2012 - year of Linux!

argedion said:

I'm glad there is not an "ignore" button in the forum for when certain people try to inforce their fashist veiws one the rest of us. I could actually be typing this to my self.

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Actually, there is, it's on your User CP page, linked to at the upper left of this page.

I don't think you have to worry, though.

A.Nonymous said:

Depending on where I look online I see Linux home market share around 1% in most places with some sites saying it is around 5%. I'd hardly call that "going through the roof". Google and Amazon use Linux to run most of their desktops? I can honestly say I was not aware of that.

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Google and Amazon servers are powered by Linux as is AndroidForums.com.

OK, I was thinking servers for the enterprise side of things, but as it happens, Google does extensively use Linux on it's corporate desktops. Here's an article from 2006 when they kicked off the initiative.

EarlyMon said:

Google and Amazon servers are powered by Linux as is AndroidForums.com.

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Linux powering web servers is completely different from Linux on desktops. Linuxrich pointed to Google and Amazon as enterprise companies who have been using Linux for years. I assumed he meant desktops. Of course web servers run on Linux. Virtually all of them do. It is the one segment of the market where Linux dominates because it is the best OS for the job in that sector of the market.

According to two sources linux server use is at 60+% of the market, with supercomputer use over 90%.

Usage share of operating systems - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I think android is somewhere around 47% of the mobile market share, and while linux desktop may only be 1-2%, from a few years ago when it was much lower, I think that is saying something.
Watson, the Jeopardy destroyer from IBM was linux. Fedora reports over 36 Million unique IP addresses accessing their repositories for downloads. Canonical had something like over 10 Million in 2009.

So sure, Windows has a huge market share, but you cannot deny that linux is growing.

A.Nonymous said:

Linux powering web servers is completely different from Linux on desktops. Linuxrich pointed to Google and Amazon as enterprise companies who have been using Linux for years. I assumed he meant desktops. Of course web servers run on Linux. Virtually all of them do. It is the one segment of the market where Linux dominates because it is the best OS for the job in that sector of the market.

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You may have assumed correctly.

Or you may find the organizations to be enlightened enough to vary their desktop strategy on a needs basis for each department.

If an organization runs Windows servers you may find Linux desktops highly unlikely.

If an organization runs Linux servers, you may find Linux desktops highly likely.

And your ideas about web servers is out of date. Once upon a time, the internet and the web was powered by BSD. Linux gained a bit of a foothold and then came the cheap hosting sites, especially the spam servers in Asia and India - those are primarily Windows. Statistics for that exist, I can help you hunt them down if you are really interested. (edit - I see I was ninja'd on that)

In any case, there was a reason that I mentioned Google and Amazon servers on purpose when you mentioned desktops.

I think that unless you have worked in Linux powered organizations, you might draw less than accurate conclusions about cause and effect where the desktop is concerned.

The way to look at Google and Amazon using Linux servers is not, ok Linux powers the web, but rather, this company that tops the web for presence uses it and that company that tops e-commerce is using it - obviously, they will make an organizational commitment to have as many people in their organization interterfacing with those systems fluidly and efficiently and effectively.

This means that they will use custom software. Indeed, the business model and proper execution of that software is how they do business. And how great a need do you really think that Windows drives in such an organization?

argedion said:

Yeah still try to find who seg is and why he is at fault.he comes out on an occasion says hi a.d is gone.

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I remember the Windows days, "who is General Failure and why is he reading my hard drive?"

Why do others use Apache?

This looks interesting - Enough astronomy programs and I'd jump.
New Open Tablet Will Come with Linux and KDE Preinstalled | PCWorld Business Center

Does anyone know if it is possible or if there is someone looking into the possibility of putting a Linux Desktop like Fluxbox, Enlightend, LXDE, or even maybe XFCE on an android system? I would love a Gnome type 2 desktop on my android I think that would be awesome. That seems to be the only thing with android or with most phones is that the desktops seem a bit limited. I know there are all kinds of launchers and I've used a few of them but still they just look a lot alike.

You raise a good point - windowing.

Once we can maintain multiple windows on an Android phone launcher, things will get interesting.

At this point tho, that would also require that apps would cooperate with a window manager. I don't know what this would involve, but it would not be small.

BTW and fwiw, can't stress this enough - if you are not using QuickDesk BETA (and it's always in beta) you are missing out on a lot of Android multitasking power, in my opinion. I prefer mine to respond to a long search press.

EarlyMon said:

You raise a good point - windowing.

Once we can maintain multiple windows on an Android phone launcher, things will get interesting.

At this point tho, that would also require that apps would cooperate with a window manager. I don't know what this would involve, but it would not be small.

BTW and fwiw, can't stress this enough - if you are not using QuickDesk BETA (and it's always in beta) you are missing out on a lot of Android multitasking power, in my opinion. I prefer mine to respond to a long search press.

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definitely would be interesting there would have to be a standard though for the fact that apps must be able to work with them. Even though there really is no standard in linux but I do believe all are to work the the xwindow system. Most Linux apps work fine with any desktop there are a few though that depend on libraries for the desktop it was mostly intended. I have never liked the "One Size fits all" approach to things. As we all know that is not true, everyone is different.

Never heard of Quick desk but will check it out.

A.Nonymous said:

Linux powering web servers is completely different from Linux on desktops. Linuxrich pointed to Google and Amazon as enterprise companies who have been using Linux for years. I assumed he meant desktops. Of course web servers run on Linux. Virtually all of them do. It is the one segment of the market where Linux dominates because it is the best OS for the job in that sector of the market.

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Google switch to Linux and Mac desktops about 2 years ago. This was after the China hack and they went on record dismissing Microsoft's security on the desktop. You can google this.

here..
Goodbye Windows, Hello Linux and Mac, says Google - Computerworld Blogs

I then got on the phone, IM and e-mail with my friends at Google and they told me off-the-record pretty much what the Google employees told the Financial Times that "Many people have been moved away from [Windows] PCs, mostly towards Mac OS, following the China hacking attacks." But, following that efficiency word around, I was also told that Linux was far cheaper than Windows and that many Google users preferred it, in any case, to Windows. While many others found Macs to just be more useful than Windows PCs.


Google's internal users have eclectic tastes when it comes to Linux. Ubuntu was quite popular, but so was-surprise!--Google's own Android; Fedora; openSUSE; and the newly released MeeGo. As for the Mac users, I got the impression there may be more MacBook Pro users at Google than there are at Apple.

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I remember when Microsoft bought out Hotmail and kept running their FreeBSD servers for a long time before it was known they were running BSD. MS eventually switched over to Win servers.

http://betanews.com/2001/06/18/microsoft-we-use-freebsd/

saptech said:

I remember when Microsoft bought out Hotmail and kept running their FreeBSD servers for a long time before it was known they were running BSD. MS eventually switched over to Win servers.

Microsoft: We Use FreeBSD

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I had totally forgot about that yeah during the switch over there were a lot of issues I remember people telling me they sent me things I never got or I would get emails minus attachments.

hey guys why doesnt linux have a bigger marketshare? is it because it is avaliable to everyone?

Not a bigger marketshare? Last I checked the GNU/Linux family of operating systems dominated Or was one of the main players in most computing and device categories, with the sole exception being desktop computing.

Yeah, linux really does dominate most market shares, but not desktop. My guess would be that the average user either:
a) doesn't know what linux is
b) is afraid of installing anything to the HD (except spyware and screensavers )
c) cannot buy a computer with linux on it at best buy
d) is misinformed about how much more 'difficult' linux is
e) are satisified with windows / mac.

I'm using Ubuntu and I'm sticking with it. The main problem is half the answers and help are so freaking outdated it isn't funny.

Tried to update FF on 11.04. Did get it finally, but never got the FF icon. Looked on Mozilla and all the instructions were for an earlier version of both FF and Ubuntu.
10.04 and FF 4. This is a current help file? Most of the other answers searched for covered earlier versions, too.

This is what is so dratted frustrating.

Oh yeah, that happened to me too on Debian though. Did you install FF from the tar ball on Mozilla's site? That's what I did. If so, the icon will be located in that folder. I put my extracted firefox into /opt.

So here's the path the icon...

/opt/firefox/icons/mozicon128.png

Most of users are happy with what they get. They don't want to explore the world of Open Source.

and guys there are many people who just want to use facebook on their computer and watch some videos on youtube. They don't wanna do anything else. And big companies mostly pack their laptops with Windows and that is why they are just satisfied with it. They don't intend to explore anything else.

What is marketshare? Why does Linux need it? Does it matter if it have a big one or small one?

Inquiry minds want to know!

IMHO, Isthmus & 9to5cynic have hit the nail on the head, collectively. The only thing I'd add to 9to5cynic's list is to quantify that point e is because of point a, b, c and d. If they got past those four then the last point would become not applicable.

bloodhawk771 said:

hey guys why doesnt linux have a bigger marketshare? is it because it is avaliable to everyone?

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I kind of sensed a repeat of some answers coming your way, so I merged your thread with this existing one.

this might change things a bit: Ubuntu's full desktop OS coming to multi-core Android devices (update: video) -- Engadget

bloodhawk771 said:

hey guys why doesnt linux have a bigger marketshare? is it because it is avaliable to everyone?

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What it boils down to is that Linux has traditionally been veiwed as a geeks system not really user friendly if you didn't understand how it worked