“In addition to fleshing out his LWCE coverage, Joe looks at
the future of Linux desktops in the age of the GNOME Foundation and
at Inprise’s and IBM’s plans for Java on Linux….“
“I don’t fault Michael Dell for coming to LWCE and trying to
sell his computers. Everyone was trying to sell something, even if
it was just the notion that free software is a better choice than
proprietary. But I’m not convinced he did a good job of selling
Dell. Certainly when I read the full page ad Dell ran in the
business section of the San Jose Mercury News two days after his
keynote, an ad which plainly states “Dell recommends Windows 2000
Professional for business,” it triggered rolling echoes of
cognitive dissonance….”
“The problem is that I don’t want to see a single desktop
environment for Linux. I think having KDE and GNOME competing for
users is a win-win-win situation. KDE gets better, GNOME gets
better, and all users benefit. And of course, it goes without
saying that many Linux users prefer not to use either one. That is
the way it should be. There should always be choice. The idea that
the GNOME Foundation wants to become the Linux (and Unix) desktop
is one that needs rethinking. It also represents another point of
contention between Red Hat and SuSE, and thus another opportunity
to fragment Linux in bad ways.”