8 ms·

Sergey Brin Guesses That Only 20% Of Googlers Still Use Windows Machines

28 points by ssclafani 15y ago

staunch 15y ago
He's probably way off.
- runevault 15y ago
  Pretty sure they no longer supply new people with Windows machines, only Linux, Mac, and now it sounds like ChromeOS.
  - crag 15y ago
    Might be true. But in the corporate world, (Google Apps) Google is all about Windows.So someone at Google is running Windows.
- trustfundbaby 15y ago
  I think you're thinking Googlers == "People who use Google" when its actually Googlers == "People who work at Google" I know I did at first :D
  - staunch 15y ago
    Nope. I wasn't.
    - apetresc 15y ago
      As somebody who worked at Google until very recently, I can assure you, 20% is more likely an overestimate than an underestimate.
  - brudgers 15y ago
    I suspect the misdirection in the title is intentional link bait - if it said "Google Employees" instead, nobody's first thought would be "Brin can not be that much of an idiot" and it would have been obvious that the article is no more revealing than one stating that most Apple employees don't use Windows at work.
smackfu 15y ago
Two things come to mind: 1) What are they running instead? Linux or Chrome OS? 2) 20% is probably about the number of people who do require Windows in a company. Getting rid of the 20% is the hard part.
- vidar 15y ago
  A lot of them use Macs.
- sudont 15y ago
  They are running mainly Mac and Linux. No idea on any particular distro, though. http://www.edibleapple.com/google-revamps-new-employee-computer-policy-windows-now-out-of-the-equation/ http://www.edibleapple.com/google-revamps-new-employee-compu... Here too, but you've got to be a googler to see it: http://groups.google.com/group/Google-Desktop-Linux/topics http://groups.google.com/group/Google-Desktop-Linux/topics It's pretty interesting how the two big enemies both depend on each others innovations in rolling out products. Macs google, and Macs make Google.
trotsky 15y ago
Brin also said that since Google will be deploying Chromebooks internally, he hopes that a year from now, there will only be a small percentage of Googlers not working on the devices. Weird. It's kind of hard to believe that many google employees will use a 12" atom netbook as anything close to their main machine. In addition to, sure.
- stonemetal 15y ago
  My guess is they use them like smart terminals and ssh into something else.
- erikpukinskis 15y ago
  They're definitely not running development versions of Google search on their local machine the way I do with my web app, so I don't see why a 12" netbook wouldn't be sufficient. As long as it can handle an external monitor that's a decent machine for text editing and web browsing, which is what development is.
kleiba 15y ago
I used to work at a C.S. research institute in California. Every machine there had GNU/Linux installed as their sole OS. I also worked for a German research institute - when I started in the 90's it was a bunch of Windows machines, some GNU/Linux, some Solaris. Today with a new generation of college graduates, virtually no-one uses GNU/Linux any more, it's almost exclusively Windows, although a few people have Mac Books. There are a few GNU/Linux compute servers, but they're only rarely used. What are other people's experiences over the last decade? Any apparent changes in the usage of different OS's?
- mquander 15y ago
  I was at Clojure Conj last October and in a room of 200 or 300 Clojure programmers, it looked like probably 70% of everyone had a MBP running usually OS X, sometimes Ubuntu, and the other 30% (myself included -- although I dual-boot Windows) were running Linux on a PC laptop. I would be surprised if more than 10 people were running Windows as a primary OS. However, it's worth noting that the average age of the crowd there was almost definitely above 25.
  - gte910h 15y ago
    Do MBPs dual boot into ubuntu well? I've mostly seen people using parallels and the ilk for linux booting, as the laptop was mostly unsupported according to them.
- nathanb 15y ago
  At my workplace, it's about 40% Windows, 40% MacOS, and 20% Linux. Those who use Windows generally use it to ssh and/or VNC into our general-purpose Linux compute servers. I personally have a Linux desktop as my main machine and a Linux netbook as my portable. I could see Google going the same way with its own employees, since the only things my netbook has to do is connect to the vpn and ssh to my desktop, where I connect to my existing screen session and keep going right where I left off. A Chromebook could do that sort of thing relatively easily.
  - jmatt 15y ago
evo_9 15y ago
That actually seems high to me considering how cutting edge they are. I'd think Mac's would be the vast majority, followed by a fair number if linux machines. I'd of expected Windows boxes to account for a tiny amount of testing machines, and maybe a few biz/marketing hold-outs, but even those guys I'd expect to be predominately on OSX and running either bootcamp or VM'd for Windows.
- cryptoz 15y ago
  Google builds some of the most popular - and in my opinion, exciting - Windows software that has ever existed. Between Chrome, Earth, Picasa and others I imagine a decently large number of devs need to work on Windows machines for more than just "testing". (also, in your post "I'd of" should be "I'd have")
  - evo_9 15y ago
    No, I meant "I'd" to mean "I would", as in "I would think...".
    - cryptoz 15y ago
      > I'd of expected Windows boxes http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/couldof.html http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/couldof.html
      - evo_9 15y ago
        I was actually referring to the first 'I'd think Mac's would be the vast majority...', not the one you didn't reference until above. Thanks for the link, I'll keep that handy if my copy of The Chicago Manual of Style isn't handy (oh they have a nice website now too, cool).
- Niten 15y ago
  Well it makes sense, given that Google is predominantly a linux-based company. But it's a fallacy to equate "cutting edge" with "not Windows". Windows may not be as fashionable in the same way that Macs are with the Starbucks/college campus crowd, but it's certainly no less "cutting edge" a desktop operating system than OS X or Linux.
swah 15y ago
Anyone knows if building stuff like Chrome on Windows is faster than Linux/Mac?
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
SkyMarshal 15y ago
Just last year Google eliminated Windows from their list of OS options for new employees after the Chinese hacks, leaving just OSX and Gubuntu, iirc. No surprise Windows has fallen to 20% then.

28 points by ssclafani 15y ago

staunch 15y ago

He's probably way off.

runevault 15y ago
Pretty sure they no longer supply new people with Windows machines, only Linux, Mac, and now it sounds like ChromeOS.
- crag 15y ago
  Might be true. But in the corporate world, (Google Apps) Google is all about Windows.So someone at Google is running Windows.
trustfundbaby 15y ago
I think you're thinking Googlers == "People who use Google" when its actually Googlers == "People who work at Google" I know I did at first :D
- staunch 15y ago
  Nope. I wasn't.
  - apetresc 15y ago
    As somebody who worked at Google until very recently, I can assure you, 20% is more likely an overestimate than an underestimate.
- brudgers 15y ago
  I suspect the misdirection in the title is intentional link bait - if it said "Google Employees" instead, nobody's first thought would be "Brin can not be that much of an idiot" and it would have been obvious that the article is no more revealing than one stating that most Apple employees don't use Windows at work.

smackfu 15y ago

Two things come to mind: 1) What are they running instead? Linux or Chrome OS? 2) 20% is probably about the number of people who do require Windows in a company. Getting rid of the 20% is the hard part.

vidar 15y ago
A lot of them use Macs.
sudont 15y ago
They are running mainly Mac and Linux. No idea on any particular distro, though. http://www.edibleapple.com/google-revamps-new-employee-computer-policy-windows-now-out-of-the-equation/ http://www.edibleapple.com/google-revamps-new-employee-compu... Here too, but you've got to be a googler to see it: http://groups.google.com/group/Google-Desktop-Linux/topics http://groups.google.com/group/Google-Desktop-Linux/topics It's pretty interesting how the two big enemies both depend on each others innovations in rolling out products. Macs google, and Macs make Google.

trotsky 15y ago

Brin also said that since Google will be deploying Chromebooks internally, he hopes that a year from now, there will only be a small percentage of Googlers not working on the devices. Weird. It's kind of hard to believe that many google employees will use a 12" atom netbook as anything close to their main machine. In addition to, sure.

stonemetal 15y ago
My guess is they use them like smart terminals and ssh into something else.
erikpukinskis 15y ago
They're definitely not running development versions of Google search on their local machine the way I do with my web app, so I don't see why a 12" netbook wouldn't be sufficient. As long as it can handle an external monitor that's a decent machine for text editing and web browsing, which is what development is.

kleiba 15y ago

I used to work at a C.S. research institute in California. Every machine there had GNU/Linux installed as their sole OS. I also worked for a German research institute - when I started in the 90's it was a bunch of Windows machines, some GNU/Linux, some Solaris. Today with a new generation of college graduates, virtually no-one uses GNU/Linux any more, it's almost exclusively Windows, although a few people have Mac Books. There are a few GNU/Linux compute servers, but they're only rarely used. What are other people's experiences over the last decade? Any apparent changes in the usage of different OS's?

mquander 15y ago
I was at Clojure Conj last October and in a room of 200 or 300 Clojure programmers, it looked like probably 70% of everyone had a MBP running usually OS X, sometimes Ubuntu, and the other 30% (myself included -- although I dual-boot Windows) were running Linux on a PC laptop. I would be surprised if more than 10 people were running Windows as a primary OS. However, it's worth noting that the average age of the crowd there was almost definitely above 25.
- gte910h 15y ago
  Do MBPs dual boot into ubuntu well? I've mostly seen people using parallels and the ilk for linux booting, as the laptop was mostly unsupported according to them.
nathanb 15y ago
At my workplace, it's about 40% Windows, 40% MacOS, and 20% Linux. Those who use Windows generally use it to ssh and/or VNC into our general-purpose Linux compute servers. I personally have a Linux desktop as my main machine and a Linux netbook as my portable. I could see Google going the same way with its own employees, since the only things my netbook has to do is connect to the vpn and ssh to my desktop, where I connect to my existing screen session and keep going right where I left off. A Chromebook could do that sort of thing relatively easily.
- jmatt 15y ago

evo_9 15y ago

That actually seems high to me considering how cutting edge they are. I'd think Mac's would be the vast majority, followed by a fair number if linux machines. I'd of expected Windows boxes to account for a tiny amount of testing machines, and maybe a few biz/marketing hold-outs, but even those guys I'd expect to be predominately on OSX and running either bootcamp or VM'd for Windows.

cryptoz 15y ago
Google builds some of the most popular - and in my opinion, exciting - Windows software that has ever existed. Between Chrome, Earth, Picasa and others I imagine a decently large number of devs need to work on Windows machines for more than just "testing". (also, in your post "I'd of" should be "I'd have")
- evo_9 15y ago
  No, I meant "I'd" to mean "I would", as in "I would think...".
  - cryptoz 15y ago
    > I'd of expected Windows boxes http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/couldof.html http://www.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/couldof.html
    - evo_9 15y ago
      I was actually referring to the first 'I'd think Mac's would be the vast majority...', not the one you didn't reference until above. Thanks for the link, I'll keep that handy if my copy of The Chicago Manual of Style isn't handy (oh they have a nice website now too, cool).
Niten 15y ago
Well it makes sense, given that Google is predominantly a linux-based company. But it's a fallacy to equate "cutting edge" with "not Windows". Windows may not be as fashionable in the same way that Macs are with the Starbucks/college campus crowd, but it's certainly no less "cutting edge" a desktop operating system than OS X or Linux.

swah 15y ago

Anyone knows if building stuff like Chrome on Windows is faster than Linux/Mac?

deleted 15y ago
[deleted]

SkyMarshal 15y ago

Just last year Google eliminated Windows from their list of OS options for new employees after the Chinese hacks, leaving just OSX and Gubuntu, iirc. No surprise Windows has fallen to 20% then.