Linux moves to the desktop
 
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While Linux server news and hype dominated much of LinuxWorld Expo last week, there was some movement on the Linux desktop front as well.
Hewlett-Packard announced that it will offer Linux on all its Evo business PCs, while Red Hat said it will release a beta for corporate desktops. Even Suns CEO Scott McNeally hinted that his firm, which launched a Linux server during the show, would get into the Linux desktop act in near future.
Users at the show also swapped stories of Linux desktop projects. At the University of Indiana, 30 Linux PCs were recently deployed for the school's theater department PC lab. The project was presented as a case study of how Linux can be morphed into a desktop system that's usable for Windows loyalists.
" If you want people to switch from Windows to Linux on the desktop, you have to make it as easy for them as it would be to move from one version of Windows to another, " says Corey Shields, Unix systems specialist at Indiana University, who oversaw the Linux desktop deployment.
Linux desktops such as KDE and GNOME - both of which ship with most Linux distributions - often cram many applications and icons onto the desktop and the menu and task bars which can confuse end users who may just want to surf the Web or edit documents.
" In order to design a desktop of Windows users, you have to see things through their eyes, " Shields says. The key, he says, is using tools within Linux to clearly label what programs certain icons launch, and paring down the number of icons users can see.
Shields says the 30-person lab running Dell PCs has been successful so far, and that he plans on deploying Linux boxes to other labs on the university's 94,000-student campus.
RELATED LINKS
IDG News Service, 08/15/02
Red Hat preparing desktop Linux
IDG News Service, 08/13/02
Sun pushes Linux on the desktop
IDG News Service, 08/13/02
Linux, beyond the enterprise server
Network World, 08/19/02
Phil Hochmuth is a Network World Senior Writer and a former systems integrator. You can reach him at phochmut@nww.com.
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