Note: welcome Linux enthusiasts! 
All of the logs are pointing to tuxmachines.org as sending people to this page. Primarily this is a blog about my studies but maybe you’ll find it interesting anyway… keep in mind this post isn’t aimed at a ‘technical’ audience particularly!
As you may know if you’ve read any previous entries in this blog, I’m primarily a Linux user (mandriva on laptop and ubuntu on desktop) though I do have a Windows dual-boot option for those occasions that it’s necessary to use Windows. Not that I’ve ever actually found it necessary to use Windows yet – 99%+ of my time is spent using Linux.
The OU conferencing software, FirstClass, is available in a Linux (as well as the more usual Windows and Mac) version, with various different Linux options being available e.g. Debian, Fedora and ‘generic’ Linux which is a .tar.gz file. I tried the .tar.gz first on mandriva but unfortunately ran into a number of dependency problems, which I do have the technical knowledge to resolve but unfortunately didn’t have time to put into resolving dependencies so resorted back to the old Mandrake (in case you don’t know, what Mandriva used to be known as) version which obviously isn’t an up-to-date version but does do the job perfectly well. The Debian version worked on Ubuntu without dependency conflicts – at least on my installation (8.10 with a few additional bits). This is a good thing since as I may have mentioned I’m hoping to participate more in the course conferences this year, as well as the face to face tutorials if they’re placed reasonably. There is a web based interface to the conferences but in many ways is feature limited compared to the software. However it is still an option and some people prefer it (mostly for accessibility and “access anywhere” reasons I imagine).
Mandriva is actually my ‘favourite’ distribution and has been for quite a number of years, but the main reason I ended up with Ubuntu on the desktop was primarily due to wireless support – after endless problems with Mandriva wireless (with 2 different USB wireless adapters) I gave up and migrated to Ubuntu instead. Shame on me! In the past I didn’t like their development model as much but it has improved a lot over the last few releases so I was prepared for “words on toast” and change to Ubuntu. On the laptop I still kept Mandriva as it worked well for what I wanted and wireless support was OK etc. As they all use the ‘standard’ Linux kernel the main differences between the various distributions are the things they add on compared to the standard kernel. Things like the user admin interface, package manager (for software installation), etc.
However it occurred to me that the more popular a distribution gets (I don’t know any statistics for this, but gut feeling is Ubuntu is more widely used than Mandriva, for example) the more popular still it’s bound to become, since people developing software for them will focus on the most widely used naturally since that encompasses the widest range of users. For example, the Amazon MP3 downloader (which I mentioned on this blog a few weeks ago) distributes versions for Ubuntu, Debian, (.deb versions) Fedora and OpenSUSE (.rpm versions). No generic Linux version so either no chance of installing it or a lot of ‘hacking’ with the existing versions. I’ve installed the Ubuntu one and it works fine and all praise to Amazon for actually releasing a Linux version, it’s a lot more than most people do! But we have a situation where the “rich get richer” since more people will find that only the ‘main’ distributions (Ubuntu etc) have readily available versions of a lot of software, and Joe and Jane Bloggs probably don’t want to spend hours trying to resolve dependencies etc if they want things to ‘just work’. So they choose distributions that a lot of people are already using …. Repeat this thousands of times and it becomes clear that only complete paradigm shift, not incremental change, can reverse a situation like that. Same as what’s happened with Windows – 95% plus (I think) market share which means developers only develop for that platform and therefore that people ‘must’ use Windows particularly for gaming for example … Linux gaming is very far behind and probably will always be. Many games can be played with WINE though but maybe not the more complex or system intensive ones. So I hear a lot of people comment that they have to stick with Windows, or at least dual boot with Windows, because of the need to use it for gaming, or whatever.
Software such as NetBeans which I’m using for M257 is thankfully available on many different platforms including Windows, Mac, Linux and I believe some others. I’ve already had a go with the OU supplied examples for M257 in the introductory ‘netbeans guide’ and it’s been successful so no issues there at all. I haven’t got that far with the course yet as it doesn’t officially start until next month, but it’s looking hopeful for being “alternative OS compliant” (a lot of the searches I get to this site appear to be from people wondering whether various courses are ‘compatible’ with operating systems that are not Windows).
All of this seems to be a ‘micro’ version of market forces in general…
Most people you introduce to Linux will tell you that they all look the same.
KDE and GNOME are what you notice most. Use one desktop and the next distro you use with the same will look almost identical.
And since almost everyone on the planet has used WIndows, we shouldnt be surprised that KDE is more confortable for people switching over.
Kubuntu is still not in the top 3-5 KDE distros so I dont use it on any regular basis.
I do use XUbuntu on older computers along with Puppy though.
my friends and family distro is Mandriva and PCLinuxOS from which it comes. Mandriva has been the user friendly desktop before Ubuntu was ever created and has (along with PCLOS) been a favorite among the Live CD’s i offer to friends.
Tthey also are a publicly traded company which served mainly desktop users so I have problems supporting a company like Ubuntu which comes in and uses sugar daddy’s money and THEN tell us that the desktop space will never make money. Gee thanks…. johnny come lately has NO business plan and craps into the food of other who have one.
They say all the right things when it comes to free software but they are still a rich mans toy which has no business plan.
Id rather support the OpenSuse and Mandriva’s who have plans.
Being with a top distro is meaningless except to those who feel that labels/status is important.
PCLinuxOS was on top of distrowatch for over a year and its basically Texstar and a handful of other who run this distro so these come and go.
If you are into GNOME (I can deal with the ugly look, the multiple taskbars and the Mac need to have the top text show but the lack of customization is a deal breaker. I want my desktop to look like I WANT, not how someone else thinks I will want. Limiting my choice is a proprietary company thing.) then I might suggest Linux Mint which comes from Ubuntu which came from Debian and so on and so on.
Mint;s finishing touches make it nicer for those who are all about the user experience.
PS: Ive been running Ubuntu on Dell Mini 9 for 2 months now and I said I would run it for 3. Of course, I had to dumb down the natives apps which were just craptacular.
Totem? Id rather go back to Windows Media 6. Instead I put on VLC which has no peers. Pidgin is featureless and still doesnt support IM webcam, so I installed Kopete and Rhythmbox makes me want to cry, so Amarok came to the rescue.
Bottom line: we all have our choices and preferences but you have to compare distros with same desktops. too many of the differences you can find between both are due to the desktop environment and not distro.
I use KDE, GNOME, XCFE, Windows and Mac during most days so I know that life doesnt end when not using one’s desktop (My desktops look all the same: pictures of kids as wallpaper and make sure that ever taskbar disappears and gets out of the way, screensaver uses my own pictures and I have 6-7 icons on the screen with my most used programs. You cant tell what OS I use most times)
Some distros dont implement (see Kubuntu) desktops as well as others but lets be honest, most newbies cant see past the wallpaper and theme colors.
Guy
I think you are right about the desktops and to a lot of people especially people coming from Windows recently there does seem to be a bit of confusion between the desktop environment (GNOME, KDE etc) and the actual OS itself… as I don’t think this distinction really has an equivalent in Windows! I am comparing the GNOME versions of both Mandriva and Ubuntu (also tried Xubuntu on an elderly laptop: 64 mb of RAM which I upgraded to 128 to try it out – high stakes indeed – and about a 550 hz I believe CPU pentium II. Actually it did work, very slow as I expected but better than the windows ME which was on there previously and I knew I wouldn’t go back to!)
Unfortunately said old laptop is currently semi retired as it was about 7 years old already when I tried Xubuntu out and was only quite a low spec to begin with ! But I have some plans for it…
Personally I find GNOME easier and less ‘clunky’ to use than KDE – have used both at various times and did go through a period of using KDE quite a bit but I dunno, it just seems more… ‘flashy’ somehow (I don’t use the 3D desktops and stuff either!)
I think you are right with the Shuttleworth criticism and yes in some sense it does seem almost ‘cheeky’ in a way to “compete” with distro’s which you might say have more of a ‘legitimate’ ie conventional business model. Adam Williamson (ex) of Mandriva wrote a blog post on this which you may have come across: “Why I don’t like Canonical” (http://www.happyassassin.net/2008/10/28/why-i-dont-like-canonical/) where he talks about their business plan and how there aren’t really any concrete plans or specific ideas for the future as to how to make it profitable.
I guess it comes down to the old issue of principles/ethics/beliefs or whatever vs what is a ‘reality’ in the market and unfortunately for most people I think the reality is that Ubuntu is the distro they will have come across if any, as I think (but stand to be corrected if wrong) that Ubuntu is what’s distributed with many new PCs when they are sold as “alternative” to Windows. Certainly for the Dell ones which I think is a big selling point. (I know someone with one of these and for them it was the ability to customise the processor etc etc and know everything would “just work”… some of these people are probably willing to try Linux if it’s set up for them and if everything is easy, but I wouldn’t expect the normal “non technical” type of user who just wants to do some word processing, email etc etc to want to go into the minute details of compiling source code and hacking symlinks to various libraries etc (amazon mp3, I’m looking at you!) and fiddle with wireless etc just to get things to work the way they do “instantly” in Windows!)
Mandriva should get things really serious,how come that PCLinuxOS is a rolling release,but Mandy must be reinstalled every 3 months!One would say that linux sucks,if he or she will try it for it the first time !Well Ubuntu is not doing a great job either,it it’s reinstalling every six months!One Windows Xp install(if the system is well maintained)stands for(let’s see 2002 present)like 7 years with the most recent software!Some of them distros never learn.
@ Marius Tim
Yes, most people will only try things once or at most twice and then give up if they can’t get any sense out of it – there’s a significant contingent of technical “meddlers” of course and I would put myself in that category, but for the general user Linux needs to be more readily “robust” on the desktop… Strange to hear myself saying that as even a few months ago I would have said 2008 (and previously 2007 etc) would be the year Linux became a viable desktop alternative. Obviously I realise this isn’t a new sentiment!
The automatic upgrade is a big advantage Ubuntu has over some of the others since as you say, the ‘upgrade’ process for Mandriva for example isn’t great and I believe there isn’t an automated one. I’ve done the Xubuntu upgrade over the internet before (something like 700mb of packages, and I had a broadband download limit of 2 GB so best hope it succeeds first time! lol) Though in some cases it can be easier to re-start from scratch especially if / and /home are on separate partitions!