[Bradford] Ubuntu

[Nick Rhodes]

Interesting read relevant to this discussion  about why Mark Shuttleworth
still invests his money in Ubuntu:

http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2013/08/why-ubuntus-creator-still-invests-his-fortune-in-an-unprofitable-company/

Cheers, Nick


On 13 August 2013 09:03, Nick Rhodes <nick at ngrhodes.co.uk> wrote:

> Try again.
> Up until 6 months ago I had been a .net developer. I don't miss it. Really
> enjoying programming in dynamic languages, php mostly and bits of Python
> are so refreshing to work with.
> On 13 Aug 2013 07:02, "Mohammed Djavanroodi" <mo.roodi at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi Nick,
>>
>> Sounds like your attitude towards Ubuntu is very similar to mine,
>> although I have to admit I don't have much experience with Ubuntu on the
>> server as I work with .Net which in the corporate environment at the moment
>> means I work with Windows and Visual Studio and the like.
>>
>> I think the "problem" at the moment is that we're in the wait and see
>> phase of the changes which Canonical are introducing. That always leads to
>> a certain amount of uncertainty, which is never good when you have to use
>> an OS on a daily basis. Obviously sticking with the LTS version does make
>> things a little more certain. I think the "problem" with Mir is the same.
>> Things are still up in the air, and we're not sure about proprietary
>> graphics vendors supporting Mir so it means that people just aren't sure
>> how things are going to play out. Getting it ready to be the default by
>> 14.04 is certainly a bold and ambitious move!
>>
>> I agree wholeheartedly about Unity. If they had just waited until 12.04
>> before making Unity the default I think the backlash would have been much
>> smaller. Unity has become a very stable and easy to use DE. And I've
>> recently started taking much better advantage of the lenses and scopes to
>> search things like iPlayer, GitHub, and Wikipedia and I think they
>> definitely have their uses. If the amazon search stuff had been installed
>> as a separate scope rather than being included in the home lens again I
>> believe the backlash would've been much smaller and there would have been
>> far fewer people removing it (I know quite a lot of people who did end up
>> removing it because the results were just annoying and not relevant).
>>
>> As for convergence I know this is going to be the next big thing. Working
>> on websites I know that since the introduction of the iPhone in 2007 the
>> number of people browsing the web via mobiles has gone through the roof,
>> and with smartphones pretty much becoming ubiquitous and more powerful it's
>> only natural that they're going to become as capable as a netbook (which I
>> think is the market they should be aiming for).  Admittedly Canonical
>> aren't the first people to think of this idea, Motorola attempted it with
>> the Atrix in 2011, which was a very interesting idea, but totally hampered
>> by Motorola's lackluster "desktop" OS, which although was based on Ubuntu
>> (I believe) was just the Firefox web browser and was completely useless.
>> But IF Canonical's implementation lives up to expectations and the hype I
>> think it could really be a great OS for these hybrid devices. But they do
>> need to make sure that the Desktop OS isn't full of too many compromises.
>> Take Windows 8 as an example. I use Windows 8 at work and I can honestly
>> say that if you ignore the whole Metro/Modern/Windows 8/whatever UI it is
>> actually one of Microsoft's most accomplished versions of Windows. The
>> focus on mobile has meant that it's quick, and lightweight, and works on a
>> huge range of devices. But what Microsoft have done is they've made too
>> many compromises on the desktop. I use a 3 widescreen setup and when you're
>> in a metro app there's just too much wasted space. Maybe 8.1 will redress
>> this somewhat, but who knows. If Canonical can maintain Ubuntu's  desktop
>> experience without making too many compromises then I don't see why
>> convergence couldn't work.
>>
>> Well it looks like the Ubuntu Edge campaign isn't going to hit its $32M
>> target, but the more I think about it (and maybe this is the cynic in me
>> coming out) I don't really think this was ever about making this device.
>> Sure if they hit the target they would make the phone, but what I really
>> think this was all about was a *relatively* cheap marketing campaign. Just
>> look at the amount of press it's received! I think this article sums up why
>> Canonical has attempted this:
>> http://www.zdnet.com/canonical-will-win-even-if-ubuntu-edge-doesnt-make-its-32-million-7000019241/.
>> Personally I believe that ChromeOS is pretty well suited to these devices,
>> to the point where I believe Google has totally missed a trick:
>> http://mohammed.djavanroodi.co.uk/2013/06/18/has-google-missed-a-trick/.
>>
>> M
>>
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