Linked by Thom Holwerda on Fri 14th Sep 2012 22:30 UTC
You'd think this sort of stuff belonged to the past - but no. Apparently, Microsoft is afraid of Android on its Windows 8 tablets, because Intel has just announced that it will provide no support for Linux on its clover Trail processors. Supposedly, this chip is "designed for Windows 8". What?
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RE[11]: Comment by stabbyjones
by moondevil on Sun 16th Sep 2012 14:16
in reply to "RE[10]: Comment by stabbyjones"
Member since:2005-07-08
RE[12]: Comment by stabbyjones
by boldingd on Mon 17th Sep 2012 08:55
in reply to "RE[11]: Comment by stabbyjones"
Member since:2009-02-19
But this is the message I was trying to get across, without success.
If your business is to sell software, instead of services around it, which is not always possible, then the open source model does not work for a sustained business.
If your business is to sell software, instead of services around it, which is not always possible, then the open source model does not work for a sustained business.
You have a gift for misconstruing what people say.
lemur2 was talking about companies that work with software, where software was not the product. Like Amazon, where they use software to provide a service. Or google, where they use software to provide a service. Or every other web-based business, where software is part of the business process, but isn't the thing sold to the user. For these people, working with open-source software vendors can make a lot of sense; they get a high-quality web server to build a site off of, or a high-quality operating system and platform to make a product out of (for example with Android and Valve's upcoming set-top), or a high-quality database system, or etc. And they get it for free, with free improvements from the community over time.
For these people, contributing to the health of the project can also make sense, as long as it allows them to keep getting otherwise free high-quality software (especially if the cost of the contribution is much less than the expense of hiring a team of software engineers to create an equivalent bit of software).
RE[12]: Comment by stabbyjones
by Lennie on Mon 17th Sep 2012 12:40
in reply to "RE[11]: Comment by stabbyjones"
Member since:2007-09-22
People selling software is just a small part of the business.
Most customers need 1 of both:
1. a commodity solution
2. a custom solution
The commodity software is already available from large open source projects or large proprietary software companies. Or a commodity webbased solution, like Salesforce.com
The rest need a more custom solution, for example the enterprises someone mentioned in this thread or small businesses.
This is the kind of work that gets payed by project or by the hour.
Or software for some specialty industry, it is commodity software but only applies to that industry.
Sometimes such industry specific software gets such wide use that the companies that build it have become very large. I assume that is what happend to Autodesk in the case of AutoCAD.
If you are trying to compete with the large companies you are probably doing it wrong.
You wouldn't try start a business for building a new office or desktop operating systems to compete with companies like Microsoft, right ?
News
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/20/13 6:17 UTC, submitted by MOS6510
"In the first episode of Microsoft's new film series 'On the Whiteboard', Editor Pamela Woon chats with two-time Oscar winner Randy Thom about the (often underestimated) importance of sound in human-technology interactions. Thom, the lead sound designer at Skywalker Ranch who worked on films such as The Incredibles, Castaway and Forrest Gump, says that people rarely consider the significance of those signature sounds that come from their trusty devices, whether it be a cell phone, a computer or a tablet."
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/19/13 23:02 UTC, submitted by M.Onty
"Microsoft has sensationally abandoned its controversial plans to restrict the sharing of XBox One games, and has also removed daily online authentication requirements for its forthcoming console", reports The Guardian. They had no choice. Still a good move.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/19/13 22:28 UTC
"A snippet of code in the Steam digital distribution platform has revealed that Valve may be planning to let users easily share their games with friends in the future. The Verge has verified the code's authenticity, which was originally spotted by a member of the NeoGAF gaming forum; the code references a 'shared game library' and a notification that would alert a user when their games are currently in use by a borrower." This would change the, uh, game.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:33 UTC
Official Apple statement on PRISM and privacy: "Regardless of the circumstances, our Legal team conducts an evaluation of each request and, only if appropriate, we retrieve and deliver the narrowest possible set of information to the authorities. In fact, from time to time when we see inconsistencies or inaccuracies in a request, we will refuse to fulfill it." This is basically Apple re-publishing their earlier statement in a more official manner. You either believe it, or you don't.
Linked by Anonymous on 06/18/13 22:26 UTC
The open source Contiki operating system and its commercial Thingsquare distribution are making strides towards the connected home. According to a Computerworld article, a new LED light bulb manufacturer is putting small computers into their light bulbs. Each computer runs the Contiki OS, which gives each bulb an IP address and allows them to be controlled with a smartphone application. To connect the bulbs to the application, the bulbs use both Wi-Fi and the much lower power IEEE 802.15.4 mesh technology.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 22:25 UTC
"Google asked the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court on Tuesday to ease long-standing gag orders over data requests it makes, arguing that the company has a constitutional right to speak about information it's forced to give the government. The legal filing, which cites the First Amendment's guarantee of free speech, is the latest move by the California-based tech giant to protect its reputation in the aftermath of news reports about sweeping National Security Agency surveillance of Internet traffic." Draining the ditch after the cow has drowned in it.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:45 UTC
"I can't find one person who has been using the Nexus 7 for an extended period of time, and hasn't seen a massive downgrade in performance. Just what kind of downgrade are we talking here? I cannot pick up my Nexus 7 without experiencing problems like a lag of ten seconds, or more, just to rotate the display; touches refusing to acknowledged; stuttering notification panel actions; and unresponsive apps." Fully and utterly agreed. My Nexus 7 was blazing-fast and awesome for a few months, and at some point, it just started sucking. Just like that. I've tried loads of ROMs, and nothing helps.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/18/13 17:32 UTC, submitted by poundsmack
A new release of the hobby operating system MenuetOS! The release notes are a bit non-descript, but you'll have to take what you can get: "updates and improvements (picview, httpc, ehci, ...)".
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:58 UTC
"The Internet is one of the most transformative technologies of our lifetimes. But for 2 out of every 3 people on earth, a fast, affordable Internet connection is still out of reach. And this is far from being a solved problem. There are many terrestrial challenges to Internet connectivity - jungles, archipelagos, mountains. There are also major cost challenges. Right now, for example, in most of the countries in the southern hemisphere, the cost of an Internet connection is more than a month's income. Solving these problems isn't simply a question of time: it requires looking at the problem of access from new angles. So today we're unveiling our latest moonshot from Google[x]: balloon-powered Internet access." Insane.
Linked by Thom Holwerda on 06/17/13 17:52 UTC
"MineAssemble is a tiny bootable Minecraft clone written partly in x86 assembly. I made it first and foremost because a university assignment required me to implement a game in assembly for a computer systems course. Because I had never implemented anything more complex than a 'Hello World' bootloader before, I decided I wanted to learn about writing my own kernel code at the same time. Note that the goal of this project was not to write highly efficient hand-optimized assembly code, but rather to have fun and write code that balances readability and speed. This is primarily accomplished by proper commenting and consistent code structuring." Just cool.More News »
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Member since:
2007-02-17
How do you pay your bills?
Open source is economically the best option for companies whose primary business is NOT to sell software. Any business whose products incorporate software, but the product itself is not the software per se, has a great business case to use open source.
Hence open source Android for businesses which sell phones, not apps.
Hence Samsung:
http://www.pcworld.com/article/257063/samsung_gets_serious_about_li...
http://www.businessinsider.com/samsung-linux-foundation-apple-2012-...
Hence Toyota:
http://www.linuxfoundation.org/news-media/announcements/2011/07/toy...
http://www.linuxinsider.com/story/72867.html
Hence the scientific projects such as the Large Hadron Collider:
http://www.internetnews.com/skerner/2008/09/large-hadron-collider--...
Hence the OIN community:
http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/licensees.php
Hence Google:
http://code.google.com/opensource/projects.html
These companies and institutions all collaborate to invest in open source software, to the benefit of all of them.
This is how the bills are paid.
Edited 2012-09-16 12:17 UTC