Boot Camp? Who Cares? The Real News Story Concerns Linux
Maybe you missed it. If so, I understand. This was a tough week to be a Mac user. Due to recent events many of us are alternatively howling in dismay and chortling with joy. As a result we have temporarily lost our minds. Don’t worry, we should all be ok by Monday. However, while the world was stunned by this little surprise from Cupertino they managed to miss a much bigger story. Maybe you heard about it?
No?
Well, truth be told I am not surprised. It is difficult to concentrate on other tech news when Apple unveils some shiny new toy. But for those of you who didn’t get the memo let me clue you in to an interesting news piece concerning Linux.
If you followed that link and perused the story you would now know that the Portland Project is nearing completion. Why is this such an important event? Well, because the Portland Project will finally allow KDE and Gnome to play nice with each other. For those of you who don’t use Linux, KDE and Gnome are the two most popular desktop environments in the Linux world, and for years the two have been bitter rivals. Each group has its own die hard fans who, of course, are convinced that “their” system is the best. The main casualty of this stubbornness to work together has been the end users who have fought with interoperability issues for years.
But now, suddenly thanks to the Portland project, an application built for Gnome will be able to run in KDE as well. No performance lag, no dependency problems and (hopefully) no hassle for the end user. Ladies and gentlemen, you are witnessing the first step towards a unified Linux operating system. This means that in a couple of years Linux could be a much different beast than it is today.
Let me put it this way, in five years Linux could finally be in a position where not only are there fewer distributions, but each distribution works fairly seamlessly with the others. This would be an enormous boost to the open source community because it would finally put them into a position to make a move to the desktop. This could serve to chip away at Microsoft’s market share at the low-price end of the spectrum. Dell has already started to quietly ship PCs pre-installed with Linux, now this opens the door for other makers to do the same. Eventually Apple might even open up Boot Camp to include more than two operating systems.
In fact, after reading Apple’s announcement my first thought was “I wonder if I could boot OS X, Windows and Linux?” It really isn’t such a far fetched idea. If Apple is willing to invite Microsoft onto their machines I see no reason why not to include Linux in the party. Who knows, maybe in a few years Linux will have consolidated things enough to warrant such a move by Apple. If so, I can’t wait.
Thanks to Portland there are very interesting times ahead for the open source community. This is the beginning of a grand change and so I expect lots of news from Linux in the future.
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Comments
Yeah, Linux for the average desktop user has been predicted every year to be “almost there”.
The Portland project may or may not work, but it only addresses one of the many barriers Linux has for widespread adoption.
A user can simply choose Gnome or KDE and be just fine with the user experience. The bigger problem is having all the proper drivers and config and dependencies checked out for your hardware.
There are and have been numerous projects addressing this problem, with little progress.
Another barrier is large PC vendor willing to provide sales and support for Linux based machines. Sure Dell offers Linux machines, but not for the average person or even a professional user like me. Red Hat has been doing very well, but their core business is sales and support for large enterprises, not individuals or SoHo users.
Linux for everyone is stil 6+ years out. And that’s not a random number - I remember in 2000 all the hype Linux for the desktop was getting - and 6 years later we are not too much farther along.
“If Apple is willing to invite Microsoft onto their machines I see no reason why not to include Linux in the party. Who knows, maybe in a few years Linux will have consolidated things enough to warrant such a move by Apple. If so, I can’t wait.”
Don’t hold your breath. Apple doesn’t need Linux. Where’s iTunes for Linux? Apple could release it just to make a “let all the flowers grow” statement.
But Apple doesn’t need competition here as long as Linux is as “safe”, “reliable” and “cool” as OS X. Sure Linux looks worse, but, for example, Firefox reached its 10 % not because it looks better - it doesn’t.
As for KDE/Gnome “good news”, I just dont understand the need in two desktop environments. OK, I’m not a Linux guru, but this KDE/Gnome controversy only makes things worse. I think they should start working together on one desktop environment.
And finally, people don’t need operating systems. They (we) need applications. The difference between what was in 2000 and what we have now is huge - we have Firefox and Open Office for all main operating systems. The last time I installed Linux it was a (more) pleasant experience because I could use the same programs I usually use. The “only” thing missing was a decent media player.
iTunes for Linux?
Linux has the chance to host the distant-cousin of Mac OS X, namely GNUStep, which has a Finder-like file manager, many efficient development tools and 90% of the code required to build standard applications.
Linux for the desktop is sitting just there, straight under the nose of the Linux community and yet everyone prefers a me-too Windows-like bloated environment!
Quote: In fact, after reading Apple’s announcement my first thought was “I wonder if I could boot OS X, Windows and Linux?”
Ditto!!
“One Ring to rule them all!” at least that’s how it seems things are heading….