WetGeek In short, Solus. We need to get folks to stop thinking of Linux as a free version of AT&T Unix, but as something much better suited to consumer use. There's no reason why users who install Solus Budgie can't be up and running from the start, in less time and with less frustration than it took them to learn Windows the first time. ... As far as I am concerned, Solus Budgie is better suited for consumers than any other distro in the Linux universe. ... No large retailer would ever consider dropping Windows "cold turkey" at this time, but if they offered a Solus alternative for their consumer products, eventually their sales might convince them that it was a good move.
I think that Solus Budgie is a near-perfect Linux environment for consumers -- designed specifically for consumer users, efficient and free of bloat, fast on low- to mid-end computers, suitable for laptop use, an elegant and sophisticated front end on par with the Windows and MacOS design quality, and so on.
With that background, I want to try to think through the issues that need to be confronted and the issues that need to be solved in order to turn potential into reality. To focus the discussion, I want to look at a single OEM (Dell), a single consumer product line (Inspiron) and a specific laptop size (15" FHD), coupling that with Solus and Budgie. That limits the focus to three primary stakeholders -- Dell, the Solus Project and the Buddies of Budgie project.
Looking at Dell, I want to focus on all-Intel implementations of the Inspiron line, specifically a reasonably priced (400-600 USD), reasonably well-equipped, mid-level Inspiron 15-3000 series of laptops:
Dell need do nothing special to prepare the laptops themselves for Linux use, because the all-Intel specifications are well supported for Linux by Intel and other component manufacturers.
But Dell will need to make significant investment to support the computers: (1) develop support pages and other infrastructure to deliver BIOS, firmware and driver updates to Solus Budgie users, (2) train support staff to understand and resolve solve Linux/Solus/Budgie support issues, (3) develop tools (similar to SupportAssist for Dell's Windows consumer products) to allow users to keep the computers up-to-date and healthy, (4) develop, in cooperation with the Solus Project and Buddies of Budgie project, a marketing program for Dell Solus Budgie Inspiron computers, (5) obtain necessary licensing and copyright permissions (similar to those worked out with Canonical and RedHat) to allow Dell to modify Solus and Budgie as needed to develop and deploy Dell-based tweaks/tools supporting the Dell hardware (specifically tools/tweaks to manage display resolution, battery life and processor use), and (6) cooperate with Dell-supported peripheral manufacturers (mice, keyboards, printers and so on) to ensure that drivers are included in the Dell pre-installed distribution and maintained for a reasonable period thereafter. None of it will come cheap for Dell.
Looking at the other side of the coin, the Solus Project and Buddies of Budgie projects are going to have to make very significant changes to make this work, and it isn't clear to me that the changes will be acceptable to either team.
When Dell sells a computer to a consumer, Dell undertakes to support the OS (provide drivers and so on) after purchase. In the case of Windows, Dell's support coincides with Windows EOL schedules, as is the case with Ubuntu and (I assume) Red Hat. To make that level and length of support a reality for Solus Budgie, both the Solus and Budgie projects will need to make changes to ensure that both Solus and Budgie will remain viable and in production for a minimum of 5 or so years on a rolling, going forward basis, and (almost certainly) give Dell some level of control over the direction of Solus and Budgie development. Dell will not and should not commit to either Solus or Budgie without a reasonable level of confidence that both Solus and Budgie will remain viable, remain compatible with Intel hardware and the Dell configurations sold by Dell, provide, on an ongoing basis, a consumer-oriented distro of quality at least that which exists now, and keep Solus and Budgie up-to-date.
I'm not sure what form those assurances would take, because neither the Solus project nor the Budgie project is structured like Canonical and Red Hat, with significant financial reserves, professional developer teams, and contractual commitments to/from suppliers and business/enterprise customers. But I am sure that neither the Solus project nor the Buddies of Budgie project could continue to operate as usual, if for no other reason than Dell would demand that both develop professional, paid, full-time development/maintance teams and find a way to fund those teams before Dell commits. Dell and other OEM's got seriously burned by Conexant's abrupt abandonment of HD Audio drivers, and you can bet that Dell is not going to depend on a small community of volunteer developers headed in who-knows-what direction.
Last but not least, both the Solus project and the Buddies of Budgie project are going to have to bring Solus Budgie up to speed in some respects. A small example from this thread -- Dell 15" FHD displays are set to run at 125%. Currently, that isn't possible under Solus Budgie. This is something that comes to mind, but I am sure that there are other improvements that will need to be made, as well, to get Solus Budgie up to speed
WetGeek That will require the major distributions to start to target the non-technical user, as Solus does, as opposed to the computer scientists who had to deal with Unix and it's four-foot-long rack of user manuals.
I suspect that Dell (in particular) and other major OEM's (in general) will offer Ubuntu, if anything, as a consumer Linux operating system. I think that because Canonical is a strong company and Ubuntu has a long track record. But Ubuntu and other major distributions -- Fedora, openSUSE for example -- are offshoots of server and cloud-based services, and I doubt that any of them are going to develop distributions targeting non-technical users. I'm not sure where any of this is headed.
