Outside the Bubble

We in the open source community live in a bubble world. People live in an Ubuntu bubble or a Fedora bubble. Fedora 9 was just released and I, as an Ubuntu user, couldn’t care less. I don’t use Fedora, so the announcement of Fedora 9, does not resonate with me. Likewise, when Hardy Heron was released in April, Fedora users let out a collective yawn. The most eagerly awaited release among Ubuntu users was just not news to users of other distros.

In fact, quite the opposite happened. Users of other distros reacted negatively to the release of Hardy Heron because they had no news of their own to celebrate. In fact, some users never do because their distro follows a different model with rolling releases.

What if things were different, though? What if all distros were released at the same time and users could compare distros feature for feature at the same point of time in its development cycle? Wouldn’t that benefit all users? What would it take to do this and would developers embrace it? This week we got a glimpse of that possibility.

Mark Shuttleworth has touched off a debate on his blog on synchronicity. It came as a result of an offer that he made to synchronize release dates of LTS versions to align various projects and possibly modifying the release date of upcoming Ubuntu LTS versions. His offer to the open source community needs to be taken at face value because it was made in good faith.

It is important to note that Ubuntu is the leading desktop distro. Shuttleworth’s offer then takes on new significance when this is taken into account. He is offering to work in concert with others. He is showing leadership and is not resting on his laurels, as the front runner. He wants the open source community as a whole to develop. This is an important step in a community which is notoriously prone to fractiousness and is leaderless.

I, for one, would welcome Linux developers working together to further the community as a whole. I don’t have a problem with so many distros and actually like the idea that we have so much choice. I think that this has led to much innovation and others are continually emulating the leaders in their various contributions. In this way, we are driven by change and the new innovations of developers from all projects as a whole. However, there are many good reasons to work together as well.

This has caused me to extend his idea into other areas where synchronicity would benefit users. What would happen if there was a similarity to all distros where things worked universally well, but each developer could add his or her own embellishments to a well polished core. This would not take away from the distinctiveness of each distro. It would not stifle creativity and it would give a degree of consistency, now lacking. It would also give commercial developers something that they can count on. It would mean that they could concentrate their efforts instead of having to work towards producing diverse solutions for each distro. It would mean than people coming to Linux for the first time would find it less daunting and bewildering.

Gnome could still be Gnome. KDE would continue to exist. PCLinuxOS users could still user their favorite distro and Ubuntu users theirs. The only thing that would change would be things that happen below the surface anyway. Packages could be managed the same. Many packages could be the same for many distros, but there would be others that are peculiar to each distros as well.

We already have this to a degree. The kernel is managed separately. The effort of kernel developers is coordinated because the goal is to produce a consistent and controlled product. What if a similar model was used for more than just the kernel? What if vision could be shared, responsibility could be divided and collaboration could be coordinated? Wouldn’t this produce a better experience for end users?

I congratulate Mark Shuttleworth for looking outside the bubble. I hope that others start to do this as well. In Linux, we often dream big, but get nowhere. It is time that we became as big as our dreams. It is time for some developers to start to look beyond and reach out to others within the community.

This will not end division. There is always going to be someone wanting to head in a new direction and be answerable to no one. I think that there is something to say for more sharing and cooperation, too. One does not have to end the other.

I don’t see this as the beginning of the end as some would characterize it. I don’t see it as anyone trying to gain advantage or trying to eliminate competition. I see this as a step towards maturity. It is about having great vision and wanting more for everyone. Everyone will benefit to some degree. It will give momentum to Linux as a whole and not just to specific distros. Each distro then can then concentrate on what it wants to do to distinguish itself.

Or we can continue to live in a bubble, oblivious to those outside of our own community and not caring about what others think. This is one way to go, but it isn’t the only way. We can always wonder when the breakthrough for Linux will happen or we can make it happen. The choice is ours.