Due to the power situation of last week, and it only being restored on Monday, I have not had adequate time to build Freeciv on my Linux box. I do have experience in building and making executables on Linux, but I will attempt to get around to this assignment later if possible.
Luckily, I did have time to read two articles from http://opensource.com/ .
The first article I looked at was about how Linux will grow in the mainstream market. It starts off by stating quite obviously that in the OS market Linux doesn't even exist to most people - they only know about WIndows and Mac. I have to agree with the assessment that one reason people do not know about Linux distributions is because they don't know of a PC they can buy that comes with one installed - they all have Microsoft Windows or Mac on them. The closest thing that comes to that in the mainstream market is the recently launched Chromebook.
He states that most people are happy with theirs, with the exception of it's ability to produce video and manipulate images. The Chromebook isn't really designed for this, and he suggests some fixes. Honestly, I do not know anyone who would have one for anything other than note taking or other portable functions - as everyone I know wants to be able to do more memory and CPU intensive things.
His opinion on Ubuntu seemed to be that it replaces Windows well enough, but has a problem with the web-cam software. He had similar problems with Mint, the only difference seemed to be that those that are more familiar with technology would prefer Mint.
All in all, I was disappointed in the article as I was expecting more business discussion, but it was still a somewhat interesting read. Given that I already knew of Mint's existence and that it was slightly cleaner and faster than Ubuntu, I learned nothing other than the most popular webcam application doesn't always work. Useless information to me really, but information I now have none the less.
The second article I looked at was about how 3D printing could improve interest in open source material. I have a significant interest in 3D printing as a consumer, but have more pressing issues to think about most of the time. I did like and agree with the point that companies already sell products for really cheap (in comparison to the production cost) - and almost give them away for free - in terms of printers, video game consoles, and even razors. They do this so that they can sell that which goes with the product - applications, video games, razor blades. In terms of doing this by giving the initial blueprint to a device, and then selling accessory blueprints, it makes a lot of sense. I can somewhat see his vision of the goods becoming worthless in comparison to it's personalized data and connection to the internet, but I think this is quite a ways off indeed - even if we all had 3D printers tomorrow. I think this will be accelerated mostly by the fact that if 3D printing gets really big, then everyone will have the data necessary to create what they want - the product itself won't be valuable, but what makes it work correctly will be.
No comments:
Post a Comment