Gservo
3rd February 2003, 02:35 AM
I was not the only one disapointed at the Linux Expo
We promised in our coverage of LinuxWorld to follow up on the companies that were missing in action. Among the missing were Mandrake, Lindows and KDE. There was also one big company that everybody knows that wasn't there but should have been – but we'll leave that for last.
Mandrake
Let's start with Mandrake. As we all know Mandrake has fallen on some difficult times financially and is in the process of restructuring. Mandrake is one of the best distros for Linux newbies and it would be a crying shame if it went out of business. So we hope that the restructuring succeeds and that the company recovers.
Based on what we heard from Mandrake, we're optimistic about the company's chances. Kadjo N'Doua of Mandrake told us that "For this year, we've chosen to focus on the Paris show. We intend to participate in the next US LinuxWorld shows." N'Doua went on to say that Mandrake had just released the "...second beta of Mandrake Linux 9.1" and that the company's "focus now is to provide users with the best Mandrake ever."
So keep your fingers crossed, Mandrake users! Let's all hope that things turn out well for this prominent distro. The Linux community needs Mandrake to succeed over the long haul.
KDE
The absence of KDE left a gaping hole when it came to desktop issues at the show. Many people were surprised that the Gnome folks were there but that KDE wasn't. We tracked down some of the KDE people to get the inside scoop about why they missed the show.
We talked in email with George Staikos and Crisitian Tibirna of KDE. Both said that funding played a significant role in KDE's decision to stay away. Tibirna also told us that it is sometimes difficult for KDE volunteers to attend shows because "most of us are employed full time in jobs strictly unrelated to KDE and/or we are students too. Finding time for such time-wasting enterprises isn't always easy."
Staikos said that KDE had been in touch with the LinuxWorld Expo folks and that they "...told us that we must pay for a booth...$1200 + $1500 per IP address. This is quite beyond our budget, but we...decided to go and just not have a net connection."
But, despite the initial decision to go, KDE ultimately still didn't attend. It seems that there was a bit of keystone cops action happening inside of KDE – one person who was scheduled to attend bowed out and then George also had to bow out because of work concerns (he has a full-time position outside of KDE).
Staikos also told us that he is "...trying to take action to make sure this never happens again." Let's hope that he, and the rest of the KDE folks, are able to do just that. KDE is too important to the Linux community for it not to have a visible presence at such important events.
The folks running LinuxWorld Expo would also do well to come up with some kind of cheaper net connection arrangement for non-profit orgs like KDE. Seems to me that bilking them for $1200 for a net connection is more than a little over the top. And the absence of groups like KDE undermines the credibility of the show itself. So I hope the LWE folks read this and work out some kind of arrangement with KDE for the next show.
The other clear lesson that comes from KDE's absence at the show seems to be that it suffers from a visible lack of manpower in North America. Given all of the people that use KDE as their desktop, this seems sad to me.
I hope more folks will get involved with the KDE effort and help them out. If you are a developer or marketing person or if you are just someone who wants to pitch in, you might want to contact KDE to volunteer your time and services.
Lindows & Xandros
Lindows
Given the widespread curiousity felt by many desktop users about Lindows, it perplexed us that Lindows wasn't at the show. Lindows has attracted so much attention and has become such an annoying thorn in Microsoft's side in some ways that it was somewhat shocking that Microsoft was at the show but Lindows was not. So what gives?
Kevin Carmony, President of Lindows.com, said that "LinuxWorld isn't the best targeted show for our market." Carmony feels that "Linux World has traditionally been more about servers, development, and for the more technical crowd" and that Lindows is "more for the end user and mass market consumer."
Not to worry though, Carmony says that Lindows was at "...COMDEX and CES, where you found very few Linux companies. These shows are more our target audience." Carmony also confirms that the company will be attending the Desktop Linux Summit (http://desktoplinuxsummit.org) as well.
Xandros
Xandros was also a no-show at LinuxWorld. This puzzled us since they have a brand new release just out and since Suse was touting their own product with Windows compatibility. It seemed odd to us that Xandros would let Suse have the spotlight in that sense.
Steve Harris of Xandros told us that several Xandros staffers "...attended the NY LWE, and we held a number of fruitful meetings and discussions. We regret that timing issues prevented us from exhibiting." On our end, we regret not bumping into Steve or any of the other Xandros folks. It would have been nice to chat with them. Steve went on to say that Xandros expected "...to be a presence at future LWE and other Linux forums." We think that's a good move on the part of Xandros and we look forward to seeing them in action at future shows.
Apple
And last, but certainly not least, is Apple. My excellent and nearly omniscient (when it comes to all things Apple) colleague Matthew Rothenberg, mentioned this issue in an email earlier today. And it got me thinking. Why should Apple go to a Linux show? Well if you think about it, an alliance between Apple and the LinuxWorld makes all the sense in the world.
Both platforms, Apple and Linux, have a tiny percentage of desktops. Both are competing head to head with Microsoft and all of Microsoft's billions in resources. And, given the Unix underpinnings of Mac OS 10x, there's a natural kinship between Apple and Linux.
And many of the great applications available for Linux can and should be utlitized by Apple. For example, when we are at the show the OpenOffice.org folks mentioned a port of OO for Mac OS 10. We thought it was a terrific idea and Apple should be doing everything in its power to support such an effort. More than that Apple should be making every possible effort to reach out to the Linux community and make sure the lines of communication are open.
So why wasn't Apple at the show? I don't know. But I do know that Microsoft was there. And that alone should be a prime reason for Apple to get its rear end in gear and start having a presence at Linux events whenever and wherever they are. Will Apple smarten up and start engaging in some bold thinking? That remains to be seen but if I were a marketing executive at Apple, I'd make sure that I was at the next show.
We promised in our coverage of LinuxWorld to follow up on the companies that were missing in action. Among the missing were Mandrake, Lindows and KDE. There was also one big company that everybody knows that wasn't there but should have been – but we'll leave that for last.
Mandrake
Let's start with Mandrake. As we all know Mandrake has fallen on some difficult times financially and is in the process of restructuring. Mandrake is one of the best distros for Linux newbies and it would be a crying shame if it went out of business. So we hope that the restructuring succeeds and that the company recovers.
Based on what we heard from Mandrake, we're optimistic about the company's chances. Kadjo N'Doua of Mandrake told us that "For this year, we've chosen to focus on the Paris show. We intend to participate in the next US LinuxWorld shows." N'Doua went on to say that Mandrake had just released the "...second beta of Mandrake Linux 9.1" and that the company's "focus now is to provide users with the best Mandrake ever."
So keep your fingers crossed, Mandrake users! Let's all hope that things turn out well for this prominent distro. The Linux community needs Mandrake to succeed over the long haul.
KDE
The absence of KDE left a gaping hole when it came to desktop issues at the show. Many people were surprised that the Gnome folks were there but that KDE wasn't. We tracked down some of the KDE people to get the inside scoop about why they missed the show.
We talked in email with George Staikos and Crisitian Tibirna of KDE. Both said that funding played a significant role in KDE's decision to stay away. Tibirna also told us that it is sometimes difficult for KDE volunteers to attend shows because "most of us are employed full time in jobs strictly unrelated to KDE and/or we are students too. Finding time for such time-wasting enterprises isn't always easy."
Staikos said that KDE had been in touch with the LinuxWorld Expo folks and that they "...told us that we must pay for a booth...$1200 + $1500 per IP address. This is quite beyond our budget, but we...decided to go and just not have a net connection."
But, despite the initial decision to go, KDE ultimately still didn't attend. It seems that there was a bit of keystone cops action happening inside of KDE – one person who was scheduled to attend bowed out and then George also had to bow out because of work concerns (he has a full-time position outside of KDE).
Staikos also told us that he is "...trying to take action to make sure this never happens again." Let's hope that he, and the rest of the KDE folks, are able to do just that. KDE is too important to the Linux community for it not to have a visible presence at such important events.
The folks running LinuxWorld Expo would also do well to come up with some kind of cheaper net connection arrangement for non-profit orgs like KDE. Seems to me that bilking them for $1200 for a net connection is more than a little over the top. And the absence of groups like KDE undermines the credibility of the show itself. So I hope the LWE folks read this and work out some kind of arrangement with KDE for the next show.
The other clear lesson that comes from KDE's absence at the show seems to be that it suffers from a visible lack of manpower in North America. Given all of the people that use KDE as their desktop, this seems sad to me.
I hope more folks will get involved with the KDE effort and help them out. If you are a developer or marketing person or if you are just someone who wants to pitch in, you might want to contact KDE to volunteer your time and services.
Lindows & Xandros
Lindows
Given the widespread curiousity felt by many desktop users about Lindows, it perplexed us that Lindows wasn't at the show. Lindows has attracted so much attention and has become such an annoying thorn in Microsoft's side in some ways that it was somewhat shocking that Microsoft was at the show but Lindows was not. So what gives?
Kevin Carmony, President of Lindows.com, said that "LinuxWorld isn't the best targeted show for our market." Carmony feels that "Linux World has traditionally been more about servers, development, and for the more technical crowd" and that Lindows is "more for the end user and mass market consumer."
Not to worry though, Carmony says that Lindows was at "...COMDEX and CES, where you found very few Linux companies. These shows are more our target audience." Carmony also confirms that the company will be attending the Desktop Linux Summit (http://desktoplinuxsummit.org) as well.
Xandros
Xandros was also a no-show at LinuxWorld. This puzzled us since they have a brand new release just out and since Suse was touting their own product with Windows compatibility. It seemed odd to us that Xandros would let Suse have the spotlight in that sense.
Steve Harris of Xandros told us that several Xandros staffers "...attended the NY LWE, and we held a number of fruitful meetings and discussions. We regret that timing issues prevented us from exhibiting." On our end, we regret not bumping into Steve or any of the other Xandros folks. It would have been nice to chat with them. Steve went on to say that Xandros expected "...to be a presence at future LWE and other Linux forums." We think that's a good move on the part of Xandros and we look forward to seeing them in action at future shows.
Apple
And last, but certainly not least, is Apple. My excellent and nearly omniscient (when it comes to all things Apple) colleague Matthew Rothenberg, mentioned this issue in an email earlier today. And it got me thinking. Why should Apple go to a Linux show? Well if you think about it, an alliance between Apple and the LinuxWorld makes all the sense in the world.
Both platforms, Apple and Linux, have a tiny percentage of desktops. Both are competing head to head with Microsoft and all of Microsoft's billions in resources. And, given the Unix underpinnings of Mac OS 10x, there's a natural kinship between Apple and Linux.
And many of the great applications available for Linux can and should be utlitized by Apple. For example, when we are at the show the OpenOffice.org folks mentioned a port of OO for Mac OS 10. We thought it was a terrific idea and Apple should be doing everything in its power to support such an effort. More than that Apple should be making every possible effort to reach out to the Linux community and make sure the lines of communication are open.
So why wasn't Apple at the show? I don't know. But I do know that Microsoft was there. And that alone should be a prime reason for Apple to get its rear end in gear and start having a presence at Linux events whenever and wherever they are. Will Apple smarten up and start engaging in some bold thinking? That remains to be seen but if I were a marketing executive at Apple, I'd make sure that I was at the next show.