Back to the Source: Why FOSS is More Important Than Ever

[securitybreach]

A bit long but a good article:

 

Linux and FOSS dominate in all key computing arenas: supercomputing, embedded computing, cloud, networking, data centers, web sites and services.

 

In the olden days the topic of software freedom was central to Linux and free/open source software. Software freedom needs to remain front and center. Remember Richard Stallman's Four Freedoms?

 

"Nobody should be restricted by the software they use. There are four freedoms that every user should have:

 

the freedom to use the software for any purpose,

the freedom to change the software to suit your needs,

the freedom to share the software with your friends and neighbors, and

the freedom to share the changes you make."

Another way to say this is we should always have the freedom to tinker.

 

We used to take these freedoms for granted with all of our personal property. We can mod our homes, we can buy random items, glue glitter and googly eyes on them and resell them as holiday crafts, we can do anything we want with our own stuff. Except for our digital property. There we run into vast mazy minefields of laws and Digital Rights Management and prohibitions and the idea that we don't own it, but merely license it, so it's not really ours and the vendor has the right to control it, and to control what we do with it.

 

Even Free Software does this; for example the GPL requires that if you mod and distribute GPL code, you must also distribute your source code. But there are significant differences. If you violate a typical proprietary software license you'll feel the wrath of attack lawyers, which is assuaged by applications of large sums of money. If you violate the GPL you lose the right to use GPL code. When you repent and mend your ways you get to use it again. These GPL provisions only apply when you re-distribute code; whatever you do in the privacy of your own home or shop is nobody's business but yours. Most proprietary licenses insert themselves into your normal use and private business.

 

Just for fun, go read the EULAs for Windows 8. There are 10, count 'em, ten of 'em. This is what Windows users must "agree" to.

 

Did Linux Really Win?

 

My fellow codgers are experts at treating insomnia with stories from the olden days; those heady days back in the last millennium when Linux was a radical adventure, and only riff raff and weirdos were into it. Microsoft was Sauron, Apple was Saruman, and we free software/open source rabble had epic flamewars about everything: Emacs vs. Vi, KDE vs. GNOME, graphical desktop vs. the text console, apt-get vs. Yum, and oh my gosh the license wars. GPL, BSD, artistic license, MIT license, copyleft, copyright, Apache, the Unlicense, Q, Nethack, Multics, Sleepycat, Fair, and dozens more, all sounding like characters at a comic con. Every week a new milestone and a new adventure, and fighting for legitimacy: Groklaw, Lindows, the hated SCO; Windows Refund Day; IBM's first billion-dollar Linux pledge and their famous Linux commercials ("The servers! They stole all the servers!"); the United States vs. Microsoft; the Red Hat initial public offering; Ernie Ball publicly dumping Windows and adopting Linux after being raided by the Microsoft license police...I could ramble on and on, because the Linux and FOSS world was smaller then, more like a loud but cozy club, and events felt bigger.

 

The Linux and FOSS world is many times bigger now, so individual events and personalities don't loom as large. We like to boast "Linux has won!" because of Android and the dominance of Linux and FOSS in all key computing arenas: supercomputing, embedded computing, cloud, networking, data centers, web sites and services...everywhere but the general-purpose PC desktop. But even as Linux has exploded in the enterprise, software freedom for the consumer masses has suffered. So -- have we really won?

 

 

http://www.linux.com...tant-than-ever-

[raymac46]

As we have noted many times previously, Linux will have a serious shot at winning on the desktop when:

• You can buy a machine anywhere - online or in a bricks and mortar store - with Linux preinstalled. Failing this:
  
• You can get any type of machine with no O/S and install Linux yourself.
  

Right now you can build your own desktop machine and install your choice of Linux. It's much harder to do this with a tablet or laptop. About the best you can do with a laptop (at least where I live) is get a refurbed model, and replace the O/S with your choice of Linux.

Having said this, I think that developments like Steam for Linux are moving things in the right direction. I also don't count Android as a Linux win because Google has its own Android agenda.

Edited October 1, 2014 by raymac46

[securitybreach]

I agree Ray but the article was about Linux in the corporate world (servers, data centers etc.) which is a whole different ballfield than the desktop.

[Hedon James]

I agree with Ray. But I also agree with Breach. And to a certain extent, I think you're both saying the same thing.

 

I remember working for an insurance company in the early 1990's, fresh out of college, where the entire corporate IT was a Unix system. This was way before I knew what Unix was. I had used it in college, with dumb terminals and central servers; the same setup was in my first corporate environment; to me, it was just how you operated a computer.

 

Until the day I had to walk through the IT department and saw the entire department huddled around a color CRT monitor (a big culture shock from the orange or green text terminals throughout the rest of the company). I asked my programmer friend Tom "what's going on?" and he proceeded to gush....babbling some incomprehensible nonsense about "Windows.....Microsoft....mouse clicks..." I didn't understand a word of it, but could tell that he was supremely excited about it! Me? What is a mouse? And what does my "Window" have to do with computers? Do I need to open the window to keep it cool?

 

Next thing I know, we're in company meetings to discuss "migrating the entire IT structure" to Windows, with stand alone desktops, rather than central servers. When the first machines arrived, we had training sessions on how to use Windows 3.0! It really was a strange bird, requiring a "mouse" to use it, but people quickly acclimated and concluded that the mouse was easier than remembering the FN key combos. Shortly thereafter, Corel WordPerfect was replaced by MS Word. Lotus 123 was replaced my MS Excel (and 2 years of college classes using Lotus 123 were quickly diluted). Much later, Netscape and/or AOL was replaced by Internet Explorer.

 

And based on those experiences, and their level of familiarity, people bought computers and software for their homes that they were already familiar with through their work! Based on what I saw back then, I truly believe that the road to adoption for a Linux desktop travels through adoption of Linux in the workplace. People seek their comfort levels. In the work environment, they have no choice; they learn to get comfortable with what they are dictated. If Linux is the de facto standard for corporations, corporate desktops, and corporate software, then people will be comfortable with it. Once they're comfortable with it, they'll want the same in their home devices.

 

It's a process, not an event. There will never be a "year of the Linux desktop" anymore than there will be a "year of global warming" or the "year that sea levels rose 3 feet." But I do believe that corporate adoption will be the accelerant. Just my opinion...

[securitybreach]

Yeah but even with the datacenters and servers running Linux, most of the terminals are still running some form of Windows unfortunately.

 

BTW Linux is still the most widely use kernel in the world and is used by most people on a daily basis. Here is a list off the top of my head of ways people use linux without knowing:

 

The majority of internet routers

DVRs like Tivo and others

Car entertainment systems including GPSs and radios

Pretty much any new flatscreen tv runs an embedded Linux including smart tvs

Traffic control systems

Flight Entertainment Systems

Hadron Collider

I think like 98% of the world's fastest super compuetrs run Linux http://sourcedigit.c...-runs-linux-os/

The amount of Android devices is insane with 1.5 million daily activations

 

My point is that Linux has already conquered the overall computer and embedded markets. The only thing that Window's has more of is the desktop.

[Cluttermagnet]

Interesting thread, guys. Linux may still be 'niche' as a desktop, but let Windows take most of the blows from the black hats... Security through obscurity is just fine by me.

 

Yep, to this day it remains a little geeky to actually get Linux installed and running on any given (desktop) machine. I've now coached a few folks, and it's a long process if they were not geeky to begin with. Most are not. Let the masses eat shrink wrap, I guess...

[securitybreach]

Yep, to this day it remains a little geeky to actually get Linux installed and running on any given (desktop) machine. I've now coached a few folks, and it's a long process if they were not geeky to begin with. Most are not. Let the masses eat shrink wrap, I guess...

 

I disagree as distros like Ubuntu and LinuxMint are just click, click, click and your done. You do not even have to know how to read as long as you could click next with a mouse. So easy a toddler could do it.