Quotes article from the Epoch Times, the Falun Gong paper. This may not the most credible source.
What would "China" dropping Microsoft windows mean? Surely not all Chinese companies stopping use, since that would be extremely disruptive. More likely a few ministries starting a program to try Linux.
Not that a scenario where possession of an install disk would be a crime doesn't appeal to me. The weight of the entire Chinese state might help the Linux desktop crack 10% usage but suspect I'll have to dream on.
Isn’t the linux desktop mostly a driver problem? If it is the case I would assume that given the number of chinese manufacturers, China could force them to release suitable drivers. The linux desktop would reach a critical mass that would make it hard for non chinese manufacturers to neglect it.
It would require more UI that there currently is. Even for simple things I often find myself stuck in front of a terminal, looking at the documentation to figure out how the damn thing works before I can even look for the right syntax.
As a 20-year Linux user, I must say that many points are valid, but yes, there appear to be at least as many FUD items on that list.
My pain points, when trying to build a HTPC:
- Proper video support (like GPU offloading or vblank syncing) is haphazard at best.
- Font management is a pain. Not just the antialiasing, but adding a custom font and making sure all apps can find it.
- Audio support is a mess; pulseaudio creates as much problems as it solves (for example last I checked, it did not support IEC958 passthrough over spdif).
- Bluetooth connectivity appears to be a desktop-environment thing, so good luck logging in with your BT keyboard.
- Zeroconf service configuration is archaic (for example, advertising a Samba print share so that local machines can find it, or advertising a DLNA media source). It requires hand-editing xml configuration files.
Still, for all its flaws, it still beats other commercial offerings in terms of productivity.
> It's picking up every issue on Linux and paints it as a disaster.
Every time I tried to use Linux on desktop, I stopped due to a dozen of issues from that list.
> There's no concept of drivers in Linux
In Windows ecosystem, you buy hardware, plug it in, install drivers, and it works. On modern Windows, often they downloaded automatically by Windows, and start without reboots.
I think the OP meant that Linux can't offer comparable UX. The drivers are compiled into the kernel.
On the source level, this is due to the lack of the ABI.
There is plenty of great Desktop Environments nowadays that can easily compete with the UX you are used to from Windows (KDE Plasma, Gnome 3, Deepin,...).
Most things just work out of the box even without installing drivers. Yes there is still some problems (e.g. Laptop WiFi / old or exotic hardware) but I stumbled upon them in Windows and OSX as well.
Every OS has issues but I prefer Linux for everything besides graphics and working on PDF because most of the times I find a solution I can implement myself without much hassle.
OSX on the other side is very closed in comparison but I don't bother because Photoshop and Acrobat run just fine and I don't need much more.
Windows is just spyware, a security threat to people with free minds. I totally welcome China to switch to Linux and probably this will bring our world to a path towards more free software (very ironically because the US always tries to appear as the "Sheriff of the free world").
The average user is not the average HN user; the latter can solve the minor issues they stumble upon, but not the former.
Would you buy a car where "most things work", if you had no mechanical skills?
I'm a hardcore Linux user, but even with that, I don't advocate it unless I know exactly the platform a given user is going to work on.
There are surely issues on any system, but in Windows/Mac there is the expectation of everything working out of the box, since there is more of a "package" ("box") culture.
In this sense, projects like the Dell XPS are certainly big steps forward (and even the XPS has at least one significant issue out of the box).
You are basically right but for me this is a bit different.
My family and friends like to come to me with their IT problems and it's easier for me to solve them if they use Linux.
The big problems with Mac/Windows can in many cases also not be solved by me, easily (e.g. Driver for XYZ doesn't work - on Windows this means searching another EXE that could work but if it doesn't you can exchange the device in question because my Latin is exhausted at that point).
Sure there is problems with every system - it just depends on what you do and how you use computers what problems are the most concerning ones I think.
> Every time I tried to use Linux on desktop, I stopped due to a dozen of issues from that list.
At this point in time, given how technical a site HN is, and how many people have success with linux, it looks very much like the problem might be you. I don't mean this to be nasty, but installing and customising linux now is a pretty trivial exercise.
> On modern Windows, often they downloaded automatically by Windows, and start without reboots.
On modern linux, they are usually already present on the system and it just works. You don't need the download stage for the vast majority of things. Nvidia Graphics cards are an obvious exception, but for the most part, this complaint is spurious.
This includes me. I successfully develop commercial-quality stuff for Linux servers, also embedded for ARM devices (using Debian kernel so far). But the desktop is different.
> usually already present on the system
The hardware is just too diverse. I have following USB devices plugged into my desktop right now. USB 3.0 DisplayLink monitor: proprietary protocol, still experimental support on Linux, chip vendor only supports Ubuntu, monitor vendor doesn’t support any. Logitech C920 web camera: microphone, auto focus, on-board h264 codec. Logitech G700s: a mouse with 7 extra buttons and horizontal scrolling. Microsoft LifeChat LX6000: 2 way USB audio, OS volume controls, a couple extra buttons. Also wireless adapter for xbox gamepad: 6 analog axes, many buttons, two vibration motors, two way audio.
More likely a few ministries starting a program to try Linux.
Worth noting that this is far from the first time China has done this. First there was the original Kylin OS, based on FreeBSD, then they created their own Linux distro called Red Flag OS, and now they have the new Kylin project which is Ubuntu based. Interesting to see how it plays out this time around.
> The irony of a nation state oft-associated with cyber-attacks on Western targets, both in the business and government spheres, blaming the U.S. hacking capability for the need to develop a custom OS is not lost on me.
What irony? I thought that by this point it was clear that nations all over the world are hacking each other; it doesn't seem that far-fetched to try and protect your nation from that. Whether that should be through a new custom built OS is a different ball of wax.
It's very clear that the next 30 years will be very different from the last 30 years. I doubt we'll ever come back to the same era of global trade anytime soon.
Trade will continue as before between all actors. What's going on is that great powers are wary of sourcing smart things that can be turned off or reprogrammed remotely (think OTA updates) from other great powers. So trade in these smart things is shakier. It was good before when we ignored the issue!
As more products become smart things, this will impact trade somewhat.
For the smaller countries, there's no change from the atomic era: they'll source their smart thing from their protector power. There's a lot of friction getting there though, as many of them defected and sourced from a cheaper alternative.
I really think that social media and the broader internet has accelerated the collapse of the old world order. The institutions that were owned or partly controlled by a small minority no longer have as much control over national narratives.
There will be a period of chaos as the old world and new world duke it out.
Except that we are heading toward 3 antagonistic blocks. A western democratic capitalist block. A Chino-Russian illiberal capitalist block, and an islamist theocratic block. With additional internal tensions within these blocks like in the good old days of the cold war.
Or we were too relaxed during the 2nd phase, until Russia annexed Crimea, Iran kept sponsoring their terrorist organisations, China started building military bases in the South China Sea to intimidate its neighbours and it's general secretary went on to hint at annexing Tawian by force. I'm not surprised that the current US administration is taking action against China. This should have started in 2014.
This level of one sidedness scares me. It's just as easy for a Russian/Chinese/Iranian/etc citizen to say the same about US.
I'd say it's easier, if you take into account the ludicrous number of military bases the US has all around the world, the constant involvement in one or more wars, the infinite sabre rattling with North Korea, the unconditional support for what ever the hell Israel decides to do.
I don't think US is more or less naturally inclined to be an international bully, but they have the capacity and actually do it on a scale no other country can since the USSR dissolved.
And definitely didn't station its own or NATO military forces and installations on the border with Russia and in Turkey in direct contravention of agreements with Russia.
No sir, they definitely didn't do that before Russia countered by doing the same.
Nope. We have always been at war with Eurasia. Move along citizen.
My country used to have a direct border with the USSR. We'd much rather have NATO defensive instalations and troops on our territory, rather than Russian tanks and little green men with guns. The last time that happened we had 50 years of communism, the USSR took away several parts of our territory, effectively plundered our country's resources and invaded neighbouring countries in order to "restore order".
I think this is just a positive side-effect for PRC (which is miles away from a "PR").
China is playing the exact same card that USA does. Microsoft (willingly or not) have been playing ball with the 3-letter-agencies (3LA) to keep vulnerabilities secret and to the 3LA's advantage. If USA is going to 'cry wolf' on Huawei, then it is fair game that RPC will 'cry wolf' on Microsoft (and/or Cisco, and/or Oracle, and/or pick-your-own-company).
For most normal people it doesn’t matter who initiated it. Neither of the 2 parties have much credibility. Between the NSA hacking revelations and the way China cracks down on its own people it doesn’t feel like anyone would take either side from a moral standpoint.
Oh, states will take sides out of interest: interest to make money, to get protection, to not become enemy via the “with me or against me ideology”. But not for any moral reason.
At worst, cynically, I think it's our spyware vs their. US companies and xEyes in general lost privacy credibility some time ago. Both gov't s are known and proven to spy using big companies.
And china isn't 1st here in issuing a ban, they are retaliating here.
Imagine putting RMS (Richard Stallman) in China. What do you think the authorities would think of him? Will software in China ever be free as in the definition made by Free Software Foundation?
From reading the article it seems it won't be a linux distribution. I also wonder if this will hit the consumer market or if it will just be a replacement for within the military.
Either way it will be interesting to see if they succeed in making it more secure considering that they don't have technical debt to worry about.
The real hacking threat is all those unlicensed copies of Microsoft Windows that never get updated + the fact of just how insecure Windows was until recently / somewhat remains + the 2x turnover lifetime of pc’s there vs here.
My first thought was will Microsoft even notice. If I look at my own business the only orders I get from China are from outposts of Western corporations. Software piracy is rampant there.
I wonder how they want to achieve this. It's not trivial to just re-build Windows or Linux from scratch, but from the article it sounds like that's exactly want they're planning to do.
Even with enough time, such a project requires highly skilled workers, and those are the ones that could also find good opportunities in the private sector (potentially outside China) with likely better compensation and less pressure. So I doubt they will find the best people for this job.
If this will be a flagship project of the goverment I suspect they won't have a problem attracting talent. Also I wouldn't be suprised if they would dump money on top talent
And Google seems to be able to pull it (Fushia). The only real objection I can think of is how you convince hardware manufacturers en masse to write 4-6 drivers when they only needed to write 1-3 before.
If this is true, it is acturally a good thing for us who live in China.
Currently, a lot of chinese websites, especially for goverment websits, are using outdated even non-standard technologies.It is really a pain in the ass if you are a Mac or Linux user.
Sounds like China is going to have a silent logistical nightmare. When going through the airport I noticed they were using Vista and windows app, going to take a while to port the rest of it over to their linux distro.
All networking gear and computing systems used for sensitive purposes need to be produced locally by each country. Or if they are going to be developed together then they need to be based on common open source components that are very well audited. That's the only sane approach to all of this. It's obvious that computing systems and networks can be used to steal data from and spy on all sorts of commercial and non-commercial matters and that matters a lot in negotiations between even friendly countries.
What all of these countries should be doing is organizing these sorts of open source frameworks for developing future tech because it's obvious that it can be done that way and that individual countries are incapable of producing these goods on their own in various corrupt authoritarian sorts of governments.
Except self-sufficiency in critical industries like food and fuel ARE prime examples of things that any sane country fights tooth and nail for even today. The US has been pushing for increased rice exports to South Korea and Japan for decades now, but they've always pushed back successfully with the argument that protecting their agricultural industry is a matter of national security. This is from two countries that literally depend on the US for their military defense, and are among the closest allies the US could ever hope to have.
Disagree. The net cost for the past year and the next two years that this 'war' is being played out, will be a large number. The net profit for either side, if measured across the board and not only mentioning we got X amount of dollars in import taxes, will be a large negative number. Things will change, both sides will become stronger om certain points, but the total game is a loss for all involved.
Hopefully not. A healthy competition is better than Microsoft monopoly. If China could spend billions of dollars on an open OS and make it compatible with major windows applications, it would be better for everyone. This is challenging because it involves huge amount engineering and testing effort, and Microsoft/US is likely to use restrictive patent/technical standards to contain it. But China is probably the only one with the ability and willingness to make it happen.
In the short term yes. In the long term, i'm not so sure. If no revolution take place in China, they might come out stronger in ~20 years.
[edit] Also this trade war is gold for the propaganda. While the wealthy/educated people don't buy it too much, it helps Xi and his government with the "mass", thus strenghtening his power.
US will get its head bitten off. China still does business with the rest of the planet. Trump's "us or them" at some point will lead the 'free world' to say a royal "screw you, we go with them".
I disagree with the way that Trump administration is handling things. Making more noise to cover the previously-made-noise is a downward spiral/slippery slope, and he's on it.
China (aka Chinese People) will not suffer, because they will just not. They won't feel the 'pain' of losing 20% of their income if that happens. People living in the USA on the other hand, they will feel a 20% drop much harder. It is a sprint for Trump administration, but a marathon for Xi's and Vlad's administration. I fear that we haven't seen the worse part yet.
The US with its own separate tech supply chain and rare metals and China with an entirely self-sufficient tech ecosystem? Will be interested to see how history works out for each country. It will be game-changing.
Forcing China to create their own version of anything did not work out for the US. Remember when they banned Intel to ship CPUs for China's supercomputer? The end result: new CPU from China, Intel had to let people go because of the reduced amount of revenue. I suspect this trade war is going to result in a new Chinese OS and some other projects like that. At the end they will enter with these new products to the global market. Essentially unless the US gets every single country to ban Chinese products (which is unlikely) they just created more competition for themselves.
Intel, as far as I know, only let people go because they've been diminished due to ARM and Cisco with smartphone processors.
What is this new CPU from China? China is quite publicly known to be years behind the US in semiconductor design & fabrication.
I would agree with your statement that we'll get a new Chinese OS. Overall this is already in existence w/ WeChat, and all they need to do is go further down into the Kernal. As Android is restricted partially in the future, this may lead to other problems thought.
I am not saying Intel lays off people only because of the Chinese ban but I think it contributes to its troubles if they cannot sell Xeon processors to China.
So you are saying China is a special butterfly which grows stronger if limited in terms of resources but America and no one else has this special ability. Ok, time will tell
And what do you think that will do tactically? It doesn't diminish the intrinsic geopolitical positions of both nation-states.
Both countries, honestly, should be "fine" without the same levels of trade we've had in the past. Per capita GDP is to the point where trade can be diminished whilst maintaining relatively stable growth. The problem is primarily, IMO, to do with world tensions & world peace.
Your current presidential administration is not the norm. Most countries keep highly knowledgable/connected people from one administration to another, without changing them despite different political colors, especially diplomatic administration.
Trump did not name enough ambassadors, and everything turned out pretty well, no? That's because US ambassies work pretty well w/o any ambassador. Those are just prestigial distinctions, the workers don't really change. At least in France, there is at least 5 power: the administration is the 5th, and it should not be underestimated.
But according to the article: "This latest report suggests that any Linux variation would not meet the standards of the secure by design brief from the ISILG."
that is an atrocious and absolutely wrong claim that had no basis in reality but has screwed over the deepin folks.
What the creator of that video identifies as 'spyware' was telemetry of the app store because it was built with web tech (cnzz, the chinese equivalent of google analytics). Calling it spyware given that we're talking about Chinese users is clickbait of the worst sort.
no, it's absolutely hyperbolic and it spawned a dozen articles convincing people that somehow the Chinese government controls Deepin or whatever. There's a lot of people working on the thing and throwing terms like this around does them a disservice. The Stallman lingo isn't helpful.
"The Stallman lingo" has unfortunately been correct far too many times to call it "not helpful". A spying "feature" built by third parties that ends up with the same end result than one built by first party then it doesn't matter who made it.
What would "China" dropping Microsoft windows mean? Surely not all Chinese companies stopping use, since that would be extremely disruptive. More likely a few ministries starting a program to try Linux.
Not that a scenario where possession of an install disk would be a crime doesn't appeal to me. The weight of the entire Chinese state might help the Linux desktop crack 10% usage but suspect I'll have to dream on.