San Francisco, Wed. 14th Aug 2002. This was my first Linux-related exhibition, so I did not exactly know what to expect. Jill from DesktopLinux came by the house and picked me up this morning (thanks Jill :) and we arrived there around 10:40 AM, with lots of enthusiasm and some expectations for a nice geek show. However, it seems that this year's LinuxWorld is much more corporate than expected. Which is both a good and a bad thing for the Linux universe.
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Wow, sounds like it was fun. Red Hat's Under the Brim (newsletter) last contest was about thinking up gimmicks that they could do at the expo -- any idea what these gimmicks were?
>Wow, sounds like it was fun
Yeah, it was cool. 
>any idea what these gimmicks were
What do you mean by "gimmicks"? :o
But they don't have their own booth (money problems?)
http://www.mandrakesoft.com/company/community/mandrakesoftnews/news...
n=/mandrakesoft/events/2369
I did not see them! Were they wearing the AMD shirts? If yes, there would not be a one in a zillion chance to spot them specifically. Like with the Lycoris situation. They were completely undetectable! And especially Mandrake, should have a bit more space and a bit of its own design.
Eugenia,
Excellent review of the show. I heartily agree with your opinions. I was there from 12:30-4:30 today, and I spent a great deal of time at the Red Hat booth (being an ex-Red Hatter, I did a lot of schmoozing with some old friends :-) and it WAS crowded.
Too bad we didn't bump into one-another (actually, we may have, as we've never met in real-life!)
Cheers,
Ken
Yeah, it would have been cool to meet up! 
But hey, I think you are living 15 mins from where we do, maybe we can arrange something.
Eugenia: Were they wearing the AMD shirts?
They never said what cloths they were wearing. But at the AMD booth, you should have spotted a box that is running Linux. Check to see if it has any Mandrake logos on it. Raise your handbag and prepare to hit the monitor with it. Soon a Mandrake guy should come. Works all the time in Malaysia (only, I use my fist).
Eugenia: And especially Mandrake, should have a bit more space and a bit of its own design.
Well, They didn't own the booth. They should have wore Mandrake T-Shirts though, but I think it was AMD, IBM and HP that caused them to go there. Going for such events, especially for a non-US company, is very expensive.
----
<rant>
Anyway, I found Xandros's PR to be the best I have seen ever from any Linux-only companies. For example, when I send a email to Mandrake, I get something that isn't professionally written (for example, Microsoft becomes M$). Only, it comes 2 months after I sent it. But to Xandros, for all three emails I have sent, the person replying it replied within a day, explain it fully to me, and the email was very professional. I wish guys like Transgaming, Codeweavers, Mandrake, Ximian, SuSE etc. learn something from Xandros. Lycoris is the only company that could rival Xandros. What I got from Red Hat on the other hand, if my message is about a current product, an URL. If it is about a beta, "Sorry, we can't discuss about unreleased products".
</rant>
I tried to get in but they were asking for ids so even though I was prepared to pay $30 I was turned away. I don't carry any ids on me. I guess they want to verify the information that you give them. I know for a fact that the last one in San Jose didn't ask for them.
I decided not to bother, after that. So I went home, pissed of course after spending a couple hours on the bus and in line, and worked on Linux. How ironic. Eugenia, do you know the deal with the ids?
Redhat seems to be putting up a new beta on their ftp server, i notice a folder called "null" which at the moment can only be accessed by server admin. which wasn't there before also after a quick search on google i havn't come across any previous redhat beta's called null
ftp> cd pub/redhat/linux/beta
250 Directory successfully changed.
ftp> ls
200 PORT command successful. Consider using PASV.
150 Here comes the directory listing.
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Jul 13 10:13 fisher
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Aug 14 23:34 limbo
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Jul 13 10:13 lorax
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Jul 13 10:13 mustang
dr-x------ 3 218 218 4096 Aug 14 22:31 null
drwxr-xr-x 3 0 0 4096 Jul 16 22:07 pensacola
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Jul 13 10:13 piglet
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Jul 13 10:13 pinstripe
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Jul 13 10:13 rembrandt
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Jul 13 10:13 roswell
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Jul 13 10:13 skipjack
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Jul 13 10:13 starbuck
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Jul 13 10:13 thunderbird
drwxr-xr-x 2 0 0 4096 Jul 13 10:13 wolverine
226 Directory send OK.
>What do you mean by "gimmicks"? :o
Sorry, I should've been a bit more explanatory. This is from the July UTB:
"There are no limits to the depths some companies will go to attract attention.
Ok, maybe there are limits. You're going to help us find out. Your task for contest 34: Come up with the best way we can attract attention to the Red Hat booth. No matter how wild or shameless. It helps if your entry somehow relates to Red Hat or Linux. But as past tradeshows will tell you--that's not always necessary."
The August newsletter came out a couple of days before LinuxWorld, but they would'nt say what the winning ideas were because they were going to use them!
Nice review Eugenia! Thanks for clueing us in.
> Redhat seems to be putting
> up a new beta on their ftp server,
That would be cool. Has anybody confirmed this? Looks like Red is developing real fast these days.
...Since we all know Enlightenment is the best WM there is would have been cool if they had a booth showing off E17
Nerds:
-Jay Beale (lead developer for Bastille).
-Bruce Perens (author and open source evangelist).
-Rob "CmdrTaco" Malda (founder of Slashdot).
-Arthur Ulfeldt (student at the University of California).
Geeks:
-Jeremy Allison (cocreator of the Samba project). Geeks team leader.
-Dave Sifry (cofounder and chief technology officer of Sputnik).
-McAllister (director of strategic technologies at Egenera).
-Miguel de Icaza (founder of Ximian).
Host and referee was slashdoter Chris DiBona
>>
Geeks had racked up 12,500 points while the Nerds had 11,500. In the final round, DiBona asked both teams to name as many Linux distributions as they could. A feminine version of Tux, the Linux mascot, danced on stage during the final tally.
>>
http://www.linuxworld.com/ic_936143_8574_1-3133.html
Damn! I was betting for the Nerds.
>>
"All of you guys are doomed," groaned Jeremy Allison, a veteran of three losing Geek teams.
>>
Next time is going to be a landslide...
Wonderful report, Eugenia!
The SuSE people surprise me. They have such a great disto, yet don't seem to care.
Xandros is a puzzle to me. I'm so glad to hear you had a chance to talk to Mr. Begos.And a poster reported getting prompt emails from Xandros, which is great. but, they are so silent about theor upcoming product. It hope it's great.
Wasn't Xandros going to announce something important at the conference? Wasn't their an office package or something ????
No personal offense intended to Ms. Loli-Queru, but this article came off as a first draft, perhaps transcribed over telephone by a fourth-grader.
The grammar and content were inappropriate for a business audience. The smileys were part of parenthetical asides (which should not have even bee present, eg. this kind of aside). The tone was glib and too familiar, more like conversation with a cocktail waitress than a professional account.
I am appalled that this article could make it into piblication without anyone proof reading it. However, it gives me great confidence that perhaps I can be a journalist, too. Perhaps I need to hit the bong or the martini bar before writing up my adventures, however. The standards of OS News seem to reflect those of drunken airliner pilots. I guess this is the price society must pay for fewer liberal arts majors in the world.
>The grammar and content were inappropriate for a business audience.
I give no flying monkey if it was "inappropriate for a business audience." OSNews is my hobby. The fact that it happens to be successful, is a... byproduct of my work. I do the best I can, with the knowledge I have from the english language. I seek no further knowledge of it. I need to learn French now, as my husband is french and I can't speak it at all...
What do you mean by "business audience"???? This is a news site made by a few individuals who do it mostly for fun and not in order to cater to a "business audience." At least that's what I understand this site is all about.
Most people who are interested in OS news are geeks. It would be nice if the articles didn't contain any typos or other mistakes but who cares?
What's wrong with a familiar tone? At least there is no marketing crap flying around.
Mike, your comment drips with monumental pretentiousness, insensitivity and hypocrisy. More likely than not, judging by your living in Colorado and having a stock American name such as yours, you aren't proficient in a language aside from English... if you do, more power to you, however. Eugenia is not a native speaker of English, cut her some damned slack! It makes me sick to be an American considering how quickly we judge non-native English speakers despite our complete linguistic ignorance.
So, allow me to be coarse: you and any other English nazis out there can go straight to hell!
So, allow me to be coarse: you and any other English nazis out there can go straight to hell!
Why do people always have to use this Nazi word? Most of you probably don't even know what it means otherwise you wouldn't use it. If you want to make a point please do so more eloquently and not by lowering yourself to use common-place stereotypes.
I was being intentionally coarse, as noted. And, aside from not wanting political correctness to stand in the way of my making a point, I feel that the word's use in this case was at least somewhat justified; after all, were not Nazis horribly close-minded, oppressive, fascist party?
Please stay on topic guys (LinuxWorld), or this whole thread wil have to get moderated down. Thank you so much for the moral support, but we should be staying on topic...
I read one additional review of Linux World, and it went on and on about corporate participation - blah blah. Yours had a much more positive bent, and was an entertaining and informative read. It's nice to see the big names paying attention. As an aside, stories like this make OS News a daily stop for me - please keep them coming.
To 'Mike'. Perhaps you should double check your own spelling before ranting about someone else. If not, I'd enjoy seeing what kind of 'piblication' you yourself can come up with.
Well ... I've seen them as well, they certainly stand out. A good strategy at a tradeshow I think.
Anyway - thanks for the report; this is exactly the sort of artcile I like to read about a show. Not commercial, corporate or too serious. Well done.
Me? I was day dreaming about going to LinuxWorld someday (I'm in London), perhaps even this one. Especially when I heard MS was there. I wanted to give them a piece of my mind basically. I like a good argument!
Cheers!
Why was HP there? www.hp.com/linux/
Why was Sun there? www.sun.com/linux/
(It also doesn't appear the author was aware, however CDE is Sun's default WM. Gnome is an option).
Interesting to note the author has no knowledge of real hardware, just concerned with that which is pretty on x86.
Cheers.
p.s. $ cat article | editor
You are talking complete trash.
Of course and I know what HP does for Linux, I just don't like it. Just pure consulting and other shit like that. I want to see real CODE, I want to see project involvement.
As for SUN, you have misinterpreted my article. I HAVE USED CDE. I know very well, what is default today and what will be default tomorrow for Solaris.
Take your trolling elsewhere please.
> You are talking complete trash without having no idea who I am or what I do.
Are you a mobster or a journalist? I am simply replying with my perspective of your article.
> Of course and I know what HP does for Linux, I just don't like it. Just pure
> consulting and other shit like that. I want to see real CODE, I want to see
> project involvement.
HP does a lot with Linux. Have you seen http://www.hp.com/linux? What about http://linuxworld.netcomsus.com/? http://www.parisc-linux.org? What have you done to contribute if you don't feel they are moving fast enough?
> As for SUN, you have misinterpreted my article. I HAVE USED CDE. I know very
> well, what is default today and what will be default tomorrow for Solaris.
Idem.
It's unfortunate that is not apparent in your article. I wouldn't have guessed you've ever used anything other than your dual-cpu x86 box based on the article, however I will take your word for it.
> Take your trolling elsewhere please, not on my site.
You're welcome for my criticism.
Genuflect,
--
Yashy
It was no doubt the best report so far, but I'm far more interested in the anecdotes. For example, what did the MSFT guy say that was so interesting? I imagine he admitted freely that the irony was lost on no one, but that he was personally interested in free software.
Yashy: Why was Sun there? www.sun.com/linux/
(It also doesn't appear the author was aware, however CDE is Sun's default WM. Gnome is an option).
An Solaris 9 update would ship GNOME 2.0 as default. It won't happen in 9.0 because GNOME 2.0 couldn't be as ready for Solaris before the Solaris 2.9.0 release.
Yashy: Are you a mobster or a journalist? I am simply replying with my perspective of your article.
Neither. She is officially NOT a journalist. She is also (hopefully) officially NOT a mobster. But I heard she is an evolved form of an homo sapien (evolution, *gasp*). :-)
Some told me the M$ stand was blue with white letters...
Can someone give some example of how or why the MS guy impressed Eugenia? A lot of techies have charisma (considering the general anti-social behavior that working with technology requires), but this Linuxworld wrap-up (& my experience at previous ones) makes it apparent that even the best companies (SuSe, Mandrake, etc.) don't have enough charsimatic PR people. Of course, MS can afford to hire the best (& Apple has real celebrities lined up behind them). But everyone else can make up in spirit what we lack in money (kudos to Eugenia, BTW). For example, the Debian crew is always gung-ho cuz they know they're the most free .
I saw _Revolution OS_ and the biggest names in open source, Perens, Raymond, Augustine, didn't present themselves well. Linus is a great poster boy, but he's only one guy (& busy). Stallman's great but shunned by corporations. I like Michael Tiemann, but where is he now? Bob Young does his Red Hat thing. The rest are just nerds--no offense, that's me, too. This Xandros guy sounds interesting, but any business plan based on repackaging Debian is bizarre at best.
So MS shows up with basically nothing, and manages to make an impression. How'd they handle the crowd? Eugenia says the main guy was sharp, so I'm guessing no Ballmer-esque monkey-boy dancing?
I am a woman. And I do have a charisma of my own: Most of the times, I can see through people.
And this guy was certainly a winner (opposite to a "loser"). He was so sure of himself, of the product, of what he was doing there. He wouldn't take a second to think of your questions. He had the answer already underneath his tongue. The guy was just way too clever, too fast for me to follow.
The rest of the people I spoke there, were good, bad, intelligent, tired, boring, interesting or common. But he was just on the top of all of the other people. He was just the man for the job. No wonder why Microsoft hired him.
Now I remember why I loved BeNews (I remember when you got married; bonne chance learning French)! Thank you, Eugenia, you're doing great work.
The whole MS+Linuxworld thing must have been aimed at the suits who attended. That MS guy may naturally have been really sharp, but I bet a lot of it was due to good planning and positioning. Redhat's strength seems surprising, but otherwise the distributions would have been almost invisible. I bet they drew in all the SuSe & Mandrake users, too.
Hopefully, embedded systems will turn out to be more viable and fun than they have so far. MS killed Be to delay tablet computing until Windows is ready (which it's still not, hence the whole shared source WinCE). GNU/Linux can still win that race. Apple & Palm don't seem committed enough, but would make it interesting.