Android/Linux Future

Jason and Tychoish

This is somewhat outside my expertise, but it seemed to me like this piece sort of missed the point until you got to the last "big question." If Android is the sign of things to come and tablets are ascendant, Linux adoption won't be based on increased computer literacy and perhaps will be based on decreased computer literacy (at least of the type I think you are talking about). It will be based on Linux's ability to stay hidden behind applications and the ability of Linux-based developers to churn out the most diverse/stable/desirable set of applications. Both Apple and Google have (to me at least) made it abundantly clear that their goal is to make the OS shut up and get out of the way for most users - to make the kernel as irrelevant as possible. I suppose in a LONG long view I could see things moving in more of the direction you seem to be talking about in that as computing is pushed into the cloud perhaps more people will become literate in knowledge and manipulation of server/host computers. Perhaps a more short-term side effect might be more people exploring Linux on "general purpose computers" such as regular laptops and desktops (if they even realize Android=Linux) but it seems to me the long-term goal is to have those kinds of computers go the way of the netbook for most users.

Speaking of netbooks, I was a bit surprised to read you say netbooks really aren't a thing anymore but on reflection I suppose they sort of aren't (even if the electronics stores/departments I've visited lately still devote a whole section of display space just to them). At least they aren't the ascendant thing they were even a year or two ago. But I wouldn't have ever attributed this to Microsoft's strategies. I would have chalked it up to the rise of tablets and, more recently, chromebooks. Chromebooks just seem like the next evolutionary step for netbooks, while tablets make an even more convenient second computing device if you also want a full-fledged laptop/desktop. Heck, my smartphone did 90% of what I needed to do on our last trip (which, along with the fact that I'm increasingly moving into the cloud, has had me leaning in the direction of replacing my current laptop with a netbook next time around, actually).

-- ?jason

I think the job of the kernel has always been to get out of the way of what's going on in the userspace. If anything I think what's going on is more the sequestering of whole display server (X11) and the conventional desktop environment in favor of the browser iPhone/iOS-style apps. Beyond that I don't know that we actually disagree too much I think the eventual trend is, "general purpose desktop computing is probably a waning paradigm.

My line on netbooks is basically that while we're not seeing a lot of movement around netbooks, that technology, and the lessons learned from netbooks (i.e. cheap laptops, slightly under-powered laptops, and separately SSDs) have been into incorporated "conventional laptops." I'm convinced that netbooks made ~400 dollar laptops possible and successfully launched Asus as a laptop vendor. I've got a 12" Lenovo ThinkPad which is virtually the same size as most netbooks, except it's got a ThinkPad keyboard, a higher resolution screen, and a nipple mouse rather than a touch pad. So I think netbooks-as-netbooks aren't a thing, but the technology lives on in interesting forms elsewhere.

-- tychoish

All this talk of Linux! What about the BSDs?

Don't forget NetBSD; it's in a crazy amount of embedded devices, too, mainly because it's better at it than Linux. The kernel's highly modular, which makes it (a) very easy to port to new platforms and (b) easy to strip down to a lightweight bare minimum. A friend of mine used to have a job porting NetBSD to development platforms for people like mobile phone manufacturers to use, and a lot of network appliances are NetBSD inside.

Why's it not taking over the world, then? Well, as Linux is more widespread, it gets more people writing drivers for things like wifi cards... Although it's easier to write drivers to get NetBSD running on any given system, there's less people doing so.

So it's fine for servers and desktop PCs, but rougher on laptops, which tend to be full of less-standard hardware. I run NetBSD on my servers, but have to go to Ubuntu on the laptop, as I quite like good graphics support, working sound, and wifi, thankyouverymuch...

-- alaric

I think there's ultimately an interesting distribution to explain the relationship between licensing and project size. For small utilities and libraries, GPL probably inhibits use outside of the already GPL'd space because you don't want to go copyleft for something small that you could rewrite. Permissive licensing solves that problem. That's conventional logic. For really really big projects or projects that aren't "one-step away from the end-user," BSD problem ends up inhibiting contribution.

The competition between BSD and Linux isn't about code-correctness or technological beauty, BSD probably wins (though I know even less about it,) but Linux already has drivers and platform support, and so people go with that. Also, while I'm very partial to arguments in support of minimalism and efficiency, I don't think they remain convincing over the long term.

-- tychoish