Convalesco

I firmly believe that GNU/Linux will overthrown other operating systems in the future if lawsuits and corporate tricks doesn’t stop in some way, the development. Of course, I’m not sure, no one can tell what’s gonna happen next, but I think that the operating systems in the future along with the internet will be free or dead. Free meaning, not priced. Not necessarily open source, just free. I believe that the operating systems will become a platform for developing programs. They already are. Windows, MacOSX and GNU/Linux have all powerful development tools with their pro’s and con’s. The main difference is the price: GNU/Linux is FREE. It’s development model may has it’s week spots. The end user, for most GNU/Linux programmers is considered above the average end user’s level. Which is not wrong at all. If some Linux geek needs a widget his desktop, Fluxbox, I as a GNU/Linux hacker he may write the code and the GUI just for his window manager not carrying about others. He may not care too much about newbies and installation harassment. Yes, still it’s free. The lovely distribution called Ubuntu has done a marvellous work around Linux. It made it much more efficient and easy to install and upgrade. Still there are issues that require console to be used, while MacOSX doesn’t require console although the BSD roots are visible if you open the Terminal.

Linux already is a great platform for corporations to develop their business on it. It’s not an accident that the Linux server market share is huge and growing. The TCO is often in Linux’s favour. Especially when it comes to large scale projects.

Linux is usually the first operating system to implement new ideas. Usually these new ideas are badly or poorly implemented, but most of them start here. Widgets for example, made their first appearance in MacOSX Panther if I’m not mistaken using a third party program and then Apple implemented them into Tiger. Microsoft waited for Windows Vista, in order to put them on the desktop. For computer users like me, widgets are just memory consuming eye candies, that usually hurt productivity, but still the first operating system that had small pieces of software running on the desktop showing computer stats, the weather or other staff where made for Linux. This is just one of the ideas. There are many other examples.

Big corporations supported linux after they understood it’s possibilities and the divine gift that were given to them by Linus Torvalds and the GNU community. File systems such as XFS, JFS and EXT3FS were made for Linux by corps. IBM strongly supports linux, Sun Microsystems supports Linux, while producing Solaris, HP supports Linux too. With corporations like the these it’s hard to fail.

Back on the desktop. Linux still has a very small percentage of users. But, think about it, can it grow smaller? I’m convinced that it cannot. It can only grow larger and stronger. The reason, is the openness and price. How can you compete with something that its free? By delivering a far superior product and supporting it. But for how long will Windows and MacOS be so much better than Linux for desktop users. There’s a convergence towards a similar model. You can see it clearly if you check out the three new operating systems: Linux Ubuntu (KDE 4.0), Windows Vista, MacOSX Leopard, they all have the same eye candies, the same capabilities. Ubuntu has done a great job, I rarely have to use command line with Ubuntu. In a few years, if the developers and community can keep the pace, they will need no console at all to make everything work (printers, scanners, webcams, etc). What will happen then?

People still use Microsoft’s pirated products. Piracy kills both open source programs and closed source programs. If someone needs to use Adobe’s Photoshop for it’s supreme picture editing capabilities, he must purchase the software! Otherwise go Gimp and be legal. Most of the average users will never use Photoshop’s advanced features.

While I like so much the MacOSX and the Macintosh community, for being smart and fancy and everything, like Apple and MacOSX is, I see no future if the OSX remains closed. I’m talking about the immediate future, I’m talking about something that will happen in 50 or 60 years. When all the operating systems around will be very much alike. I may or may not be wrong, I hope I’m not though, for the sake of everybody. I don’t believe that software like Final Cut should be free. I firmly believe that considering the fact that Linux is around, the others have no choice. They must go open source, free or die.

Σύμφωνα με το άρθρο του MacWorld το Google έχει διαμορφώσει δημιουργήσει μια βελτιστοποιημένη έκδοση του Google για το iPod Touch και το iPhone. To Gmail κι όλες οι άλλες υπηρεσίες του Google είναι βελτιστοποιημένες για το διαμάντι της Apple! Υπάρχει αυτόματο συμπλήρωμα των μενού, ενώ η ταχύτητα ανταπόκρισης είναι αισθητά γρηγορότερη.

Good going Google!