Mandrake has applied to come out of the French equivalent of bankruptcy protection: ‘declaration de cessation des paiements’. Some of the new features of Mandrake 10 that MandrakeSoft will be pinning their hopes on to make succeeding quarters more profitable. “There will be many new features in Mandrake 10.0, but it’s a bit early to say more. There will be new improvements on the ergonomy side, the integration of a groupware solution, and of course the inclusion of Linux 2.6.x kernel as default which provides better performance.“
Mandrake Set to Emerge from Bankruptcy Protection
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Lot’s of good things from Mandrake these days. They acknowledged the 9.2 problems and are working hard on improving their distro.
10 is far from ready for laptops, but there are some nice new features, including KDE 3.2
If Mandrake provides an integrated and easy-to-configure groupware server, all of it under the GPL, it will be leading all the other distributors in a big way. Nobody right now is offering this. Suse’s openexchange also has client access licenses, just like the original exchange. Red Hat doesn’t have it. Mandrake is really bringing a very much needed product and in doing so raising the competitive bar. Well done.
This is what I like about Mandrake. They were the first to have a good installer, the first to use CUPS, the first to provide JFS, XFS and Reiser, and on and on.
Methodologically speaking, their new development process is a marked improvement from the current one and should provide a rock-solid distribution for everyone using the Mandrake Official release.
I think than in the short-term 80-90% of all the global linux distros will disappear (when i say global i say all but the firewalls and localized distros). To keep your head above the water you got to have something special, not just have KDE 3.2, Kernel 2.6, XFree86 4.4, Glibc 2.3.3. That will be common to almost all the distributions. It’ll be the little things that set distros apart. Things like stability, usability, performance or loyalty.
PS: Just a thought, don’t flame for it…
I’ll start. I think it has to do with the fact that they do listen to their users and try their best to make them happy. They are also very open about their policys and what the fact that their distro will always remain open. ( http://www.mandrakesoft.com/company/press/pr?n=/pr/corporate/2446 )
I also think that they have a great community behind that is willing to help out and support them, and their numbers are only growing.
I think technology wise Mandrake is one of the leaders of the pack. Your right its not just down to including the latest greatest kernel/kde version, but thats part of it. Its also down to packaging and other little things that make the users life easer (supermount, drakconf, etc).
My opinion anyways.
I agree with you, i wasn’t talking about Mandrake but distros in general. I think this Mandrake release is going to be fantastic! Especially because of the new development process. I really hope that Mandrake 10 Oficial ends up being the most polished Mandrake release to date. It looks good…
I hope Mandrake pull thru all this.
– Service
– Ease of use (not simply installation)
– Unique functionnalities not found in many other distros (up2date for RedHat)
– Price
– Availability on different platforms
– Sales channels
– Demonstrated commitment to Linux
And I forgot:
– Ability to provide complete solutions to businesses
– Overall consistence
– Documentation and community support
– Ease of Installation/Update
– Stability
– Complete and Powerfull Configuration Tools
– Hardware Detection and Installation
– Security (Security Alerts/Firewall configuration, etc…)
Sure, lots of distros are going to include 3.2/2.6 – however, its fair to say that Mandrake is one of the most polished/comprehensive out there – personally feel that Mandrake only has to be “good enough” to retain its position – ie it doesn’t have to have any outstanding features for it to stay – its got more history/development behind it relative to many other distros – along with 3.2/2.6, that should be sufficient to ensure that 10 is succesful…………
what’s wrong with what? wishing him dead? i was merely trying to point out how assinine it was to wish a company’s downfall because of a personal preference. sounds to me like you are reading things that arent really there. i don’t even use mandrake.
As if my logic was that twisted, equating a company with a human life. At any rate, my original statement still stands.
don’t agree. if there were tons of distros trying to survive on a large-scale COMMERCIAL model…maybe. but actually there’s not VERY many ambitious commercial distros; RH, MDK, SuSE are the big three, then there’s maybe six or seven second tier ones like Lindows, Xandros etc. I would expect some consolidation on the second tier – if Lindows does well financially I wouldn’t be at *all* surprised if it went on the acquisition trail – but I see the top three remaining separate for the time being. Below those two top tiers what we have are sorta hobbyist distros, which aren’t commercial and are generally developed by a small, committed, voluntary core team and used by a small, committed group of users. That’s not a model that lends itself to consolidation, though it does lend itself to flux…but I think there will always be a healthy set of lower tier distros, even if individual ones pop up and disappear regularly. I don’t see any economic or technological need for them to disappear, and I think their existence is a good thing in general.
now the big 3 linux:
novell suse ximian along with ibm (suse is great but lindows and xandros both have put big effort into their distro)
sun java desktop: huge contracts (over 200 million+ worldwide)
polished desktop no kde desktop is ok but cant even run kde apps?!
im wondering hows sun goin to introduce 3 differant java desktop into their product (one is for sure looking glass the other 2?)
redhat: this guy has ‘standard’
to me therere (& will be) only 6 players in the game:
suse, sun, redhat, madrake, lindows & xandros.
IK would keep using MDK 9.2, but since Winex 3.2.1 doesn’t run as it should, locks down when I play Diablo II or StarCraft, and game speed is terrible, and CrossOver Plugin works also badly. I play a movie with QuickTime 6.3 in CrossOver Plugin, and when I right click it just hangs the sound and the movie. On any other distro this works fine. I have sound issues also with winex 3.2.1.
Anyone else has this problem?
I would appreciate if there would be a solution to the wine related trouble with mandrake.
AdamW: I would expect some consolidation on the second tier – if Lindows does well financially I wouldn’t be at *all* surprised if it went on the acquisition trail – but I see the top three remaining separate for the time being.
Nah, I doubt Lindows would succeed. Nothing personal (currently downloading Lindows Developers Edition) but the fact is that Lindows primary market currently is the home user market which isn’t making a lot of money for Linux. In addition to that, LindowsOS is a play on the word Windows and people would equate Lindows with Windows though matter how generic windows originally was.
Although it would be by a long shot I would use Xandros, I think it has a higher chance of succeeding. Their solutions seems to be more in-tune with small/medium-sized businesses and they have some level of consistency with their marketing. Take Lindows for example – they have so many editions of the same distribution, you’d loose track. Xandros has two editions; one if you don’t want to use Office/Windows apps (CrossOver) and you don’t have Windows installed on your computer, the other if you need Office/other Windows apps. In the future, there would be an additional version of Xandros, for servers.
But for Lindows, I don’t see the point of having a “laptop edition”. Why not just put in the laptop features in the standard package? Sure, it wouldn’t make as much money, but my customers would be less confused. However, I wouldn’t be suprised if Xandros and Lindows would merge one day, especially when Lindows is denied use of their name. If anything though, I expect Xandros to be pulling in profits before Lindows. I don’t expect Lycoris to merge or go bankrupt because it is pretty much a garage company.
I also expect to see one of these days either Ximian ditching Ximian Desktop or SuSE ditching KDE; Novell can’t afford both. I believe Novell bought Ximian for Mono, and I believe Ximian would one day port Mono to KDE (moving the focus away from GNOME). But who knows? I also expect companies like Conectiva (that Brazillian company) and TurboLinux to either go out of business or merged with another company (but I don’t see any business viablity in merging) especially since UnitedLinux had died out.
tetsuo: Where did you get that 200 million number for Java Desktop? Cause, if that’s the case, Linux’s market share would have already jumped up to 5-7%. Besides, looking at Sun’s track record, I doubt Sun can fix upon one strategy for an extended period of time. Which means, they would be the least of the top 3-4.
Red Hat on the other hand had removed itself from the small and medium-sized businesses and gone big league (Red Hat Enterprise 3 seems to be focused more on large organizations, looking at its licensing plans). Which means, I don’t expect it to stay the “standard”. And since Fedora lacks a viable business behind it, I don’t think it would take over Fedora’s dominance.
“200 million number for Java Desktop? Cause, if that’s the case, Linux’s market share would have already jumped up to 5-7%.”
I doubt it very much that there are 4 billion Pc’s world wide
The World’s population is around 6 billion, with about two thirds living below the poverty line.
Anyways, what does market share mean? Suppose there are 100 PCs world wide. all have XP and Linux installed. Does this mean that both MS and Linux have 100% market share?
i love mandrake. We need “Mandrake BSD” next 😉
A Mandrake BSD? That’s like a contradiction in terms.
Mandrakes big problem was sloppy product quality and very buggy releases. This new release scheme should help fix that. Other issues still remain however. Multiple desktops make it great for the hobby geek crowd but not a viable alternative to MS. Mandrake needs to focus. Lack of integration with KDE makes it confusing to noobies. For example you have Kcontrol and drakeconf both with different setting. All those configuration options should be ingrated into kcontrol. This is what the leading “desktop” distros like Xandros, Lycoris and Lindows do. If Mandrake dumped gnome and integrated with KDE and improved there rpm selection installation program to compete with CNR from Lindows then they might be a real contender again. I’ve just not seen any real creative thinking since 7.0. mandrake was once the hope of most Linux users to take on MS. That is no longer the case by a long shot. they missed a great chance. Now i look to Lindows.
“A Mandrake BSD? That’s like a contradiction in terms.”
It is, Isn’t it lol..
Although its possible mandrake could release an OS based on *BSD.. It was just humoring myself.
IBM may look long and hard at Mandrake. With a built in groupware product they may find it irresistable. With Novell offerring Suse+Ximian and Sun locking up lucrative contracts, IBM will undoubtably consider Mandrake as saver bet. Mandrake does offer that crossover appeal between biz and consumer markets. I’ve always liked Mandrake for their easy installation and config tools for novices, yet still offerring more advanced users ( for the most part) all the tools and parts to trick out a souped up distro. My only complaint, and this carries over to other distros, is not including the source as default. Seems to me sooner or later when installing something you’ll need the source (end tangent :-).
Mandrake was my first favorite distro way back when it was literally just Red Hat + KDE, well before it ever became a business. This was like 1999 I think. I followed every release but found that the quality was rather sloppy at times, it just felt to consistently unstable or unpolished in too many areas, and so long ago I simply stopped using it altogether. I went back to Red Hat and Slackware, experimenting with a new distro every great once in a while, but always going back to my Slack. Competition is good, I hope their able to give Red Hat Novel/SuSE a run for their money. I trust by now Mandrake is at least reasonable stable, hardware destroying release aside.
I don’t expect to see Turbolinux going out of business or merging, unless some other distro picks up the slack first and products top-notch Japanese/Chinese/Korean support from the ground up, like Turbolinux does.
Turbolinux has also been on the cutting edge, offering the 2.6 kernal well before the stable release was even announced. (Yes, they included a simple means of upgrading to stable once it was out)
It’s too bad Turbolinux doesn’t market in North America more. I want to give 10D a try, but I’m a little worried about the lack of RPMs available. I’m still a newbie, but I need something with good Japanese support.
Paul
My point wasn’t that Lindows is the best or most likely to succeed second-tier distro. My point was that Lindows, the company, is the most aggressively-minded of the second tier companies, therefore the most likely to start buying up its competition.