The Ximian Desktop 2

1
The Ximian Desktop 2

• Tony Brett
• Oxford University Computing Services

2
Agenda

• Linux Adoption Trends
• Why Deploy Linux
• Recent Progress
• Open Office
• Linux Desktop Challenges
• Red Carpet
• Ximian Desktop 2 with Demo
• Whats Coming
• Resources

3
Linux Adoption Trend

• From the outside in.

4
Why Deploy Linux Clients?

• Control
• Multiple vendor strategy
• Flexibility, standards
• Strategic independence
• Cost
• Reduced software licensing costs (70-80)
• Reduced support cost (fewer viruses, security,
  better robustness)

5
Large Ongoing Linux Client Deployments
Up to 1,000,000
200,000
140,000
100,000
9,000
Largo
Brazil
Munich
Spain
Thailand
Largo
Brazil
Munich
Spain
Thailand
6
Linux in the Movies

• Linux on Intel outperforms SGI
• Many Movie Studios have moved to Linux
• Pixar
• Digital Domain
• Disney
• Sony
• Dream Works
• Flash Film Works
• Hammerhead

7
Harry Potter 11/16/01 RH Lord of the Rings 1
12/19/01 Weta Stormrider Disney Theme Park
Productions/2001 D2 A Beautiful Mind 2001 D2
Vanilla Sky 2001 D2 Lord of the Rings 2001
D2 Collateral Damage 2/8/02 Flash Film Works
Blade II 3/22/02 Tippett Death to Smoochy
3/29/02 Flash Film Works Star Wars Episode II
5/16/02 ILM Spirit of Cimarron 5/24/02
Dreamworks Scooby-Doo 6/14/01 Rhythm Hues
Haunted Lighthouse (IMAX) summer 2002 Busch
Gardens Pluto Nash 8/16/02 Flash Film Works
Blue Crush 8/16/02 Hammerhead Below Q3 02
Double Negative Santa Clause 2 11/1/02 Tippett
Star Trek Nemesis 12/13/02 D2 Lord of the
Rings 2 12/25/02 Weta (New Zealand) We Were
Soldiers Once 2002 D2 Time Machine 2002 D2
XXX 2002 D2 Jungle Book 2 2003 Disney
Matrix 2 2003 Tippett 2 Fast, 2 Furious
2003 Hammerhead Finding Nemo 2003 Pixar
Dantes Peak 2/7/97 D2 Titanic 12/19/97 D2
What Dreams May Come 1998 D2 Armageddon
1998 D2 Ed TV 1999 D2 Lake Placid 1999 D2
Fight Club 1999 D2 Supernova 2000 D2
Stuart Little 12/17/99 RH Little Nicky
11/10/00 RH Grinch 11/17/00 RH, D2 Sixth
Day 11/17/00 RH Rules of Engagement 2000 D2
X-Men 2000 D2 Red Planet 2000 D2 O Brother
Where Art Thou 2000 D2 Enemy at the Gates
3/16/01 Double Negative Cats Dogs 4/4/01
RH Shrek 5/16/01 Dreamworks Fast the
Furious 6/22/01 Hammerhead Hammerhead Dr.
Dolittle 2 6/22/01 RH Final Fantasy 7/11/01
Square (ceased operations) Planet of the Apes
7/27/01 RH Captain Corelli's Mandolin
9/17/01 Double Negative
8
Linux Clients Recent Progress

• Product Advancements
• Release of GNOME 2.4, KDE 3.2 (Feb '04)
• Mozilla Web Browser 1.6 (Jan '04)
• Ximian Evolution/Connector Groupware Suite (Oct
  '03)
• OpenOffice 1.1 (Oct '03)
• Commercial Support
• Novell buys SUSE and Ximian (Sep 03)
• Consumer/SOHO companies (Lycoris, Lindows, ...)
• Growing market readiness
• Government adoption efforts (Germany, Brazil,
  China)

9
OpenOffice

• Real alternative to Microsoft.
• Over ½ million downloads per month.
• File Compatibility with MS Office 2000/XP
• Massively improved file support.
• Finally growing community traction and momentum.

10
Linux Desktop Interface Stability

• Interface stability for Independent Software
  Vendors
• Platform interface definitions cover APIs, ABIs,
  component acivation and remoting interfaces,
  config format schemas, CLIs, ...
• Backwards compatibility guarantee

Core Developers
Interested Linux developers, college students,
etc.
More Tolerance (Less Bathing)
More People
ISV Early Adopters
Large ISVs, Broader Developer Market
11
Improved Windowing Platform

• Linux font problem solved
• Quality low-level font selection and rendering
  architecture
• On screen, on paper
• Availability of high quality free fonts
  (Bitstream, others)
• X window system limitations no longer relevant
• Direct rendering extension (DRI)
• Vector drawing extension
• Xrender for high-quality hardware alpha
  composition
• RandR extension allows dynamic resolution
  switching, rotation
• Fully alpha, animatable cursors

12
Standardisation

• Multiple Linux desktop efforts rapidly drafting,
  adopting shared standards
• Desktop file formats, Cut n paste, drag n drop,
  hardware notification, UTF8, CORBA use, file
  manager interactions, menus/merging, theming,
  runtime file location,...
• Free Standards Group (freestandards.org)
• Desktop committee freedesktop.org
• Linux Standard Base (LSB)
• OpenOffice XML document file formats OASIS

13
Linux Desktop Software Challenges

• Deployment barriers
• Application availability
• Address core productivity application needs
• Interoperability
• File formats
• Network protocols, directories
• Support costs
• Usability
• Learnability, familiarity
• Integration, total interaction
• Manageability
• Deploy, administer GNU/Linux clients

14
Linux Management Challenges

• Key management pain points for Linux users
• Deploying software package updates
• Creating standard package set images
• Linux unique technical challenges
• Complex web of software package dependencies
• Rapid updates of Linux OS and key applications
• Rich software management primitives built into OS
  (rpm)
• Decentralized, back door deployments now at
  critical mass
• Companies now looking to enforce standards
• Current state of the market
• Significant administrator overhead
• Costly manual methods or roll your own tools
• No previous solution provider

15
Ximian Solution Red Carpet
16
Ximian Desktop Solution
Complete, Integrated Desktop Stack
Software, Configuration Management (Red Carpet)
Red Carpet
?
Other Msg Servers
Other (IM, graphics)
Office Suite (OpenOffice)
Groupware (Evolution)
Browser (Mozilla)
Desktop Shell (GNOME)
Linux OS (RH, SuSE, etc.)
Build
Partner
Open Source Community
17
Ximian Desktop 2

• Core applications
• Office
• Mail
• Browser
• Usability through consistency
• Integrated user experience
• My Computer navigation
• Familiar to Windows users
• Interoperable
• MS Office file formats
• Windows and Linux networks
• Messaging standards support
• Media objects, fonts
• Printer detection, set up
• 250,000 downloads

18
What's Coming The Next 18 Months

• Desktop lockdown, manageability
• Software/configuration templating, rollback
• Child-proof configurations
• High-resolution change management
• Single sign-on, identity management
• Remote debugging, administration
• 2.6 Kernel
• VM and VFS working together
• Improved page allocator fairness
• Process scheduler, I/O scheduler
• Preemptive kernel
• Driver work
• Hotplug support

19
What's Coming Continued

• Desktop integration
• Core apps exposing programming interfaces
• Cross-desktop standards adoption
• More shared code
• Innovation watch this space.
• Intermediate hardware layer
• Ability to identify devices by type
• Device-appropriate interfaces
• Notifications
• TCO studies
• Initial large deployments will complete
• Cost savings will become evident
• Ambitious displacements will push the software
  forward

20
What the press says

• (With) Novell's purchase of SuSE, Ximian's future
  stands to get even brighter as its technology is
  merged into one of the best distributions
  currently available Ximian is easy to use,
  convenient, well polished and robust. In many
  ways, it exemplifies the way things ought to be.

http//www.ofb.biz/modules.php?nameNewsfilearti
clesid273
21
Resources

• http//www.ximian.com
• http//www.kde.org
• http//www.gnome.org
• http//www.openoffice.org
• http//www.suse.co.uk
• http//redhat.com/
• http//users.ox.ac.uk/aesb/ximian2.ppt