评论：Linux基金会和Linux的未来
时间：2008-04-14 来源：linux论坛
来源：linux.com 作者：Joe Barr
首先，我想说，我是带着矛盾的心情结束了两天的Linux基金会合作峰会的，因为我不得不感激这些大企业和linux基金会，他们对Linux的发展做出了这么多的贡献，比如赞助Linus Torvarlds能够专职作为Linux世界的领袖等。但是同时，我也为Linux基金会的光环感到担忧。
本次大会是由IBM赞助的，可以说，它也是整个Linux世界的最大赞助商。而且在Linux基金会的会员名单上的成员都是来自各大IT巨头，或者即将成为IT的公司，比如Adobe，他们最近刚刚加入Linux基金会，你可以在Linux基金会的官方网站上找到完整的名单。
这些大公司为开源事业在花钱，而且还将继续持续下去，对Linux和开源软件事业是一件好事，帮助了他们的发展，同样使用Linux和开源软件的人也是受益者。正如在对Linux基金会的执行董事Jim Zenmin的采访中提到的，目前的linux基金会的重点是大规模的、需求复杂的Linux用户；那些为Linux做开发的个人开发者和个人用户，还有成千上万的部署了开源软件和Linux的中小企业，都不是他们目前的工作重点。
本次峰会的重点也是非常显著的体现了这点，本次会议的议题不是服务器就是安全，或者就是高性能计算，没有一个是Linux桌面等个人用户比较关心的相关话题。
很显然，大公司赞助了那些开发者，给他们发工资，赞助他们全球旅行进行开发交流等等，那么给他们一个发言的机会那是很符合常理的。世道就是这样，拿人家的手短，明显的Linux内核和主要应用程序的开发人员已经受到了大企业的影响，过分的看重了企业服务器平台Linux和开源软件的发展，而这些将大大伤害那些Linux桌面用户，他们需要一个Linux桌面系统，而不是服务器平台。
从目前的Linux基金会的成员开看，上述情况暂时不会出现。公司事宜盈利为目的的。IBM在Lnux桌面市场繁荣的时候是不会挣多少的，但是Linux服务器市场的繁荣可以给他带来大把的票子。HP和Dell则是在和微软的合作，在桌面用户平台售出大量的桌面windows系统，他们也挣的非常多，所以目前来看，Linux想要在桌面市场有所突破看来是很难了。
但是，目前Linux基金会的成员中也有小部分在做Linux桌面的市场工作，但是他们更多的是在廉价笔记本电脑和花里胡哨的发行版领域里奔波，但是挣的也就是服务器厂商们的零头了。
I came away from the second annual Linux Foundation Collaboration Summit with mixed feelings. I mean, it's hard not to support the group that pays Linus Torvalds to spend his time continuing to lead the poster-boy project for free and open source software. But at the same time, those golden chains are my biggest concern about the Linux Foundation.
IBM sponsored the event, and they are the biggest supporter of Linux in the corporate world. The foundation membership is made up of almost all the large and and many of wanna-be-large IT firms around the globe -- including Adobe, which is one of the foundation's newest members. You can find a complete list of members on the foundation website.
There is no doubt that the time and money the corporate world has spent -- and keeps spending -- to support Linux development has been beneficial to Linux, and therefore to all of us who use the platform. When world-class IT gurus like Torvalds are freed from the demands of a day job not directly related to kernel issues, it's a good thing for all of us. Likewise work on projects like the LSB, which can smooth a few rough edges keeping some from adoption. But still, I worry about the price.
As pointed out in Robin Miller's video interview with Linux Foundation Executive Director Jim Zemlin, the Linux Foundation at present is focused on a core group of large, sophisticated Linux users, not on the needs of individual users and developers or the thousands of small-to-medium-sized companies using or developing software for Linux. Zemlin also notes that the great thing about open source is that anyone who wants to can start their own organization or foundation, and suggests that if the Linux Foundation is not right for some, they should do just that. While Zemlin's comments helped to clarify the Linux Foundation's immediate goals and practices, it didn't really quiet my discomfort.
Before I learned that the press was not welcome in any of the working-meetings at the summit on days 2 and 3, I saw and heard rumblings of discontent from more than one ordinary Linux desktop user. One example: a top-ten list of inhibitors to Linux adoption, created by a committee of foundation members, contained nothing at all relating to desktop usage. Nothing. Everything on the list was about back-room usage. Servers. Big iron.
Wi-fi drivers were mentioned in passing, but not addressed as an action item. Jittery notebook keyboards/track pad/sundry rodents weren't mentioned at all. Those two items are certainly on my top-ten list of inhibitors to adoption, but not on theirs.
It's only natural that the people who are paying developers hard cash and paying kernel folks' travel and documentation and system administration costs want to have a say in what those kernel folk and application developers are focusing on. This is the way things are supposed to work. The problem is, or may become, that the close relationship between core Linux developers and large IT firms may overshadow the wants and needs of those who want Linux to become the best desktop platform, not just the best server platform.
With the current makeup of the Linux Foundation membership, that may never happen. The money people are concerned about money. IBM won't make more money if Linux does well on the desktop, but they will if it does better on big iron. HP and Dell make so much money from selling Windows on desktops that they have precious little motivation to work harder to see Linux grow in that space. That's fine, too.
That is, that's fine unless the wants and desires of IBM, HP, Dell -- substitute any other members names for any of those three, I use them out of familiarity, not to pick on them -- so totally dominate the time and the efforts of free software developers that Linux never gets to the next level as a desktop platform. Money talks. And when Linux Foundation money says do this, and this means backroom stuff, then the desktop will continue to get short shrift.
Now, there are firms interested in seeing Linux do well on the desktop. But by and large they are the smaller firms among the foundation's membership. They are trying to make a go with small, cheap laptops or eye-pleasing desktop distributions. And they don't bring the same money to the table that the big boys do.
What's the answer to this dilemma? I don't know. But I do worry over it. So does Paul Elliott, a longtime member and officer of the Austin Linux Users Group. He read about the summit in the local paper, and tried to attend. Unfortunately, he showed up on the second day and attempted to register as a journalist, when the press was no longer welcome in the talks and workshops. He blogged about his unhappiness with the experience on the LUG's website.
It doesn't make good business sense to have reporters sniffing around business meetings. I won't argue with that. To a corporation, information needs to be sanitized, not free. PR handlers need to be present when management speaks to the press. This is life in the corporate world. I don't have a problem with that, except when that same lack of transparency begins to enter the FOSS world, as it seems to have done at this Linux event. It doesn't belong here. It's not part of our culture, or our community. I worry about what we're giving up for the corporate dole.
I hope that the Linux Foundation's plans to broaden the membership base and to address the concerns of individual developers and users, as mentioned in the Zemlin interview, come to fruition, and that as they do they prove my worries to unfounded and unnecessary.
[ 本帖最后由 Send_linux 于 2008-4-14 12:01 编辑 ]
首先，我想说，我是带着矛盾的心情结束了两天的Linux基金会合作峰会的，因为我不得不感激这些大企业和linux基金会，他们对Linux的发展做出了这么多的贡献，比如赞助Linus Torvarlds能够专职作为Linux世界的领袖等。但是同时，我也为Linux基金会的光环感到担忧。
本次大会是由IBM赞助的，可以说，它也是整个Linux世界的最大赞助商。而且在Linux基金会的会员名单上的成员都是来自各大IT巨头，或者即将成为IT的公司，比如Adobe，他们最近刚刚加入Linux基金会，你可以在Linux基金会的官方网站上找到完整的名单。
这些大公司为开源事业在花钱，而且还将继续持续下去，对Linux和开源软件事业是一件好事，帮助了他们的发展，同样使用Linux和开源软件的人也是受益者。正如在对Linux基金会的执行董事Jim Zenmin的采访中提到的，目前的linux基金会的重点是大规模的、需求复杂的Linux用户；那些为Linux做开发的个人开发者和个人用户，还有成千上万的部署了开源软件和Linux的中小企业，都不是他们目前的工作重点。
本次峰会的重点也是非常显著的体现了这点，本次会议的议题不是服务器就是安全，或者就是高性能计算，没有一个是Linux桌面等个人用户比较关心的相关话题。
很显然，大公司赞助了那些开发者，给他们发工资，赞助他们全球旅行进行开发交流等等，那么给他们一个发言的机会那是很符合常理的。世道就是这样，拿人家的手短，明显的Linux内核和主要应用程序的开发人员已经受到了大企业的影响，过分的看重了企业服务器平台Linux和开源软件的发展，而这些将大大伤害那些Linux桌面用户，他们需要一个Linux桌面系统，而不是服务器平台。
从目前的Linux基金会的成员开看，上述情况暂时不会出现。公司事宜盈利为目的的。IBM在Lnux桌面市场繁荣的时候是不会挣多少的，但是Linux服务器市场的繁荣可以给他带来大把的票子。HP和Dell则是在和微软的合作，在桌面用户平台售出大量的桌面windows系统，他们也挣的非常多，所以目前来看，Linux想要在桌面市场有所突破看来是很难了。
但是，目前Linux基金会的成员中也有小部分在做Linux桌面的市场工作，但是他们更多的是在廉价笔记本电脑和花里胡哨的发行版领域里奔波，但是挣的也就是服务器厂商们的零头了。
I came away from the second annual Linux Foundation Collaboration Summit with mixed feelings. I mean, it's hard not to support the group that pays Linus Torvalds to spend his time continuing to lead the poster-boy project for free and open source software. But at the same time, those golden chains are my biggest concern about the Linux Foundation.
IBM sponsored the event, and they are the biggest supporter of Linux in the corporate world. The foundation membership is made up of almost all the large and and many of wanna-be-large IT firms around the globe -- including Adobe, which is one of the foundation's newest members. You can find a complete list of members on the foundation website.
There is no doubt that the time and money the corporate world has spent -- and keeps spending -- to support Linux development has been beneficial to Linux, and therefore to all of us who use the platform. When world-class IT gurus like Torvalds are freed from the demands of a day job not directly related to kernel issues, it's a good thing for all of us. Likewise work on projects like the LSB, which can smooth a few rough edges keeping some from adoption. But still, I worry about the price.
As pointed out in Robin Miller's video interview with Linux Foundation Executive Director Jim Zemlin, the Linux Foundation at present is focused on a core group of large, sophisticated Linux users, not on the needs of individual users and developers or the thousands of small-to-medium-sized companies using or developing software for Linux. Zemlin also notes that the great thing about open source is that anyone who wants to can start their own organization or foundation, and suggests that if the Linux Foundation is not right for some, they should do just that. While Zemlin's comments helped to clarify the Linux Foundation's immediate goals and practices, it didn't really quiet my discomfort.
Before I learned that the press was not welcome in any of the working-meetings at the summit on days 2 and 3, I saw and heard rumblings of discontent from more than one ordinary Linux desktop user. One example: a top-ten list of inhibitors to Linux adoption, created by a committee of foundation members, contained nothing at all relating to desktop usage. Nothing. Everything on the list was about back-room usage. Servers. Big iron.
Wi-fi drivers were mentioned in passing, but not addressed as an action item. Jittery notebook keyboards/track pad/sundry rodents weren't mentioned at all. Those two items are certainly on my top-ten list of inhibitors to adoption, but not on theirs.
It's only natural that the people who are paying developers hard cash and paying kernel folks' travel and documentation and system administration costs want to have a say in what those kernel folk and application developers are focusing on. This is the way things are supposed to work. The problem is, or may become, that the close relationship between core Linux developers and large IT firms may overshadow the wants and needs of those who want Linux to become the best desktop platform, not just the best server platform.
With the current makeup of the Linux Foundation membership, that may never happen. The money people are concerned about money. IBM won't make more money if Linux does well on the desktop, but they will if it does better on big iron. HP and Dell make so much money from selling Windows on desktops that they have precious little motivation to work harder to see Linux grow in that space. That's fine, too.
That is, that's fine unless the wants and desires of IBM, HP, Dell -- substitute any other members names for any of those three, I use them out of familiarity, not to pick on them -- so totally dominate the time and the efforts of free software developers that Linux never gets to the next level as a desktop platform. Money talks. And when Linux Foundation money says do this, and this means backroom stuff, then the desktop will continue to get short shrift.
Now, there are firms interested in seeing Linux do well on the desktop. But by and large they are the smaller firms among the foundation's membership. They are trying to make a go with small, cheap laptops or eye-pleasing desktop distributions. And they don't bring the same money to the table that the big boys do.
What's the answer to this dilemma? I don't know. But I do worry over it. So does Paul Elliott, a longtime member and officer of the Austin Linux Users Group. He read about the summit in the local paper, and tried to attend. Unfortunately, he showed up on the second day and attempted to register as a journalist, when the press was no longer welcome in the talks and workshops. He blogged about his unhappiness with the experience on the LUG's website.
It doesn't make good business sense to have reporters sniffing around business meetings. I won't argue with that. To a corporation, information needs to be sanitized, not free. PR handlers need to be present when management speaks to the press. This is life in the corporate world. I don't have a problem with that, except when that same lack of transparency begins to enter the FOSS world, as it seems to have done at this Linux event. It doesn't belong here. It's not part of our culture, or our community. I worry about what we're giving up for the corporate dole.
I hope that the Linux Foundation's plans to broaden the membership base and to address the concerns of individual developers and users, as mentioned in the Zemlin interview, come to fruition, and that as they do they prove my worries to unfounded and unnecessary.
[ 本帖最后由 Send_linux 于 2008-4-14 12:01 编辑 ]
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