[andthejets]

Meh, I doubt it. Vendors can complain all they want but the average consumer is sure as hell not going to switch to linux. And if they wanted to switch to OSX then they probably have already bought a Mac.

Everyone else wants Windows because they are used to it and it runs all their programs.

[TazeTSchnitzel]

You sure?

It might motivate vendors to, for instance, sell Ubuntu PCs. It's quite user-friendly. Who knows. I don't think it's likely, though.

[andthejets]

I mean its easy to make a nice interface for people who just browse and such. But it becomes a problem when people go: "Oh so does it have Word and all my other office products?"

Open office and etc are all pretty poor replacements.

[TazeTSchnitzel]

You sure? I suspect for most people, they don't use enough features of Word for LibreOffice Writer to feel much different.

[andthejets]

Its not just about the feature set, its about using whats familiar for a lot of the "average" consumer.

[TazeTSchnitzel]

Familiarity is an issue, but the newer generation are quicker to pick up new technology.

[disgruntledphd2]

I agree with you (and I use Linux, and have recently converted my girlfriend). I saw a really interesting device in a shop over the weekend. flatscreen touch TV's running Windows. Now currently, they are running Win7, but Win8 will be a hit in that market. I don't know how big that market will end up being (they were too expensive for my taste), but if people are economising and purchasing a combined tv computer, then Win8 could do really well there. I do agree that the next four years will be fun to watch.

[moheeb]

These will be huge and everywhere in a few years. Most tech folks seem shortsighted in this regard. Nearly every time touchscreen monitors are brought up I hear the 'gorilla arms' excuse.

These types of setups are perfect for the living room. With more advanced Kinect-like devices it will not even be necessary to touch the screen anymore.

Windows 8 on a large touch screen in the living room is perfect. Small keyboard and mouse available when necessary for work, but most interaction is done via a remote or the screen itself.

[slowpoke]

The biggest problem that GNU/Linux faces on the desktop is that people think GNU/Linux faces big problems on the desktop.

(It doesn't.)

[tedunangst]

The situation with wireless is still terrible. It took all the voodoo I could muster to get ubuntu to install the right wireless driver.

And then the battery meter is broken. The remaining life estimate is forever "coming soon".

And then there's unity. We'll put the menu bars on the top of the screen for all your programs. Except your word processor, but that's ok, end users don't use word processors that much.

[slowpoke]

Another problem that GNU/Linux faces is that people are incredibly biased when comparing the two operating systems.

Whatever little fault GNU/Linux has is immediately regarded as an absolutely crucial flaw that will forever prevent it from being usable by anyone but a fat, smelly nerd living in his mother's basement.

This is completely ignoring that Windows is far from faultless, too. It's also inconsistent as hell, it's buggy, and drivers also don't always "just work".

If anything, the current popular DEs on GNU/Linux are more consistent than anything Microsoft has ever produced. They work better out of the box than any crapware-laden computer you can buy at a store. If you're not using absolutely obscure hardware, it should be usable. In fact, the Linux kernel probably supports more hardware and does it better than Windows ever has.

My point stands: GNU/Linux is perfectly usable on the desktop and has been so since years. One of the major things hampering its adoption are people like you who spread FUD about it.

[tedunangst]

Why do you assume Windows is my preferred desktop OS?

[muuh-gnu]

And you can't get new versions of apps without upgrading the whole OS (including every other app) every few months.

Ubuntu 12.04 is nice, but it is already "abandoned" in the sense that new versions of apps that came out after 12.04 dont generally offer 12.04 packages.

You can get Windows exes which work on 12 years old XP, but there is no binary for an Linux OS that was published 4 damn months ago.

Until that _fundamental_ flaw with Linux software distribution is fixed, Linux as an end user OS is going nowhere. No sane user is going to install an OS, or even worse, buy a computer with an OS, for which there is no standard way to update or upgrade apps other than reinstalling the OS.

[takluyver]

This is slowly changing - apps submitted through Ubuntu's app developer site are updated separately from the OS. And new Firefox versions are pushed out automatically to stable versions.

It will take some time to adopt this model, but I think that's what Ubuntu is aiming for.

[takluyver]

Two of those issues are irrelevant if competent OEMs decide to sell computers with Linux - they'll make sure the hardware works with it.

The menu in the word processor is a work in progress, but in the meantime it hardly makes Linux impossible to use.

[tedunangst]

The battery issue was strictly a software bug. A regression introduced because somewhere between upower or gnome power manager or wherever nobody could agree on the right number to use. It did work, then it didn't, because party A "improved" things, but party B wasn't ready for the improvements.

Anyway, the claim wasn't that the linux desktop can be made ready. It was that it's ready right now.

[ralfn]

Most people just want a facebook machiene. Linux, classic windows and osx are all going to share the niche called. "desktop os".

I actually think, the whole metro + clasical desktop (why choose) will at least make win8 somewhat relevant in the high end of the market.