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Remote desktop vs. remote displayRemote desktop vs. remote displayPosted Feb 20, 2013 17:45 UTC (Wed) by khim (subscriber, #9252)In reply to: Remote desktop vs. remote display by jmorris42 Parent article: LCA: The ways of Wayland
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.
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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.
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