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> Because, if anything history has taught us, Open Source will eventually win the war. How does that work? Where is the open source OS that "won" the desktop w

> Because, if anything history has taught us, Open Source will eventually win the war. How does that work? Where is the open source OS that "won" the desktop war? Where is the open source codec that "won" the codec wars?

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biomechanica 14y ago
I'm unsure I agree with it also. Android has Google's wallet to fall back on. That could be one reason why it's successful. Mobile devices fill a different "comfort", I think. Desktop OS's out there try to fill a broad spectrum of wants (and needs). I think Linus has been quoted as saying something like, "Desktop is a hard problem to solve", and that the Linux world hasn't even come close to solving it (yet). I know a lot of people who would otherwise be lost on a Windows machine be completely comfortable with iPhone or Android devices simply because it fills that niche. Computer illiterate people seem to gravitate to, not desktop, but mobile devices. So maybe Android is the new "desktop" for those types of users. Power users are now left to fill their own comforts. Maybe Linux powered desktops will eventually be the winner in the future. We'll see. Open source codec race is, as far as I'm concerned, not over yet. Opus shows a ton of potential for audio related streaming/recording. Webm is supported by most browsers (except for Safari and IE). It's not a bad container, too. Compared to mp4, it's not that great, but I really can't tell the difference when watching something online anymore. So, the wars aren't over. Android with Google's backing will be, and is, a force to be reckoned with. However, I wouldn't cancel out the possibility of another open source and free alternative coming around the corner to change that. Perhaps Firefox OS, who knows?
- bdcravens 14y ago
  Pretty much every open source project that has succeeded has been the result of fat wallet corporate backing. I'm sure someone will offer a counterexample, but for the most part, hackers have to eat, and I haven't seen the "donate" model really work out. However, this is cool: it shows that open source isn't anti-commercial, it's pro-freedom.
mey 14y ago
Open source has won the enterprise. (Servers and platforms)
- taligent 14y ago
  Server operating system definitely. But Java and .Net are both effectively proprietary.
bitcartel 14y ago
I am guessing the original poster is referring to GNU/Linux beating Solaris to win the server market. EDIT: Regarding the desktop, just saw this: "Ubuntu will account for roughly 9% of all global PC shipments by 2014" http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2012/11/ubuntu-pc-sales-skyrocket-in-2011 http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2012/11/ubuntu-pc-sales-skyrocket...
- dfrey 14y ago
  pro-tip: Every VP of sales for every company will tell you that their market share will increase in the next year. Half of them will be wrong.
ZeroGravitas 14y ago
x264?
- shinratdr 14y ago
  I don't think "heavily used by pirates" really qualifies as winning anything, I would hand that claim to H.264.
SiVal 14y ago
And will HCJ (HTML5/CSS/JavaScript) ultimately win the mobile app platform war? Right now, native apps do a better job than Web apps, so they tend to be Plan A. You do one if the market justifies it. Plan B is a Web app for market segments too small to write a native app for. But if Android takes enough total market share with its motley crew of incompatible devices, it could push iOS into being just another of the small fragments, and mobile development could become dominated by HCJ. I would like to see Google use its leverage to actively, explicitly work toward making HCJ the Plan A for the great majority of mobile apps. If they reached the point where enough devices used HTML5/CSS as essentially the native UI, they could even make the Plan A for native apps be browserless HCJ on the client with an option to use compiled Go instead of JavaScript (behind the HTML/CSS UI) where it made sense. The Web app and the native app become nearly the same stack.
glomph 14y ago
LAME, FLAC and x264 all won in a sense.

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biomechanica 14y ago

I'm unsure I agree with it also. Android has Google's wallet to fall back on. That could be one reason why it's successful. Mobile devices fill a different "comfort", I think. Desktop OS's out there try to fill a broad spectrum of wants (and needs). I think Linus has been quoted as saying something like, "Desktop is a hard problem to solve", and that the Linux world hasn't even come close to solving it (yet). I know a lot of people who would otherwise be lost on a Windows machine be completely comfortable with iPhone or Android devices simply because it fills that niche. Computer illiterate people seem to gravitate to, not desktop, but mobile devices. So maybe Android is the new "desktop" for those types of users. Power users are now left to fill their own comforts. Maybe Linux powered desktops will eventually be the winner in the future. We'll see. Open source codec race is, as far as I'm concerned, not over yet. Opus shows a ton of potential for audio related streaming/recording. Webm is supported by most browsers (except for Safari and IE). It's not a bad container, too. Compared to mp4, it's not that great, but I really can't tell the difference when watching something online anymore. So, the wars aren't over. Android with Google's backing will be, and is, a force to be reckoned with. However, I wouldn't cancel out the possibility of another open source and free alternative coming around the corner to change that. Perhaps Firefox OS, who knows?

bdcravens 14y ago
Pretty much every open source project that has succeeded has been the result of fat wallet corporate backing. I'm sure someone will offer a counterexample, but for the most part, hackers have to eat, and I haven't seen the "donate" model really work out. However, this is cool: it shows that open source isn't anti-commercial, it's pro-freedom.

mey 14y ago

Open source has won the enterprise. (Servers and platforms)

taligent 14y ago
Server operating system definitely. But Java and .Net are both effectively proprietary.

bitcartel 14y ago

I am guessing the original poster is referring to GNU/Linux beating Solaris to win the server market. EDIT: Regarding the desktop, just saw this: "Ubuntu will account for roughly 9% of all global PC shipments by 2014" http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2012/11/ubuntu-pc-sales-skyrocket-in-2011 http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2012/11/ubuntu-pc-sales-skyrocket...

dfrey 14y ago
pro-tip: Every VP of sales for every company will tell you that their market share will increase in the next year. Half of them will be wrong.

ZeroGravitas 14y ago

x264?

shinratdr 14y ago
I don't think "heavily used by pirates" really qualifies as winning anything, I would hand that claim to H.264.

SiVal 14y ago

And will HCJ (HTML5/CSS/JavaScript) ultimately win the mobile app platform war? Right now, native apps do a better job than Web apps, so they tend to be Plan A. You do one if the market justifies it. Plan B is a Web app for market segments too small to write a native app for. But if Android takes enough total market share with its motley crew of incompatible devices, it could push iOS into being just another of the small fragments, and mobile development could become dominated by HCJ. I would like to see Google use its leverage to actively, explicitly work toward making HCJ the Plan A for the great majority of mobile apps. If they reached the point where enough devices used HTML5/CSS as essentially the native UI, they could even make the Plan A for native apps be browserless HCJ on the client with an option to use compiled Go instead of JavaScript (behind the HTML/CSS UI) where it made sense. The Web app and the native app become nearly the same stack.

glomph 14y ago

LAME, FLAC and x264 all won in a sense.