11 ms·

Seriously, why isn't Linux higher on the priority list of vendors? A huge portion of devs have Linux as their main OS but support is so scarce.

by adtac 10y ago

digi_owl 10y ago
Because the margins are just not there.
- marcosdumay 10y ago
  Why a Linux computer should have any less margin than a Windows one?
  - wmf 10y ago
    Because crapware doesn't exist for Linux.
    - eth0up 10y ago
      It's pleasantly scarce, but does come along occasionally: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/ubuntu-spyware.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/ubuntu-spyware.en.html
    - marcosdumay 10y ago
      Does the crapware really pay more than the cost of a Windows EOM license? How does that work economically? Because not everybody buys the crapware license later (and they normally cost less than Windows), and mass stealing of data is not very lucrative.
      - Alupis 10y ago
        Typically OEM's are paid per install of crapware (regardless if the user ends up paying for the subscriptions). It's just a form of marketing for these companies - ie. a certain percentage of potential users will convert into paying users. The reason Windows laptops have been cheaper or the same price as the linux counterpart is usually due to the combination of subsidized licensing from Microsoft, crapware installation kickbacks, and lower cost of support infrastructure (the OEM already has a huge Windows support staff and infrastructure, creating a new one for Linux - or more correctly, a specific distro of linux - costs more). If the linux laptops sell more and more, eventually the support costs will come down to on-par (or lower perhaps... who knows). It's a chicken-and-egg problem, and one that OEM's are not willing to foot the bill up front for. We have to vote with our wallets and take that short-term hit in order to push the ecosystem in that direction.
        marcosdumay 10y ago
        Support might be a reasonable reason, yes. But crapware can not pay that much. The crapware creators themselves get less revenue than licensing costs, and they can kick back just a fraction of that revenue. (That is, unless they have another business model that isn't selling licenses or spying on users.)
        Alupis 10y ago
        Margins on computers are notoriously thin. Even say, $1.00 per system sold with crapware pre-installed can make a difference in the profitability of a product line at scale. Then there's the kickbacks for when a customer does pay for a subscription.
        marcosdumay 10y ago
        The crapware can not pay more than the Windows cost, simply because it does not have enough revenue. Unless, of course MS is paying the OEM to install Windows, or billing for Linux computers. Or crapware has some business model that I'm not aware of.
      - mikekchar 10y ago
        When I worked at Corel (many, many years ago), I was stunned by how much we paid to put Word Perfect on OEM computers. It certainly wasn't worth it from the perspective of a single sale. I think we easily spent more than we recouped from sales. The thinking was that the person who bought would also upgrade, though, and I think that was sound reasoning. Vendor lock-in is a powerful force. Personally, I thought it was a waste, though. Cost of sales was a large multiple of development cost... :-P
  - antoinealb 10y ago
    The correct comparison would be "Linux + Windows" one will have less margin than "Windows only" one, only because of cost of testing / opportunities of bundling software with it.
frostburg 10y ago
Most of their clients aren't developers, I imagine.
SEJeff 10y ago
The same could be said about windows on supercomputers. Why is windows supported so poorly by Cray and other HPC supercomputer vendors when Linux is supported so well? It is just about the demographics.
- syshum 10y ago
  That is easy. Linux is technologically superior to Windows in every way.
  - jpitz 10y ago
    I think hyperbole is unnecessary here - Linux is superior in many ways, but your statement is only going to provoke arguments of exceptions.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- semi-extrinsic 10y ago
  Actually, MSFT has pushed Windows Server on supercomputers a few times, as well as for other latency critical applications like the London Stock Exchange. Each time they've ended up with egg on their faces for technical reasons, i.e. Linux consistently outperforms Windows Server both on speed and reliability for these workloads. Example: http://www.computerworld.com/article/2467082/data-center/london-stock-exchange-to-abandon-failed-windows-platform.html http://www.computerworld.com/article/2467082/data-center/lon...
  - SEJeff 10y ago
    Right, you're simply providing reasons that agree with me! I work as a tech guy (linux wrangler / code monkey) for a finance firm. I worked in finance during the meltdown of LSE and the new linux based "Millennium" platform. I agree with you that Linux consistently is higher throughput AND lower latency, but that is my point. Windows isn't on supercomputers because it isn't a great fit and there isn't much of a market for it. Ditto can be said for Linux on the Desktop. * This message brought to you from my RHEL7 work workstation running GNOME 3 and Chrome :D
JamesBaxter 10y ago
The Stack Overflow developer survey would suggest that's not correct[0]. Mac OS X 26.2% Windows 7 22.5% Linux 21.7% Windows 10 20.8% Windows 8 8.4% Windows XP 0.4% Though it is possible that the sort of developers that use desktop linux don't use Stack Overflow. [0] http://stackoverflow.com/research/developer-survey-2016#technology-desktop-operating-system http://stackoverflow.com/research/developer-survey-2016#tech...
- captainmuon 10y ago
  Huh, 21.7% is a surpizingly huge portion in my book. I would have suspected a much smaller number. One fifth is a market segment that is large enough to cater for. If you even put a small team on the task of ensuring that Linux installs on your notebooks, and make the minimal neccessary changes (like this BIOS change... or better revert of a breaking change), then you could claim Linux support as your unique selling point, and grab a huge fraction of those 20%.
  - ddeck 10y ago
    >One fifth is a market segment that is large enough to cater for Keep in mind that that's 21.7% of stack overflow users (i.e. developers), not users in general. According StatCounter (based on browser stats), GNU/Linux represented 1.44% of desktop/laptop OS as of last month. Perhaps developers are more likely to use these laptops in particular, but they're unlikely to be 100% of users.
    - Alupis 10y ago
      > Keep in mind that that's 21.7% of stack overflow users (i.e. developers), not users in general. The unfortunate reality is that while this number is largerish, whenever a company comes out with a linux-based "developer edition" laptop, folks don't buy it. The Dell XPS 13, for example, is a great looking machine - but too many folks were busy buying macbooks to help Dell learn this market segment does indeed want more products like this. We need to vote with our wallets, in order to reinforce this behavior. Perhaps this may change now that developers are feeling disenfranchised with Apple over the recent model releases.
wmf 10y ago
Dell, Lenovo, and HP support Linux on their "pro" PCs but they don't bother for their toy laptops like this Yoga that we're talking about.

Seriously, why isn't Linux higher on the priority list of vendors? A huge portion of devs have Linux as their main OS but support is so scarce.

by adtac 10y ago

Seriously, why isn't Linux higher on the priority list of vendors? A huge portion of devs have Linux as their main OS but support is so scarce.

digi_owl 10y ago

Because the margins are just not there.

marcosdumay 10y ago
Why a Linux computer should have any less margin than a Windows one?
- wmf 10y ago
  Because crapware doesn't exist for Linux.
  - eth0up 10y ago
    It's pleasantly scarce, but does come along occasionally: https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/ubuntu-spyware.en.html https://www.gnu.org/philosophy/ubuntu-spyware.en.html
  - marcosdumay 10y ago
    Does the crapware really pay more than the cost of a Windows EOM license? How does that work economically? Because not everybody buys the crapware license later (and they normally cost less than Windows), and mass stealing of data is not very lucrative.
    - Alupis 10y ago
      Typically OEM's are paid per install of crapware (regardless if the user ends up paying for the subscriptions). It's just a form of marketing for these companies - ie. a certain percentage of potential users will convert into paying users. The reason Windows laptops have been cheaper or the same price as the linux counterpart is usually due to the combination of subsidized licensing from Microsoft, crapware installation kickbacks, and lower cost of support infrastructure (the OEM already has a huge Windows support staff and infrastructure, creating a new one for Linux - or more correctly, a specific distro of linux - costs more). If the linux laptops sell more and more, eventually the support costs will come down to on-par (or lower perhaps... who knows). It's a chicken-and-egg problem, and one that OEM's are not willing to foot the bill up front for. We have to vote with our wallets and take that short-term hit in order to push the ecosystem in that direction.
      - marcosdumay 10y ago
        Support might be a reasonable reason, yes. But crapware can not pay that much. The crapware creators themselves get less revenue than licensing costs, and they can kick back just a fraction of that revenue. (That is, unless they have another business model that isn't selling licenses or spying on users.)
        Alupis 10y ago
        Margins on computers are notoriously thin. Even say, $1.00 per system sold with crapware pre-installed can make a difference in the profitability of a product line at scale. Then there's the kickbacks for when a customer does pay for a subscription.
        marcosdumay 10y ago
        The crapware can not pay more than the Windows cost, simply because it does not have enough revenue. Unless, of course MS is paying the OEM to install Windows, or billing for Linux computers. Or crapware has some business model that I'm not aware of.
    - mikekchar 10y ago
      When I worked at Corel (many, many years ago), I was stunned by how much we paid to put Word Perfect on OEM computers. It certainly wasn't worth it from the perspective of a single sale. I think we easily spent more than we recouped from sales. The thinking was that the person who bought would also upgrade, though, and I think that was sound reasoning. Vendor lock-in is a powerful force. Personally, I thought it was a waste, though. Cost of sales was a large multiple of development cost... :-P
- antoinealb 10y ago
  The correct comparison would be "Linux + Windows" one will have less margin than "Windows only" one, only because of cost of testing / opportunities of bundling software with it.

frostburg 10y ago

Most of their clients aren't developers, I imagine.

SEJeff 10y ago

The same could be said about windows on supercomputers. Why is windows supported so poorly by Cray and other HPC supercomputer vendors when Linux is supported so well? It is just about the demographics.

syshum 10y ago
That is easy. Linux is technologically superior to Windows in every way.
- jpitz 10y ago
  I think hyperbole is unnecessary here - Linux is superior in many ways, but your statement is only going to provoke arguments of exceptions.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
semi-extrinsic 10y ago
Actually, MSFT has pushed Windows Server on supercomputers a few times, as well as for other latency critical applications like the London Stock Exchange. Each time they've ended up with egg on their faces for technical reasons, i.e. Linux consistently outperforms Windows Server both on speed and reliability for these workloads. Example: http://www.computerworld.com/article/2467082/data-center/london-stock-exchange-to-abandon-failed-windows-platform.html http://www.computerworld.com/article/2467082/data-center/lon...
- SEJeff 10y ago
  Right, you're simply providing reasons that agree with me! I work as a tech guy (linux wrangler / code monkey) for a finance firm. I worked in finance during the meltdown of LSE and the new linux based "Millennium" platform. I agree with you that Linux consistently is higher throughput AND lower latency, but that is my point. Windows isn't on supercomputers because it isn't a great fit and there isn't much of a market for it. Ditto can be said for Linux on the Desktop. * This message brought to you from my RHEL7 work workstation running GNOME 3 and Chrome :D

JamesBaxter 10y ago

The Stack Overflow developer survey would suggest that's not correct[0]. Mac OS X 26.2% Windows 7 22.5% Linux 21.7% Windows 10 20.8% Windows 8 8.4% Windows XP 0.4% Though it is possible that the sort of developers that use desktop linux don't use Stack Overflow. [0] http://stackoverflow.com/research/developer-survey-2016#technology-desktop-operating-system http://stackoverflow.com/research/developer-survey-2016#tech...

captainmuon 10y ago
Huh, 21.7% is a surpizingly huge portion in my book. I would have suspected a much smaller number. One fifth is a market segment that is large enough to cater for. If you even put a small team on the task of ensuring that Linux installs on your notebooks, and make the minimal neccessary changes (like this BIOS change... or better revert of a breaking change), then you could claim Linux support as your unique selling point, and grab a huge fraction of those 20%.
- ddeck 10y ago
  >One fifth is a market segment that is large enough to cater for Keep in mind that that's 21.7% of stack overflow users (i.e. developers), not users in general. According StatCounter (based on browser stats), GNU/Linux represented 1.44% of desktop/laptop OS as of last month. Perhaps developers are more likely to use these laptops in particular, but they're unlikely to be 100% of users.
  - Alupis 10y ago
    > Keep in mind that that's 21.7% of stack overflow users (i.e. developers), not users in general. The unfortunate reality is that while this number is largerish, whenever a company comes out with a linux-based "developer edition" laptop, folks don't buy it. The Dell XPS 13, for example, is a great looking machine - but too many folks were busy buying macbooks to help Dell learn this market segment does indeed want more products like this. We need to vote with our wallets, in order to reinforce this behavior. Perhaps this may change now that developers are feeling disenfranchised with Apple over the recent model releases.

wmf 10y ago

Dell, Lenovo, and HP support Linux on their "pro" PCs but they don't bother for their toy laptops like this Yoga that we're talking about.