Microsoft Trying Litigation to Compete — Again

It’s almost become a pattern too easy to see when it comes to Microsoft and open source.  Microsoft loves using litigation or threats of litigation to get its way against open source software providers.  Starting in 2007 with the agreement with Novell, Microsoft has been busy trying to “manage” the open source competition.  It’s hard to compete against free, as open source software typically is, especially if the free software becomes popular enough to compete against proprietary options.

This most recent attempt at litigation comes in the form of an antitrust lawsuit against Android filed with the European Union on behalf of the FairSearch group, a collection of companies such as Microsoft, Oracle, and Nokia, that are all unsurprisingly Google’s competitors in some way or another.  In unrelated news, today I learned Microsoft and others got together to create an anti-Google activist web site, somewhat akin to Microsoft’s old anti-Linux campaign.  The litigation claims that Google has a dominance in the smartphone market and in the mobile advertising market and is abusing their power to lock out competitors.  This comes on the heels of sales reports that show Windows Phone has had dismal sales and has failed to penetrate the market in a meaningful way.  Perhaps in light of that news this litigation shouldn’t come as too big of a surprise.

It’s hard to get past the irony of this… Microsoft has been hauled into the E.U. antitrust courts more than a few times.  At first, it seems that this litigation is only about search and services dominance by Google, but one thinly-veiled accusation demands attention:

“Google’s predatory distribution of Android at below-cost makes it difficult for other providers of operating systems to recoup investments in competing with Google’s dominant mobile platform,”

So, distributing open source software for free is considered predatory?  For Oracle, this is almost like the pot calling the kettle black.  Oracle contributes quite a bit to the popular open source projects OpenOffice.org and MySQL, assets they obtained after buying Sun Microsystems, Inc.  Oracle has a track record of not being kind to the open source community, especially with it’s mishandling of open source projects such as those mentioned above and their Red Hat Linux clone that they distribute. 

It’s not difficult to see what is happening here:  Microsoft and others are frustrated by the fact that in smartphones, it’s either Apple or Google, and they don’t know how to break this formula so that they can successfully enter the market.

This is nothing new and it serves as an example of the challenges the current market faces.  It’s incredibly difficult to compete against free, especially if that free software becomes popular and as a result, a standard.  But unlike a proprietary software, Android is open source, and can be modified and used by anyone, including every member of the FairSearch group.  Perhaps Microsoft should start focusing on how to tie-in their services with Android, or even take the Android software and modify it for their own purposes and devices.  This will never, never, ever happen, but at this point and given the condition of market, it might be FairSearch group’s best option.

The Streamlined Bandwagon

First of all, I’m still alive.  I haven’t posted here in quite some time, mainly because of school but since I have some time to come up for air, I thought I’d write a quick post.  Even though I haven’t been actively updating this blog, I have been watching the industry and I believe that a trend is forming, and it is a trend I actually like.

For a while now, software companies including Apple have been designing new devices and investing in new opportunities, mainly the tablet market.  The tablet market, which Microsoft attempted to create some years ago was just a bit too early for its time.  It took the portability of the iPad and the Apple juggernaut to bring tablet computing into it’s present frenzy.  What was really interesting about this is that the iPad was not a full-blown computer like the old Windows tablets which were really laptops with a touchscreen instead of a clamshell design.  Simple led to something new…

To illustrate that history does actually repeat itself, I have been reading a book called Piloting Palm which is about the founding of Palm Computing, the makers of the popular handheld PDAs.  An interesting thing about the handheld computing market was that it was actually set to begin in the very early 90′s.  During that time, many large companies tried their best to create devices that would essentially be a computer in your pocket, including Apple.  However, they were slow, bulky, limited devices that ultimately failed.  What made Palm different is that they recognized that simple might be better so they stopped trying to cram all the features of a PC into a pocket-sized device.  That was the strategy they took, and their strategy paid off.  Well, it paid off at least from ’96-’07 or so, but that’s a story for another day.

So that’s the first aspect of this trend, that simple is better.  And we’re seeing this.  Apple is being.. well, Apple.  Microsoft has moved away from the standard desktop appearance and is using whatever used to be called MetroUI before they got sued for the name.  Now even Ubuntu is growing their already tailored-for-mobile interface and has announced systems for phones and tablets based off the popular open source operating system.  Beyond simply changing designs for a more mobile-focused world, all of the major players in the market are streamlining their interfaces and systems to create what I call a streamlined environmental universe.  All their devices will connect, Apple with iTunes, Microsoft with SkyDrive, and Ubuntu with Ubuntu One.

And that’s the second aspect of this trend – everyone is getting on board with a mobile experience that is streamlined, wherever you are, whether it be on your laptop, tablet or phone.  Each company is providing a full universe of products.  What is possibly more interesting is how this trend manifests itself.  All these products are causing companies to change.  Microsoft has created their first device in-house that is aimed at the computing market, the Surface.  If they’ve ever produced another computing device in-house, I certainly can’t remember it.  It’s easy to see why, too.  Microsoft needed to make the device themselves so that it works flawlessly with their other products.  The experience has come to the forefront, it’s no longer about making one device do something the others can’t in order to compete.  No, it’s making sure devices work well together within your product universe by providing a streamlined experience.  That’s the trend I’m seeing, and I like it.

Have any thoughts to share?… Seeing this trend, or seeing something totally different?  Leave a comment in the section below!

Is GNOME Dead?

As reported by OMGUbuntu, the founder of the GNOME project believes that the Linux desktop is dead.  This wouldn’t be the first or the last time someone has made such remarks.  In many ways, I believe that such talk should always be considered with the same level of caution as the claims of the “Year of the Linux desktop.”  It seems like everyone, and admittedly even myself at times, have some sort of belief about the state of the Linux desktop.

Miguel de Icaza, the founder of the GNOME desktop environment project made these remarks right on the heels of incredible amounts of criticism against the latest version of the GNOME desktop, version 3.  GNOME 3 did away with much of what was popular with the second edition and made a leap for a design more apt to fit the future of computing – a future where people use a broad range of devices.   Apparently GNOME designers believe that both a small tablet screen and a large 40 inch desktop screen deserve the same interface.  This made using the desktop a bit cumbersome when paired with a desktop interface tuned to perform on a 7-9 inch screens.

In spite of this, the comments that Mr. Icaza made were somewhat unsettling.  Would in fact GNOME decide to leave the traditional Linux desktop behind and opt for catering to touch screen devices?  Personally I believe that would be a suicide mission.  Android has its own interface, and trying to convince any of the major device manufacturers to  use GNOME would be incredibly difficult, if not impossible.

Mr. Icaza’s criticisms are focused on developers and their inability to develop mainstream applications for the Linux desktop, saying that applications built for one version of Linux might not work a year later as new system versions are released.  I will agree with Mr. Icaza on this point.  I have long argued that Linux needs a strong developer community, one that is dedicated to making truly compelling applications on the desktop.  However it appears that Mr. Icaza is unaware of what is happening in the Ubuntu project as of late. 

As of July last year, the Ubuntu project implemented an idea that I had posted to the Ubuntu Brainstorm site a long time ago.  Many others in the project shared in this same dream and what became of it is now known as the Ubuntu App Developer site.  Think of the UAD site as an equivalent to MSDN or the Apple Developer Network – it’s a place for developers to figure out how to create applications for the Ubuntu system, both novice and corporate programmers alike.  Already, several big-name games have made their way onto the Ubuntu App Store.

I don’t think the Linux desktop is dead, even when it seems a lot of the attention is going solely to Android phones.  Many of the major Linux distributions are doing great things and are still growing.  The distribution with which I have the most familiarity, Ubuntu, is growing and also creating a very dynamic and energetic development community.  Developing applications for Linux is becoming easier, not more difficult.  If GNOME wants to leave the Linux desktop behind, that’s fine.  However they should understand the consequences that there will be many traditional laptop and desktop users leaving them behind too.

Finally Studying MIS and Some Thoughts on The Cloud

This post is somewhat of an update.  As I have written before, I am a Management Information Systems major in my third year of college.  To say that my time in college has flown by is true, and yet at times I feel that the end could not come soon enough.  Perhaps that’s just the beginning stages of Senioritis, but I digress.

This semester is the first time I have a class dedicated to Management Information Systems, and the good news is that I am loving it!  The textbook that goes along with the course is the first book since I have entered college that I have been willing to read.  It is incredibly comforting to know that I’m on the right path.  I’m really hoping that this course will give me a little more direction into an area which I can specialize.

Aside from finally having an MIS class, I have noticed a bit of a trend on Twitter, and I have a few thoughts on the subject.  Everyone seems to be talking about “the cloud.”  I’m beginning to think that it’s the new buzzword, just as “open source” was a big buzz word back in 2008.  So for the past year or so, the cloud has really been picking up interest.  Here’s a quick snapshot of the rate of Google searches regarding the subject:

http://www.google.com/trends/?q=%22the+cloud%22

Boom.  Late 2010 and interest takes off after being relatively stagnant ever since Google has been tracking searches.  Interestingly, this period of interest has gone through some interesting transformations.  As of last month, there was a big kerfuffle involving Steve Wozniak and his concerns regarding the idea of putting all of our information in the cloud.

It’s the Woz’s concerns that really reflect my own.

One day I will be working in an IT department at a company, working on developing strategies for information management, and honestly I don’t think I would want to sacrifice any sensitive company data into the cloud.  In spite of continuing efforts to increase security – that still doesn’t satisfy my fears that someone, anyone, could hack their way into the system.  I certainly do not believe that intranets are any more secure, its just that the cloud is far more accessible than an internal system.  Suddenly, damage control becomes far more difficult if someone is able to penetrate the network.  I can’t help but wonder what the cloud will become in the next five years.  Some seem to believe that it will eliminate the need for server farms.  I humbly, but strongly disagree.  The need for internal servers that can be isolated if the need arises to keep data safe seems to be the best answer to making sure the most critical information stays in your hands.  I will not deny the clouds overall usefulness especially considering I’ve used plenty of online services.  Yet I still have my concerns, especially regarding the protection of critical sensitive data.   Anyways, enough on that subject, I need to get back to studying!

Google, Microsoft, and the Move to Self-Branded Products

Recently both Microsoft and Google have come out with devices that are self-branded. These moves solidify a trend coming from the big three that changes the way that the major players in the computer industry promote their products. Apple has been doing this for years, and for many years, they remained one of the only technology companies to do so.

By the 1990′s, computer companies began switching from developing all of their hardware and software in-house as was popular in the 1980′s to producing products via a number of companies. This strategy had a number of benefits, solely the lowered cost and time it took to develop a product. If you had a consortium of companies that built their hardware to run your system, then mass collaboration could take place developing all aspects of the computer at once. Yet, Apple avoided this policy, and it almost destroyed their company.

Almost.

Their company was saved through products that once became popular locked users into that company’s offerings to get the most out of your iPod, iPad, or Mac. It only made more sense that the user experience would be better from the company that produced the product, their software and systems would work together seamlessly. No need to download additional drivers or suffer the inevitable upgrade that breaks everything. That is one of the main benefits of in-house development – the level of control that you have not only over the customers that use your products but even more importantly today the overall user experience. It’s a win-win for the producer. The better experience brings more customers who must use only that company’s products to obtain the quality experience. Now, the other major players (Microsoft and Google) had found themselves in an interesting situation. People were beginning to define their products by the brand. Nobody really cared if they used a Compaq versus a Gateway. If it’s a PC, then it’s pretty much going to be the same experience.

That leads us to the second major benefit of in-house development, the one that I believe is leading this trend of companies pushing for self-branded products. Products built in-house often times work better than their collaboratively-produced cousins. This experience is something Apple has tried incredibly hard to maintain in their products, and in the case of Microsoft and Google this experience factor was showing it’s edge over the competition. Microsoft was notorious for having slow, often crippled software, often caused by the hardware on which the system was installed. Google’s Android system worked great on the really good phones and tablets, yet seemed broken on weaker devices.

When a user decides how much they like a product, who are they going to blame for shortcomings? Since Apple has become a major player in the industry and the media has focused more on what Microsoft and Google were doing in response to the seemingly more successful company, people are more likely to blame Microsoft and Google for shortcomings in the devices on which their systems are installed. Google may have nothing to do with a cheap phone that had Android slapped on it, their reputation is still hurt by the product’s performance.

Now Microsoft and Google have taken steps to build products that display their name, not only to compete with Apple but to engage the public in showing that their products are just as good, if not better, than the Apple offerings. Google cooperated with Asus in developing the Nexus 7, yet their cooperation with Asus was much closer, much more intimate than that of normal OEM operations. Microsoft went truly in-house when developing Surface, and perhaps the quality of the device will be enough to show that when developed in-house, Microsoft can create some pretty amazing products.

What I find most interesting about this trend is that it does break with tradition and bring the focus back on the company who’s software is on the device. Following public perception about who is responsible for creating the products, Microsoft and Google have been working on product offerings aimed at showing that they can create amazing products, especially when not left to the workings of unsupervised OEMs. It will certainly be interesting to see how this trend effects not only OEMs, but the major corporations as well. I personally believe that when a company’s reputation is at stake in their own device, there is a larger amount of risk than that of an OEM produced product. There’s only one company to blame — and that company is themselves.

So, Kinda Quiet Around Here Eh?

I have neglected this blog for the past several weeks.  Of course, this absence of new material is a result of the seasonal migration of students to their work — finals.  After next week I’ll be done and back to updating this blog with new articles.  Until then, have a good one.

Web Site Makes Ubuntu App Development Easy

As one of the major distributions of the Linux operating system, the Ubuntu project understood that it is important to maintain a vibrant and enthusiastic development community — not just for the core system but also for applications built to run specifically on Ubuntu.  For this purpose, the Ubuntu App Developer web site was introduced in July of last year.  The Ubuntu App Developer web site provides resources, tools, and how-to’s that make the application development process faster and easier for both the complete novice as well as seasoned programmers.

Built much like the Microsoft Developer Network (MSDN), the Ubuntu App Developer web site includes tracks that developers can follow for creating an application, packaging it for the Ubuntu platform, and then uploading it to Launchpad for version control and bug tracking purposes.  There are also resources that detail the process of submitting an application for acceptance into the main Ubuntu repositories.

You may have never heard of the Ubuntu App Developer web site.  While it is an official part of the Ubuntu project, a link is nowhere to be found on the main page or any of its sub-directories.  As this web site is partially volunteer-based, then it could be that the site itself is still awaiting further articles and guides for its official release.  The way I found this site was by checking in on an idea I was working on several years ago.  I am doubtful if anyone would remember when I was promoting the Ubuntu Developer Network a while ago.  However, when I found the website through a Google search I went to the Ubuntu Brainstorm site, found my idea submission from over two years ago and saw that last Summer the idea had been approved and completed.  At the bottom of the page, a moderator simply wrote, “This idea has been implemented.”

The Ubuntu App Developer site is more than I could have imagined.  There is a tool released some time ago that has reached maturity and is now promoted on the UAD site as the easiest way to build, package, and upload Ubuntu applications.  This program is aptly named, “Quickly.”  Quickly uses Python as the programming language and PyGTK for the application design.  Run from the terminal in a set of extremely simple commands, Quickly simplifies the application development process on Ubuntu tenfold.  That’s not just a guess, as a man who tried his hand at packaging some time ago with OpenProj, Quickly is a much easier route than trying to configure everything by hand, typing the make command, and praying everything compiles correctly.  Some developers may not want to use Python, and for that the Ubuntu App Developer site has tracks for other programming languages such as Java, C(/++/#), and Vala, as well as other languages.

The Ubuntu App Developer web site is unique in the fact that it is the only web site like it — focused solely on Linux application development for the Ubuntu platform.  This development community will become ever more important as Ubuntu finds itself being placed on more desktops and on a broader range of devices.  Perhaps other distributions will take notice and will provide their own developer network as well.  If any single Linux distribution encourages developers then it helps Linux in it’s entirety.  There is a need application developers to help continue making the user experience better.  Now with the Ubuntu App Developer web site this process has become much easier.