http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/opi ... me-os-fail
http://www.semiaccurate.com/2009/07/08/ ... rome-os-v/
Definitely either going to succeed or fail!
Are you at all interested in corporate giant-branded Linux(-ices), either as a user or as a developer? E.g. ChromeOS, Moblin, Android (why do they need two?), etc.
ChromeOS
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quantus
- Tenth Dan Procrastinator
- Posts: 4891
- Joined: Fri Jul 18, 2003 3:09 am
- Location: San Jose, CA
Re: ChromeOS
Corporate types will always want a corporate branded Linux just so that they can get support nearly instantaneously without having to have an extreme Linux guru on hand all the time. Red Hat is still growing revenues through the downturn. It's hard to provide top down direction to a completely open source project to get something done fast. It's much easier in a corporation. If you want creativity, then open source is better since you'll likely have a wider array of ideas, but if you want something specific with speed, corporations can deliver that (iff corporation != MS or Boeing or a car manufacturer). The cooperation between Red Hat and the open source community is very complementary. This is why Android will likely win over Moblin. That, and corporations can also afford to advertise.
Personally, I'd like to be paid for my work, so I'd work for Red Hat or some other corporation if I wanted to work on Linux and it's much more likely that I'd want to work on Linux than Windows. As a user, I won't pay for support. I have time and can google answers as well as the next person. If there's a free version of a corporate linux, I'd likely use that for a more main computer, but still play around with other versions of linux on a computer I wouldn't mind reinstalling periodically on. Right now, I have neither the computers nor time to bother though, so I'm sticking with my Windows laptop.
ChromeOS to succeed or fail?
Up to this point, computing in the home has really been a trickle down from corporate use. Getting widespread adoption from corporations (linux on every desktop) will take a brain dead usable version of Linux to handle things like web browsing (with flash for games)/music playing/video watching/email/document,spreadsheet and picture editing/maybe visio/maybe Project-like functionality. The iPhone handles the first 4 already (minus flash), so the netbook market is really going to be differentiated by providing flash and file editing because it has a reasonably sized keyboard still. I don't see people jumping ship from MS soon because the alternatives to Office are just not quite prime time enough. Google docs are nice, but still have usability issues with formatting and going offline needs a bit of work still. Netbooks may be able to get past the latter issue if they were always connected like iPhones, but that doesn't seem to be a high priority for netbooks yet. Google has Picasa already, which will help, but nothing to compete with iTunes really, so they'd be reliant on Apple making a compatible version for them. Maybe that's why Schmidt was on Apple's board? There are no viable equivalents to visio or project at this point, so as far as convincing managers, they're screwed I think at this point unless they can pull a rabbit out of their hat. They might try to convince managers to use some free agile management tools instead, but I don't see that working. Without management support, I really don't see the purchase of ChromeOS computers being authorized for the masses (management always gets the new toys first).
Now, the iPhone is an interesting possible reversal to the the trickle down trend. In some ways it's not, since smart phones have been around a while in corporate environments a la Blackberry and Palm devices. It is the first truly brain dead easy smartphone meant for the average consumer. Convincing the ordinary consumer to switch from MS to ChromeOS will take that sort of usability leap, which didn't seem there with Android. To be fair, that wasn't the primary goal of Android-standardizing a mobile platform was. So, back to the software requirements listed above. It should be easy to convince consumers they don't need project and visio, heck, just don't mention them! Convincing them that they can do everything else they want to do with ChromeOS will take time and likely third-party developer support (likely why they announced now to give them time to plan before the alpha). Because it's Google, there are going to be plenty of people willing to drop a few hundred (like people did with Android) to try it out so that will help. Still, I doubt the adoption curve will be near as high as with the iPhone.
HMS MS a sinking ship? Maybe, if they don't get their next release of Office (aka M$ Cash Cow) out it's possible they'll start losing a lot of market share to Google.
Personally, I'd like to be paid for my work, so I'd work for Red Hat or some other corporation if I wanted to work on Linux and it's much more likely that I'd want to work on Linux than Windows. As a user, I won't pay for support. I have time and can google answers as well as the next person. If there's a free version of a corporate linux, I'd likely use that for a more main computer, but still play around with other versions of linux on a computer I wouldn't mind reinstalling periodically on. Right now, I have neither the computers nor time to bother though, so I'm sticking with my Windows laptop.
ChromeOS to succeed or fail?
Up to this point, computing in the home has really been a trickle down from corporate use. Getting widespread adoption from corporations (linux on every desktop) will take a brain dead usable version of Linux to handle things like web browsing (with flash for games)/music playing/video watching/email/document,spreadsheet and picture editing/maybe visio/maybe Project-like functionality. The iPhone handles the first 4 already (minus flash), so the netbook market is really going to be differentiated by providing flash and file editing because it has a reasonably sized keyboard still. I don't see people jumping ship from MS soon because the alternatives to Office are just not quite prime time enough. Google docs are nice, but still have usability issues with formatting and going offline needs a bit of work still. Netbooks may be able to get past the latter issue if they were always connected like iPhones, but that doesn't seem to be a high priority for netbooks yet. Google has Picasa already, which will help, but nothing to compete with iTunes really, so they'd be reliant on Apple making a compatible version for them. Maybe that's why Schmidt was on Apple's board? There are no viable equivalents to visio or project at this point, so as far as convincing managers, they're screwed I think at this point unless they can pull a rabbit out of their hat. They might try to convince managers to use some free agile management tools instead, but I don't see that working. Without management support, I really don't see the purchase of ChromeOS computers being authorized for the masses (management always gets the new toys first).
Now, the iPhone is an interesting possible reversal to the the trickle down trend. In some ways it's not, since smart phones have been around a while in corporate environments a la Blackberry and Palm devices. It is the first truly brain dead easy smartphone meant for the average consumer. Convincing the ordinary consumer to switch from MS to ChromeOS will take that sort of usability leap, which didn't seem there with Android. To be fair, that wasn't the primary goal of Android-standardizing a mobile platform was. So, back to the software requirements listed above. It should be easy to convince consumers they don't need project and visio, heck, just don't mention them! Convincing them that they can do everything else they want to do with ChromeOS will take time and likely third-party developer support (likely why they announced now to give them time to plan before the alpha). Because it's Google, there are going to be plenty of people willing to drop a few hundred (like people did with Android) to try it out so that will help. Still, I doubt the adoption curve will be near as high as with the iPhone.
HMS MS a sinking ship? Maybe, if they don't get their next release of Office (aka M$ Cash Cow) out it's possible they'll start losing a lot of market share to Google.