The future of linux gaming?

[Svartalf]

Netbook makers would disagree with you. Less and less netbooks are being made available with linux even as an option. In fact HP in the UK just recently REMOVED it from availability there on the product that was supposed to have it. People do care about windows on their systems. The linux based systems are experiencing a massive return ratio not because of hardware but because of the software.

So they say. Dell's not saying this and I've got a few friends down there at Round Rock. Let's just say that this is the excuse, rather than the reality.

Windows may need not apply but Joe Smith down the street doesn't care about items like the beagleboard. They are not a developer, they are not a DIY hacker. If they want a small device to handle specialized tasks they generally go for the cheapest readily available solution available which more times then not has not necessarily windows but an other propriatary solution.

Why are you even here, deanjo?

I think your missing the whole point and appeal to these devices. It allows people to have small solutions without having to learn something new or foriegn with somewhat a feeling of reassurance that it will be supported for a long term as well as utilize their existing product with it.

And you're missing that this all MEETS it. Skip what we're using- that's for our crowd. There's more and better waiting for them and it's already getting used.

Oh but that is changing. Windows 7 for example does run rather well on a atom board. Don't think MS is going to just sit back and let the competition have a unchallenged growing market.

Do you know this for a fact. It runs about as well as XP does on the lower machines. Seriously. It still requires 2Gb of RAM to be honestly usable. Keep repeating to yourself- this is a UI clean up that makes it FEEL like it works better. It doesn't actually DO that.

I don't think anybody would argue that linux is a very appealing as a appliance OS. Unfortunately, because of nitpicking and harrasment from the likes of the FSF, many of those devices are now going back to a propriatary solution that they can licence without having to worry about giving away their enhancements to their competitors to use.

Excuse me... Do you work in that industry? If you do, you're barking up the wrong tree. The harassment is the LICENSE deal you get to get the code in question. You have similar license terms with other stuff, surprisingly. I'll bet the ones that ran afoul of this would also have been in violation of their licensing agreements with WindRiver or Microsoft. As for going elsewhere...not likely. I'm IN the embedded space and have been for YEARS. It's growing in spite of your remarks because it's blindingly simple to comply with the GPL license terms and it's friggin FREE otherwise.

[xav1r]

You gotta understand that emerging markets won't work like america or europe worked. America we engineer too much junk. Emerging markets won't stand for that. If they want 2 people on a computer they will add keyboard, mice and video panel to a single linux computer. In america we would buy 2 computers and hook up router. They will DVR video onto a computer instead of buying $500 piece of junk motorala dvr.

Funny you mention that. While some of that is true, there are some people behind trains of thinking, like some colleges here for example, which are trying to inject a "engineer everything" American idiosincrazy, upon students. And then these graduates go into the real world and see the differences in between what they learned and reality.

[deanjo]

So they say. Dell's not saying this and I've got a few friends down there at Round Rock. Let's just say that this is the excuse, rather than the reality.

Interesting you would choose an example of a company which offers all but the most basic netbook model with windows. Given that their other three netbook models are windows based systems (which all by the way have a higher customer satisfaction rating then the linux model), why do you think that is? Perhaps because it's what the average Joe wants. If you read the trade mags at all you will see that Acer, Asus and MSI have all gone on record citing that the Windows based models do better in sales and with satisfying customer expectations. I also have many contacts "in the know". These are retailers, resellers and distributors which all basically reflect the observations that the manufacturers are seeing. In the case of the distributors they are seeing many returns from the resellers despite having heavy restocking fees as to discourage returns. Resellers are sending them back because of the high returns and they are afraid to get stuck with them after they have devalued so much from sitting on the stockroom floor while they have a hard time keeping the windows models in stock.

I also see many, many netbooks around my area of employment. Being that my employer is on a university campus with many other tech firms I see them all day. Most are windows models. The majority of the linux models have been converted to window based systems with the exception being usually one of a comp-sci student. Seeing linux netbook actually running linux on a non comp-sci student's machine is indeed rare.

Why are you even here, deanjo?

Why am I here? Why shouldn't I be here? Someone has to be the voice of reality. Someone that has been and practices on all sides of the popular X vs Y matches such as FLOSS vs Closed, Lin vs Win vs OS X, x86 vs Power vs Alpha vs insert your favorite embedded solution here, etc.

Do you know this for a fact. It runs about as well as XP does on the lower machines. Seriously. It still requires 2Gb of RAM to be honestly usable. Keep repeating to yourself- this is a UI clean up that makes it FEEL like it works better. It doesn't actually DO that.

Excuse me... Do you work in that industry? If you do, you're barking up the wrong tree. The harassment is the LICENSE deal you get to get the code in question. You have similar license terms with other stuff, surprisingly. I'll bet the ones that ran afoul of this would also have been in violation of their licensing agreements with WindRiver or Microsoft. As for going elsewhere...not likely. I'm IN the embedded space and have been for YEARS. It's growing in spite of your remarks because it's blindingly simple to comply with the GPL license terms and it's friggin FREE otherwise.

As far as embedded experience goes, yes I do have experience in embedded development. Former projects ranged from military to aerospace to control system to nuclear control systems to weight's and measure systems using solutions such as VxWorks, QNX, linux as well as some other in house solutions. It's nothing new to me either. So there... satisfied? You got your e-penis reply. Please don't assume that your the only one here with any knowledge of the industry and it's implementations. You may surround yourself with projects that fit your ideal criteria, I don't, I'm a jack of all trades without any real preference to any solution and am perhaps exposed to more of a diverse environment then you are. My decades of experience in the industry does not match yours.

Now back to the "Do you know this for a fact?".

This entire response has been written using Win 7 with Dragon Naturally Speaking on a E E E 1000 H with 1 gigabyte of ram. Sure another gig would be nice, just as it would be with the original linux distribution that was on this system to begin with. Unfortunately due to recent circumstances the short comings of linux required a switch of OS in this netbook. Thankfully my pre-teen daughter was able to install it and dragon for me. Typing is pretty damn hard when you have second and third degree burns on your hands and makes it impossible to use linux.



My macbook would have sufficed as well but it got burnt up in the fire (no it was not the macbook that started the fire), so the answer to your question is yes, absolutely, it's been my only real means of computing for the last two weeks and I'm very aware of what a Win 7 and netbook combo work like together. Do you?

[xav1r]

whoa, everybody, please stand back a little, chill, relax a little. This was supposed to be about linux and gaming, it's getting too personal i think. Im just speechless. Im glad too that youre ok, Deanjo.

[Hephasteus]

Sorry have to agree with Deanjo on a few things. The world came knocking at linux's door last year and it didn't have the hospitality to let them in. Linux will absolutely rule and crush anything that is just app based that is preprogrammed and just gets used. But it's not ready for mainstream to spend the effort to get accustomed to it. The number of ship jumpers in core 10 release of fedora was rediculous. Boards went from 300 users and 600 guests to 400 users and 1500 guests all with the same problems. If they had come in 4 months later it would have been better.
Nothing can kill it at this point but if windows 7 can even addresses more than 10 to 15 percent of windows users disatisfaction then it's doomed to unecessary problems of losing alot of resources that the industry needs to throw at it.
Linux is going to pick up market share the next 2 years, the only thing up in the air is how much. Redhat and IBM are going to make sooo much money over that time too as projects get cancelled and people try to figure out how to get the most out of what they got.

[superppl]

I think a serious problem with linux is the reputation that surrounds it. Too often it's thought of as a "hacker" or "elite" operating system. When I suggest to my mum that she should give linux a try, she thinks of some really crazy, out of the world things. When I installed linux (openSUSE) on her computer and told her that it's "something new", she said "I can get used to this". When I told her what it is, she was afraid to turn on her computer until I setup grub to boot straight to windows. I've gotten the same reaction of my sister (she likes it, and hogs my laptop when given the chance) and many friends ("Can you install this on my computer? ... Oh linux? That sounds complicated").
IMHO, obscuring reality isn't going to help, and nor is changing the name. We need to let people know that my (or your) grandma can and did install linux (Ok, fine. She didn't but a little 8 year old managed it.), get to a working desktop, checked her mail, and found all was fine. Also, we need to get people to stop teaching and preaching how difficult it is to use linux.


On another note, I find heated debates humorous. Seriously guys, when you feel the blood hit your face, just step away, wash up with cold water and go for a (long) walk. Don't think of it as random advice on the internet, think of all the keyboards and monitors you'll save!

[Svartalf]

Why am I here? Why shouldn't I be here? Someone has to be the voice of reality. Someone that has been and practices on all sides of the popular X vs Y matches such as FLOSS vs Closed, Lin vs Win vs OS X, x86 vs Power vs Alpha vs insert your favorite embedded solution here, etc.

All you've been has been a negative influence of late. Seeing some of what you're telling us, I can see WHY that is the case- but your remarks aren't that of the voice of reality. It's the voice of defeat.

That's why I asked you what I did.

As far as embedded experience goes, yes I do have experience in embedded development. Former projects ranged from military to aerospace to control system to nuclear control systems to weight's and measure systems using solutions such as VxWorks, QNX, linux as well as some other in house solutions. It's nothing new to me either. So there... satisfied? You got your e-penis reply. Please don't assume that your the only one here with any knowledge of the industry and it's implementations. You may surround yourself with projects that fit your ideal criteria, I don't, I'm a jack of all trades without any real preference to any solution and am perhaps exposed to more of a diverse environment then you are. My decades of experience in the industry does not match yours.

You have decades in it doing the same thing, so do I. I don't see what you're claiming. Haven't for a while yet. And I'll stand by what I said. It wasn't dick waving. I just do not see the same thing you do and it's not because of rose colored glasses. Amongst other things, I wouldn't be getting paid what I do in my day job if it were as you describe.

Typing is pretty damn hard when you have second and third degree burns on your hands and makes it impossible to use linux.



My macbook would have sufficed as well but it got burnt up in the fire (no it was not the macbook that started the fire), so the answer to your question is yes, absolutely, it's been my only real means of computing for the last two weeks and I'm very aware of what a Win 7 and netbook combo work like together. Do you?

It doesn't work as well as other configurations, but in light of your current circumstances, I can see why you'd want that. Dragon's still sort of hit-and-miss under WINE. It still doesn't change my take on this. Yours has been the voice of defeat, not of reality, for a while now. You may SEE it that way, but you're so far back the other way you're as distorted as the rah-rah crowd (of which, I'm not...I'm pretty damn cynical over time... )

I'm sorry to hear you had the incident that you had and even more distraught that you got as hurt as you did- but glad you're still alive, cynical or not. Please DO get well.

[Svartalf]

On another note, I find heated debates humorous. Seriously guys, when you feel the blood hit your face, just step away, wash up with cold water and go for a (long) walk. Don't think of it as random advice on the internet, think of all the keyboards and monitors you'll save!

Heh... I dunno... I use an old IBM AT Clacker keybaord... Can't kill that...

I will admit deanjo's remarks of late have been rubbing me raw- and now we know some of the why he's been a bit more acerbic than his usual self. It's definitely not as good as I'm probably making it sound, but it's definitely NOT as bad as he's been making it sound for the last little bit either and I responded in kind and probably was a bit more brusque than it should have been, especially in this thread.

[xav1r]

Heh... I dunno... I use an old IBM AT Clacker keybaord... Can't kill that...

I will admit deanjo's remarks of late have been rubbing me raw- and now we know some of the why he's been a bit more acerbic than his usual self. It's definitely not as good as I'm probably making it sound, but it's definitely NOT as bad as he's been making it sound for the last little bit either and I responded in kind and probably was a bit more brusque than it should have been, especially in this thread.

In all fairness, sometimes you let your enthusiasm cloud your judgement Svartalf. I agree with several points that deanjo makes, most if not all people want something quick and easy to do their (important to them) stuff for them. They dont care about freedoms of use in the software world, or maybe any IP related areas, they dont want to fiddle with the terminal or "that thing that looks like DOS", or check regularly that their glibc is updated. Netbooks illustrate this very clearly. Netbooks are something meant for quick pickup, use, and toss away with the rest of the books, stacks of paper, tissueboxes, etc. Here in my country, netbooks are just starting to arrive. All of them initially offered linux with a choice of installing windows xp. Now all have xp by default, with a choice of installing linux, but no one actually asks for it. And it's interesting, since none of the other computers for sale run xp. XP is now a netbook operating system.

[Svartalf]

In all fairness, sometimes you let your enthusiasm cloud your judgement Svartalf.

I don't think it's so much enthusiasm, it's that I see some issues similar to the ones he mentions (not all of the things he talks to are actually issues...) and I try to do something about it or encourage others to do so rather than just bitching about it and saying "that's what's wrong with Linux". People that do the latter rub me the wrong way.