But I won't. The original statement was that "Desktop Linux Failed". I objected and offered a way to "Succeed": IBM/Lenovo could have taken their existing ThinkPad line with its 100% hardware compatibility, put a prettier face on a hundred or so selected Gnome apps, give it a cool name and spend $50 million promoting them on TV, exactly what Apple did to BSD.
The basic point of the first part of my post was supposed to be that very few distros contain all the features that make the distro equal to OS X or even Windows. Because of this, it's inaccurate to say that Linux as a whole is equal.
The second part of my post was a reply to a statement you said. It makes a lot more sense if read separately instead of part of the same post.
To reply to what you said in response to me (Pretend this is the start of a separate post for more coherence if you like): What reason is there for IBM/Lenovo to do such a thing? Apple had a clear reason for buying Next; the failure of Copland. But how would taking Linux, developing a new UI, and rebranding everything else help IBM/Lenovo?
How many people really need Fusion? The vast majority of distros are niche designed to showcase a particular innovation or for a particular application, which may have nothing to do with general desktop use. Many others are designed for 'enterprise' applications and also have no need of Fusion. Yet more are designed for power users, who may or may not want Fusion, and certainly know how to install it if they do. only a few distros are targeted at casual users and of them, only a couple think that Fusion is the proper solution.As you must understand, linux about flexibility and just because a particular distribution doesn't pack the features that you think it should have doesn't mean that it doesn't suit its target audience very well.
"How did Linux manage to surpass other OS's if it doesn't have the same/similar features that people use?"
Different target market.
Ideally (to me), some distro could have website that could autodetect hardware and have a bunch of {check, drop down, radial} boxes for software to put on it. (Want Fusion? OpenOffice? Gnome or KDE or XFCE or so on? How much information to see? Everything/Quick blurb/Errors only/Whatever else? Hell, if its for the end user, let them upload their own desktop background to use right away. Little things are important too) The site would then customize the distro and create the iso as needed for the individual.
That would in itself go a long way to creating a usable customizable OS that does what people want instead of trying to guess what they want and create yet another variation within the sea of distros. But, such a thing hasn't happened yet for a variety of reasons.
Just because I can customize a {Gentoo, Slackware, Debian, Red Hat, etc} install to be exactly how I need it, doesn't mean my neighbor who "heard about this lunix thing" can do the same.
"Different target market." Which one are you discussing? And is it the same one as I am? I'm talking about end users.
The OP criticizes open source as a 'failure' because it doesn't satisfy a demographic for which it was never meant.
'End users' as you describe them, don't need Linux, they have Windows, and for them, it works just fine.
Because if you define "end user" as businesses, then they're going to come in contact with Linux int he office. If "end user" is defined as "power users" then Linux is doing just fine and every "This is the year of Linux" or "My technophile girlfriend uses Ubuntu!" article is wrong off the bat.
Whoever you wrote it for. In open source, it is usually yourself and people like you. Sometimes its businesses, or non-computer people, but usually its 'hackers.'
Gentoo doesn't come with Fusion because it's target user base is made of technophiles who like to tinker. Red Hat doesn't have it because it is targeted at business users who use it to power servers and backends. Ubuntu targets 'ordinary users' and does come with Fusion. It's really that simple.
"Ideally (to me), some distro could have website that could autodetect hardware and have a bunch of {check, drop down, radial} boxes for software to put on it. (Want Fusion? OpenOffice? Gnome or KDE or XFCE or so on? How much information to see? Everything/Quick blurb/Errors only/Whatever else? Hell, if its for the end user, let them upload their own desktop background to use right away. Little things are important too) The site would then customize the distro and create the iso as needed for the individual."
That would be a cool distro but I don't think that it's feasible. Besides, part of the fun of Linux is exploring what's available. Ubuntu comes with a large repository and it makes it easy to explore all the different applications that are available. Trying different things out was one of the things that always kept me on Linux, it was a lot more fun than the Windows model, never mind that I couldn't use Photoshop.
As for the feasibility of the idea? Its not feasible for me to do - beyond my knowledge. But I don't see why someone can't manage it at some point in the future if they wanted to. But that could just be because I thought of it and no one likes to think that they've thought of a bad/impossible to implement idea.
You mention that linux needs a "…catchy name and distinguished set of applications…" before it can gain popularity or widespread usage. How did Linux manage to surpass other OS's if it doesn't have the same/similar features that people use?