"For years now, Linux has been a black sheep standing in the shadow of Apple and Microsoft. Despite having a fervent and enthusiastic following, the operating system hasn't been able to grab a sizable share of the computing market and has instead been content to subsist on the customers that come away dissatisfied with the mainstream competition. But that may be about to change. With the release of Microsoft Windows 8 on the horizon, some are saying Linux may have a great opportunity to steal a significant share of the market away from Microsoft, allowing it to finally take the helm as a major operating system service provider." This has to stop, and the only reason I'm linking to this nonsense is to make this very clear: Linux will not magically conquer the desktop or even make any significant gains because of Windows 8. People who don't like Windows 8 (Vista) will continue to use Windows 7 (Windows XP). This is getting so tiring. And does it even matter? Linux is winning big time in the mobile space, server space, and countless other spaces. The desktop is and always has been irrelevant to Linux.
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Member since:2007-11-11
RHEL is $400 a year, Windows a one time cost of $80-$140 depending on version, no comparison. And Cent is a leecher mod done by a couple of guys that could disappear tomorrow, as we saw a couple years back with them just falling away for months without even email, again no comparison.
Again I'll be happy to step up and take the challenge, and don't blame me that Linux HAS to be upgraded, as Windows supports for 10 years and Linux could too if they chose, instead the devs say "its free" so they upgrade. Well my time is NOT free and those upgrades make messes. We'll take 2 bog standard COTS laptops, any OEM, slap whatever Linux and Win 7 RTM with NO driver packs, we'll see what works OOTB and if either needs drivers we'll install, then we'll patch/upgrade to current.
As I've said I've done this and seen with my own two eyes, drivers BREAK badly. Wireless and sound are the worse, but video will often be flaky, changed settings will be reset or sometime end up borked completely, its a mess.
Member since:2006-07-14
RHEL desktop ( we are talking about desktops, right?) is as little as $50 a year.
https://www.redhat.com/apps/store/desktop/
If you can't afford redhat and don't trust cent to be around... there is scientific linux. Also free, developed and supported by Nuclear physicists.
What do you mean by "drivers break badly"? Are you talking about binary blob drivers? Or out of kernel drivers? If so, then yes they do break by the abi changes. If you are talking about open source drivers that are included in the kernel, then I can honestly say I've never seen that happen. I've never seen an open source driver included in the driver break because of an update.
Why does Google get so much credit in the technology industry? Why, despite the company's many obvious failings, do many geeks and enthusiasts still hold a somewhat positive view on the all-knowing technology giant? A specific talk at Google I/O this week provides the answer.
OSNews is a sponsor of this year's O'Reilly OSCON in Portland, Oregon, USA. A lucky OSNews reader will win a free three-day pass, including two tutorials days. To win the pass, post a comment on this story saying something about Open Source Software or OSCON. We'll pick a winner at random next week. If you don't have an OSNews account, you may email us your entry. Part of the conference is the 9th annual Open Source Awards, and today the 16th is the deadline for nominations. If you'd like to nominate an outstanding open source contributor, do it here. Read on for more information about OSCON. Update: The 20% discount code for OSNews readers is "OSN."
"Windows is indeed slower than other operating systems in many scenarios, and the gap is worsening." That's one way to start an insider explanation of why Windows' performance isn't up to snuff. Written by someone who actually contributes code to the Windows NT kernel, the comment on Hacker News, later deleted but reposted with permission on Marc Bevand's blog, paints a very dreary picture of the state of Windows development. The root issue? Think of how Linux is developed, and you'll know the answer.
This is one of those news items that's fun to write, fun to read, fun to comment on, and where no one will be able to say anything unkind. It's all just one big ball of awesome fluffiness. TuneTracker, the BeOS radio automation software, has just released something very special: TuneTracker System 5, the first version designed entirely and specifically for Haiku. In fact, it actually includes Haiku in the software package. Better yet, TuneTracker also unveiled several system-in-a-box products - which have Haiku and TuneTracker pre-installed.
Exactly twenty years ago, a document was published that played a huge role in establishing the web as we know it today. Twenty years later, and this simple and straightforward document is proof of an irrefutable fact: while closed technologies can change markets, open technologies can change the world.
Oh multitasking. That staple of computing that got thrown out the window with many modern smartphones. We got some rudimentary thing in its place - but even as multitasking on phone and tablets improves, its user-visible side remains cumbersome. Windows 8 has a neat implementation, and now it's time Android follows in it footsteps.They're here! Whether that excites you or not remains to be seen, but the Galaxy S4, which will most likely become the best selling Android smartphone of the year by a huge margin, has been reviewed by all the major sites, and there's lots of interesting conclusions in there - although I think most of you will get the gist.Nokia has posted its quarterly results for the first quarter of 2013, and just like the quarters that came before, there's not a whole lot of good news in there. The rise in Lumia sales still can't even dream of making up for the sales drop in Symbian phones, and when broken down in versions, the sales figures for Windows Phone 8 Lumias in particular are very disappointing. In North America, Nokia is getting slaughtered.The day has finally come: Google has started shipping Google Glass to the lucky few early adopters. Now that it's shipping, Google has also unveiled a lot more about the API and the specifications of the device itself. While the company had already given out substantial details at earlier occasions, there are still a few surprises here.
Almost exactly three years ago, I wrote about why OSNews was no longer OSNews: the alternative operating system scene had died, and OSNews, too, had to go with the times and move towards reporting on a new wave of operating systems - mobile, and all the repercussions that the explosion of smartphones and tablets have caused. Still, I was wondering something today: why aren't we seeing alternative operating systems on mobile?
Member since:
2006-07-14
I've actually done that "Pepsi challange" since 2009 with fedora, things just get better. Or are you saying that you need to upgrade to new "versions" of Fedora while windows 7 is still windows 7? Or are you saying that Fedora 11 is no longer supported and therefore loses? I think it passes as I have upgraded it and nothing has broken. Hardware that didn't work well at first got better. Software that didn't work well at first got better.
If you want a desktop version that doesn't need a "Version" upgrade and with minimal fuss, then I'd direct you to Red hat enterprise Desktop or CENTOS. Those are pretty rock solid and get a decent amount of backports.