to set up. Everything we need Just Worked. And ongoing maintenance is a breeze.
With ActiveDomain membership, centralized backup, etc.? I doubt it. You need to buy something like SuSE for that and it ain't cheap.
Again, Linux might be OK for you on desktop, but it certainly is not significantly better than Windows. And given that Windows+Office is pretty cheap - there's simply no business case for small-to-midsize companies.
Then there's question of home users. I'm not a Mac fanboi (I just like MacBook's Retina display too much), so I don't have any other Apple hardware (well, I also received an iPad as a gift) - my phone is Android-based. But I've seen people with all-Apple infrastructure at home: TimeCapsules for backup and WiFi, Apple TV to view movies rented on iTunes, iPods for home sound system, etc. Integration is really impressive and mostly JustWorks. Windows comes at close second and is slowly getting better. I know people who use Windows Media Center to play music over multichannel and multizone sound systems.
Linux? Nah, we still can't get one decent media player/manager.
So yes, I'm pessimistic. It doesn't seem like Linux is capable of catching up with classic desktop computers.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 6:00 UTC (Sat) by apoelstra (subscriber, #75205) [Link]
>Again, Linux might be OK for you on desktop, but it certainly is not significantly better than Windows.
This is very silly. But if we are going to argue with anecdotes, let me tell you about my experience with the last six Windows computers I tried to use.
Windows takes forever to boot up (and requires frequent reboots!), displays a desktop long before it has actually booted (to prevent you ever knowing if the computer is in a usable state), routinely freezes up as it pegs the hard drive for long periods of time for no apparent reason, changes keyboard layouts out from under you once or twice every hour (and often only for specific applications), and generally looks and feels unprofessional. The installer cannot handle repartitioning or multiboot, but you must run it every year or so because the OS naturally degrades to the point that it must be reinstalled.
If you buy Windows off the shelf, you will find it is missing crucial drivers, so you get the fun of searching a motherboard website for Ethernet drivers and then transferring them via USB key to the new system. Or, you can install an OEM copy which will have most drivers, and spend a month finding and deleting crapware and advertisements. It is your choice.
It has awful filesystem support, awful network support, awful driver support, no tiling window managers, no scripting languages. It ships without any sort of development environment or compiler. It requires a slew of arcane third-party programs to constantly monitor the system and spackle over security holes. These all need constant updates.
Office can't handle nearly as many formats as LO can, nor can it handle LaTeX. Windows Media Player can't play half the formats out there, including Vorbis or Theora or FLAC. Outlook can't deal with PGP unless you pay extra to yet another third party. (So I guess it's OK that Windows doesn't support any filesystems, since it can't deal with any files..)
Almost of its software is closed-source, so you have no chance of dealing with the barrage of bugs you will encounter. Of the dozens of vendors you will need to deal with, you will find that most of them are either AWOL or openly hostile to bug reports. There is no software repository or standard way to manage updates, so everything just pops up and interrupts you.
Windows is great if you are looking for garbage and despair. But for anything involving files or networks, you'd be much, much better off with Linux.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 6:35 UTC (Sat) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Sure, whatever. Windows sucks and must die. We know that, yes.
However, everybody else just doesn't care about it much. Most computers can be ordered with pre-installed Windows that works sufficiently well enough for 99% of users. Who don't care at all about LaTeX or scripting.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 14:59 UTC (Mon) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
So... we should ditch Linux on the desktop because Windows works fine for the majority of users who don't want to *do* much with their computers?
That's logical.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 16:49 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
That just about sums it up. For the 'classic' desktop Linux only, of course. It's clear that it won't be able to capture a significant marketshare from Windows without some pretty drastic changes in development process throughout the whole stack. And these changes are not going to happen.
On the other hand, moving from the areas where Linux is a strong contender into 'desktopy' segments seems to be a better strategy.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 18:26 UTC (Mon) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]
I think there's always room for another Mac OSX, in no way dominant but carving out a significant and sustainable market share. I think a similar strategy would work as well, selling a small number of boutique devices as a profit to fund development on a constrained set of hardware. Canonical could maybe pull it off if they could focus on one thing but I think Google has a better chance with their Chrome books which seem to be doing OK.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 20:57 UTC (Mon) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] I think there's always room for another Mac OSX, in no way dominant but carving out a significant and sustainable market share. I'm not so sure. Mac OSX is only sustainable because Apple sells hundreds of millions iPods and iPhones. It's not a sustainable as a purely desktop OS. And I'm not sure even large companies (like RedHat) have enough money to pour in the development of Mac OSX alternative. Canonical could maybe pull it off if they could focus on one thing but I think Google has a better chance with their Chrome books which seem to be doing OK. These are no yet sustainable by itself: they are somewhat popular but you can't develop software for ChromeOS on ChromeOS. Give it few years and situation may change, though.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Mar 11, 2013 9:34 UTC (Mon) by Duncan (guest, #6647) [Link]
> but you can't develop software for ChromeOS on ChromeOS.
In theory, you develop it for the web and run it on a server an it "just works" on chromeos... and anywhere else there's a reasonably current browser. Yes, as always with the web there's some issues with portability on the advanced stuff, but it's still far more portable than stuff written to a local system api.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 11:32 UTC (Sat) by mpr22 (subscriber, #60784) [Link] I ran the same installation of Windows XP Home for something like five or six years without needing to reinstall, and I've never had a Windows XP Pro installation at work's lifespan be shorter than the corporate desktop-PC replacement cycle. Fact is, a Linux box whose user treats it as cavalierly as most people treat their Windows boxes will break.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 15:45 UTC (Sat) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Fact is, a Linux box whose user treats it as cavalierly as most people treat their Windows boxes will break. Could you provide a citation, please?
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 22, 2013 17:23 UTC (Fri) by Pawlerson (guest, #74136) [Link] I ran the same installation of Windows XP Home for something like five or six years without needing to reinstall, and I've never had a Windows XP Pro installation at work's lifespan be shorter than the corporate desktop-PC replacement cycle. Fact is, a Linux box whose user treats it as cavalierly as most people treat their Windows boxes will break.I recommend you to stop telling us some fairy tells. I reinstall windows boxes quite often, so you won't trick me. Fact is Linux doesn't break unless you break it intentionally. Windows breaks, because it's broken by design.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 22, 2013 17:44 UTC (Fri) by mpr22 (subscriber, #60784) [Link] It appears to me that it is your intent to state that I have knowingly made a false statement (I admit that there was a slight error - the Windows XP Home installation I recently abandoned due to purchasing a new desktop PC was only three years old - but it was accidental and certainly not in the land of "fairy tales"). Would you like to disabuse me of this impression, or is it correct?
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 22, 2013 18:49 UTC (Fri) by mjg59 (subscriber, #23239) [Link]
"Fact is Linux doesn't break unless you break it intentionally."
I have *no* idea how I managed to get paid for most of the past 5 years, then.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Mar 5, 2013 21:18 UTC (Tue) by bronson (subscriber, #4806) [Link]
Why this didn't make QOTW I have no idea.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 13:38 UTC (Tue) by nye (guest, #51576) [Link]
>Fact is Linux doesn't break unless you break it intentionally.
Aha, haha, haaahaaahaHAHAAAAaa
That's probably the most hilarious thing I've heard in the last three years.
Hehe.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 6:59 UTC (Sat) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
> Linux might be OK for you on desktop, but it certainly is not significantly better than Windows.
It's interesting how we've moved from "Linux is junk" to "Linux isn't significantly better than Windows"
You may not like it as a desktop, and you may consider it utterly hopeless. Fine. Nobody is trying to force you to use it.
But to deny that many other people are successfully using it as a desktop (including 15K or so people in Munich) is just being obnoxious.
Different people want different things from a desktop. It's very possible that Linux will never satisfy your needs, so go ahead and use something that does.
Unlike it's competitors, Linux isn't trying to prohibit you from using the competition.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 7:14 UTC (Sat) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
> It's interesting how we've moved from "Linux is junk" to "Linux isn't significantly better than Windows"
Can't it be both?
Right now it is not significantly better than Windows so it is on the level of junk for most software vendors. There's simply no market sense in creating Linux software.
> But to deny that many other people are successfully using it as a desktop (including 15K or so people in Munich) is just being obnoxious.
Again, I'm saying that I'm extremely pessimistic about Linux on desktop. The time for that is long past. But there are new markets that are within Linux's grasp, and it would be wise to think what was done incorrectly in the "battle for the desktop" and try to avoid doing these mistakes in future.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 7:42 UTC (Sat) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
> Munich migration is a story in itself. They did save some money, but at the same time it required a multiyear project with lots of high-level system administrators.
The migration from one version of Windows to another for an organization that size is a multi-year effort requiring lots of high-level system administrators.
continuing to run that many systems, of whatever type requires lots of high-level system administrators.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 7:44 UTC (Sat) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
> The migration from one version of Windows to another for an organization that size is a multi-year effort requiring lots of high-level system administrators.
Sure. That's why it makes sense for large organizations to move to Linux.
That's not true for small and medium companies, though.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 15:43 UTC (Sat) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Sure. That's why it makes sense for large organizations to move to Linux. That's not true for small and medium companies, though. Migration is expensive and you are right... small and medium companies will find it expensive and painful. Proprietary vendors have them by the short hairs. We were smart, however. We didn't migrate to Linux. We started out with Linux from the get-go. That's one reason we can keep our costs low and in many cases undercut our competitors. In my business, running an all-Linux shop has proven to be a significant competitive advantage. I like the fact that small and medium competitors are struggling under the burden of proprietary crap like Windows.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 7:24 UTC (Sat) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
> It's interesting how we've moved from "Linux is junk" to "Linux isn't significantly better than Windows"
Just as an illustrative example - remember VHS versus Betamax. Betamax had somewhat better picture quality. But VHS had a killer feature (longer play time) that was useful for 99% of users who couldn't care less about 10% better picture quality. So VHS won easily.
Betamax lingered in a small niche of high-quality professional cameras where it continued to evolve (somewhat successfully).
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 7:50 UTC (Sat) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
actually, as I remember it, a large part of the win/loose was how available the two formats were.
Betamax was held close by one manufacturer while VHS was implemented by many different manufacturers. VHS was also cheaper. The network effect then added to it.
Betamax also had to either take over or die, Linux is not in that situation, If it doesn't take over, it can keep going and continue to grow slowly.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 7:53 UTC (Sat) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Formats were pretty much the same in price at first. Then VHS started to benefit from network effects and the economy of scale.
> Betamax also had to either take over or die, Linux is not in that situation, If it doesn't take over, it can keep going and continue to grow slowly.
Basically, your only hope is to capture a new market and then grow from it into other markets. Or live within a small niche.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 18:45 UTC (Sat) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] Linux is doing just fine pretty much everywhere except on the end-user desktop. Unlike Betamax in its time, it isn't going away anytime soon. Even on the end-user desktop, a market share of 2% or so still adds up to a whole lot of seats.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 17:50 UTC (Sun) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Linux on the traditional desktop is about where Windows is on phones. Microsoft will keep Windows on phones by throwing boatloads of money at it because it can't afford to lose face, but it will remain a niche player. Linux will survive on the desktop because a sufficient number of people can see its clear advantages. No boatloads of money will be required.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 19:16 UTC (Sun) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] Linux is doing just fine pretty much everywhere except on the end-user desktop. Let me paraphrase this sentence: Linux is doing just fine pretty much everywhere except where it uses X.Org. Unlike Betamax in its time, it isn't going away anytime soon. Of course not! Linux will survive and thrive! X.Org will die, though. And we are discussing X.Org and it's successor Wayland here, not Linux.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 22:32 UTC (Sun) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Let me paraphrase this sentence: Linux is doing just fine pretty much everywhere except where it uses X.Org. Although X is somewhat old and crufty, I don't believe it's the reason Linux has very little desktop penetration. I don't think Wayland will cause a huge spike in desktop penetration. On the other side, my N900 phone runs X and it's a great little mobile device... just as good as any Android phone. "Use of X" and "success of Linux" are orthogonal.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 8:22 UTC (Mon) by mgedmin (subscriber, #34497) [Link]
> On the other side, my N900 phone runs X and it's a great little mobile device... just as good as any Android phone.
You have low standards.
Now the successor, the N9, is almost as good as any Android phone. The only things it lacks are beefier hardware and a larger software selection. And corporate support.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 10:54 UTC (Mon) by thisisme (subscriber, #83315) [Link]
>You have low standards.
I guess "standards" - whatever is meant by that - and expectations are very subjective. A few months back I replaced my N900 with an Android phone due to hardware failure. I was much happier with Maemo on N900 than I am with Android ICS.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 19:06 UTC (Mon) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] You have low standards. How so? What's wrong with the N900? It does everything I need and does it really well, and as a bonus, porting some Linux software I wrote to Maemo took no time at all... essentially just a recompilation. Can't do that with Android.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 19, 2013 18:00 UTC (Tue) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] "Use of X" and "success of Linux" are orthogonal. Yes - and that is the problem. Since people know that Linux is a runaway success" and they "know" Linux uses X.Org they assume that future of X.Org is secure. What they tend to forget is the fact that places where Linux is a runaway success and places where Linux uses X.Org are disjoint. Which does not bode well for the future of X.Org.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 0:22 UTC (Mon) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] The success (or not) of Linux on the desktop is nothing whatsoever to do with X.org. If anything, the main problem that is holding Linux back on the desktop is that pretty much every major Linux distribution does its own thing as far as desktop environments go. All of this goes on on top of X.org, which all the competing desktop environments use as their base technology. If there was one obviously canonical desktop environment/graphical tool kit instead of half a dozen it would be a lot easier to standardise things farther down the stack, and hence to develop or port applications that can be distributed in a neutral format to run on all important Linux distributions. Which does not by any stretch of the imagination mean that Linux isn't any good as a desktop system today. As dskoll's examples show, among many others, it can be a very capable, powerful and cost-effective system. You just have to get rid of some preconceived notions.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 19, 2013 18:11 UTC (Tue) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] I'm not saying that X.Org is a failure. Far from it. But - and you've noted that above, too - it's the other way around. I mean: Linux has huge momentum today. Ton's of companies do tons of work. But they are not doing all that for desktop Linux - and X.Org is only used on desktop! This means that X.Org can easily repeat fate of Betamax even if the Linux world will continue to thrive. The signs are there: X.Org people often complain that there are so very few of them and this situation persists over years, any development which pushes what's possible happens elsewhere, etc. The fact that Linux is growing everywhere else will not save X and/or Wayland.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 21, 2013 3:12 UTC (Thu) by mmarq (guest, #2332) [Link]
And having a paradigma where half of the apps are X and other half are Wayland... doesn't make it better makes it worst, no matter if you could run both on the same system.
Has many "experiences" reported here, even from the Windows world, success on "mass adoption" for the end user, the large majority not tech aware, depends a lot on "familiarity" and "consistence"... all things that have run against Linux many times... ppl can't even agree on something so simple has having a common Icon Set engine, and one Icon Theme is installable everywhere...
And that is the main problem, everyone wants his bit of fame and success not sacrifice... it lacks humility, it lacks truly cooperation at most levels... any perceived growing triggers a wave of arrogance and bickering...
This way outside potential participants tend to stay away... even worst than when every "analyst" predicted that Linux desktop will never happen...
It seemed better then, outside "important" criticism made some how ppl group a little together... but its so absurd the situation, of why you **fork** so much yourselfs instead of the sacrifice to make it better and improve for the sake of compatibility and that "consistence"... why you shoot yourselfs so much in the foot, that it seems if Microsoft wants that Linux desktop never succeeds, the only thing it has to do is pay for a lot of reporting praising Linux!
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 15:39 UTC (Sat) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] With ActiveDomain membership, centralized backup, etc.? I don't know what "ActiveDomain membership" is, but of course we have centralized backup. Actually, everyone's home directories are NFS-mounted so there's very little to back up on each individual machine. The machines are pretty much generic and interchangable; any staff member can go to any machine and immediately have his or her usual desktop and files available. And given that Windows+Office is pretty cheap - there's simply no business case for small-to-midsize companies. That's total bullshit. My 10-person company has saved between $50K and $100K in software licenses over the last 10 years, not to mention not having to worry about most malware. You really have no idea what you're talking about. Linux might be OK for you on desktop, but it certainly is not significantly better than Windows. That's your opinion. It's my opinion that it's much better and it's an undisputed fact that it's much cheaper.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 22:18 UTC (Sat) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>I don't know what "ActiveDomain membership" is,
It gives ability to manage users and services on all enrolled devices.
>but of course we have centralized backup. Actually, everyone's home directories are NFS-mounted so there's very little to back up on each individual machine. The machines are pretty much generic and interchangable; any staff member can go to any machine and immediately have his or her usual desktop and files available.
>That's total bullshit. My 10-person company has saved between $50K and $100K in software licenses over the last 10 years, not to mention not having to worry about most malware. You really have no idea what you're talking about.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 16, 2013 23:55 UTC (Sat) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Yeah, works really great if a staff member decides to take their machine home to finish this very important presentation for tomorrow. If you want the gory details on how that works, here's how: All of our important documents are stored in Subversion. I would use git, but there's a limit to how much my non-technical staff will put up with. If someone wants to take a machine home, it won't be their desktop... it'll be one of the company laptops. From home, the person will connect via OpenVPN and pull the latest files via SVN. He/she will edit the report and commit. In the morning, he/she will pull the SVN repo to the desktop. It's a very smooth work flow and works extremely well. As a bonus, my staff now no longer have files like presentation.odp, presentation-draft1.odp, presentation-draft1-mike-updates.odp because they're using the right tool for the job. I even have somewhat dated slides about our use of open-source (though concentrating on Asterisk) from a talk I gave. So that's $5k per year or $500 per user per year. WAY too much We have 10 users, but more than 40 computers. We have a large number of servers because we offer our product in the cloud. Additionally, I buy really cheap used computers for salespeople's desktops (they work fine and are fast enough.) So when one of the $69 desktop machines dies, I just swap it for a spare. Under Microsoft's licensing terms, I'd need to be properly licensed on all our machines.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 9:26 UTC (Sun) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
So your company is very atypical, compared to 99% of small companies where nobody even knows what SVN is. Great for you, however totally irrelevant for the market picture.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 13:04 UTC (Sun) by pizza (subscriber, #46) [Link]
He is the perfect example of what happens when you look at IT strategically.
His higher initial investment (planning, implementation) and a little employee training greatly reduces his direct (licensing) and indirect (downtime, being beholden to 3rd party vendors, able to customize precisely, etc ) operational costs and overhead going forward.
Granted, it's a lot easier when you're starting from scratch since there's no inertia to overcome.
But as an example -- My employer uses MS Office. Unfortunately, there are *three* different versions of it in use. Perversely, by my using LibreOffice on Linux, I actually have better interoperability.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 15:18 UTC (Sun) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] So your company is very atypical Yes, of course it is. We have a sensible IT environment. where nobody even knows what SVN is Aha. So your strategy is to shove proprietary crapware at them rather than educate them? Wow, I'd love to put you in charge of my IT department. Great for you, however totally irrelevant for the market picture. I don't care about the "market picture". You started this whole thing by saying that Linux is useless for typical desktop tasks, and I have proven that you're talking utter BS. Just because the tools you use for a sensible Linux environment are different, it doesn't mean the Windows ones are better (and in my experience, they're a whole lot worse.)
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 18:31 UTC (Sun) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>Yes, of course it is. We have a sensible IT environment.
Yeah. And most companies out there don't HAVE any "IT environment". They simply get stuff and ask a consulter IT person (who might come once every couple of weeks) to hook it up.
That's the environment you have to work in to achieve at least 10% of the market. Instead of current 1% or so.
>Just because the tools you use for a sensible Linux environment are different, it doesn't mean the Windows ones are better (and in my experience, they're a whole lot worse.)
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 22:29 UTC (Sun) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] And most companies out there don't HAVE any "IT environment". And they are the ones who can most benefit from Linux. That's why I set my parents up on Linux: I configured everything for them just as a consultant would for a small business and I didn't give them the root password. It's very, very hard for my parents to mess up their computer permanently. Actually, Windows tools for corporate networks are still superior to Linux. You keep saying that. I don't know why you think that argument by repetition is valid. I think I've demonstrated pretty convincingly that Linux excels in the corporate world; you just keep saying things without offering any evidence.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 22:57 UTC (Sun) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>And they are the ones who can most benefit from Linux. That's why I set my parents up on Linux: I configured everything for them just as a consultant would for a small business and I didn't give them the root password.
We tried it. Doesn't work without a dedicated admin.
The amount of custom tasks that are required in a small business environment is simply too large. Your setup might handle 90% of them, but the rest 10% would case unending problems.
Examples? An owner bought a security camera and its software only works on Windows. Or maybe a printer/scanner/fax combo with configuration utility for Windows only.
All these finicky details cause problems in real life. Sure, it's possible to avoid them by careful analysis and planning. But small shops simply don't have anyone who is interested in doing it.
>You keep saying that. I don't know why you think that argument by repetition is valid.
>I think I've demonstrated pretty convincingly that Linux excels in the corporate world; you just keep saying things without offering any evidence.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 23:42 UTC (Sun) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Corporate world is predominantly Windows Um? So? How does that make Linux less suitable? Just because something is, doesn't mean it always has to be. 40 years ago the corporate world was predominantly IBM mainframes or else typewriters. Windows is successful now just as dinosaurs were successful for millions of years. But conditions change. Examples? An owner bought a security camera and its software only works on Windows. Or maybe a printer/scanner/fax combo with configuration utility for Windows only. So don't buy things like that. Here's a brilliant piece of advice: If you want to get things done, hire competent people to do them. It works for us and it can work for you too. Our security camera, for example, is a cheap webcam and we use motion plus some scripting to save photos remotely and batch up a day's worth of pictures into movies that we archive. Cost us $30 in hardware, $0 in software and about 4 hours of my time for Perl hackery. For example, I work in a large company now - we have a central user database. So adding a user to a project requires a couple of clicks in the AD manager and this user gets access to all required files (on all of the hosts), devices, shared email inboxes, calendars, etc. I do it too, albeit with a couple of commands rather than clicks... GUIs are incredibly stupid for managing users, especially if you have to add more than a few at a time. And your comment about "all required files (on all of the hosts)" is charmingly quaint... it's funny to read about people who work with IT infrastructure where the physical location of files matters. :)
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 2:40 UTC (Mon) by dpquigl (subscriber, #52852) [Link]
I understand that Linux is working for you but Cyberax has a very good point about corporate infrastructure management. Linux is way behind in this area. If you're not aware of what is meant by corporate infrastructure management look at what FreeIPA provides (http://www.freeipa.org/page/About). The whole point of FreeIPA is to take a bunch of tools and provide similar functionality to active directory. AD isn't anything special technology wise. It uses a lot of the same technologies everyone else uses (LDAP, Kerberos, etc...). What AD does well is that it integrates it into a nice easy to use package that makes administration of 10s or 100s of thousands of users easy. Its the tight knit integration of services which makes AD useful and while FreeIPA is gaining ground it still has a way to go. The ability to survey boxes and push out patches and policy though AD is also a big feature. We have similar tools that can do this (CFEngine and Puppet) but once again show me a single package that has all of this integrated and makes it trivial to ensure you're compliant on your network for patch levels?
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 4:47 UTC (Mon) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
> The ability to survey boxes and push out patches and policy though AD is also a big feature. We have similar tools that can do this (CFEngine and Puppet) but once again show me a single package that has all of this integrated and makes it trivial to ensure you're compliant on your network for patch levels?
Companies routinely run Linux and Unix on tens of thousands of servers, and keep all of them up to date with all the right patches. Why would that same infrastructure not work for Linux desktops?
apt and yum both provide you will all the info you need to keep your systems on the software that _you_ want them to be on (which isn't necessarily the latest and greatest that's been released, you can trivially run your own repositories that only contain approved software and everything can trivially update from there)
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 6:36 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
> Companies routinely run Linux and Unix on tens of thousands of servers, and keep all of them up to date with all the right patches. Why would that same infrastructure not work for Linux desktops?
Because it's much harder to do it for desktops. And I've actually wrote my own cluster computing system for Amazon EC2 that has more than 2000 nodes (Linux, of course) during peak times.
For servers it's easy - you create config files and start required services. Easy peasy lemon squeeze.
It's much more difficult for desktop software. Puppet has lots of useful templates for servers, but almost nothing for desktop. For example, some HP printers require hplip setup that can only be done interactively. Fail.
> apt and yum both provide you will all the info you need to keep your systems on the software that _you_ want them to be on (which isn't necessarily the latest and greatest that's been released, you can trivially run your own repositories that only contain approved software and everything can trivially update from there)
On Windows it can be done by an MCSE (Minesweeper Consultant, Solitaire Expert). They'll probably won't understand how this devilish ActiveDirectory works, but it'll work good enough.
That's the problem with Linux - you HAVE to have a solution that can be deployed by average technician. And right now the only way to do it with Linux is to restrict functionality to a known-good set (Chromebooks, various set-top box devices).
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 6:51 UTC (Mon) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
if you want the level of support that you get from your cheap MSCE, just install ubuntu and configure it to automatically install all updates.
your MSCE isn't going to do any more than what the auto-update will do. And just like the MSCE, most of the time everything will 'just work' and when it doesn't, the answer can be the same 'just reinstall the OS'.
And just like your MSCE isn't going to be able to handle a large company this way, the auto-update from the Internet repository isn't going to scale to a large company.
but to claim that this means that it can't be done is redefining "can't be done"
If you have a company with tens of thousands of systems, you had better have a team of highly paid admins checking everything before it gets pushed out to them.
Enterprises running Windows don't rely on windows auto-update, they verify all the patches, roll them out in waves and cross their fingers to find out what business critical software Microsoft broke this time.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 14:47 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
> if you want the level of support that you get from your cheap MSCE, just install ubuntu and configure it to automatically install all updates.
Tried that (I really did!). Didn't work.
The problem are not updates, but all kinds of small maintenance.
>And just like your MSCE isn't going to be able to handle a large company this way, the auto-update from the Internet repository isn't going to scale to a large company.
For small companies it's different. They usually don't have anybody with sufficient knowledge of system administration - and simply contracting third-parties doesn't really work as well.
While with Windows you can get one of the MCSEs to setup something that almost works. It won't be perfect, but it'll be good enough.
That's what Linux has to do - offer an easy-to-use _complete_ system. So that a trained monkey (MCSE) can setup everything, including commercial third-party software. It also must work all the time for the most common scenarios. Right now it's not really possible with the "regular" distributions, but it's becoming possible with the _new_ Linux distributions (Chromebooks and Android).
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 16:12 UTC (Mon) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] The problem are not updates, but all kinds of small maintenance. I have a friend who owns a small residential seminar centre about 150 km from where I live. Her PC, which I set up for her more than five years ago, is used for the usual office-type tasks and is running Linux. I see her once or twice a year, and among other things we usually spend an hour or so over coffee going over user questions and doing the type of »small maintenance« she can't do by herself. (She can, and does, install distribution security updates on her own.) Very occasionally I get a phone call if something goes wrong, but whatever it is is usually nothing to do with her computer – it is more likely to be an ISP outage of some sort or other. There is no way whatsoever that this sort of arrangement would work with a Windows machine. While with Windows you can get one of the MCSEs to setup something that almost works. It won't be perfect, but it'll be good enough. Please explain why it is impossible to get a modern Linux install to a point where »it won't be perfect, but it'll be good enough«. It is funny how many people are willing to cut Windows huge amounts of slack but will tolerate nothing short of absolute perfection when it comes to Linux.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 16:45 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>I have a friend who owns a small residential seminar centre about 150 km from where I live. Her PC, which I set up for her more than five years ago, is used for the usual office-type tasks and is running Linux.
How about QuickBooks or TurboTax or something like it? Or maybe a couple of games?
> Please explain why it is impossible to get a modern Linux install to a point where »it won't be perfect, but it'll be good enough«.
In my experience EACH company has at least a couple pieces of infrastructure that are not supported under Linux. From softphones with T.38 fax sending to high-end printers with Windows-only configuration utilities. Or maybe that nice order-tracking system with WinCE-based wireless scanners. Or maybe that small Access database that tracks lab samples. Etc.
Seriously, start a company and try to offer migration services. You'll quickly see that the RealWorld(tm) is quite a bit different from "just use OpenOffice instead of MS Office".
What can be done? First, you need to start from a "known good" situation. Chromebooks offer a nice opportunity here - they work just fine, have a nice management infrastructure and are explicitly designed NOT to replicate all desktop tasks. So using Chromebooks to augment existing Windows-based infrastructure should be quite easy (we haven't tried it yet, to be honest). Then this platform might become attractive to third-party developers, so it can be slowly expanded into more general 'desktop' usage.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 17:38 UTC (Mon) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] How about QuickBooks or TurboTax or something like it? My friend's (external) accountant takes care of that. Or maybe a couple of games? We're talking »office PC«, remember? Here in Germany, you get to deduct the cost of your office PC from the taxes you pay for your company, but if you do so the tax office doesn't like you to play games on such a computer. Hence, no games. (My friend is not a computer-game person, anyway.) A lot of software is simply not available on Linux, a lot of hardware STILL doesn't work completely. A lot of that software is software you may not really need (as dskoll has aptly demonstrated) if you're willing to think outside the box. And for most categories of hardware there are specimens that are well-supported by Linux. Hence the problem reduces to one of getting the right hardware to begin with. Of course if you buy the el-cheapo-stuff-of-the-week and then expect it to work perfectly with Linux you may be in for a surprise every so often. And on the other hand, it isn't as if every piece of hardware worked perfectly with Windows all of the time, either. Seriously, start a company and try to offer migration services. It's funny, but the guys in the office next to ours (our sister company) are doing exactly that, among other things. AFAIK they're doing fine and I don't hear them complaining more than one would expect. I guess it helps if you're competent …
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 19:04 UTC (Mon) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Cyberax has a very good point about corporate infrastructure management Maybe so, but does that apply to small companies? Remember, Cyberax is arguing that small companies are the worst candidates to run Linux desktops.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 19:43 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Yeah, it's just that Windows also works pretty well for large corporations.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 20:58 UTC (Mon) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Make up your mind. You yourself wrote: Sure. That's why it makes sense for large organizations to move to Linux. Your position seems to shift like sand every time you want to avoid the issue.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 3:29 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>So don't buy things like that. Here's a brilliant piece of advice: If you want to get things done, hire competent people to do them.
Done that. They've recommended Windows Server.
>It works for us and it can work for you too. Our security camera, for example, is a cheap webcam and we use motion plus some scripting to save photos remotely and batch up a day's worth of pictures into movies that we archive. Cost us $30 in hardware, $0 in software and about 4 hours of my time for Perl hackery.
Thought so.
Another customer had a similar problem with keycard access system which supports only Windows for its configuration utility.
Do you think all these vendors operating on razor-thin margins are going to spend time writing custom software for 1% of users? Ha!
That's what I mean by "power of networking". And that's why it's so complex to regain the lost marketshare.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 4:53 UTC (Mon) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
>> So don't buy things like that. Here's a brilliant piece of advice: If you want to get things done, hire competent people to do them.
> Done that. They've recommended Windows Server.
I could be snarky and say something along the lines of "he said hire someone competent" :-)
but instead I'll say that with your anti-linux and pro-windows attitude, any competent consultant you hire is going to figure out what you prefer and find some way of making it work that fits your bias
In any case, it's clear that you refuse to be convinced.
You say it's not possible to run Linux as a desktop.
We show you large organizations that do so and you dismiss them because they are large (saying that small organizations can't do it)
We show you small organizations that do so and you dismiss them because they are small (because of the requirements of large organizations)
We have many people who speak up and say they are using Linux this way, and have non-technical relatives that are using Linux this way.
you label all these examples as fringe cases that don't matter.
It's not that Linux can't work on the desktop, it's that the network effect and pre-training of people makes it easy to run Windows as a desktop. This is a "nobody ever got fired for buying IBM" thing, not a "windows is the obviously better choice" thing.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 6:52 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
> I could be snarky and say something along the lines of "he said hire someone competent" :-)
> but instead I'll say that with your anti-linux and pro-windows attitude, any competent consultant you hire is going to figure out what you prefer and find some way of making it work that fits your bias Actually, that was about 4 years ago when I was flamingly pro-Linux and tried to push it everywhere. I've actively searched for security companies that offered Linux-based solutions - and couldn't find any. At most a couple of companies offered a solution (hosted on Windows Server) with a buggy Java applet to viewing the security footage.
As I've said, I was so pro-Linux that I've founded a company to help with migration services. This company actually still exists (I'm no longer involved in its day-to-day operations), but business is not that good - it can't charge much more than the price of Windows-based software licenses, and just a couple of extra support cases per customer can ruin all the profit margins.
>You say it's not possible to run Linux as a desktop.
>We show you large organizations that do so and you dismiss them because they are large (saying that small organizations can't do it)
>We show you small organizations that do so and you dismiss them because they are small (because of the requirements of large organizations)
But:
The only thing that matters is the marketshare. And it's been stagnant for many years now. That speaks louder than any words.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 19:01 UTC (Mon) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Nope, I've said that it's not really feasible to just run Linux desktops as a straightforward replacement for Windows. It always requires planning and competent personnel. Look. I have proven that not only is it feasible to run Linux desktops instead of Windows, it's also cheaper and more efficient. Granted, we started with Linux so we didn't have migration costs. And if you plan on running a business without planning and competent personnel then you should not be in business. The only thing that matters is the marketshare. And it's been stagnant for many years now. That speaks louder than any words. That speaks to fear. It speaks to monopoly market share. And most of all, it speaks to legions of Cyberaxian "consultants" who spread FUD and live on the fat profits they get from foisting commercial crappy software on their clients. The entire Windows IT ecosystem is a giant scam that fattens consultants and Microsoft at the expense of end-users and small businesses.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 20:06 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>Look. I have proven that not only is it feasible to run Linux desktops instead of Windows, it's also cheaper and more efficient. Granted, we started with Linux so we didn't have migration costs.
No you haven't. You've shown that you can run Linux with highly competent admins in an organization that can outsource non-Linux tasks.
>And if you plan on running a business without planning and competent personnel then you should not be in business.
You can offer them better software? Fine! However, your offer doesn't replace the existing functionality - it won't be even considered.
>That speaks to fear. It speaks to monopoly market share. And most of all, it speaks to legions of Cyberaxian "consultants" who spread FUD and live on the fat profits they get from foisting commercial crappy software on their clients. The entire Windows IT ecosystem is a giant scam that fattens consultants and Microsoft at the expense of end-users and small businesses.
I think that all Linux fanbois should be forced to spend a year working with a well-supported Windows network and a year working with an average MCSE. It'd greatly improve the general quality of Linux software offerings.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 20:56 UTC (Mon) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] No you haven't. You've shown that you can run Linux with highly competent admins in an organization that can outsource non-Linux tasks. Any organization can outsource Linux administration to competent admins. Quite a lot of small businesses already outsource their Windows administration (at fairly high expense, I might add.) And yes... my company does outsource things like payroll and tax filing because other people do it far more effectively and cheaply than I can do it. It makes sense to outsource that to people who are good at it rather than try to do it myself, especially on Windows. It's a pure business decision. It might be a news for you, but most businesses are not IT-related. They treat software as a business expense - like office chairs or printer paper. In my consulting days, I set up a lot of Linux machines for businesses exactly as you describe. They were of course servers and firewalls, not desktops, because the businesses already had a significant investment in Windows. However, a small business starting from scratch with no computers at all could get by just as easily on Linux as on Windows, and far more cheaply. I think that all Linux fanbois should be forced to spend a year working with a well-supported Windows network and a year working with an average MCSE. It'd greatly improve the general quality of Linux software offerings. I think you need to be less closed-minded. You need to think outside the box and see how Linux tools enable you to get things done. You need to think of tasks that need doing instead of specific pieces of software. Use some creativity, if you have any.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 18:57 UTC (Mon) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Done that. They've recommended Windows Server. I said competent. Yup. Does it support writing 24 parallel h264-compressed streams with automatic highlighting of movement, archiving support and indexing? No, because that is not a requirement of ours. I'm fully confident I could do all that with free software should I have the motivation and requirement to do so.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 19:58 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>No, because that is not a requirement of ours. I'm fully confident I could do all that with free software should I have the motivation and requirement to do so.
I can offer you $2000 (it's about the breakeven price for this task) for a solution that can utilize hardware not more expensive than in Windows, with similar features. It also should be done within a couple of weeks.
I have really checked it and there's nothing available for Linux - the only project is Zoneminder and it has extremely poor hardware support.
That's one typical task in Linux migration in the real world out there. And I have encountered tons of problems like that.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 20:50 UTC (Mon) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] I can offer you $2000 (it's about the breakeven price for this task) for a solution that can utilize hardware not more expensive than in Windows, with similar features. It also should be done within a couple of weeks. No thanks, because I don't need the product and I don't need the $2000. Besides, my solution does things yours doesn't. For example, does your solution pop up a small window on our receptionist's desktop whenever motion is detected so she can see who has entered our office? Same thing for the display monitor in our kitchen in case we're all at lunch. Does it email me when someone's in the office outside normal office hours? Does it securely archive after-hours video on a remote server so even if our office is trashed our video is still accessible? Those are all more important and more useful to me than your features.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 18, 2013 21:00 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>Besides, my solution does things yours doesn't. For example, does your solution pop up a small window on our receptionist's desktop whenever motion is detected so she can see who has entered our office? Same thing for the display monitor in our kitchen in case we're all at lunch.
Yep. With tunable triggers and alarms for any channel, including keycard system and various detectors.
>Does it email me when someone's in the office outside normal office hours? Does it securely archive after-hours video on a remote server so even if our office is trashed our video is still accessible?
>Those are all more important and more useful to me than your features.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 0:01 UTC (Sun) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] So that's $5k per year or $500 per user per year. WAY too much. Microsoft subscription for Windows + Office costs about $100-$150 per year per user (depending on required feature sets). Even if that's true, that's the tip of the iceberg. Please add in costs for:
While some free software similar to the above is available for Windows, some is not and we'd end up having to pay for proprietary software. Our existing software licensing budget is $0. Nothing. And our work flow is smooth and efficient. I simply can't see how Windows (or any other proprietary software) can compete. You can argue all you want, but I invite you to come visit us and see how efficient and productive people are on Linux desktops. You have objections; I have 10+ years of real-world business experience on Linux.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 0:47 UTC (Sun) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] Our existing software licensing budget is $0. Nothing. And our work flow is smooth and efficient. I simply can't see how Windows (or any other proprietary software) can compete. Also you don't have the hassle of having to deal with surprise auditing visits from the BSA because somebody – usually an ex-employee with a grudge – claimed you didn't have proper licenses for all your software.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Mar 3, 2013 17:04 UTC (Sun) by JanC_ (guest, #34940) [Link]
Actually, the BSA will hapily investigate your purely open source company (as happened to an acquaintance of me after he requested a refund for the removed Windows on their new laptops...).
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Mar 3, 2013 21:39 UTC (Sun) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] Actually, the BSA will hapily investigate your purely open source company Not when I'm not under any contractual obligation to actually let them into the building they won't. They're free to come back with the police – if they can convince a judge to grant them a search warrant – and are prepared to be sued afterwards. Incidentally, did your friend actually get that refund?
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 9:32 UTC (Sun) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Total strawman.
But let's see. A lot of CRM/ERP software is free or very cheap for Windows, especially for small companies.
>CRM software. (We use SugarCRM.)
>Development tools. (We're a software development company.)
>Anti-virus. (We don't use AV.)
>Email software (Exchange and Outlook.)
>Phone system (We use Asterisk.)
>Issue-tracking system (We use RT.)
>Accounting software (We use Ledger-SMB.)
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 15:16 UTC (Sun) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] A lot of CRM/ERP software is free or very cheap for Windows, especially for small companies. First of all, you still fail to understand that "very cheap" is not the same as "free". Secondly, you fail to understand that "Free" is not "proprietary". You simply don't get it, so there's not much point in continuing.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 15:26 UTC (Sun) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Quickbooks works fine for this for small companies AND it also allows to track taxes/checks/invoices. Did you read my slides? How easy is it to integrate Quickbooks with our CRM system and phone system so that when a customer calls, a web page pops up with all their open tickets, their CRM information and all outstanding invoices? Oh. It's impossible. Because Quickbooks is proprietary and you're out of luck. MSVS Express is free and even professional versions are cheap Again, let me remind you that cheap != free. Windows has one [AV] built-in. To quote your comment about Ledger-SMB: LoL People simply use one of the cloud offerings now. Running own mailserver is totally a non-starter for 99.99% of small companies. It's not for us; spam-filtering is our business so putting our email in the cloud would be ridiculous. Furthermore, in case you have forgotten, cheap != free and there are no business-level free cloud email services. Atlassian has a $10 for 10 users starter package So you are saying that $10 is less than $0? Where did you learn arithmetic? And does Atlassian permit us to integrate with our phone and CRM system in the way I described in my slides?
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 18:28 UTC (Sun) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>Did you read my slides? How easy is it to integrate Quickbooks with our CRM system and phone system so that when a customer calls, a web page pops up with all their open tickets, their CRM information and all outstanding invoices?
Actually, it's quite easy because QB has fairly complete API that allows to access customer data. But don't let that to distract you.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 22:26 UTC (Sun) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] OK, I didn't know that about QB. Something to remember if I ever lose my mind and buy a Windows machine. ;)
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 20, 2013 10:12 UTC (Wed) by jmorris42 (subscriber, #2203) [Link]
Sorry, if you can recommend QuickBooks with a straight face you must turn in your geek card right now because you sir, are a menace to your customers.
Quickbooks (and Peachtree/Sage) have a timebomb built in which forces a very pricy upgrade when a transaction/line item limit is hit. This limit is of course NOT disclosed prepurchase. So you are either running some very small operation that has not managed to hit the trigger or you just don't care you are encouraging people to fall into a trap.
And the limit is fairly low, we are starting to worry about it (and Sage is sending monthly notices/sales pitches) to us and we only started using it in 2010. And we are a small public library.
This very news source recounts our esteemed editors recent travails with Quickbooks and lwn.net running into the paywall.
That sort of thing happens too often in the Windows world because the customers there are accustomed to being hosed on a regular basis.
And as for the ease of deployment of Windows vs Linux... I was recently tasked with building a small training lab for Win+Office (we are a public library, we got some grant money to offer the classes) so I have purchased the Windows 7 Resource Kit and am reading it. Why am I hearing the theme song from Gilligan's Island when reading it, seeing myself cast as the Professor building everything from coconuts. Deploying on Linux is something I have down to a science, Windows PE and the Windows deployment tools are like returning to Slackware or something.
My current plan in fact is to mostly ditch the Microsoft tools and use a dual boot Linux install to handle reimaging the Windows side. Rsync is fast, simple and understandable without a total retrain. If rsync can't be made to work it will be back to the stone knives and coconuts.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 20, 2013 15:24 UTC (Wed) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Technically, I was recommending 1C Enterprise (my company is in Ukraine, after all). It actually has a native Linux client now, but not at the time I was active in my company.
Also, I would also recommend QB because _it_ _works_. Yeah, it's not free and very scammy, but customers don't care as long as the price is reasonable - it's just another business expense.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 20, 2013 17:45 UTC (Wed) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] And as for the ease of deployment of Windows vs Linux... I was recently tasked with building a small training lab for Win+Office (we are a public library, we got some grant money to offer the classes) so I have purchased the Windows 7 Resource Kit and am reading it. Why am I hearing the theme song from Gilligan's Island when reading it, seeing myself cast as the Professor building everything from coconuts. Deploying on Linux is something I have down to a science, Windows PE and the Windows deployment tools are like returning to Slackware or something. And that is Windows-to-Linux migration problem in a nutshell. Except it's the other way around. Once upon time migration to Linux was quite easy because people used UNIX in the universities and Linux administration is similar to that. Back then Linux had a chance but it blew it. Microsoft have invested literally billions and have reached a state where most organizations only know how to operate things built "from coconuts". Linux deployment starts from the prerequisite that you need to learn the whole new world and instead of helpful wizards you need to write configuration files by hand. You may preach the advantages of "Linux way" till you are blue in face, but they fact remains: most businesses will not survive long enough to ever see these benefits yet they still need to pay for the problems these future benefits create here and now. If business uses Quickbooks in the first year (because it really is cheaper) then it'll probably pay for the upgrade when the timebomb hits. Business which tries to use Linux to avoid timebomb will just fail in the first year thus it does not matter what'll happen after that.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 16:18 UTC (Mon) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link] Linux deployment starts from the prerequisite that you need to learn the whole new world and instead of helpful wizards you need to write configuration files by hand.Have you used a Linux system in the last decade? Because this bears no resemblance to anything I recognize in that time period. You can write configuration files if you want to: you don't have to.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 16:57 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
If you are deploying anything reasonably complicated - you HAVE to. Now, I quite like my config files but there's no denying that they are more complex then GUI utilities for a lot of people.
Another story (I have tons of them) from my Linux deployment experience. Situation: company's managers want to control access to Facebook and similar sites, allowing unrestricted access to certain groups of users. Their current solution is Kerio Firewall (actually an HTTP proxy) on Windows Server, it allows to edit access lists using a simple GUI tool (translated into Russian, btw).
I've tried replacing it by transparent Squid but there are NO solutions that provide necessary functionality. There is a couple of commercial ISP-oriented packages that require dances with shaman's drum around them to make them work, and still they are not enough.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 19:06 UTC (Mon) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
if you are deploying anything large and complicated you WANT to be able to write config files (either manually or through automation tools)
it's impossible to automate deployments that require GUI clicks.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 19:10 UTC (Mon) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
Defense of .inf files in 4... 3... 2...
:-D
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 21:11 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Sure. We all know this.
Now explain this to a non-English speaking "admin", who only knows how to click on buttons. And such "admins" can actually support networks of 30-50 Windows machines without much effort. A good Linux
Again, I think it should be mandatory for anyone working on Linux to see how Windows works in the RealWorld(tm)(r).
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 21:37 UTC (Mon) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
a good linux admin can support many small companies remotely, without having to visit the office at all other than to make people feel good
Yes, many companies dig themselves a hole that makes it hard to change, but companies do this with webservers as well, and yet somehow they manage to make the 'horrible' switch from IE to Apache when they get large enough (not all companies switch, but those that don't serve as good object lessons to others as why they should switch)
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 22:48 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>a good linux admin can support many small companies remotely
No they can not. They quickly get bogged down in minutiae (like broken fax machines or non-working VoIP), get disgusted and then quit their job.
Having separate 'low level' admins is not really an option with Linux because these admins won't be able to do anything complicated. And doing back-and-forth between two departments leads only to frustration and pain. It's much easier for businesses to pay a couple of thousands dollars and get a Windows Server.
Guys, I'm speaking from a (bitter) personal experience of actual migrations. You're offering me basically anecdotes in the form of: "But my organization works fine! See, our employees are kernel developers and compile their own desktops from individual molecules using 3D-printers! So this workflow can definitely work for all Mom&Pop companies with 2 employees!"
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 23:03 UTC (Mon) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
I am not doing this from the point of view of 'my company has kernel hackers...' first off, you don't have any idea what my company is, let alone what they do or don't do.
But I am saying that I have seen companies do this. I and my friends have had contracts to support small companies running Linux, and we can do wonders remotely without a lot of effort.
You have also shouted down a person who runs their entire company on Linux.
You are "I'm speaking from a (bitter) personal experience of actual
Yes, migration is harder than starting with Linux, by that logic we need to give up doing anything. By definition, we aren't going to be the first, default experience in any new space we start moving into.
But--- We weren't first in the mobile space, in the server space, or in the embedded space. In all of those spaces we faced similar problems with entrenched market leaders, but in all of those spaces Linux is becoming dominant.
By your exact same logic, Apple faces a hopeless task and should just go out of business, but they are actually gaining market share in the desktop/business environment. This actually helps Linux in these same environments because it does break the mindset that the windows way is the only way to do things.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 0:03 UTC (Tue) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>But I am saying that I have seen companies do this. I and my friends have had contracts to support small companies running Linux, and we can do wonders remotely without a lot of effort.
So can Windows admins. Remoting works just fine for Windows (using RDP, TeamViewer, Gotomypc, RAdmin and a plethora of other technologies).
> You have also shouted down a person who runs their entire company on Linux.
> But--- We weren't first in the mobile space, in the server space, or in the embedded space. In all of those spaces we faced similar problems with entrenched market leaders, but in all of those spaces Linux is becoming dominant.
> By your exact same logic, Apple faces a hopeless task and should just go out of business, but they are actually gaining market share in the desktop/business environment. This actually helps Linux in these same environments because it does break the mindset that the windows way is the only way to do things.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 10:39 UTC (Tue) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] But--- We weren't first in the server space, Yes, we were. Linux replaced UNIX in server space, not Windows. It's [relatively] easy to switch from UNIX to Linux and [relatively] hard to switch from UNIX to Windows. Microsoft has much, much, MUCH better success with server then Linux has with desktop. in the embedded space Yes, we were first there, too. Before Linux embedded space was filled with homebrew solutions thus when they outgrew that stage Linux was an easy choice. The fact that most embedded space developers know how to alter config files and most embedded space users only deal with creations which don't expose configs cinched the deal. in the mobile space, Linux only managed to carve out some niche in mobile space when bunch of companies threw all that "our way or the highway" attitude and offered integration with Windows, MacOS, etc.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 23:49 UTC (Mon) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] I'm speaking from a (bitter) personal experience of actual migrations. You're offering me basically anecdotes in the form of: "But my organization works fine! You're only offering anecdotes claiming the contrary. That other people seem to succeed where you apparently don't could just as well be an indication that those people may be more competent at what they do, including dealing with problems. I'm not doing this as my main day job (various colleagues of mine do), but in my experience supporting non-technical Linux users, actual reality is nowhere near as bleak as you make it seem.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 0:17 UTC (Tue) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Nope. I'm saying again and again that the classic Linux desktop right now is unusable because it doesn't offer the complete solution that can be used by anybody. You always need someone who understands how it works in details.
Microsoft offers complete solutions - not perfect, by any measure but still /complete/. Linux needs something that at least is just as good, and right now it doesn't seem possible on classic desktops.
> I'm not doing this as my main day job (various colleagues of mine do), but in my experience supporting non-technical Linux users, actual reality is nowhere near as bleak as you make it seem.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 1:39 UTC (Tue) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] Linux needs something that at least is just as good, and right now it doesn't seem possible on classic desktops. You keep saying »it doesn't seem possible« when you should really be saying »I didn't manage to make it work«. Other people do manage that. If you have non-technical Linux users then it means that somebody has already done all the groundwork for the migration. Who said anything about a migration? I support various people who started out on Linux. One person »migrated« from Mac OS 9 to Linux (where going to Windows would also have required expert assistance). With the one person I support who actually used Windows (XP) to begin with, the »migration« essentially amounted to copying a bunch of Office documents across to the new (Linux) computer and a couple of hours of »training«, i.e., about the same as one would have had to spend going from Windows XP to a new machine running Windows 7. All of these people are regular non-technical users (certainly not geeks in any way, shape, or form) who expect their computers to »just work« but even so they need very little hand-holding and they are perfectly happy with their Linux desktops.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 5:28 UTC (Tue) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
> You keep saying »it doesn't seem possible« when you should really be saying »I didn't manage to make it work«. Other people do manage that.
Yep. Maybe a team of genetically engineered kernel hackers (with transplanted genes from GNOME and KDE developers) might be able to find all the required software, easily writing missing pieces in kernel-level Haskell.
But that's exactly my point - an average admin/user CAN NOT do things that are possible with COTS software on Windows (or even with the built-in Windows functionality).
Have you ever wondered why Linux's traffic stats on popular website hover near 1% of the total? That's why.
> Who said anything about a migration? I support various people who started out on Linux.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 7:40 UTC (Tue) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] an average admin/user CAN NOT do things that are possible with COTS software on Windows (or even with the built-in Windows functionality). So? An average Linux admin/user can do loads of things with the content of a typical Linux distribution that are not possible (or, at least, not possible for people who are not Windows experts way above MCSE level and/or without very considerable expense) with Windows. That doesn't prove anything either way. That's vanishingly small number - less than 0.1% of total world desktop users. So what? It's still a large number of bodies. (On the other hand, there are way more people in the world who have never used Windows than there are people who have.)
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 15:35 UTC (Tue) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
> So? An average Linux admin/user can do loads of things with the content of a typical Linux distribution that are not possible (or, at least, not possible for people who are not Windows experts way above MCSE level and/or without very considerable expense) with Windows.
Irrelevant. By definition, these things are not used in organizations with Microsoft Windows-based workflows, so they won't affect the migration.
> So what? It's still a large number of bodies.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 16:01 UTC (Tue) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] By definition, these things are not used in organizations with Microsoft Windows-based workflows, so they won't affect the migration. You bet they will, if you use them to do stuff in half an hour that takes the Excel pushers half a day. Compare dskoll's experience thinking »out of the box«. I had a great summer way back when I was a university student when I was the single Unix person in a Windows shop. They hired me for four weeks to come up with a program that would collect and aggregate router statistics via SNMP. It took me about four days to write the program in Tcl/Tk (including a GUI), and I basically spent the rest of the time testing and documenting it, doing other sundry stuff and reading Usenet news. Suddenly a lot of the people there became quite interested in Unix.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 16:48 UTC (Tue) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
> You bet they will, if you use them to do stuff in half an hour that takes the Excel pushers half a day.
No you won't, and that's the fact.
For the most real businesses out there tasks that can be automated make a fairly small part of the workload. Having a better infrastructure - like storing documents in SVN or SharePoint instead of mailing them back-and-forth, gives SOME improvement but it almost never is decisive.
> Compare dskoll's experience thinking »out of the box«.
And they're right, you know. Do you care about the color of your stapler? What would you say if tomorrow somebody comes and says:
- Hey, we have this new paper-folding system that can replace your staplers! It can cut down on number of workplace injuries and speed up your document flow.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 18:25 UTC (Tue) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] No you won't, and that's the fact. It must be great to live in a dream world where you can claim what you want and are always right. In the world I inhabit, many people are deeply interested in making their business more efficient – especially in the current economic climate where cost-cutting is all the rage. For our customers, using Linux more is a very viable option in this context, and my company and its siblings next door are doing very well helping them along this path (in various different ways). You can insist until you're blue in the face that what we are doing every day is actually impossible, but money talks, so we shall simply have to agree to disagree.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 19:23 UTC (Tue) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] It must be great to live in a dream world where you can claim what you want and are always right. Probably. That's the world you live in, right? You can insist until you're blue in the face that what we are doing every day is actually impossible, but money talks, so we shall simply have to agree to disagree. Yes, money talks and the plural of anecdote is not data. I just don't sure why we should agree to disagree. It's pretty clear by now that Linux is a failure on desktop: it's market share was kept basically the same in the last decade while MacOS grew from couple of percents to 7% worldwide and to above 20% is some countries (namely US). That's hard facts, when you ignore them you really look silly. Now, when we go from well-established facts to the possible explanations for these facts things become blurry. You may claim that the problems with config files don't matter — fine, we can agree to disagree. If you have another explanation for the Linux's failure. Do you have such an explanation? Just please keep in mind that for such explanation to be plausible it should work for Linux only, not for MacOS (which slowly but steadily grows especially in affluent countries and high price of the hardware nicely explains why it's a failure in poor countries). I'm just not sure why desktop discussions are so different. When Microsoft posted the infamous Mindcraft's Benchmark results Linux community responded in entirely sane way: first it become angry (because it mistakenly believed that back then Linux was clearly superior to Windows) иге then, after some time, it found the relevant problems and fixed them. Somehow "desktop story" is entirely different: when confronted with facts and possible explanations Linux enthusiasts claim that all the evidence which shows that Linux sucks on desktop is riddled, then they claim that everything is fine and we just need to continue do what we did for the last ten years and when confronted with facts that this strategy does not work they explain how that don't matter because 1% "it's still a large number of bodies". Why it's so hard to talk about these things rationally?
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 19:59 UTC (Tue) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] Why it's so hard to talk about these things rationally? Search me. It is patently obvious what the Linux community would have to do to make Linux more interesting on the desktop. Unfortunately the strategy in question is unlikely to fly with the people who would most have to cooperate to implement it, so it isn't going to happen unless a major miracle occurs first. However, this does by no means imply (like Cyberax seems to believe) that Linux is completely useless on the desktop. There are fine Linux-based desktop systems which are great for non-technical (and especially for technical) users to get actual work done. It's just that these systems are not particularly popular, because the vast majority of users buys computers with a pre-installed operating system that, while inferior to Linux in various respects and superior in others, appears to serve these users well enough so they do not necessarily feel the need to install Linux instead. The problem with this situation is that it is self-perpetuating as long as Microsoft essentially owns the PC manufacturers, who also don't want to jeopardise their Windows discounts (and preinstalled-junkware kickbacks) by pushing other OSes too hard. After all, even though it would be perfectly possible to market pre-installed Linux systems, selling Windows PCs is most of their business. This is unfortunate but not a reason to give up on desktop Linux altogether. I've been using Linux on my desktop for 20 years now and I don't intend to stop anytime soon.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 27, 2013 2:50 UTC (Wed) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
> However, this does by no means imply (like Cyberax seems to believe) that Linux is completely useless on the desktop.
I never said that. Linux desktop can be used in niche markets, sometimes it can be used to a great effect. That's self-evident.
However, I'm claiming that Linux is a failure in the _general_ 'classic' desktop market for a variety of reasons. These reasons are certainly disputable but the failure is evident in the marketshare. You can argue until you're blue in the face, but that won't budge 1% share of Linux desktop at all.
From my personal experience - desktop Linux lacks an ecosystem around it (from third-party developers to cheap sysadmins).
>The problem with this situation is that it is self-perpetuating as long as Microsoft essentially owns the PC manufacturers.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 27, 2013 6:50 UTC (Wed) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] Yet in 90-s and early 2000-s the most popular OS in Russia was pirated Windows (sometimes installed right in the computer shops), even though Linux was readily available. Speaks volumes. Possibly, but it certainly doesn't imply Windows is the better desktop OS. I agree with you about the lack of an ecosystem, but on the other hand, even at 1% market-share, Linux does seem to be able to sustain itself on the desktop (and has done so for a couple of decades). It would sure be nice if it was more popular in the general community, but as I said this is unlikely to happen for a variety of (mostly fairly obvious) reasons.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 27, 2013 7:02 UTC (Wed) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
> Possibly, but it certainly doesn't imply Windows is the better desktop OS.
It kinda does. People choose Windows overwhelmingly, even though alternatives (BTW, it included OS/2 as well) were readily available.
I actually agree with them - Linux in early 2000-s was nothing but embarrassingly clumsy for general users. It started to get somewhat usable only close to the second part of the last decade.
>I agree with you about the lack of an ecosystem, but on the other hand, even at 1% market-share, Linux does seem to be able to sustain itself on the desktop (and has done so for a couple of decades).
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 27, 2013 7:43 UTC (Wed) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] People choose Windows overwhelmingly, even though alternatives (BTW, it included OS/2 as well) were readily available. I don't think people walk into a computer store in Russia (or for that matter anywhere else) and the sales clerk asks them »Do you want Windows on your computer or Linux?«. People aren't actively asking for Windows in favour of Linux (or. in the 1990s, OS/2). For the most part people are unlikely to be aware that there even is an operating system apart from Windows, and that would include many computer salespeople. So the popularity of Windows is less due to its overwhelming technical superiority and ecosystem, but mostly due to the fact that it is the default assumption. This in turn stems from the fact that Windows used to be pretty much the only game in town in the early 1990s, and that Microsoft used that time well to cement its predominance. You can be pretty sure that (a) Russian computer stores wouldn't bother with Windows if Windows hadn't already been popular in the US, the Far East and western/central Europe (which is where most of the celebrated »ecosystem« was), and (b) Windows wouldn't stay as popular as it is if Microsoft were to really crack down on piracy (Ballmer famously said about the Chinese that »if they must steal an operating system, let them steal ours«). Also, Windows does for most people roughly what they expect, including the crashes and virus infections, which many people have learned to accept as facts of life (sort of like getting the flu – a nuisance but normally not the end of the world) – hence looking for alternatives to Windows isn't something that figures big in most people's minds. At this rate and attitude? Might be not for long. The demise of desktop Linux has been predicted for so long that I'm not unduly worried. People have been saying that Unix would disappear long before Linux even came out, and see where we are now.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 27, 2013 9:19 UTC (Wed) by BlueLightning (subscriber, #38978) [Link] Microsoft never owned computer producers in Russia (or xUSSR). Yet in 90-s and early 2000-s the most popular OS in Russia was pirated Windows (sometimes installed right in the computer shops), even though Linux was readily available. Speaks volumes.Not really. At that time Linux was vastly less capable and polished than it is now.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 23:30 UTC (Mon) by mathstuf (subscriber, #69389) [Link]
> but companies do this with webservers as well, and yet somehow they manage to make the 'horrible' switch from IE to Apache
I assume you mean "IIS to Apache"? Using IE as a web server would be…special.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 23:43 UTC (Mon) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
But possible. After all, node.js is in Javascript and IE can use external COM objects.
...evil grin...
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 21:11 UTC (Mon) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] if you are deploying anything large and complicated you WANT to be able to write config files (either manually or through automation tools) Oh, absolutely. The only problem: by the time you need large and complicated scripts Linux is no longer a contender. I think you are missing some facts which are clear and obvious to me and Cyberax but somehow are lost to you. Think about it: there are over 20 million businesses in US. What does it mean? Most of them have no admins, most of them have no IT department and most of them have noone who can change config files by hand. How can they ever do anything you ask? They ask someone to work as part time admin. Said guy can visit them once per week or once per month — when they need to do something complex and/or when they manage to break the system they have. But surely when they'll grow they will need the ability to manage complex configurations? Sure. But by that time they have dozens of computers in Active Directory domain, they have Exchange server and bazillion Windows-related programs. Wholesale switch to Linux is no longer an option. This is how Linux loses the battle: it loses it at the very beginning. And then it keep the potential users "out" by offering alien (for them) tools.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 21:43 UTC (Mon) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]
It's kind of sad, Cobalt had a good thing going for SoHo servers, which would have been a foot in the door but was destroyed when Sun bought them out.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 25, 2013 23:19 UTC (Mon) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] Univention Corporate Server (a Debian-based distribution) is really quite good for low-hassle Windows-like office setups. Among other things it supports centralised management, migration from existing Active Directory servers to Samba 4, and good integration with Zarafa (an Exchange workalike).
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 26, 2013 14:39 UTC (Tue) by nye (guest, #51576) [Link]
>if you are deploying anything large and complicated you WANT to be able to write config files (either manually or through automation tools)
I don't think any serious admin is going to disagree with that - least of all Microsoft. Which is why for several years now the administrative GUIs for MS systems are essentially 'command-line builders' - they have a graphical wizard that generates the PowerShell command line to run, then *tell you what it is*, and runs it.
This is extremely useful because it means that there is an easy way to work out exactly what command you need to run for a particular task - and you know it's correct because it's the supported way to do it using first-party tools - and then you can modify/script it for your needs. Basically it adds extra discoverability to the PowerShell API, which is the native way of working with modern Windows systems.
If you have experience of Windows that's only as recent as the XP era (or, god forbid, 9x), then the operating system you're thinking of bears only a passing resemblance to what currently exists - seriously, it's *so much* better than it used to be, in practically every respect.
I'm not going to claim that Windows makes a better server than Linux, but I will claim that there are common situations now in which it is, and also that it is no longer *clearly worse* overall - as it once was.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 19:10 UTC (Sun) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] So yes, I'm pessimistic. It doesn't seem like Linux is capable of catching up with classic desktop computers. Actually it looks like it can be quite capable. It's like with mobile: huge number of companies spent huge amount of time and money trying to make Linux which does not suck on mobile (have you noticed what folks which created Wayland worked for when iPhone arrived?) and in the end it was achieved and Linux even dominates it… only it was done by different guys in different place using different set of tools. And now it looks like desktop story starts repeating itself: as I already wrote bestselling laptop on Amazon right now, today is Linux-based. But somehow I think if history will indeed repeat itself and 70% (or even 90%) of desktop will be occupied by Linux — we'll hear the same unhappy voices who will bitterly complain that it's "wrong" Linux and their "perfect" Linux is unfairly deprived of drivers and marketshare.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 19:56 UTC (Sun) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Chromebooks (which are really nice) are not really in the 'classic desktop' range. They are in a new niche (let's say 'netbooks done right').
Maybe they can grow into 'classic desktop' tasks in future, though.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 20:51 UTC (Sun) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] Maybe they can grow into 'classic desktop' tasks in future, though. That's what I'm talking about. In about 2-3 years they'll get the ability to write and execute code on device and in 5-7 years they can be self-hosting. That's not 100% guarantee but that can happen. If that'll happen then Linux will win on desktop like it won on mobile, but somehow I doubt people who explain how "X.Org is a pearl of Linux world" will be satisfied by this outcome.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 17, 2013 17:22 UTC (Sun) by boudewijn (subscriber, #14185) [Link]
"All of my kids, without exception, do not like using Windows. They grew up with Linux so a lot of your complaints have to do with what you're used to and not with any real deficiencies in Linux."
Same experience here with my daughters. There was one especially tense moment when a virus struck msn messenger, and they were the only people in their class who still could use msn (which was the main way for 10-year olds to connect, back then, in the Netherlands). It lead to lots of recriminations, like "If you don't switch to linux so we can MSN, you are not by Best Friend anymore!".
And the guy who is calling me his as-it-were father-in-law, he saw Krita and was like, "where can I download that? is it on bittorrent?". And then I told him he could get it, for free, because it is free software.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 22, 2013 17:15 UTC (Fri) by Pawlerson (guest, #74136) [Link] Battle of the classic desktop is lost.It's not. Thanks to Steam Linux will become far more popular than OS X.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 22, 2013 18:26 UTC (Fri) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
Mac OS X already has Steam...
That might result in a nice Steam console, but I doubt it will result in EA porting all their games to Linux.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 1:04 UTC (Fri) by neilbrown (subscriber, #359) [Link]
> by that argument, all of Linux is a 1% niche and we should stop wasting our time and just live with what Windows provides us.
I realise you are being sarcastic, but this is so deeply wrong I felt the need to reply.
It is a big market. 1% is still a lot of people. In any case, I *like* smaller markets - the people tend to be friendlier, and people are more important than technology any day.
And what is this "wasting our time" that you speak of? Developing functionality that only I will use is not a waste (unless I learn nothing and don't enjoy it) and if someone else does use it: double prizes!
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 1:26 UTC (Fri) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
I'll point out that the comment I was replying to was making the case that a specific use case was a 1% or tiny fraction of users, and so we should just accept that we are such a small minority that our needs don't matter and we should just accept the loss of capabilities that we've used for decades because the vast majority of users don't need them.
If that is a valid logic trail to follow, all of Linux should not exist.
I fully agree with you that even small percentages amount to lots of people, and that the number of people doesn't matter as long as there are people who want to use it.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 10:02 UTC (Fri) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] There is nothing wrong with serving the needs of tiny niche (there are a lot of specialized companies who sell things by hundreds and may be, if they are lucky, thousands), but you must understand that you are serving the needs of tiny niche. But there is such thing as fairness: if you serve some tiny niche you get the resources from this tiny niche, you can't demand the resources spent for them mainstream. When people demand to keep that "X network transparency" they, in fact, demand that their obscure needs must be honored before needs of wast majority of the population - which is quite strange thing to do. Develop software for the 99% of cases first, then start thinking about that remaining 1%. If it's turned out that you can not solve 99% problem and 1% problem simultaneously then solve just 99% problem. People who need solution for 1% problem can then solve it themselves or do without. I think people who endlessly raise this "perfect X network transparency" argument again and again actually understand these basic facts of life, they just refuse to accept them. I mean: they are trying to influence developers who are trying to solve 99% problem exactly because they know they don't have resources in their tiny niche to keep it from breaking. But I still don't understand why 99% of users should suffer for the needs of 1%. It's just illogical. It's as in hypothetical case where DirectX is banned on Windows because Linux users can't use it. Makes no sense at all.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 10:22 UTC (Fri) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
If you start cutting features because "99% of the users don't need that feature", you will very quickly get to a system that has no users.
I've seen businesses do exactly this. One company had a 3 year development effort to re-write their entire codebase, along the way they had a couple dozen decisions to cut features that only 1-2% of the corporate clients they had used. The end result (which got announced with great fanfare) was a version that only 30 out of their 2000 customers could use because of the missing features.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 10:49 UTC (Fri) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] If you start cutting features because "99% of the users don't need that feature", you will very quickly get to a system that has no users. Sure. No doubt about it. But if you'll not implement features which are needed by 99% of users because they break this oh-so-important 1% of then you'll get there much, much, MUCH faster. And this is, in fact, what happened with Linux. Do you know that bestselling laptop on Amazon right now, today is Linux-based laptop? Go and check, if you want. What? What do you mean "it's not Linux"? It sure is. It just culled some features not useful by 99% of users (such as the ability to run compiler locally) and added some features useful for 99% of users (such as the ability to watch netflix), that's all.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 10:28 UTC (Fri) by neilbrown (subscriber, #359) [Link]
> When people demand ....
I've noticed that ... people seem to demand, but don't put any resources into it. I don't really understand that attitude.
People who endlessly raise any argument again and again are best ignored. But if they were, these comment threads would be much shorter.
:-)
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 11:09 UTC (Fri) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] I've noticed that ... people seem to demand, but don't put any resources into it. I don't really understand that attitude. It's not hard to understand, really. Think about it. Here is the feature they used for decades but which is not used by most of other users and which is major PITA to support. This combination means that they have no hope to keep it supported independently (because it needs a lot of resources) and it means that they can't argue that "hey, there are few of us, but we only need ten lines of code here and dozen more there", so what can they do? Raise huge racket and hope that developers will be intimidated. It's as simple as that. This strategy rarely works, but it sure is amusing to watch. Think "focus follows mouse" which went over similar contortions and was eventually punted from one of the most popular Linux desktops (I mean Unity here, of course). It to went from "something most definitely supported" to "something which works poorly" to "something which can be enabled but you can't really used" to "it's no longer an option". People who raise this racket are all too familiar with this pattern and they hope to slowdown (or, ideally, stop) it at early stages.
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 12:16 UTC (Fri) by daniels (subscriber, #16193) [Link]
Assuming we're talking about remote display (per-window or per-desktop, both are equally possible with Wayland right now, today), who ever - ever - said it wouldn't be supported? What's being taken away?
What part of 'this works right now and here's the git branch to go look at if you don't believe me' was misleading?
Remote desktop vs. remote display Posted Feb 15, 2013 17:55 UTC (Fri) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]
And who the heck does khim think is intimidating anyone? I've seen intimidation. There's none here. Yowls of 'please don't break this' perhaps, but intimidation? You must be kidding.
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