GNU/Linux Rising: Relevant News Items From March
- Dr. Roy Schestowitz
- 2014-03-19 19:12:45 UTC
- Modified: 2014-03-19 19:12:45 UTC
Desktop
I'm sure there will be objections from people who want to define "the year of the Linux desktop" differently. There will be those fans of GNU/Linux distributions like Ubuntu who will object that the Linux Desktop has not arrived until we're all running KDE and Gnome. I fear those folks have a while to wait. Others will object because there are still so many copies of Windows and new PCs are still shipping with Windows. That's a fair point, but I believe even those users are actually Linux Desktop users. As I argued last year, Linux has already won on the Windows desktop.
Eurocom sent out a news release that beginning today they will be offering choices of operating systems in their line of GPU-upgradeable, high-performance, professional laptops. Besides the high-end laptop line-up, they will also be offering Linux options for their lightweight notebooks.
If your office runs 24/7, you'll have to do the migration in stages. You may have to migrate servers one at a time, and migrate departments group by group. So, some work gets paused, but most of your business will run during the entire migration process.
Linux has a reputation for being designed for geeks only, but that’s old history. Many modern Linux distributions exceed the user-friendliness of XP, and they’re free to download. If you don’t like the feel of one, you can easily switch to another. What’s more, each Linux distribution comes loaded with useful software such as productivity suites, modern browsers like Chrome or Firefox, and photo and music management apps.
"This is a subject very near and dear to me," Linux Rants blogger Mike Stone told Linux Girl over a fresh Tequila Tux down at the blogosphere's Punchy Penguin Saloon.
Though Stone spent several years teaching "how to" computer courses for faculty and staff at a local university back in the 90s, "all those years barely prepared me for my greatest challenge: my own mother," he said.
To wit: After buying his parents a Windows 95 computer way back when, "I sat her down and showed her how to use the basic hardware," he explained. Yet "even after hours a day over the course of weeks, the computer was too much for her. Windows just had too many options, and she kept getting herself into places she couldn't get out of.
"I literally spent years looking for environments that would make her comfortable," Stone went on. "She went through the Windows OSes (95, 98, ME and finally XP) and some Linuxes -- Red Hat first and then a couple variations of Ubuntu. She always found ways to get herself into trouble."
I’ve been a computer user since around 1991, when we got our first PC, a Tandy from Radio Shack (almost $1,000), which came with Windows 3.1. Since then I’ve used each and every version of that operating system (OS), and still do. But at home and for personal use, it’s Linux for me. Why? Well that’s a question with many answers.
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The biggest driving factor for software developers to work together with open source is cost. It is much cheaper for them to cooperate through open source than it is to remain isolated with proprietary software, asserted Inktank VP of Product Management Neil Levine. "You can no longer rely on one particular vendor to provide everything you need with regard to technology."
After the Desktop
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QOOQ is a durable tablet designed for use in then kitchen. It's even got its very own Linux-based OS...
There was a time, back before smartphones and tablets, when most of us used, at most, only three operating systems.
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For months now David Herrmann has been working on a new project known as OpenWFD for open-source WiFi displays on Linux. OpenWFD is an open-source implementation of the WiFi Display Standard / Miracast. That work is now showing success and as part of that Herrmann has just announced Miraclecast as a component to providing open-source Miracast/WFD support on the Linux desktop.
Chromebook
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Chromebooks are making a big statement in the laptop world: NPD Group Inc. reported that Chromebook sales accounted for 21 percent of all notebook sales last year. For devices that are functionally little different from tablets — designed for basic tasks like checking email and web browsing — they're growing fast. Even as the tablet market continues to grow, capturing 22 percent of the entire personal computing market just last year, Chromebooks are giving people an alternative to rectangular touch screens.
Recent Techrights' Posts
- Banning Things Versus Teaching People the Reason/s to Shun/Boycott Those Things
- Prohibition has its limits
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- The Cyber Show Has "Exciting Guests Coming" and a Gemini Capsule
- "Site development is ongoing but now settling into a more stable form"
- GNU/Linux Measured at 10% in Liechtenstein This Month
- it seems like statCounter wrongly classified some GNU/Linux clients as Mac clients and is now issuing a correction
- Communicating With Freedom - Part III - Quibble Envisioned as a New and Easily Accessible Communications Platform Based on LibreJS
- the FSF really needs to become more active if not proactive in promoting those sorts of things
- Clownflare Says Majority of Web Traffic is Now Bots, But the Net is Another Story
- Bots are to Clownflare what lawsuits are to lawyers
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Sunday, June 07, 2026
- IRC logs for Sunday, June 07, 2026
- The Strikes at the European Patent Office Planned to Carry on for the Entire Year, Maybe Future Years as Well
- There's a cautionary tale somewhere
- Number of Patent Grants Has Plunged 23% Amid Strikes at the European Patent Office, Today There Are More Strikes (Strike Participation at Over 3,000, More Than Doubled Since Winter)
- There is a growing crisis at the European Patent Office
- E.E.E. Still Ongoing, the War on Copyleft/GPL Enables That
- It also imperils security.
- Gemini Links 07/06/2026: Lynx in the 'Modern' Web and 'Overcooked' (Plagiarised by LLM) Code
- Links for the day
- Links 07/06/2026: Java Needs Seawall, Egypt Blasted for Arbitrary Detention of Activists
- Links for the day
- SLAPP Censorship - Part 100 Out of 200: Interlude and Outline of the First Half, 3+ Months That Got Us Death Threats Connected to Brett Wilson LLP (and Cyber Attacks That Are Difficult to Attribute)
- This week we plan to have a good time
- Links 07/06/2026: NASA's Mars Maven Declared Dead, Telegram Founder Pavel Durov Bemoans Russia's Crackdown
- Links for the day
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Saturday, June 06, 2026
- IRC logs for Saturday, June 06, 2026
- Gemini Links 07/06/2026: How to Train Your Dragon (2010) and "Six Days of Play"
- Links for the day
- Links 06/06/2026: 'Epstein Problem' in Board of Directors of Microsoft, Surveillance Giant Google Under Legal Threats for Online Misuses
- Links for the day
- Software Freedom Takes a Lot More Than Coding
- some of the roles in the Free software community that don't receive (m)any grateful words
- Ubuntu is Losing to Other GNU/Linux Distros
- "Linux Mint"
- Old Articles Explaining That Patents - Especially Software Patents - Are Bad for Innovation
- We've omitted more than 50% of the articles we had gathered as candidates for inclusion
- European Patent Office (EPO) Crisis: Huge EPO Strikes, Profound Corruption, and Cocaine Use by Managers Tolerated
- These strikes won't be ending any time soon
- Why GNU and FSF Will Choose AV1 Over AV2 (It's More Widely Supported)
- for the foreseeable future they'll stick with AV1
- Mass Layoffs (RAs) and PIPs (Excuses to Sack) at IBM: Insiders Tell No Relation to Actual Performance
- If many thousands are impacted by this, then certainly it is newsworthy
- Links 06/06/2026: LinkedIn Infested With Spies, Ethernet WiFi Router On Pi Pico 2W
- Links for the day
- 25 Years With PalmOS
- That my Palm PDA still works in 2026 (not in mint condition but close to that) says a lot about the "build quality" of gadgets 20+ years ago
- Why We Dumped Online Shopping (Groceries)
- subsidies kept the "online" stuff artificially cheap
- Microsoft Fell to All-Time Low in Monaco Last Month
- So says statCounter anyway
- Lawsuits That Don't Work
- Not as expected anyway
- SLAPP Censorship - Part 99 Out of 200: Graveley and Garrett Seem to Have Crashed Brett Wilson LLP (Worse Than Taking Russian Oligarchs as SLAPP Clients)
- a state of disarray
- Microsoft Has Spent Months Preparing Lists of People to Cull in Massive Wave of Layoffs (Allegedly Start of July)
- There is some consensus that we're weeks away from mega-layoffs at Microsoft
- Gemini Links 06/06/2026: "Competing" With LLMs and "Automation of Any Kind"
- Links for the day
- Links 06/06/2026: 'Linux' Foundation Openwashing Slop on Microsoft's Payroll, Ukraine Wants Permanent Ceasefire With Russia
- Links for the day
- 50% of the 'Gains' Made by "Quantum" Hype Already Evaporated
- "It was all hype about quantum nonsense. Heading back to reality now. Expect sub-$220 after earnings release next month."
- Heap of Trash Online, Not Just the Fault of LLM Slop But Enabled by Slop
- Google News has just promoted a pair of prolific slopfarms
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Friday, June 05, 2026
- IRC logs for Friday, June 05, 2026