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
- The Register MS Has Just Published Slop Spam for NVIDIA and HP, It Says "AI" 43 Times
- As usual, The Register MS ought to be ashamed of itself for participating in it
- The Slop Debt (Trillions of Dollars, Money That Does Not Exist) is Causing the Collapse of GAFAM et al
- This slop hype will end up like "metaverse", except "metaverse" never ended up justifying trillions of dollars in "investment"
- Social Control Media is the Opposite of Information
- That says a lot about social control media
- Lack of Empathy Rampant in the Sector
- Sociopaths are sociopaths. They cannot help themselves
- Before the "Big Tech" (That Almost Everybody is Forced to Use) Was Controlled by Men Who Hate Women
- Such rejection and even hatred of women qualifies/enshrines oneself as an "incel"- a dangerous and violent online cult
- Enshittification More Than a Century Ago
- Is enshittification more than a century old?
- GNU in 1991 (35 Years Ago): Compiler and Lots More Ready, Linux Now Becoming 'Vibe Heap' (Slop Replaces Real Code)
- Without curbs in place, many Linux developers will flee
- SLAPP Censorship - Part 147 Out of 200: The SLAPP Series is 'Slow' Because Timing Matters
- It is important to stress that after this series is finished there will be many more series, with some of them showing raw evidence of what we've been illuminating and telling
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- Gemini Links 12/08/2026: Losing a Child, "The OpenWeb Needs Diversity", and Gmail Woes
- Links for the day
- Voluntary' Layoffs and 'Proper' Layoffs at IBM This Year
- When will IBM management confess that 15% of staff is already marked for potential removal?
- Links 12/08/2026: Trouble in Proprietary Chaffbot Company 'Open' 'AI' and Slop "Investors Are Suddenly Quaking in Their Boots"
- Links for the day
- Daniel Pocock in National News in Australia the Day of the Election
- "Posted 20m ago" (Thursday in Australia), it's timed nicely to help illuminate Pocock and give him last-minute exposure
- Simpler Means More Reliable
- The simple old way of local storage and local backups is still the best
- Clownflare and statCounter See GNU/Linux at ~8% in Norway
- Norway has long championed GNU/Linux compared to the rest of Europe
- Clacton manifesto: Reform UK hacking, leaks, raw sewage & 8GB Swiss Archive
- Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
- statCounter Today: ChromeOS + GNU/Linux Measured at 10.98% Globally (Desktops and Laptops)
- Clownflare does not quite refute this
- The Register MS Has Just Published Fake Article About Replacing Linux With Proprietary Google System, "Sponsored by ASUS."
- All of those things are proprietary GAFAMware
- Links 12/08/2026: "X’s Advertising Business Continues to Tank", "Stop Feeding the Billionaires"
- Links for the day
- In Defence of Hoarding CDs, More So When Digital Restrictions (DRM) Come to More 'Content' and Even Offline/Physical Media Won't Work When Some Remote Server Says "No" (or Goes Offline)
- made to serve and entertain owners, not to allow companies like Sony and Microsoft subjugate owners
- Clownflare: In Finland, Birthplace of Linux Kernel, GNU/Linux Now Bigger Than Apple's MacOS
- It's not just in Finland where we see such trends
- More Mass Layoffs Due to Monumental Debt Excused as "Investment" (in Slop)
- They're maxing up the private debt and their country is already insolvent
- METRO Interviews Daniel Pocock a Day Before Election
- The article is behind a wall that blocks people who block ads
- Company-Wide 'Reorg' ('Redundancies') at IBM, Mark October 1st 2026 in the Calendar
- Is Oct 1 the new Apr 1?
- Even ZDNet Accepts That "Market Share" of GNU/Linux May Have Doubled on Desktops and Laptops
- GNU/Linux is definitely growing, and quite quickly in fact
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, August 11, 2026
- IRC logs for Tuesday, August 11, 2026
- Microsoft Layoffs and Shutdowns Continue This August, Morale Low, Employees Set Up Giant Inflatable Rat to Protest Against CEO
- nothing demonstrates their anger better than what they did to the CEO
- Gemini Links 12/08/2026: Sophomore Slump, Mandatory Phone Addiction, and Vintage Web Game Gallery
- Links for the day
- Summer Layoffs and 'Redundancies' (Cost-Cutting) at Microsoft and IBM
- IBM is merely buying its revenue - an unsustainable strategy that aims to hide the company's rapid decline
- Links 11/08/2026: Tensions South of China and Stingy "YouTube Doubles the Eligibility Requirements" (to Get Paid)
- Links for the day
- The Independent (UK) Today: "Independent candidate Daniel Pocock is concerned about media issues."
- Let's see what results say around Friday
- Gemini Links 11/08/2026: Stargate, Stargazer, Air-gapped Environments, and SystemVerilog Simulator
- Links for the day
- The Slop ('Linux') Foundation Celebrates 35 'Linux' Years a Week After GNU/Linux Turns 43
- they'll keep on trying to change history
- Keumars Afifi-Sabet Produces Useful, Informative Coverage Regarding Privacy
- And it's good for Richard Stallman
- Confirmed: Microsoft Layoffs in August 2026, Entire Operations Shut Down Too
- Microsoft is just bleeding
- Paying With Cash in 2026
- Cash isn't going away. Not any time soon.
- Blocking Tor Is Not a Solution, It's Paranoia
- Tor is not a crime
- Oligarchs and Their Footsoldiers Are Most Enthusiastically Loud About the Things They're Attacking
- Like "Microsoft loves Linux"
- FOSSY (SFC) Platforming GAFAM, Sells Endorsement
- Houston, we have a problem here
- Not Allowing Misogyny and Misogynists to Run the World
- We stand with (and for) equality, justice, and freedom
- "SPONSORED EXPLAINER" at The Register MS is Just More SPAM "Sponsored by HPE."
- This is a great example of crap 'journalism'
- IBM Won't Hire (or Hardly Hire) This Year
- IBM is bluffing with buzzwords while shrinking out of existence and reducing salaries
- SLAPP Censorship - Part 146 Out of 200: An Industry of Plagiarism, 'Normalised'
- they pursue personal enrichment by stealing from Free software developers
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Monday, August 10, 2026
- IRC logs for Monday, August 10, 2026
- 5.1k Capsules Known to Lupa, Gemini Protocol Crawler
- If no limits (e.g. 10k max per capsule) were imposed on crawling, there would likely be millions of pages in the database
- Gemini Links 11/08/2026: Waking Up Earlier, Whining About LLMs as Destructive Plagiarism
- Links for the day
- Links 11/08/2026: "The Enemy Is the Platform" and 'Vibe' 'Coding' Shown to be Little But Plagiarism
- Links for the day
- IBM's Age Discrimination Leads Workers to Contemplate Suicide While the CEO Becomes Billionaire for Lying to the Press and Faking Performance (Fraudulent Accounting)
- IBM avoids issuing WARM notices
- If Your Software Project Welcomes Bots, Then All You'll Have Left at the End Is Bots (Same for Sites Which Permit LLM Slop; They End up as Slopfarms and No Human Wants to Contribute Anymore)
- A "slippery slop."
- Clownflare Affirms Disturbing Trend of Web Monoculture (Which Extents to Clownflare Itself)
- Clownflare itself is another layer of the same problem
- The Open Web Is Not Coming Back
- the open Web going out of control
- Tell Me Something I Don't Know
- Those who have a stake in the secrecy would do anything to maintain secrecy
- Gemini Links 10/08/2026: Recollections and Washing Machine That Only Last a Few Years
- Links for the day
- Claims of Mass Layoffs at IBM (in Finance)
- IBM tries hard to maintain an illusion of normality - to the point of viciously censoring critics and whistleblowers.
- The Slop Bubble (Pyramid Scheme) is Becoming Bigger and Everyone Should be Terrified (Its Implosion Will Cause More Damage)
- there's no plan for a turnaround
- Microsoft and Apple Lose Ground to GNU/Linux in the United States
- This contributes a lot to the international curve
- Escaping Ads
- When users do not want ads, then no ads should show up, period
- For Second Year in a Row Software Freedom Conservancy (SFC) Loses Money (Over $3,000,000 Lost in 2 Years), Bradley M Kuhn Steps Down as Treasurer
- lost almost $600,000 last year
- Microsoft/GAFAM Operating at a Loss
- Microsoft has financial problems
- Nigel Farage crisis: Taylor Swift & Jeffrey Epstein both shunned cryptocurrency bosses
- Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
- statCounter Now Sees GNU/Linux "Market Share Worldwide" at 9.21%, Soon 10%
- If this data is more or less accurate, it's time for panic at Microsoft
- Rumours of Impending Mass Layoffs in IBM's Yorktown Office, Impacting the LLM (Slop) Staff
- Bubbles never last forever, hence their name
- Links 10/08/2026: "Long COVID Linked to Lasting Damage in The Brain's Dopamine System", Microsoft’s Weather App Uses Over 1,000 Megabytes of RAM
- Links for the day
- Software Freedom Conservancy (SFC) Does Not Support Women, It Imitates Authentic Organisations, Embraces Misogynists, Then Projects
- They try to monetise for personal gain at the expense of unpaid volunteers
- When You're Evil and You're Publicly Attacking Something, That Something Will Become More Popular
- when an oppressor becomes openly oppressive and does anything to squash/censor critics, the outcome will typically be detrimental to the oppressor
- Links 10/08/2026: "Against Oligarch" and "The Invisible Women"
- Links for the day
- Social Control Media Deathwatch: After Nearly a Million Posts Sent EchoFeed Shuts Down
- EchoFeed is hardly unique
- When the LLM Chatbots Industry (Trillions in the Red) Quits Paying the Media for FOMO
- fear of missing out, or FOMO for short
- Microsoft Killing Morale
- branding the process “inhumane” and “demoralizing”
- Google's "AI Overview" as Proprietary Censorship Engine and Gatekeeper
- People do not choose to use this, Google is just shoving that in people's faces, encouraging laziness and misinformation
- SLAPP Censorship - Part 145 Out of 200: They Tried Hard to Hide the Fact Their Client Had Been Sued, Twice Even
- A month ago Brett Wilson LLP tried to take my wife "to the side" (in effect isolated) to make her an offer
- statCounter: GNU/Linux Up to 8.95% Globally
- So the estimates are being "corrected" upwards, not downwards
- Explaining How Someone Attempted to Cancel RMS This Year (and Failed)
- The process itself involved debunking some falsehoods
- Microsoft's "XBOX Ranks Last", IBM is Headed for Extinction
- If Microsoft cannot dominate its own "home turf", what prospects are there elsewhere?
- DebConf6 fight denied by Google artificial intelligence
- Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
- Over at Tux Machines...
- GNU/Linux news for the past day
- IRC Proceedings: Sunday, August 09, 2026
- IRC logs for Sunday, August 09, 2026
- Gemini Links 10/08/2026: A Mild Monday, Sleepy Saturday, OUYA, and Moving to GNU/Linux
- Links for the day