Every few weeks I see an article where someone decides they can be the one to succeed where others have failed and show us all why Linux has yet to ‘conquer’ the desktop. I’ve got three words for you: No One Cares.

If you search the internet for my nick (gphat), you’ll likely find me participating on GNOME mailing lists. I earned my C wings fighting hand-compilation of bleeding edge GNOME releases in high school. I’ve run KDE and GNOME for a long, long time. This is really more about GNOME, as I’m more familiar with it. I joined into the cheering for HelixCode, Eazel, and all other crap that came along and never amounted to much. Ximian released a bunch of junk and eventually got gobbled up by Novell. We’ve seen Mono, Beagle, d-bus, and a pile of improvements to the plumbing (HAL and inotify come to mind). We hear people ranting all the time about all the eye-candy that is “just around the corner” for Xorg and it’s ilk.

I have one thing to say about all of this: For my entire computing life, Linux’s desktop has been just on the cusp of being cool, featurewise.

It’s the guy you know that always orders too much food and a diet coke, then complains about his weight. It’s the damned treadmill your wife made you buy that you never really used (yes, you still have it. there are clothes hung on it). It’s the New Year’s Resolution you really, really meant to keep.

I’m gonna say this while I’m at it: People don’t want choice. That’s a bit inflammatory, but it’s true. I want there to be a Publix, a Wal-Mart, a Food Lion, and a Kroger’s all in driving distance. 95% of the time I’ll go to one of them, despite the freedom to choose. Homogeneity in computers sucks for people, but is great for person.

Here’s the bottom line, AFAIC, when it comes to the Linux Desktop Problem. Apple owned us all. Then took a kernel they knew well. Then they wrapped it in ‘Unix’ yumminess. To top all of this off, they went out and found the best Open Source shit they could find and they used it. As time progressed, they started improving everything and making something that really kicked ass. It’s all I need.

But here’s where you need to perk up, GNOME-anauts. I’m the person you want. I’m a developer who has money to spend on products. I buy my own hardware, I put it together, and I install my own software. I can track down your compile errors, submit patches, and checkout from CVS. Hell, I can even help out. But there’s a teeny, weeny problem: Apple’s OS is more rewarding. I use it, and it lets me get things done. I don’t have to track down libraries and install a pile of RPMs/DEBs/TGZs/STFUs. I grab a DMG, it’s automatically mounts, and it even opens the damned thing up for me. I copy a single freaking file to a clearly named folder and it works.

So here’s my solution: Go get all the best of breed Linux desktop shit and pile it up. Then emulate Apple’s idea to create a consumer operating system. Each time you get to a piece of the OS puzzle, reach into your pile of OSS shit and pull out the best tool for the job. Place it into your puzzle. You might have to create some patches and whatnot to fit it in, but it will work eventually. Then, when you’ve built this amazing masterpiece, package it for other people. 90% of the Linux folks out there are nothing more than consumers with bigger cajones. Hell, I’ve turned into one. We will use your stuff.

Then, magic will happen. The pieces you pulled from your pile will continue development outside of your masterpiece. You can, completely for free, use their changes to improve your product. You will always be working to integrate these changes in, and it will be a PITA from time to time: get over it, people are paying you for it at this point. Keep rolling out a new release everything 6 months or so. Charge people for it. Ignore compatability with all the other Linux distributions. When you show them how much better it can be on a computer that doesn’t have 10 different bin directories and dependency hell, they’ll start making themselves better.

You’ll also need to mind the licensing and distribute the source along with your product. There will be a group of people that will spring up, take your source, compile it, and distribute it for free. Ignore them, the people that use that were either not going to pay you in the first place, or they are masochists.

So when one of you decides to emulate what Apple did with OS X with Linux and create a desktop distribution that doesn’t suck and is designed to be what we are all waiting for, call me. I’ll help. I’ve been wanting to do this for years.

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Posted at : July 13th, 2005 - 8:43 pm
Filed under : General, Linux, MacOS, Operating Systems, Windows
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