4 ms·

With so many major vendors of professional software switching to the software rental model, I'm hoping for an open source renaissance from the bottom-up.

by ksk 9y ago

edwinnathaniel 9y ago
I very much doubt it. This is akin to "hoping" that there would be renaissance of of VPS/Dedicated hosting. Open Source typically requires people to manage everything themselves, including update. For those who see IT as cost-center/necessary evil, they want to have as less investment and as short-term as possible.
- ghthor 9y ago
  OSS lags behind in the UX category because we frankly just don't have UX designers in abundance. Then tend to follow the other UI/US designers.
  - flukus 9y ago
    That may be true in many cases, but I find ubuntu/gnome is way out in front of windows 10 when it comes to UX. Windows 10 is all over the place, every app looks different, some are full screen others aren't. Half the OS is touch friendly but the other half isn't. All sorts of functionality is hidden in slide out menus. If this is the product of UX designers then I'm glad the OSS world doesn't have any.
  - bloaf 9y ago
    I'd say that the OSS UX will always lag in terms of overall polish. But in terms of pushing ideas, they can be ahead of the curve. E.g. gnome 3 (April 2011) did a full screen "start menu" before windows 8 (Aug 2012)
  - cjsuk 9y ago
    I'm not sure this is a major issue. End users are mainly concerned that when they wake up in the morning, lots of stuff hasn't moved. What it looks like and where it is to start with doesn't seem to matter as long as the UI is discoverable to some extent.
    - ygra 9y ago
      End users are also concerned with not being frustrated at every corner with arcane and weird UI choices or a user experience that plainly mirrors the implementation choices underneath. Worrying about whether features have been moved around the UI usually comes after they've already used a program for a while. There's lots of open-source software that, for non-technical end users, doesn't get to that point because they've ditched it already.
- icebraining 9y ago
  This is akin to "hoping" that there would be renaissance of of VPS/Dedicated hosting. I'd say there has been a renaissance of of VPS hosting, with DigitalOcean/Vultr and other providers offering a modernized UI, fast service, decent APIs, a few extra services, etc.
  - cjsuk 9y ago
    There has. Especially from people who have been burned by trying to run the traditional persistent application model on AWS and finding that costs increase rapidly when you want some performance.
  - noir_lord 9y ago
    I've been using linode for everything for the last 10 years, AWS has always been something to look at. There is value in the simplicity of just getting root on a Linux box and setting up from there yourself. New employer has dedicated machines on site which definitely helps. Once I give the main system a kick it will scream on a few year old Xeon. I've seen far too many 'shove everything on AWS' approaches fail to undertake it lightly.
remir 9y ago
Perhaps we need to fund this using, gasp, public funds? I mean, I bet every government worker around the world needs a computer with an OS and an office suite. G7 countries could pool their resources together to hire engineers and designers and develop common solutions, like a FOSS alternative to Exchange, Windows and Office. ReacOS would be a good start; it's already an open source clone of Windows.
- icebraining 9y ago
  Public funds have developed plenty of alternatives to Windows. Spain alone had four Linux distros funded by different regional governments. A whole bunch of countries around the world made their own as well. Suggesting that we bury even more public funds into alternatives to Windows/Office is not helpful unless we can first devise a model that produces something better.
  - remir 9y ago
    Spain alone had four Linux distros funded by different regional governments. How is that efficient? What a waste of public funds. What I am talking about is making ONE operating system for every level of governance. I'm talking about agreements by all party involved to pool their resources to make ONE OS, not 56. The most popular desktop OS in the world is Windows. People are familiar with it and Win32 apps, so why not use ReactOS as a starting point?
    - icebraining 9y ago
      How is that efficient? What a waste of public funds. That's exactly my point. Getting states to invest in free operating systems is not hard. But your proposal is only useful if it includes some way to get them to work together.
pjmlp 9y ago
The open source developers are the ones responsible for the software rental model when they started to go PaaS and SaaS, given that it is one of the few secure ways to earn money with FOSS. How are they supposed to fix the model they created?!
- ksk 9y ago
  Perhaps we need to re-think creating software as a career. Align it more with the creative domain than the commercial domain.

With so many major vendors of professional software switching to the software rental model, I'm hoping for an open source renaissance from the bottom-up.

by ksk 9y ago

With so many major vendors of professional software switching to the software rental model, I'm hoping for an open source renaissance from the bottom-up.

edwinnathaniel 9y ago

I very much doubt it. This is akin to "hoping" that there would be renaissance of of VPS/Dedicated hosting. Open Source typically requires people to manage everything themselves, including update. For those who see IT as cost-center/necessary evil, they want to have as less investment and as short-term as possible.

ghthor 9y ago
OSS lags behind in the UX category because we frankly just don't have UX designers in abundance. Then tend to follow the other UI/US designers.
- flukus 9y ago
  That may be true in many cases, but I find ubuntu/gnome is way out in front of windows 10 when it comes to UX. Windows 10 is all over the place, every app looks different, some are full screen others aren't. Half the OS is touch friendly but the other half isn't. All sorts of functionality is hidden in slide out menus. If this is the product of UX designers then I'm glad the OSS world doesn't have any.
- bloaf 9y ago
  I'd say that the OSS UX will always lag in terms of overall polish. But in terms of pushing ideas, they can be ahead of the curve. E.g. gnome 3 (April 2011) did a full screen "start menu" before windows 8 (Aug 2012)
- cjsuk 9y ago
  I'm not sure this is a major issue. End users are mainly concerned that when they wake up in the morning, lots of stuff hasn't moved. What it looks like and where it is to start with doesn't seem to matter as long as the UI is discoverable to some extent.
  - ygra 9y ago
    End users are also concerned with not being frustrated at every corner with arcane and weird UI choices or a user experience that plainly mirrors the implementation choices underneath. Worrying about whether features have been moved around the UI usually comes after they've already used a program for a while. There's lots of open-source software that, for non-technical end users, doesn't get to that point because they've ditched it already.
icebraining 9y ago
This is akin to "hoping" that there would be renaissance of of VPS/Dedicated hosting. I'd say there has been a renaissance of of VPS hosting, with DigitalOcean/Vultr and other providers offering a modernized UI, fast service, decent APIs, a few extra services, etc.
- cjsuk 9y ago
  There has. Especially from people who have been burned by trying to run the traditional persistent application model on AWS and finding that costs increase rapidly when you want some performance.
- noir_lord 9y ago
  I've been using linode for everything for the last 10 years, AWS has always been something to look at. There is value in the simplicity of just getting root on a Linux box and setting up from there yourself. New employer has dedicated machines on site which definitely helps. Once I give the main system a kick it will scream on a few year old Xeon. I've seen far too many 'shove everything on AWS' approaches fail to undertake it lightly.

remir 9y ago

Perhaps we need to fund this using, gasp, public funds? I mean, I bet every government worker around the world needs a computer with an OS and an office suite. G7 countries could pool their resources together to hire engineers and designers and develop common solutions, like a FOSS alternative to Exchange, Windows and Office. ReacOS would be a good start; it's already an open source clone of Windows.

icebraining 9y ago
Public funds have developed plenty of alternatives to Windows. Spain alone had four Linux distros funded by different regional governments. A whole bunch of countries around the world made their own as well. Suggesting that we bury even more public funds into alternatives to Windows/Office is not helpful unless we can first devise a model that produces something better.
- remir 9y ago
  Spain alone had four Linux distros funded by different regional governments. How is that efficient? What a waste of public funds. What I am talking about is making ONE operating system for every level of governance. I'm talking about agreements by all party involved to pool their resources to make ONE OS, not 56. The most popular desktop OS in the world is Windows. People are familiar with it and Win32 apps, so why not use ReactOS as a starting point?
  - icebraining 9y ago
    How is that efficient? What a waste of public funds. That's exactly my point. Getting states to invest in free operating systems is not hard. But your proposal is only useful if it includes some way to get them to work together.

pjmlp 9y ago

The open source developers are the ones responsible for the software rental model when they started to go PaaS and SaaS, given that it is one of the few secure ways to earn money with FOSS. How are they supposed to fix the model they created?!

ksk 9y ago
Perhaps we need to re-think creating software as a career. Align it more with the creative domain than the commercial domain.