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As far as current operating systems are concerned, Microsoft's Windows is undoubtedly the world-leader when it comes to installations on home desktops. In second place is Apple's OS X, and in a relatively close third, all Linux distributions. Thanks to Mark Shuttleworth's deep pockets, and creative marketing, his Ubuntu Linux distro has been growing steadily since its launch in 2004. But can Canonical pull off the 'impossible', and out-pace OS X, and eventually Windows?
That's the idea behind a recent posting at The Register. According to the site, Mark made a comment at the recent OSCON to call on the distro's developers to put forth a sincere effort to not only catch Apple, but surpass them, in terms of overall quality. The goal? Two years.
As it stands, that's a lofty goal, but I have little doubt it can be done. However, the fact of the matter is, the reason Linux hasn't caught on like OS X isn't because of ugly design, because really, Ubuntu and other popular distros are gorgeous. Rather, the fact that it's not easy is the reason it hasn't made a massive impact like it should have already.
When the day comes that the command-line in Linux is left only to the power-users, then the OS will catch on at a rapid pace. Until that time, we cannot just expect everyone to have the patience to learn an entirely new OS than what they are used to, if they need to type in random commands to install software, or get other minute details accomplished.
He also returned to a familiar theme of greater cooperation between disparate projects. Coordination of releases would be beneficial in cases where there are interdependencies, reducing bugs, helping produce a general open-source platform that could bring open source to the attention of the world at large.
Source: The Register
That's the idea behind a recent posting at The Register. According to the site, Mark made a comment at the recent OSCON to call on the distro's developers to put forth a sincere effort to not only catch Apple, but surpass them, in terms of overall quality. The goal? Two years.
As it stands, that's a lofty goal, but I have little doubt it can be done. However, the fact of the matter is, the reason Linux hasn't caught on like OS X isn't because of ugly design, because really, Ubuntu and other popular distros are gorgeous. Rather, the fact that it's not easy is the reason it hasn't made a massive impact like it should have already.
When the day comes that the command-line in Linux is left only to the power-users, then the OS will catch on at a rapid pace. Until that time, we cannot just expect everyone to have the patience to learn an entirely new OS than what they are used to, if they need to type in random commands to install software, or get other minute details accomplished.
He also returned to a familiar theme of greater cooperation between disparate projects. Coordination of releases would be beneficial in cases where there are interdependencies, reducing bugs, helping produce a general open-source platform that could bring open source to the attention of the world at large.
Source: The Register
