Free like Franks Beer

OK, maybe free like the wind is stretching it.

Let's keep this "Free" (as in Free Beer) discussion going.

The discussion is interesting because it isn't fully agreed upon in the 'Free' community even.

What constitutes "free" anyway? Is it about definition only?

What about 'free access" which is basically referring to the ability to have access to the 'source' code and make any changes you want to it, providing you add your changes to the pool. This is pretty cool if I know anything about programming. I can just start making customizations or even 'improving' the code to my specific needs, tastes, objectives without paying some huge fee to someone for the privilege of doing so. I like that. If, I knew a dang thing about programming.

How about 'free range' which I take to mean it can go anywhere. I can put it on this machine, that machine, those 3 machines over there. I can copy it and give the copy to my neighbor who will go to work and being the mischievous imp he is. He will convert all his works computers with the one cd, just because he can.

Now, that last example coincides with the idea of 'free beer' that a lot of folks love to argue about.

I contend that there is no such thing as 'free beer' because someone, somewhere paid for that beer to be made, packaged and possibly transported to somewhere to make it accessible. That costs money. In that sense, it is not 'free'.

However, this is no ordinary community we are dealing with.

Beer can be made right in your own house. Yes, you have to have bought the materials and maybe some or all of the ingredients, but what you can make yourself for the same price as the 'consumerized' beer is 12 to 1 (I just assume a 12 pack to a single bottle, cuz I can.)

So, there is still a cost for the beer, but it is much more affordable by brewing it yourself. Also, you have much more control in the taste and quality of the beer you make yourself.


So now, think about it this way. The neighborhood has a weekly picnic and everyone agrees to bring something to share with everyone. One guy says he'll bring beer and buys as much consumerized beer as he can afford, which honestly, isn't much.

Another guy says he'll bring some beer also (yeah, I know this is a lot of beer, but it is a picnic after all). He has been making his own beer for about ten years now and at first when he offered, people would just say "Gee thanks Frank, but I quit drinking.) ( this is while they hide the bottle they had just been drinking from). Over the past ten years though, Frank has made such a hobby of it that he has researched beer making, read dozens of books about it, researched beer making on the internet and even managed to catch a few pro's in a couple of chat rooms to talk to them about it. Now when Frank offers to bring beer, people line up for it. Practice makes perfect, after all.

Does Frank charge the folks for his beer? Even after spending the money he spent for the materials? no, because Frank likes to be part of the community. He likes to kick in his fair share (Frank has been known to eat more than his fair share of brats and bbq pork sandwiches from time to time).

So, every week at the neighborhood picnic, people all drink 'free beer'. No one paid Frank (or the other guy) a single cent. Frank never asks for a penny. Frank knows that he will trade a few of the guys at the picnic for leftovers when it is all said and done. A little beer for some steaks and bbq pork (which Frank thinks is out of his budget most of the time.) It's a system that works for the community.

Heck, even the poorest members of the neighborhood who don't have any food to bring get to sit and eat because they volunteer to set up and clean up afterward as part of their contribution. Everyone in the neighborhood is cool with that because these are all pretty good people.

The neighborhood picnic is a good representation of the Linux/OpenSource community. Everyone pitches in and pays for things they will later give away for free to the others. That is what good neighbors do. They all pitch in however they can and everyone gets something they wanted out of it in the end.

By the way, Frank traded a few of his beer recipes to one of the neighbors who bought a micro-brewery and now sells 'Frank Beer' to all the patrons for a tidy profit. Frank gets none of the money, but got a pretty decent little fishing boat out of the deal and he still takes his beer to the picnics for free, because he can.

Mr Windowspants has a bad day

This was sorta interesting. someone from the Windows world is complaining that they couldn't figure out how to install or use Linux, so instead of communicating like someone who actually wishes to use something besides their fanboy masterpiece, they write a long, incorrect and in-factual comment instead.

I will always be one of the first people to say Linux software needs more attention. Especially in the home desktop user market. it's dreadfully lacking in areas 'typical' home desktop users have become accustomed to using their computers.

However. What with distros like Ubuntu, PCLinuxOS and Mint, as well as several others, installing the basic OS/distro is pretty much as easy as falling over.

With the advent of 'appstores' and package managers like Synaptic, and others, software installation is really about the same level of ease as any other modern OS like Windows and Mac, etc... Heck, even most Windows and Mac software is installed from online sources now.

However, I'll grant you that some people have never, ever in their lives installed an operating System before in their life. They always bought pre-installed.

OK, I'll give you that one group of people who would be very troubled with a Linux OS install. Of course, they would likely also be very troubled by a Windows install as well.

Now, Mr .Windowspants, you complain about finding information online or having no one swoop down and gently lift your burdens from you in the online community.

I am guessing since you dread reading so much (as you heavily referred to"rtfm" in your comment) you have NEVER EVER read a book on how to do something in Windows. you never, ever went to one of the many Windows resource sites to read about something. Which of course means you have never, ever been to a Windows user forum. Yes Virginia, Windows users forums do exist, and have for a long time. Guess what? Linux user forums did not invent "rtfm' Whatever the first online Bulletin Board system way back in the 80's or earlier came about, THAT is when RTFM was invented and by golly, I bet there were a lot of Windows users pretty fond of using it as well. As a matter of fact me foine bucko, you could wander into any number of Windows and Mac forums this very day and ...OMG someone said to RTFM. Bank on it.

Now, I'll go along with the notion that 'RTFM'" is especially rude and obnoxious. There are much more civil ways to communicate to others that the information they need or want could be better found by reading some text. A particularly nice person will also give you a link to said text if they are aware of one.

I can't even begin to count how many Linux installations I have done. Most of them servers of some sort but more than a fair share of desktops as well. I am here to tell you that I have had 'special fun' installing some of them as much as I have enjoyed 'special fun' with many a Windows install. I have had Windows install go seemingly flawlessly and pretty quick as well. Not as many as successful and 'flawless Linux installs that I have had, but hey, that's just me and I spend A LOT more time in Linux than many people do.

Here is the primary difference between Windows, a proprietary Operating System and Linux, an OpenSource one.

Windows development is static. It occurs systematically and is planned in incremental stages, timed for intended release dates. Not always successfully, but that is the intention.

Linux is fluid. it is undergoing change in different areas simultaneously. There is no real 'planned' release dates except those by smaller teams who want to provide pre-fabbed distros which include the most recent versions of software available.

Those however, are just collection points. Linux development is de-centralized and almost organic. one day a team of people are heavily working on application X and then two days later, they move on to a sub set or related app. The kernel will see heavy development and contribution times during the year, then some times it seems as if no one is contributing. It's all relative of course and is all just part of the way the Linux/OpenSource community exists.

SO, Mr. Windowspants, if you prefer using Windows, please, be our guest and continue to use it. The last time I checked, no one was twisting your arm to use Linux. If they are, shame on them.

As the old saying goes, "Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. No matter how stupid it is."

Welcome to McBuntu's, would you like fries with that?

The other day, I was engaged in a 'bored out of our mind' discussion with another tech who was sitting at another bench doing an install just like I was at my bench.

As we went through the motions, we got to talking about how Linux distros are competing for peoples attention and the lengths they will go to to do it.

Some try to dress themselves up like another OS interface, ie.. Windows, OSX, etc...

Others try to 'supersize' the ISO by adding in every conceivable app in the repo.

When you think of Linux overall as a restaurant, what kind of place do you think of when you do?

My associate of the moment felt fast food represented it best for him. He wanted to zip in, get a pre-planned 'combo' that would give him at least 75 to 90% of what he really wanted then go from there.

I am a "Village Inn" kind of guy myself. I like to set down a moment, look over the menu, see what I really want or need, depending on the situation or meal, and make sure I get exactly what I want. I will even order 'off' the menu if I need to, because I know there are some goodies that they will make, but they don't put them out in the menu for everyone to see. You have to know what you want and ask for it yourself.

Some would say that comparing Ubuntu or even past them, Mint and PCLinuxOS, is like going to Mickey D's. It's like driving in and ordering the combo that has been pre-packaged to accommodate the widest groups typical wants or needs. Nothing wrong with that, lot's of people like to do things just that way.

I would say then, that Debian and CentOS and even OpenSuse are like a 'sit down' type of restaurant. Pop in the install DVD, look things over, I likely had something in mind before I even got to it. I might even order 'off' the menu and add in an extra repo for something specific that I know is available, but not offered right away.

I have even been known to drive through McBuntu's as well. It fit the bill at the time and tasted good too. Maybe not as filling as I might like, but hey, If I know I am needing something extra, I can usually get that extra from the dollar menu or something later.

It's hard to say one way is out and out 'better' than another. 'Better" and "best" are relative terms to the end user or customer.

It's nice to have choices though. One day I can get a quick bite, the next, set down at a table and get something at my leisure. Life would be terribly boring of I only had Village Inn or McDonalds every day, day in and day out.

Did you ever notice that all these restaurants have a LOT of variety in choices anymore? You can get chicken strips, chicken nuggetts, chicken patties, hamburgers, double burgers, triple burgers, and combos with some of this and some of that. The menu is loaded down with options featuring variations of pretty much the same thing.

Why would they do that you ask? It's good to offer choices. Yes, you get the occasional nitwit or newcomer who sits at the front of the line, pondering the same 4 choices and combos of those choices for twenty minutes, slowing everyone else down. It's not as much of an issue at a sit-down place, where you can take all the time you want looking over the menu at your own table.

"I don't know what to get, there's too many choices." you can hear them whine while you throw balled up napkins at them to encourage them to order ad move on. I'm hungry dang it!

People who can never make up their minds what to get no matter how many times they go to that place, don't have a problem with too many choices. They have a problem with being indecisive and failing to have thought things out before they got to the counter.

Would you like fries with that?

Some folks aren't happy unless they're miserable

Have you scanned distro forums lately?

It's amazing how many people will take a harsh view on a distro because it's made to be 'easy to use'

The more GUI tools available for it, the less 'professional" they seem to think it is. That or it's only for "newbies" and not reasonable for an 'experienced' Linux user.

Yep, ease of use and GUI tools are a bad thing, don't you know.

Of course, the opposite view toward console interaction is seen somewhat the same. if there is no GUI tool or requires interaction with a command line, it is 'too hard' and for advanced users only.

These folks are polarized. They can't be content with a 'happy medium'.

GUI tools particularly excel at representing flags and conditions or the more 'mysterious' commands and tools in Linux.

Having a checkbox or on/off control to activate/deactivate these switches and parameters is a godsend to someone who has the memory of a gnat ( speaking only for myself here )

It is true that not everything GUI is golden. File management is one of those areas. It can sometimes be much quicker and easier to copy files from one place to another, etc.. at the command line rather than clicking through endless directory trees and windows to find what you are looking for.

In these cases it should not be seen as abandoning one 'camp' for another. it's not a war here, GUI VS Console.

The end goal is to have a system that is as productive and capable as possible. It's also a good idea to make yourself, as a user, more productive and capable as possible.

Use the tools that work best for a given situation. sometimes that tool will be GUI, other times it might be at the console. It's all good. In the end, the job gets done faster and more efficiently.

I can't count how many veterans of professional level IT work, having been originally trained and gained the majority of their experience in using the console, will take up a GUI tool if it is more productive and efficient than the console version.

For most 'pros' one of the only reasons they might stick primarily to console interaction is because it has become an ingrained habit. You do something for ten or twenty years repeatedly, that's typically the first thing you will reach for.

Outside of habit, they are trained to use the most secure method to get work done. Of course, most IT admin work is done 'behind the scenes' and requires secure access and procedures in order to maintain a stable and secure system.

In the Office Veteran side of the equation, the help desk folks and others working with GUI applications daily and consistently, they look for productivity. What will get the job done best and quickest?

They are the 'shortcut' Kings and Queens of computing. There is no room for ego or juvenile attitudes. They are paid to get a job done and they are looking for the best ways to make that happen, be it GUI or console.

So, to all of you out there who just can't be happy unless your sequestered into one camp and limited by social standing, The best Linux distros are those who find a way to bring the best of Linux and OpenSource to the forefront.

If that means including GUI tools, so be it, If it can speed the task up and save time, what's the problem?

Same goes for the console tools, it's not just for 'Pros' it's for anyone who wants to get the tasks done and is not afraid that their friends will call them a geek for knowing how to type at the command line.

I applaud Linux distros that try to bring ALL of the best Linux and OpenSource has to offer, in whatever form that happens to be in.

The better informed and educated users are, the more productive they can be. The "happier" they will be.

the home desktop, the the work station and the school desktop, oh my!

The Linux home desktop. This is the coveted property that untold numbers go home to play video and music on. Create home made birthday cards and print their digital photos from.

The work station. The interface that millions of employees and businesses look at daily and depend on to get critical tasks done. A bastion of practicality and sparseness.

It is the dream of untold OpenSource developers to have OpenSource and Linux dominate the home desktop market. To banish Microsoft Windows from the the 'adults' table over to the 'kids' table forever.

What is it that Linux and OpenSource need to offer to accomplish even a portion of that dream?

Usability. It's time to focus on the programs now. Home desktops users want appliances. click this icon to listen to music, click that icon to watch video. If it requires more than clicking on a couple of icons, it's too hard. No one believes that one should have to be a technician in order to make good use of a computer at home. Plug things in, they work. Done deal.

The home desktop needs to be an appliance, nothing more. The customers have spoken.

Linux as an Operating System is a fine and wonderful thing. Inherently more secure than some others and with some good habits learned, immeasurably so. Hardware drivers are becoming more common all the time and only a few holdouts remain who simply refuse to make their devices compatible with OpenSource systems.

But the programs, oh the programs. Where fore art though user desirable programs?

Where are the Create A Card desktop publishing programs, the "Learn To Speak Spanish" programs, the guitar lessons, the numerous PBS kids show based learning programs? The answer is ...Nowhere.

For all the bluff and bluster about wanting to take over the home desktop market, OpenSource programmers aren't creating the kinds of programs that home users want.

Now, truth be told, some of these types of apps are dependent on things like hardware drivers for the popular printers and digital cameras that are not easy to get the drivers for OpenSource to begin with. Also, seemingly silly things like fonts are tied up in patents and trademarks and unable to be used without paying hefty licensing costs.

Where are the OpenSource software marketing people? Why aren't they on the doorsteps to these companies holding out when it comes to drivers and fonts and all manner of things and selling these companies on the value of increasing their market visibility by releasing the software to be used in OpenSource projects?

I am willing to bet a bundle that if you could get some commercial, proprietary competitive OpenSource programs available for even a low price, enough to cover license costs, etc, users would buy them without an extra thought. Look at the $10 to $20 dollar shelves at Walmart and other stores, software is selling there like hotcakes. If those programs were available for Linux, people will pay.

What has any of this to do with work stations anyway? People who use computers at work will use what they are most comfortable and confident with. That would be the computers and software that they use all day at their workplace. Why use something you don't know anything about? If you use what you have at work, not only are you more comfortable using it at home, any work you might take home is going to be compatible with what is at work. Not a hard choice to make.

Work stations require less in the way of games and fancy graphics and multimedia than home desktops do. They need to be fast, flexible and productive. Linux would be well advised to get ingrained among users by becoming familiar to them by being used at more workplaces.

Onto the school desktop now. What has that to do with anything. The next generation of computer users is in school now. What they learn to use now in terms of software is very important to employers of them in the future. Not much needed in the way of training or re-training if they come out of schools already versed in how to use a common system.

If students are proficient and comfortable with Linux and OpenSource in schools, they will be major factors in companies purchasing decisions for systems in the future. Why pay for proprietary, high cost software when most of the new employees are well versed and productive on low cost and more efficient OpenSource software?

Did I say that OpenSource software is more efficient? Yes I did.

OpenSource software is designed to make the most use of hardware capabilities as part of it's natural development process. It's built in from the start, beginning with the Linux Kernel. Not only is it more efficient in its commonly shipped forms as distros, any one or any company can take that software and customize it even further to take advantage of the specific hardware in their servers and desktop computers. You don't get more practical or efficient than that.

So, start the schools using OpenSource software and Linux. The students will be trained and proficient on it. Workplaces will buy into it to accommodate to meet the capabilities and experience of the incoming generations of skilled new workers.

More workplaces are using OpenSource and Linux so people start buying more computers with it installed on new hardware, because they are comfortable and proficient with it from using it at work.

Programmers who start catering to the one click appliance home user program desires will be ready with desirable software for leisure and personal uses.

There you have it. Linux and OpenSource becomes the dominant scene.

Of course, by that time, there will be no more dominant, monopolizing companies and software becasue people are tired of paying exorbitant prices for software that and equipment that isn't worth half of what they paid for it.

In which case, the market will have thinned out a bit and maybe a few more players in the Operating System and software arena will be in the mix, forever eliminating the ability of just one group or company of holding all the cards again.

It could happen.

Google, the Cloud and me

A new Operating System is coming. So says Google. Initially to be aimed at netbooks, but with possibly bigger aims beyond that. Can Google be the one that brings OpenSource software to commercial dominance in a Windows controlled world?

For anyone who has followed OpenSource software over the last year or two, rumors of a Google Operating System, based on Linux, aren't new. The fact of their recent of Android, the OS for portable electronics like cell phones, etc.. certainly helps set the stage.

One interesting comment struck me though, as I read one article proclaiming Google's entry into the ring. "

We're definitely going to need a lot of help from the open source community to accomplish this vision," the company added

It got me wondering about Googles position and attitude in the OpenSource community. They want help and support from the OpenSource community to make this new, commercially competitive OS happen.

Google is a big proponent of "The Cloud", referring to cloud computing and provides a number of SaaS apps and services. They say their goal with a new OS is similar to that of their web browser 'Chrome' in providing fast, secure and immediate access to the Internet.

"Chrome", like all web browsers, are glorified network 'clients' allowing a user at a computer to 'browse' the resources available over a network. The Internet is the Granddaddy of all computer networks. With Google providing a whole host of applications over the Internet How does a computer Operating system fit in?

An OS in simple terms, is what allows people to use hardware resources. It provides all the programming for each piece of hardware to interact and be accessible to the user and other services. It is also a basis or foundation to provide installable software.

Now, if they were going to provide 'another old OS" to be used as a platform for installable software, there would be no point in. The market is glutted with Operating Systems that do that task well enough.

However, they have already tipped their hat in the direction they want to go:

Android is only used for mobile phones at the moment, but the software has showcased Google's keen interest in expanding beyond its search engine base.

"Google Chrome OS is being created for people who spend most of their time on the web, and is being designed to power computers ranging from small netbooks to full-size desktop systems," said the company.

All the web-based applications developed by users, Google said, "can be written using your favorite web technologies" and will not be limited to just its new operating system, but on "any standards-based browser on Windows, Mac and Linux thereby giving developers the largest user base of any platform."

To create an OS that is a platform not for installable software necessarily, but as a springboard for web based applications, is more what they are after. They can streamline the OS to include only those programs and libraries, etc.. that a web browser (like Chrome maybe?) needs to be a top performer. That's pretty much it. If it can boot incredibly fast, have security measures in place and load the browser and be on the Internet they have accomplished their goal.

The only installable apps they have interest in are those that support the browser and security.

Where will this lead everyday computing if it catches on though? Do we trust Google so much to trust our 'private' documents for storage on their servers? Are we sure they will never 'browse through that data to see what they can sell or make use of?

Google shouldn't really be offended by questions such as these because history has shown how people trusting big corporations have been burned and abused before by 'trusting' them.

Google is a corporation that exists to make money first and foremost. It incorporated in part to take advantage of tax laws, remove personal liability and responsibility from it's management and investors and once again, maximize profits. Their deeds are not entirely 'humanitarian' or philanthropic here.

I, for one, will be watching. As long as I have the ability to keep copies of all my files locally and be able to download and upload to any web based service, I feel I can still trust them with the information I choose to trust them with. Should the day arrive when that option is removed "All your data are ours!!", then I will be stepping away from Google as well.