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Wow, talk about being out of touch with the real world. Developers, especially Linux developers, really need to give up on this whole "Desktop" operating syste

Wow, talk about being out of touch with the real world. Developers, especially Linux developers, really need to give up on this whole "Desktop" operating system idea. It's not going to work. It is already dead. And I can hardly believe we are still using these ancient systems for many tasks even today. There is no future in WIMP, and people really need to stop developing these Windows clones already. It was lame 10 years ago. If you are still working on desktop OS clones today, you so are terribly out of touch with the real world there really is no hope for you or your product. Get over it. Touch-based (and by extension, NUI-based) OS'es and mobile applications are the future. Windows always sucked. Mac OS always sucked. Every desktop OS ever built sucked because it is a horrible way to use a computer. Nobody ever really wanted to use these terrible desktop metaphor systems... they only ever did because they had to.

wittrock 14y ago
I'm going to go ahead and guess that the people behind Qubes were worrying less about the fact that the desktop paradigm may be fundamentally flawed in terms of usability (not going to argue on that one), but more about security, which is the stated goal of the project. Desktops may be on the way out, but that doesn't mean that we can't do some very basic security work on the heart of the OS. Looking at some of the documentation, it appears that their VM-per-application-group idea could scale very well to touch- and app-based interfaces with some work. Security has a vital place in every OS, regardless of the skin you put over the top of it.
viraptor 14y ago
I think you're missing the context here. This system is not about UI. It's not about desktop experience either. It's about making sure your email client is so separated from your $BUSINESS_APPLICATION, that exploiting one does not allow you to access anything on the other - and doing that without relying on handcrafted libvirt configs and hopefully without much processing overhead. I guess the desktop environment was just a random choice of "this works, so just leave it in" from whatever distribution they started with.
- erichocean 14y ago
  That already exists: it's called a web browser. Granted, browsers aren't without their security holes, but then again, neither are operating systems. Given the amount of effort being put into browsers to make them secure (especially Chrome), my money's on that.
  - viraptor 14y ago
    That's exactly why this system goes further. In a browser, it's usually enough to exploit the browser's chrome to get to other sites. Or exploit the browser's binary to get to other apps. This system goes at least 2 layers deeper. System itself makes sure that each window has its own desktop environment and can't see others. Hardware takes care about the separation between security containers the apps are running in. Protection of the app itself is just the first line of defence and is not going away, so whatever sandboxing exists in the browser still applies. They are also talking about protecting hardware sharing from being used to cross boundaries which is another layer of paranoia (not unwarranted)
  - mike-cardwell 14y ago
    Websites aren't sufficiently sandboxed from each other though. Otherwise we wouldn't have CSRF, XSS and Click Jacking attacks. If you build a webmail client, you need to know all about these attack vectors, and you need to go out of your way to prevent your application from being susceptible to them. Websites are insecure by default. I don't trust a web browser with my email at all. Not yet. If I were to use webmail, I'd make sure to set up a separate instance of Firefox to run it in, with it's own profile. I will continue to use Thunderbird for now though. I'm not against the idea of using webmail, I just don't think the web is secure enough yet.
- mike-cardwell 14y ago
  This is what AppArmor and SELinux are for.
  - viraptor 14y ago
    In many cases yes, but there are additional issues Qubes is taking care of. For example AppArmor could only restrict your access to Xorg completely - but once you have access, you can read anything from the screen.
JasonFruit 14y ago
You made a lot of assertions there, but in my opinion, there's nothing like a desktop computer for day-to-day use. The future may be in touch-based applications, but if it is, it's going to tough to get anything accomplished in it. Maybe I'm just clinging to my guns and desktop computer, but I don't think I'm alone in that.
wrekkuh 14y ago
The reason i don't think this is funny is because it's compromising the maturity of this community. Please create a new thread stating your grievances, instead of distracting things.
wladimir 14y ago
So please explain to me: what the hell does the input method (keyboard, mouse, touchscreen) have to do with the low-level security properties of a system? If anything, the switch to tablets and thus more ubiquitous computing makes security an extremely critical issue (see the many discussions about permission systems, application sandboxes, malware leaking personal information etc...). It will become even more pressing in the future, if you think about devices that are controlled by thought (EEG etc...).
- mbq 14y ago
  Think of a java applet in a browser catching all your keyboard input for instance; the general idea is that secure system must guarantee that user input goes where intended and only there.
  - wladimir 14y ago
    Sure. Of course. But my point is, how is that different for touch screen-based input or a real keyboard? The grandparent poster seems to think that in the post-pc era, security problems disappear in puffs of colored icons and magical gestures.
zwdr 14y ago
That is seriously retarded. You don't use your computer to do actual work, do you? Because the keyboard simply is the best way to do things that are not downloading porn and browsing Facebook.
SCdF 14y ago
I'm sorry but none of that is even vaguely true, as true or false as something can be when it is entirely opinion. Touch screens are to desktops as push bikes are to tractors. You need both. Some people even use both. Or just one. Or neither. Maybe you feel this way because you've been driving a tractor around all this time and you feel like you've been wasting your time, however some of us (I imagine a lot of us on HN) like to do farming occasionally :-)
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
- dj2stein9 14y ago
  That reminds me of the John Ford quote: "If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses." People do not desire better desktop operating systems. They want computers to disappear. It simply does not matter how good this awesome new, secure, desktop OS is because it's built for a world that doesn't exist anymore.
  - llort 14y ago
    that was actually Samuel Ford
  - kingkawn 14y ago
    Henry Ford. And he appears to have never actually said it. And this attitude cost Ford the early lead in market share. http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/08/henry_ford_never_said_the_fast.html http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/08/henry_ford_never_said_the_fa...
    - dj2stein9 14y ago
      Okay so I mistakenly wrote his first name... I don't see how that invalidates what I've said.
      - mquander 14y ago

wittrock 14y ago

I'm going to go ahead and guess that the people behind Qubes were worrying less about the fact that the desktop paradigm may be fundamentally flawed in terms of usability (not going to argue on that one), but more about security, which is the stated goal of the project. Desktops may be on the way out, but that doesn't mean that we can't do some very basic security work on the heart of the OS. Looking at some of the documentation, it appears that their VM-per-application-group idea could scale very well to touch- and app-based interfaces with some work. Security has a vital place in every OS, regardless of the skin you put over the top of it.

viraptor 14y ago

I think you're missing the context here. This system is not about UI. It's not about desktop experience either. It's about making sure your email client is so separated from your $BUSINESS_APPLICATION, that exploiting one does not allow you to access anything on the other - and doing that without relying on handcrafted libvirt configs and hopefully without much processing overhead. I guess the desktop environment was just a random choice of "this works, so just leave it in" from whatever distribution they started with.

erichocean 14y ago
That already exists: it's called a web browser. Granted, browsers aren't without their security holes, but then again, neither are operating systems. Given the amount of effort being put into browsers to make them secure (especially Chrome), my money's on that.
- viraptor 14y ago
  That's exactly why this system goes further. In a browser, it's usually enough to exploit the browser's chrome to get to other sites. Or exploit the browser's binary to get to other apps. This system goes at least 2 layers deeper. System itself makes sure that each window has its own desktop environment and can't see others. Hardware takes care about the separation between security containers the apps are running in. Protection of the app itself is just the first line of defence and is not going away, so whatever sandboxing exists in the browser still applies. They are also talking about protecting hardware sharing from being used to cross boundaries which is another layer of paranoia (not unwarranted)
- mike-cardwell 14y ago
  Websites aren't sufficiently sandboxed from each other though. Otherwise we wouldn't have CSRF, XSS and Click Jacking attacks. If you build a webmail client, you need to know all about these attack vectors, and you need to go out of your way to prevent your application from being susceptible to them. Websites are insecure by default. I don't trust a web browser with my email at all. Not yet. If I were to use webmail, I'd make sure to set up a separate instance of Firefox to run it in, with it's own profile. I will continue to use Thunderbird for now though. I'm not against the idea of using webmail, I just don't think the web is secure enough yet.
mike-cardwell 14y ago
This is what AppArmor and SELinux are for.
- viraptor 14y ago
  In many cases yes, but there are additional issues Qubes is taking care of. For example AppArmor could only restrict your access to Xorg completely - but once you have access, you can read anything from the screen.

JasonFruit 14y ago

You made a lot of assertions there, but in my opinion, there's nothing like a desktop computer for day-to-day use. The future may be in touch-based applications, but if it is, it's going to tough to get anything accomplished in it. Maybe I'm just clinging to my guns and desktop computer, but I don't think I'm alone in that.

wrekkuh 14y ago

The reason i don't think this is funny is because it's compromising the maturity of this community. Please create a new thread stating your grievances, instead of distracting things.

wladimir 14y ago

So please explain to me: what the hell does the input method (keyboard, mouse, touchscreen) have to do with the low-level security properties of a system? If anything, the switch to tablets and thus more ubiquitous computing makes security an extremely critical issue (see the many discussions about permission systems, application sandboxes, malware leaking personal information etc...). It will become even more pressing in the future, if you think about devices that are controlled by thought (EEG etc...).

mbq 14y ago
Think of a java applet in a browser catching all your keyboard input for instance; the general idea is that secure system must guarantee that user input goes where intended and only there.
- wladimir 14y ago
  Sure. Of course. But my point is, how is that different for touch screen-based input or a real keyboard? The grandparent poster seems to think that in the post-pc era, security problems disappear in puffs of colored icons and magical gestures.

zwdr 14y ago

That is seriously retarded. You don't use your computer to do actual work, do you? Because the keyboard simply is the best way to do things that are not downloading porn and browsing Facebook.

SCdF 14y ago

I'm sorry but none of that is even vaguely true, as true or false as something can be when it is entirely opinion. Touch screens are to desktops as push bikes are to tractors. You need both. Some people even use both. Or just one. Or neither. Maybe you feel this way because you've been driving a tractor around all this time and you feel like you've been wasting your time, however some of us (I imagine a lot of us on HN) like to do farming occasionally :-)

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
dj2stein9 14y ago
That reminds me of the John Ford quote: "If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses." People do not desire better desktop operating systems. They want computers to disappear. It simply does not matter how good this awesome new, secure, desktop OS is because it's built for a world that doesn't exist anymore.
- llort 14y ago
  that was actually Samuel Ford
- kingkawn 14y ago
  Henry Ford. And he appears to have never actually said it. And this attitude cost Ford the early lead in market share. http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/08/henry_ford_never_said_the_fast.html http://blogs.hbr.org/cs/2011/08/henry_ford_never_said_the_fa...
  - dj2stein9 14y ago
    Okay so I mistakenly wrote his first name... I don't see how that invalidates what I've said.
    - mquander 14y ago