Specifications

20 | august 2008 www.linuxjournal.com
[ UPFRONT ]
By 1988, Larry Bird had already won
the three-point shootout twice. In the
locker room, while waiting to defend
his title, he said to his opponents,
“Who’s finishing second?” Then he
went out and won for a third time.
Ubuntu is in the same position. In
DistroWatch.com’s Page Hit Ranking,
Ubuntu has been #1 for three years
running. Mandrake (now Mandriva) was
#1 in 2004. Ubuntu took over in 2005,
then repeated in 2006 and 2007.
Meanwhile, the “Who’s finishing sec-
ond?” question is always up for grabs,
changing almost as constantly as all the
other positions on down the list. Table 1
shows the results for three measures in
2008, taken on May 11.
Meanwhile, it’s pretty clear that
Ubuntu will hold its lead for at least
the current year.
—DOC SEARLS
Ubuntu Stays atop a
Volatile Distro Market
WiiLi (www.wiili.org) is a Linux port
in the works for the Nintendo Wii.
Drivers are being developed for Wii
features, including the SD card slot,
wireless 802.11b/g and Bluetooth
hardware, and for the remote.
A proof-of-concept Wii distribu-
tion was rolled out earlier this year by
the GameCube Linux Project. It relies
on a Twilight Hack developed by
Team Twiizers. The hack leverages an
exploit in a Wii game title to launch a
Linux bootloader (see a video of this
in action at www.linuxjournal.com/
content/meet-mii).
We’re eager to see Linux on the
Wii. In the meanwhile, settle for see-
ing Linux Journal on the Wii—we all
have our own Miis here in the office.
Add Linux Journal as a Wii friend,
and we’ll send you any Linux Journal
staffers you’d like. Our console
number is: 2924 2525 5556 2687
(post yours in the comments at
www.linuxjournal.com/content/
meet-mii, and we’ll add you too).
—KATHERINE DRUCKMAN
Meet Mii at LinuxJournal.com
I predict an odd period in history,
where famous quotes from techies
will all be 140 characters or less.
—Keith Hopper, twitter.com/khopper/statuses/
801585685
Here’s to “Now” for as long as it lasts.
—Shelora Fitzgerald, quoted in an e-mail to
Doc Searls
Productivity is up 99% because
nothing is failing.
—Heather Carver, District Technology and
Information Services Director for the Windsor Unified
School District in California, which is migrating to a
Linux-based system of servers and thin clients,
www.edtechmag.com/k12/issues/may-june-2008/
save-green-by-going-green.html
For about a year, however, Microsoft
has been working to get a slimmed-
down version of Windows to run on
XO laptops. As a result, Negroponte
said Tuesday that he expects XOs to
soon have a “dual-boot” option,
meaning users would be able to run
Windows or Sugar....Eventually,
Negroponte added, Windows might
be the sole operating system, and
Sugar would be educational software
running on top of it.
—Associated Press, April 22, 2008, ap.google.com/article/
ALeqM5hXa0O9XLMsWfaqt-sI9FqFy2IewgD9073PPG0
It’s easy to get caught up in the doom
and gloom over OLPC’s future. But
keep things in perspective: they aren’t
as bad as they seem.
To the developers at OLPC and
the tireless volunteer community
contributors unsettled by Nicholas’
plans—remember that no matter
what happens, your work has not
been for naught. Far from it. You
brought the smiles to children’s
faces in Escuela No. 109 in Florida,
Uruguay. Your work astounded me
with the results, after little more
than half a year, in the mountains
of Arahuay, Peru. Bryan Berry’s
team is kicking ass on establishing a
pilot in Nepal because of your
work. And if you haven’t read the
linked articles yet, now’s the time.
Nothing can take away the real,
palpable impact you’ve already had
on children’s lives.
—Ivan Krstic, April 25, 2008
They Said It
2007 Last 3 months Last 30 days Last 7 days
1 Ubuntu Ubuntu Ubuntu Ubuntu
2 PCLinuxOS OpenSUSE OpenSUSE OpenSolaris
3 OpenSUSE Fedora Fedora Puppy
4 Fedora Mint Mint OpenSUSE
5 Sabayon PCLinuxOS Mandriva Fedora
6 Mint Mandriva PCLinuxOS PCLinuxOS
7 Debian Debian Debian Slackware
8 MEPIS Dreamlinux Kubuntu Mandriva
9 Mandriva Sabayon Slackware Mint
10 Damn Small Damn Small Damn Small Debian
Table 1. Results