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Google Shares Experience of Using Ubuntu in their Offices
- Periodic 14y agoWhat I'm curious about is how much control they are willing to give their developers over their workstations. At a previous company they had trouble because the developers needed administrator access to their Windows systems because they needed to install a lot of different software and run many things in administrative mode (server development). It was a constant tension between developers and security. I wonder how it is with Linux, which might have more fine-grained controls and an easier way to install per-user software. I'm surprised xmonad got a mention. I interpreted it as a window manager that didn't have much traction outside of the Haskell community, particularly with all the configuration being done in Haskell. Perhaps it was just an example of an one of the more strange requests. That said, I love xmonad. People keep asking me for help with their Gnome desktops and I have to shrug and point out I don't really use Gnome if I can get away with it.
- neild 14y agoDevelopers have root on their workstations. Google doesn't believe in treating developers like the enemy.
- myko 14y agoAs an intern last summer with Google I had my personal Xmonad environment setup and running day 2 in the office. So yeah, Google gives their developers plenty of control over their workstations :) And Xmonad rocks for productivity.
- mhitza 14y agoWhere you using a multimonitor setup or just a single big monitor? I found xmonad not so pleasant in multimonitor setup where it saw each monitor as a separate workspace.
- daave 14y agoI've been using XMonad in a dual-monitor setup since I started working at Google in January... haven't had any problems with it. My general (rough) impression from walking around the New York office is that about one fifth of engineers here are using XMonad.
- jrockway 14y agoReally? I have not seen one other person that uses it. I haven't even heard it discussed, and I asked around a lot when I started. I'm surprised we have never discussed this, actually :)
- AncientPC 14y agoI hated that concept too when I first switched to Xmonad, but after a few months I've come to appreciate that behavior. It allows me to keep one screen static while working on another. This allows me to dedicate a workspace to communication (email, IM, etc), server, development, documentation, etc and move among them easily.
- rmATinnovafy 14y agoI've looking for that feature for a while. I'm sold. I have about a thousand different windows opened at the same time.
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- jmillikin 14y ago(I work at Google) A few employees in particularly security-sensitive positions don't have full root, and have to use "sudo" with a whitelist of commands, allowed packages, and so on. It's fairly easy to get packages added to the whitelist, by filing a request with the security team. Users who need to run insecure operating systems, or need to install arbitrary packages, use heavily sandboxed VMs. Two members of my current team used xmonad before I got here, and I've helped two more to convert. I anticipate there will be more conversions after Precise comes along and forces everyone off GNOME 2. To my knowledge, none of them know anything about Haskell.
- keithpeter 14y agoI am fascinated by the preference for Xmonad as an alternative to Unity/Gnome Shell. Would Gnome 2 -> XFCE or Gnome 2 -> Gnome Classic not make more sense? Or is it more along the lines of: we have to change anyway so lets have a look at a workflow that really fits how we work? I say this as a humble end user who has gone dwm/dmenu -> Unity with 12.04
- jmillikin 14y agoGNOME Classic is really just a thin skin over GNOME 3; it doesn't have any of the useful features that the GNOME team removed from their software. XFCE and KDE just aren't very popular in my area, though I don't know why. I have seen people discuss moving to KDE on internal mailing lists, so there is some interest elsewhere in the company. The two people I helped convert have, to my knowledge, not bothered with customising xmonad. They just copied my config, changed a keybinding or two, and then left it alone.
- keithpeter 14y agoGreat, I'm just getting my head around people missing features in Gnome 2 so instead going to a 'bare backed' window manager like Xmonad.
- jmillikin 14y ago
- sliverstorm 14y agoeasier way to install per-user software. Not "easy", but a real, functional option- compile from source in your home folder, targeting ~/bin, ~/lib, etc. The onus is entirely on the user, of course.
- krzyk 14y agoAt my company almost everyone uses Windows (it's the official supported sytem) but I installed Linux on my box and no one had issues with this (I didn't ask for any permission, I just did it - as long as I do my work there shouldn't be any issues). We have some internal page for people using alternative OSes (Linux and MacOs, didn't see any other) and there is some kind of support with the availability of an VM image with all the office software that we use. I really love that my company supports Windows only, because if they would support Linux it would mean that they would force me to use packages that I don't want to or take away my root access.
- djeikyb 14y agoDirect link to video: http://youtu.be/fu3pT_9nb8o http://youtu.be/fu3pT_9nb8o
- why-el 14y ago7 minutes into the video and I am glad to hear Google is considering offering Google Drive for linux. A free Dropbox/Drive combo will fit my needs for the moment.
- gioele 14y agoWhat Linux really needs is well documented protocols, not applications. See how integrated GTalk is in any Linux desktop and how differently is Skype treated. At the same it is nice to have a nice client as a binary package just to kickstart the efforts, but it never a good long term plan.
- Drbble 14y agoThat's what yegge's infamous platform rant was begging for. Google has been slow to appease, though. Controlling everything is more enticing to the ego of a manager.
- drivebyacct2 14y agoDo you mean Linux needs Drive to offer "well documented protocols"? Otherwise I don't know what "Linux[...] protocols" you're referring to or how it's relevant to GTalk vs. Skype, etc. Skype integrates poorly because it's locked down and has been neglected for... 4 years?
- gioele 14y ago> Do you mean Linux needs Drive to offer "well documented protocols"? Grandparent wrote: >>> I am glad to hear Google is considering offering Google Drive for linux. My point is that Google should not focus too much on developing yet another synchronisation program locked on Google Drive; what they should do is publishing and maintaining a detailed set of protocols that can be implemented by the existing synchronisation programs that are already well integrated in some Linux desktops (DejaDup, for example). Skype integrated poorly in Linux desktops because there are no publicly accessible and complete Skype protocol specification. This makes it very hard to integrate it into current applications (the telepathy frameworks, for example). There are nice hacks like pidgin-skype: a bridge that interacts with Pidgin and relays user actions to an hidden Skype window, but they are unreliable hacks because they aim at a constantly moving target. (Well, not so moving now that Skype seems abandoned on Linux.)
- sixbrx 14y agoI work in the FDA, and it almost takes an act of congress to get root on developer workstations. Also we can't install software unless it's on the the MAT (master approved technologies) list. Which is pretty ironic, because we create software ourselves, which is of course not on that centrally maintained, slow to change list. So we're not sure if we're actually allowed to ever run the results of our compiles. Nobody wants to ask because we might not like the answer...
- keithpeter 14y agoSounds like a David Foster Wallace short story there... go on ASK
- jrockway 14y agoBank of America was like that. One former colleague wanted shell logins on a windows box, but was denied permission to install cygwin sshd. So he wrote his own version that listened to a port and executed the unauthenticated command sent to that port. And that was 100% within policy.
- NelsonMinar 14y agoThe summary mentions "...won't be upgraded to Precise until next year because of a nasty Python 2.7 incompatibility bug." What's the bug?
- nswanberg 14y agoI was curious about that too. If you listen to the video at 12:26 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=fu3pT_9nb8o#t=746s http://www.youtube.com/watch?&v=fu3pT_9nb8o#t=746s), he has made that up as a reason why a team might not upgrade from Lucid to Precise, not that there is currently any such issue.
- codexon 14y agoI have found at least 3 problems upgrading to Ubuntu 12.04. I have upgraded 4 of my servers and found the following problems. 1. The ia32-libs package uninstalled itself somehow, causing all my 32bit programs to fail start back up if they restarted. 2. @reboot cronjobs ran 2 minutes after the machine booted in kern.log. I accidentally started the programs manually because I thought they wouldn't run. 3. On a fresh install, the byobu network display doesn't show up.
- srparish 14y agoI don't work at google, but my team is in the same boat because of this bug: http://bugs.python.org/issue10394 http://bugs.python.org/issue10394 Moving to python3 wouldn't be too hard, except we have some really complicated cheetah templates, and cheetah apparently has no plans for supporting python3 any time soon.
- diminish 14y agoWish Google had mostly used Linux on desktops; would be a strong motivator for the rest of the world to get better hardware certifying for Linux.
- jrockway 14y agoGoogle does mostly use Linux on desktops.
- icco 14y agoIsn't that exactly what this is about? Seems like Google uses Linux on everything according to the video.
- brown9-2 14y agoI suppose it varies between office/department but when I interviewed there 2 years ago I saw nothing but MacBooks.
- gmcabrita 14y agoPossibly because all of their products also have to work on OS X. Giving every developer a MacBook makes testing those products easier.
- packetslave 14y agoYou get a choice when you join: Macbook Pro, Macbook Air, or a couple of varieties of Thinkpad running Goobuntu.
- luser001 14y agoHow about Macbook Pro running Goobuntu?
- packetslave 14y agoFrowned upon for supportability reasons, even if you made it work with all the corp management stuff. But like drbble said, laptops for engineers are mostly for Chrome, terminals, and NX/VNC sessions, since you can't code on them directly.
- jiggy2011 14y agoHow does rebooting a workstation set them back a million dollars?
- gouranga 14y agoWell one place I worked, the entire network's DNS was hanging off the back of a single VAXstation running NetBSD. That was serving for 2350 machines. One day, someone accidentally fork bombed it via a bad script and when they power cycled it the disk popped. It took an entire day of 1500 people twiddling thumbs before they got it back... They must have a turd that size somewhere ;-)
- stfp 14y agoI think he meant rebooting everyone's workstation - at 35K employees even a couple minutes per person is something you probably want to avoid wasting.
- gbog 14y agoI don't like this way of thinking. The two or even ten minutes you spend not using your PC are not lost. It could be a unique occasion to talk to your colleagues, it could be time well spent cleaning some papers. If you think by the minute if work, then you better start eating pills instead off lunch, use headphones during commute and check emails while watching sunset with gf. We ain't no robots, sir.
- caw 14y agoMy work (not Google) get compelled reboots sometimes for patches. We're able to delay them suitably long enough, so most of the time you just go ahead and shut down at the end of the day. Either that, or you hit reboot at lunch. Everything worthwhile is running in a VNC anyway, so you just reconnect to your VNC after your laptop boots back up. Uptime on the VNCs lasts as long as physically possible (e.g., a full IT shutdown, or hardware failure on the machine)
- keithpeter 14y ago"The two or even ten minutes you spend not using your PC are not lost. It could be a unique occasion to talk to your colleagues, it could be time well spent cleaning some papers." I think that is true if you control when the reboot happens. If it just happens then it might be at exactly the wrong time.
- rwmj 14y agoWhat's interesting, I think, is that "Linux", "GNU", "Red Hat" (who write most of the software), "BSD", "free software" are not mentioned in the main article.
- tzs 14y agoIs that the same Thomas Bushnell who was the primary architect for HURD until he said he didn't think the GFDL was free enough and got kicked off the project by RMS for that heresy?
- btilly 14y agoI didn't know about that incident, but it is definitely the same Thomas Bushnell.
- j_baker 14y agoI will say this: Google has really good developer tools in general. I have had to spend far less time setting up software on my workstation than I ever have at any other job. Between using Ubuntu and some internal tools, I spend far less time installing software and more time writing software. Although I should note that certain security systems are notoriously annoying to say the least.
- insaneirish 14y agoBased on what I've seen here, Google needs to have more presentation skills classes.
- adgar 14y agoI haven't watched the linked video yet, but my only complaint as a Google engineer about our employees as presenters is that engineers are often ineffective moderators.
- joe_the_user 14y ago"However, not many employees like new UI changes meant for consumers and not developers. Some of the Google employees also requested removing Unity and Gnome 3 and using xmonad instead." This. Google is exactly the company that would use Ubuntu. They're not the company that would want unity. So WTF were they thinking? Basically, some time on the earlier 2000's, someone decided the "secret" of a good Linux UI was a UI "for dummies". Whoever decided this was wrong, pathetic and contemptible. As alternative OS for an alternative desktop, Linux needs to be easy yes, but also powerful enough to give an exciting experience to those smart and adventurous people willing try something new, not a shitty copy of cartoonish UIs intended for morons. IE, the idiots who are targeted by Unity will not lift a finger to actually install it. The people who would try Ubuntu on their own deserve better than Unity.
- res0nat0r 14y agoPlease stop saying 'this'. Just reply with your comments. Thank you.
- zerostar07 14y agonot this. 'this' is a shortcut to 'i concur' or any other phrase meaning agreement which would be in the comment anyway. isn't it shorter to just say 'this'?
- res0nat0r 14y agoShorter doesn't automatically equal better. Keep the abbreviations where they belong: text messages. All online message board communication seems to be devolving slowly into text message speak and I don't think it is a good thing.
- jacquesm 14y agoThere is the 'upvote' button for that.
- Anirak 14y agoPlease stop putting your periods outside your quotation marks. Please start using double quotes. Please stop telling people what to do. Thank you.
- darksaga 14y agoI found it interesting they made a point about rebooting. Considering if you had people turn off their PC's at night, you could save almost double that when you take into account the energy it takes to run a PC and a single monitor. Although most employees I'm sure would be running dual monitors. If they were indeed running Linux (which boots at least 5X faster than Windows) you could easily make an argument for the exact opposite.
- jeffnappi 14y agoI've written a post on our company blog about our heavy use of Ubuntu including Diskless fat-client workstations.. http://blog.iacquire.com/2012/05/15/how-iacquire-makes-use-of-ubuntu-linux-workstations-its-not-just-for-developers/ http://blog.iacquire.com/2012/05/15/how-iacquire-makes-use-o...