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Red Hat Desktop strategy: Semantics have been part of the messaging problem
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CommentsMuch has been made in the press and on community sites about Red Hat's ambivalence in the "desktop" space. If you're reading this, you may have written an article or two on it yourself. Or at least flamed us in your blog.
The most vocal detractors seem to agree that when Red Hat dropped Red Hat Linux and retail boxed sets, we were in effect reneging on our consumer desktop. I say "consumer" desktop, because the world has varying definitions for desktop; it's a commodity term needing qualifiers such as "corporate" or "consumer." We don't expect those to be the same class of users any more than you'd expect to find NT running as your gaming and entertainment platform. Desktop also means KDE v. GNOME, or the beige thing on your desk's top.
Hence the first seed of the dilemma. We have conflicting terminology.
The second part of the dilemma is that we had one product line, drawn from common bits that moved too slow for some and not fast enough for others.
Retail schedules were pressuring our release dates. ISVs and IHVs were asking for the brakes to be put on, and high-dollar customers wanted multi-year deployments they could count on to not change drastically. Others wanted the new stuff. Now or sooner if possible.
We dropped the revenue stream that was Red Hat Linux in retail and created the enterprise line and started the Red Hat Linux project, now known as the Fedora project. We wanted to merge with the existing Fedora project for a few reasons.
-
1) They had a system capable of accepting third-party contribution
2) They had a name that didn't confuse our customers and industry analysts
3) They are a talented group of people
We tried to position it as best we could without telling it what to be. For example, we called it "for hobbyists and developers," but Fedora is what you make of it. It's the proving ground for our next level technology (e.g. Core), but also enables its own community ecosystem in FedoraNews, FedoraLegacy, FedoraForum, FedoraChat, and FedoraLegacy. People run it in production. It's had its own growing pains, but so far it has been positively received and has become the most publicly tested version of Linux Red Hat ever released.
But since many folks saw retail equaling desktop, the questions still came. Was Fedora the replacement for this retail desktop? Was Fedora even related to Red Hat? What do you do if you can't afford the new line?
Then the end-of-life announcements, and stuff hitting the proverbial fan ensues.
That people were using this retail boxed set for a general-purpose desktop conflicts with Red Hat's positioning it as a server, or SME solution. We never dropped the D-word. Because the D-word means Microsoft in 90 percent of the world's mind. And that opens up a whole other level of expectations.
Fast forward, and we start talking about the corporate or enterprise desktop. We launch a product called Advanced Server (now AS), another called Advanced Workstation (now WS), and began to attack the gaps. ES is launched for the edge of network. Mind you, we'd used the terms "enterprise desktop" and "workstation" for a reason, and that is simply to keep the expectations of our products and services in line with what we can deliver.
Not surprisingly, the enterprise line sells well in its target settings: Unix-to-Linux migrations. Many folks think Red Hat goes only where the money is. Well, as a public company we have to find money, but the reality is, we beat Microsoft to where they were trying to go. Redmond wants the Unix space. This was more strategically cognizant than we are generally given credit for.
Then Red Hat's Chairman/CEO/President, Matt Szulik, is quoted as saying something about the role legacy Windows desktops were still playing.
The proverbial fan is set to oscillate. Headlines read "Red Hat Abandons Desktop!" and "Red Hat CEO Recommends Windows."
And here we are. We've just launched the first Red Hat product with "desktop" in its name (albeit with the silent "corporate" in front of it). This move is alleged to be in response to Sun's Java Desktop System. In actuality, it is in line with our market's demand, and the strategy we articulate in our Open Source Architecture. It is also just the first phase, because we aren't ready to give (or exceed) the single system consumer desktop experience currently available.
Now, I have been running Linux exclusively a home and at work. My 8-year- old daughter uses it (mostly because she never had a chance to get used to another suite of tools, apps, and games). But I'm a geek. And I work with bigger geeks all day. That does not mean Red Hat is ready for a million phone calls on getting a million peripherals to work. Does that mean we're ready to wrestle the convicted monopolist head on, replete with their new partners in crime at Sun?
The fact is that Linux has the functionality needed for most anything you can do on end-user Windows, but the world is already used to what it has, warts and all. So it takes not only recreating the experience, but the massive network of providers (systems integrators, techs, pre-loads, OEMs), and the peace of mind that they have with a known entity. How many people won't even talk about migrating without Quicken? And that's one app.
So it takes a more disruptive enabler to shake them loose. Massive downtime due to a virus? Every million machine infestation makes people willing to jump. Better game support? Try WineX. Support for plug-ins and Office apps? Try CodeWeavers. Want a preload? Go to WalMart.com.
The beginning of the support infrastructure is there. A competent admin or savvy user can get all those apps together and create one-on-one relationships, but it takes longer for a corporate entity to do likewise and guarantee any level of user experience.
As to our future intent, I said the Red Hat Desktop v.3 is just the first phase. We are focusing on things like usability, interoperability with MS servers, directory access, legacy document support, security, hardware, and peripheral support for subsequent releases. Look to Fedora to see these things early.
There are matters of focus, time, and resources to consider as to when we'll get to the point where we meet all the definitions of desktop. None of which means Red Hat is not interested in a consumer desktop. Even if you accept the bleakest portraits of Red Hat as money-grubbing Microsoft of Linux, you'd have to concede that being the Microsoft of anything means being in the consumer and corporate desktop space.
We've had communication and terminology issues, but the march in this direction has been pretty steady on our part, and there's an ever-increasing window before Longhorn to get there.
Jeremy Hogan is Red Hat's Community Relations Manager.
Comments
on Red Hat Desktop strategy: Semantics have been part of the messaging problemNote: Comments are owned by the poster. We are not responsible for their content.
It's nice to see RedHat respond, but the response seems to be trying to shift the blame onto the computing public. Before RedHat can hope to address the image and stability problems, they need to start by accepting responsibility for their mistakes and changing to prevent them from recurring.
The only truth I see is "We've had communication... issues". Any confusion of terminology is due to obfuscation by RedHat's own marketing and media management.
In the corporate world, the goal has always been to minimize the number of third party products and releases to be coordinated. This is the same market that demanded RedHat provide a stable release instead of churn. Acceptance and regression testing must be done on the same server software combination that will be running in production.
The problem is other distros have consistently delivered stable, current releases with a single core that serves both desktop and server. RedHat made it abundantly clear to the developer community that even the Enterprise server and desktop/developer installations are not identical.
Running and testing software on Fedora provides no valid regression test results for server software. Running and testing RH Enterprise desktop does not provide a valid regression-test environment for the server because RedHat makes it abundantly clear that they're not identical builds.
The only way to get a valid regression test environment with RedHat is to drop several thousand dollars worth of "Enterprise" server licenses on developer and tester desktops, which leaves them woefully outdated on the actual desktop facilities.
RedHat, please stop blaming the market and the public for your mistakes. Someone in your marketing or management team dropped the ball when they dropped RHL. Do you really think any of us in the community believe for a second that RedHat didn't drop RHL to try to force everyone to buy into the more expensive Enterprise line?
No wonder RedHat is in trouble -- their marketing department seems to think the tech community is full of gullible fools with infinite budget.
Yeah, I like that in other distros like gentoo,...
The problem is other distros have consistently delivered stable, current releases with a single core that serves both desktop and server. RedHat made it abundantly clear to the developer community that even the Enterprise server and desktop/developer installations are not identical.
Yes, in same state as Redhat (all of my smaller servers run Fedora now, and they all run flawless). Except that Suse and RH go further and prepare distro to be set up in server logic. You know, that little difference in machines that are run as Enterprise servers and common desktop machines. And some services and quality support (For both of my ES I can say only that I'm impressed with support) that don't exist in common distros.
No wonder RedHat is in trouble
I bet you don't check corporate status
btw. Your comment is just a newer version of FUD interpretation. You know, it doesn't take one to be a rocket scientist to be able twisting words like you or Joe Barr
I don't think I blamed anything on the public. The word desktop is thrown around more that the word engineer. RHL in retail was revenue for us. So you're saying we killed revenue to get... revenue?
I can see that thinking, but it still doesn't change that we didn't know exactly who was buying RHL in retail and exactly what they were using it for.
Let me ask you this. Does Morgan Stanley get their softwar at Best Buy? That explains the RHEL model.
The point I don't want missed is that we aren't done settling this new way of doing things. The Red Hat Desktop is a step that should show we listen to demand, we know what the market is asking (us) for.
$DIETY let me be an that kind of trouble. I'd gladly suffer with massive income and long term stability. Hell, I'm lucky if I can pay the rent each month.
Side rant:
I have been involved with Linux longer than almost anyone out there. I started in November of 1991. I'm not a kernel hacker or community personality. I'm just a schlub trying to make it from one day to the next. Linux, and open source, have given me the chance to make a meager living. Over the years I've seen all kinds of thing come and go. I've seen paths taken that ended up being brilliant and others that resulted in spectacular crash-and-burns. As such I just don't understand why some people are getting so bent over such little things. Red Hat as a company is working their way through the proverbial forest and so far they haven't done that bad. But in the end they will either survive and prosper or they won't. All of the things they have contributed to Linux will still be there and Linux itself will continue to go on. Why make everything so personal?
That's a feeling that many of us thought we'd never have to experience again.
They give the impression that Linux can be subject to the same abandonware problems as any commercial product. That's a feeling that many of us thought we'd never have to experience again.
So now the truth comes out at last. You are letting your feelings, your emotions, stand in the way of reason.
Reason says that all of Red Hat's software is GPLed, so by definition it cannot be abandonware. If Red Hat drops something, anyone else can pick it up, dust it off, and keep going.
Reason says that RHL7.2-9 customers have not been abandoned. The <A HREF="http://www.fedoralegacy.org/" TITLE="fedoralegacy.org">Fedora Legacy Project</a fedoralegacy.org> serves them very well with painless errata updates. In fact, much of the support for Fedora Legacy comes (unofficially) from Red Hat.
Reason says that Red Hat never abandoned the market they had served with RHL. While not officially recommended for production use, Fedora Core fills the low-end support-it-yourself market quite ably. Yes, I do run certain production servers on Fedora and yes, I am satisfied with its quality.
I am in no way affiliated with Red Hat, other than that I use their products; I am merely tired of reading all of these assinine, emotion-based arguments disparaging an otherwise fine company.
But come on, with all due respect, some of the rhetoric coming out of Redhat is just not on target. There are millions of people for whom Linux is, right now, a very, very viable desktop. I bought my boxed versions at Comp USA, myself, and as you suggest, that isn't the type of place where one goes to buy server software. I have always viewed the retail boxed versions as desktop software (with server options for the home server deployer).
You've got to admit that it is unfair for Mr. Szulik to blame the Linux desktop itself for Redhat's own business choices. It's not true and it's not even strategically wise; Linux is so often the target of vicious FUD campaigns that all that a comment like his can do is mar Linux's good name, and that kind of smear will be a detriment to efforts to market Linux as a server OS, too.
And while I appreciate your comments here and thank you for making the effort, unfortunately they come across as piling on with more inaccurate marketing-speak than as an accurate characterization of the bad blood which Redhat has caused many people to feel. It sounds like you're blaming the users who purchased your products for having unrealistic expectations. Your path would have been, and will continue to be, so much easier if you can stop going in that direction and instead accept that there are many happy Linux desktop users and you had to abandon that market for practical business reasons, personal to Redhat, rather than because of any failures of the product or failures of the customers' expectations. YOUR DESKTOP CUSTOMERS WERE HAPPY. I don't know how much more strongly I can say that.
I say all of this as a person who LOVED Redhat software on the desktop. My various Comp USA retail box versions were easily the most stable and dependable for me, compared to the other Linux distros which I tried (and I tried many). I didn't want to switch, but now I'm using another distro.
http://www.silicon.com/software/os/0,39024651,391<nobr>1<wbr></nobr> 6741,00.htm
Exactly. That was my point regarding ambiguity. We've not changed our view on that, the consumer and corporate desktop needs are different. The quote taken to the extreme was "Red Hat CEO says run Windows" which makes for sexy Register headlines, but not quite fair.
If anything, the Linux consumer desktop market as it currently stands is much more savvy and motivated than the average business desktop market or the average Windows user market.
So, consumer desktop needs ARE different. You're right about that. The business market is HARDER to market to. Linux consumers need less support.
Linux 'IS' ready for the desktop for most people. It's only the few that might require out of the ordinary tasking of special applications and such that might need to stick with what works best for them. But for the consumer who does nothing more than browse the web, check email and create a few office documents here and there, Linux fills the bill quite splendidly, and at a great price point at that.
No need to spend $300 dollars on Windows and $400 dollars on MS Office when you can get the same for a lot less. Like they say for the use of MS Office; 95% of the users only use 5% of the features whereas 5% of the other use 95% of the features. OpenOffice fills the void pretty darn good if you ask me!
Not too long ago my Dad bought a Sony Vaio laptop with Windows. One of my Dad's friends sent him an email with an attachment that he could not open, it was a Microsoft Publisher document. I told my Dad to email the guy and have him resend the document in a different format, preferably a standard open format. But no, because of this one closed proprietary document my Dad was compelled to go out and buy the Microsoft Publisher program.
Solve this problem and we will see some progress.
hmmm.....'too slow for some' and 'not fast enough for others' seem like the same thing to me?!?
hmmm.....'too slow for some' and 'not fast enough for others' seem like the same thing to me?!?
If you take your head out of your ass you would realize that was a typo. Anyone who uses their brain at all realizes from the context in the article that the author meant to say "too fast for some and not fast enough for others".
What makes you so god-like that you _know_ this was a typo? He could actually have meant what he said...
Well, the easy answer to your question is that the author responded to this thread after I did and stated that it was a typo. However, that ex post facto answer probably won't satisfy you.<nobr> <wbr></nobr>;-)
The harder answer is that I have reading comprehension and logical reasoning skills. Anyone even remotely familiar with Linux distributions is aware that there is a constant tension between those who want stability (don't want the distribution to change fast) and those who want features (want the distribution to improve fast). Therefore, when I read that statement and noted the ridiculous tautology, my gut instinct told me that there was about a 99.99% chance that this was a typo.
Perhaps your reading comprehension and logic skills are not as well developed as mine. Perhaps you just haven't been involved with Linux long enough to know about the stability-feature tension. Or perhaps you are so paranoid that you will (sub?)consciously ignore an obvious typo in order to reinforce a predetermined conclusion about a corporation.
heh. woops.
"Should be too fast for some..."
Something can can be had for $30-50/year. Supported by RH via up2date. Not a desktop, just something to run squid, samba, bind, and sendmail.
Jaap
$30-$50 for a RH supported distro to essentially replace 2003 server, Exchange, IIS seems a little low if their gonna have support call centers, etc.
Good point. My clients are contracted to receive server upgrades (new hardware) yearly, so they're upgraded then. Not SOP, I know, but it seemed stupid that the latest workstations were 2-10 * more powerful than the servers, so clients opted in.
Good feedback. Just like the desktop, we're not done with our server offerings. We know where the gaps and demands are. This was actually the first group that railed on us.
As for admitting any mistake, I'm not sure we did make one. I will admit that we burned some folks in this space, anytime a company has any strategy shift, some customers opt out. Some forever. But more people than you think opted in for ES, in this space. Now that's not 30-50 but as I said, we're not done.
Next time, just get to the point.
This quote in the article is in reference to "Fedora". It constantly annoys me to see Red Hat appropriate the name of another project (as I mentioned before, by Cornell University and the University of Virginia), and pretend the other guys don't exist.
If they want to avoid confusion, they should rename what they call "Fedora" to something else. If it is intended to be for the consumer, they should call it "Red Hat Consumer Linux (RHCL), and clarify the matter completely.
For the time being, however, I think that referring to it as "Fedora Core", while a bit geeky for most, would be an acceptable reference, instead of just "Fedora".
Thanks, that's a habit of mine to shorten it. It's in the spirit of the Fedora Project one day having more than just our Linux stuff on it. It should be a a name overarching other F/OSS projects we work on. For example the Java App Server we have currently in Beta.
"If they want to avoid confusion"<nobr> <wbr></nobr>... "they should call it 'Red Hat Consumer Linux' (RHCL)"
But calling it Red Hat Consumer Linux implies a couple of things that are untrue:
- Use of the Red Hat name implies that Red Hat provides formal support for the release. They changed the name specifically because they did not want to provide any kind of formal support for that release. Keep in mind that they still do provide resources for development and a tonne of unofficial support. Nevertheless, use of a corporate name implies formal support from that corporation.
-
Use of the term "Consumer" implies that the release is intended for the mass computing populace. Red Hat has gone on the record repeatedly with their belief that Linux is not ready for the mass market computing.
It is vitally important for you to understand that Red Hat does not believe that Linux is unready for technical reasons, but that it is unready for want of political and business infrastructure. (ie: getting drivers for all mass market devices shipped in the box with those devices.) It is unacceptable from a consumer standpoint that a consumer can walk into a retail store, pick any random peripheral device, and not have it work intuitively, out of the box, with Linux. This is not a matter of Linux technology, as it is unreasonable to ask open source developers to reverse engineer every device the instant that device hits the market. It is more a political or business relationship which needs to, but does not currently, exist with device manufacturers.
Like it or not, to have a true "consumer" grade operating system you must have the support of the majority of hardware manufacturers. I am certain that when such relationships exist with the majority of manufacturers, then Red Hat will indeed feel confident in marketing a "consumer" Linux distribution.
As for your complaint about the name Fedora, Red Hat did not "appropriate" the name of the Cornell/UVirginia FEDORA project. Red Hat merged their development with another Linux distribution project that just so happened to have the name Fedora also. If FEDORA the Cornell/UVirginia project had been a Linux distribution, that would be another story, but as they are in a totally unrelated niche of computing, these complaints are assinine. Naming conflicts arise all the time in human languages. Learn to deal with it and quit whining.
Jeremy, are you saying that Matt Szulik was misquoted? Here is what the media reported him saying:
"Matthew Szulik, chief executive of Linux vendor Red Hat, said on Monday that although Linux is capable of exceeding expectations for corporate users, home users should stick with Windows: "I would say that for the consumer market place, Windows probably continues to be the right product line," he said. "I would argue that from the device-driver standpoint and perhaps some of the other traditional functionality, for that classic consumer purchaser, it is my view that [Linux] technology needs to mature a little bit more."
http://www.silicon.com/software/os/0,39024651,391<nobr>1<wbr></nobr> 6741,00.htm
If what he said wasn't accurately reported, then it should be easy to issue a correction. But if what he said was in fact accurately reported, then not only is he wrong in the minds of millions of consumer desktop Linux users, but your implication that he only said "something about the role legacy Windows desktops were still playing" is misleading.
So which is it?
Not misquoted. Misconstrued would be more accurate.
Linux can do anything that MS WinXX can, as good or even better. But it's not yet ready to go head-to-head with WinXX. It's getting there. Much faster than one could reasonable expect, but it's not quite there yet. If you reread the quote you'll see that is exactly the point.
The only bummer I see is the fedora up2date network is slow. I also seem to get bad rpm's from the main site that up2date uses but not the mirrors. I wouldn't mind having the same deal for up2date for fedora that I had for RH-9.
The enterprise versions do seem very expensive, especially for just 1 year's subscription (yea, I know you get 2 for 1 but that is right now). I can sell $100 subscriptions to my customers with little problem, however when it is $300 or more they shy away and want the free version. Sort of like anti-spam software, unless the $300 software promises to find the spammer (or Nigerian scam artist), torture (2 weeks mininum) and skin them alive.
Well that's funny - they're available via FTP from SUSEs site, and I got a copy of the (9.2 I think) DVD edition from ebay perfectly legally.
You must be running a different fedora from the one I tried - yes it looks nice, but as usual they've knackered KDE - there's really no justification for this!
FWIW, this is now off by default pending a sane default policy.
Fedora's biggest problem IMHO is doumentation. Although they are working diligently (according to the website), we're up to Core 2 and the documentation is still lacking. OS updates is the best example of this.
The best mechanism for updating Fedora is yum. Although up2date does suffer from stability and availability issues for the average Joe, yum works almost flawlessly. Not only can you update from the command line "yum update", but there is a service that can be enables to draw and install updates in the background.
Once this and other nuggets are well documented, Fedora will gain greater acceptance. Excellent distro.
Let me, err, relay how things are looking from outside of RH in the
format everyone will understand...
<TT>--- BEGIN IRC LOG ---
<rh_pr> We are announcing Red Hat Project! A community-based
distribution!
<oss_crowd> rh_pr: Neat.
<rh_dev> rh_pr: Uh... I'm not ready.
* rh_pr is away: promoting rhel
<oss_crowd> rh_dev: what do we do?
<rh_dev> oss_crowd: I'm not sure.
<rh_legal> rh_dev: don't do anything until I say it's ok.
<oss_crowd> rh_dev: what can we do to help with Red Hat Project?
<rh_dev> oss_crowd: uh... file bugs and help test things.
<oss_crowd> rh_dev: didn't we always do that?
<rh_sales> hey, all, if you really want a stable system, don't use
fedora project. It will eat your brane. Buy RHEL instead.
<rh_dev> rh_sales: stfu
--- rh_pr removes voice from rh_sales
<fedora_us> hey, all, check out our neat community-driven system for
red hat development
<oss_crowd> fedora_us: ooooh!
<rh_pr> fedora_us: I like your name
--- fedora_rh joined the channel
<rh_legal> much better
<rh_pr> We are announcing Fedora Project! A community-driven
distribution!
<oss_crowd> rh_pr: Neat!
* fedora_rh waves
<fedora_us> I'm not dead yet.
<fedora_rh> fedora_us: don't confuse things.
<fedora_us> fedora_rh: does this mean we're merging?
<fedora_rh> fedora_us: maybe
<rh_legal> fedora_rh: don't do anything until I say it's ok.
--- fedora_us joined #limbo
<oss_crowd> fedora_rh: so, what can we do to help?
<fedora_rh> oss_crowd: uh... file bugs and help test things.
<oss_crowd> sigh... didn't we always do that?
<fedora_rh> oss_crowd: I know, let's all go in the circle and say our
names.
* oss_crowd goes in the circle and says their names. This
lasts several months.
<fedora_rh> So, there will be the following features in the next
release of Fedora Core.
<oss_crowd> Uh... Hold on. Who gets to decide?
<rh_sales> We do. That stuff will be neato for RHEL-4.
<oss_crowd> MMkay, then. When do _we_ get to suggest things?
<fedora_rh> oss_crowd: feel free to talk among yourselves.
* oss_crowd talks among themselves about new features.
<fedora_rh> btw, feature X will be disabled in the release.
* oss_crowd glares at fedora_rh
<oss_crowd> fedora_rh: nice of you to tell us while we were sitting
here talking.
<rh_dev> oss_crowd: sorry, it's just not happening.
<oss_crowd> rh_dev: when do we get to decide what's happening?
<rh_dev> oss_crowd: Dunno, I'll ask rh_legal
<rh_legal> rh_dev: ugh,<nobr> <wbr></nobr>/msg me
<rh_sales> rh_dev: let's not do anything rash here.
* fedora_us gets tired of sitting in #limbo
<oss_crowd> fedora_rh: I want to see more of the "community" part of
the whole "community-based" thing
<oss_crowd> rh_dev: how about at least a publicly accessible CVS/SVN
tree?
<rh_dev> oss_crowd: Yeah, that would be cool.
<oss_crowd> rh_dev: finally, some movement. When is that going to be
up?
* rh_dev is away: talking to rh_legal
* oss_crowd tries to occupy themselves and do things like
fedoranews and fedorapeople.
<oss_crowd> Uh... ping?
<fedora_uh> oss_crowd: what's up?
<oss_crowd> fedora_rh: We're feeling kinda useless. What exactly is our
role, again?
<fedora_rh> oss_crowd: well, it would be really helpful if you could
test some things and file the bugs.
<oss_crowd> fedora_rh: ugh. We ALWAYS did that.
* oss_crowd begins to wonder what exactly is the purpose of
fedora_rh
<fedora_rh> oss_crowd: it's the open-development, proving-grounds for
new technology component of Red Hat, as opposed to RHEL.
<rh_sales> Told ya it'll eat your brane.
--- rh_pr kicks rh_sales from the channel (you're a dolt)
<oss_crowd> fedora_rh: so, let me get this straight. Effectively, you
want us to download the packages you release, test things,
file bugs, and submit patches.
<fedora_rh> oss_crowd: Sure, why not?
<oss_crowd><nobr> <wbr></nobr>...but when it comes to things like features, direction of
the project, and which software to include in the
distribution, it's the decision of Red Hat?
* fedora_rh is away: I AM RH
<fedora_us> I'm still not dead.
<oss_crowd> fedora_rh: How is that different from how things were
before the whole "publicly-supported distribution" thing?
<oss_crowd> rh_dev: where is that long-promised public CVS/SVN repo?
<rh_dev> dunno, talk to fedora_rh
<fedora_rh> oss_crowd: look, such things don't happen in a week, ok?
<oss_crowd> IT'S BEEN A YEAR!
--- rh_sales joined the channel
<rh_sales> EAT YOUR BRAAAAAANE.
<oss_crowd><nobr> <wbr></nobr>/mode +b rh_sales
--- You're not ops in here.
<oss_crowd> figures
--- END IRC LOG ---</TT>
person a: Doesn't Microsoft suck?
person b: dunno
person c: yup
See we can use that format to suit any need and make up worthless tibits. The thing is that wasn't an objective review, it wasn't informative and it wasn't well done. It was just someone trying to be funny and they failed miserably.
I suggest you remove your head from your arse and stop critisizing others who happened to have paid attention more then you.
I think now that RedHat is corporate only they can take these truths and do what corp's do best- ignore them. Very slick skit.
"Once you have completed the installation, you will have a fully functioning Red Hat Linux desktop system."
Got it, everybody? No, we weren't all hallucinating, Red Hat was marketing its product as a desktop OS. And no, Jeremy, when you say that Red Hat never dropped the "d" word - your own company's literature proves you wrong.
And Apple sells servers too. Even if that one line could be stretched to a marketing campaign that indicated readiness for the consumer desktop, you'd see it was not a huge focus. I don't read "fully functioning Red Hat Linux desktop system" as "fully functioning Microsoft Windows take out".
In any case, the retail products suitability for a broad range of tasks was making us continually stretch to serve both ends of the market. If we created RHEL and kept retail for SMB and desktop use, we'd have two code trees that aren't necessarily able to be kept in sync.
I'm not going to judge RedHat for how they've chosen to go there way in the world. I think it's good for the most part. I don't think RedHat is the Microsoft of Linux, but there is something- if you work at RedHat- called the "RedHat Way". Like the "Sony Way", only not purple and gay all the time. Jeremy has an idea of what this is. Whatever makes you profitable- again, I'm not your judge as of yet. But you will notice some patterns arising now and in the future from RedHat.
The current stage that RedHat is in, kind of reminds me of an pre-adolescent child. He wants to be independent, and so he starts hangin out with guys with lots of cash and flash cars, and then one day after he sees his wonderful future decides to tells his family to piss off.
He goes out and gets a job at a gas station, and then comes to realize that his Dad could probably get him a better one if he just asked. So,after looking at the signs of the times and feeling somewhat dejected, he comes back home and asks for his Pops help. And then his Pops says...
Moral of the story-
Don't bullshit your parents. They know who you are.
Don't forget your roots.
Linux was developed for commodity desktop hardware. That is why it exists today. If it only ran on servers, who would ever care- and I mean ever? Call it what you wish, but don't ask the people that helped you get where you are to believe the two step above. I think you presented your case well Jeremy, but it contrasts greatly with those who run your business as of this time.
And so, that's my somewhat humble opinion. YMMV.
<nobr> <wbr></nobr>...in order to run a UNIX workstaion clone to learn UNIX development. And UNIX is a server/workstation. Not a consumer desktop.
" My 8-year- old daughter uses it (mostly because she never had a chance to get used to another suite of tools, apps, and games). But I'm a geek. And I work with bigger geeks all day. "
Congratulations, Your daughter will be unable to function in the world. Its a Windows world, I pride myself that my kids know how to use all three, Windows, Linux and Mac OS, My daugter has been known to use my Solaris machine from time to time if she happens to be at the same part of the house. I dont pump my kids with, Windows sucks because Microsoft is a monopolist, Microsoft is evil, Windows sucks because Microsoft has enough money. I let my kids decide which one to use. My daughter uses Macs and my son uses Windows XP. I gave them choice instead of shoving it down their throat.
" Does that mean we're ready to wrestle the convicted monopolist head on, replete with their new partners in crime at Sun "
That statement just shows ignorance and stupidity. Sun and Microsoft settled a bunch of lawsuits, thats it. did Sun kill their sale of Red Hat Linux? No, did they start preloading Windows? No, they continue to support and distribute Linux and load Linux and Solaris only on their servers.
" So it takes a more disruptive enabler to shake them loose. Massive downtime due to a virus? Every million machine infestation makes people willing to jump. Better game support? Try WineX. Support for plug-ins and Office apps? Try CodeWeavers. Want a preload? Go to WalMart.com. "
I am a Windows admin, I have never had a Windows vrius at work and I have over 183 Windows users out there. You can keep Viruses and other exploits at bay. The key is education. I cannot wait until Linux becomes the predominant OS, then you guys will get all the shit and finally probably shut up. Just remember some of the first computer viruses were written for UNIX. WineX sucks and the only reason I buy a preload from Wal-Mart is so I can get a box cheap and I install Windows on it.
" We've had communication and terminology issues, but the march in this direction has been pretty steady on our part, and there's an ever-increasing window before Longhorn to get there. "
No, we understood you pretty well, Red Hat has always been filled with hotheads and arroance since day 1. Who knows maybe one day I will be smart enough to hose my Red Hat installations and install SuSE or JDS.
So you like Windows but Linux will become predominant? If Windows is so good how will Linux become predominant?
And, you don't understand the security and permissions model of Linux very well. Viruses and trojans will NOT EVER become as rampant or damaging as Windows attacks. Think before you spout.
Re:I actually gave this article some weight until
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on May 08, 2004 05:37 AMIs that an invitation to a discussion???
Want to compete with Microsoft? Consider slashing your ES Basic pricing and get rid of the annual subscription just for the patches ($200 range for up2date until the product EOL sounds more reasonable). Heck, go ahead and charge a flat $350 for ES for the entire life of the product & include all of the patches - NOT $350/yr every year!
The statement, "Hence the first seed of the dilemma. We have conflicting terminology.", summarizes several paragraphs of defensive armwaving. Instead of attempting to provide understanding, you obfuscate. Weasel-working about semantics means you're aware that you have already lost the main argument.
You state: "We tried to position it as best we could without telling it what to be." Why was that not also an adequate "positioning" for RHL? Those of us who found it useful (home office, small business, consulting, etc) bought it. We didn't need you to "position" it in any particular way.
Further, you state: "That people were using this retail boxed set for a general-purpose desktop conflicts with Red Hat's positioning it as a server, or SME solution." Now, this is a little more honest, if by this you mean that enterprises were running RHL--a less-expensive product compared with RHEL--on their servers to RH's annoyance.
Bottom line: RH switched business models in order to become more profitable. I think it's pretty clear that RedHat dropped RHL in order to force the folks with money, namely enterprises, to fork over more of it. Nobody who used RHL wanted RH to lose money, so why prevaricate about it?
Meanwhile, back on the ol' homestead: where do we turn for a respectably shrink-wrapped distro, with name recognition and priced, licensed and supported suitably for home office and introductory use in small-businesses and impoverished government agencies? News flash: Fedora doesn't cut it.
In dropping RHL, RedHat has jettisoned a sizeable user and developer community, and has thwarted our efforts to evangelize Linux to small businesses and government agencies. In doing so, RedHat has not only turned its back on this developer community, but also on the sizeable potential market for which we were developing.
The truest thing you said...
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on May 06, 2004 11:13 PMThat is the truest thing you said. The problem is, in making changes, Redhat positioned it as if the Linux desktop ITSELF is not ready, capable, competent, thrilling, enjoyable, etc. for desktop users.
Had Redhat said:
"We think the Linux desktop is ready for most users, but for people at home for whom Linux is new, those folks will need a level of support which we as a company cannot financially commit to right now"
I think everyone would greatly respect the statement and its reasoning.
PS: I really can't believe that the notion I got when I first tried Linux through Redhat that somehow it would be useful for me on a desktop came to me out of thin air in the clear face of what was strongly characterized by Redhat as only a server OS. I am not the type of person to read, "This is a server OS" and ignore it and say to myself, "Oh, then I think I'll go use it on a desktop."
I have lots of manuals and other material from earlier releases where I plan to check out this statement. Heck, doesn't the installer itself give you workstation/desktop options?
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