Took a look at the site, everything comes up fine-of course I'm using mepis so java and flash are no problem (also easy to install for any debian user)

I took a look at the Flash-Site and worked fine.

That's a nice site, thanks! As I think I mentioned just this morning, Google Fusion Server runs on SLES servers at my company. Though we don't have a Wintendo client yet, at least it is a start. AFAIK, Earth is a Qt applicaiton, so it shouldn't be too hard to port to *nix, if they did things right.

Here's an image of phone GPS data from a Nextel application overlayed on Google Earth data in our servers. It is my house and the corresponidng GPS locaitons of my cell phone. (We think satellite wobble cause the location points to not be exact, since the phone was actually stationary during the testing.)

http://www.perfectreign.com/stuff/kai_gps_home.jpg

...and a closer look...

http://www.perfectreign.com/stuff/kai_gps_home_zoom.jpg

http://www.broom.org/epic/
or
http://www.robinsloan.com/epic/

Ever since Ive seen that little Nostradamus-like skit.. I've been taking notice
If that link doesnt work, just yahoo epic 2014. Should get a few mirrors.

I have tried http://www.flashearth.com/ using Mozilla and it works beautifully. I did not even have upgrade Java or Flash. Apparently I did it the first time right. Usually that doesn happen.

Still I have the idea though that Google Earth provides a bit higher resolution. I GE I could see the individual houses in my place, in FE not.

jlinkels

This thread has reminded me of something that has been nagging in the back of my mind for a while. One of the major reasons Linux isn't more widley adopted is the fact that there are so many distibutions. Bear with me here, my point will become clear.

Obviously, the number of distros out there is not something that should be 'fixed', its a natural result of Open Source. It does lead to problems in adoption tho. It seems to me that the reason for that is software development. There will always be a need for closed source commercial software for purchase. As nice as it sounds, every line of code being F/OSS is impractical in a free enterprise system. If Joe Coder is going to spend his days writing software, he can't be expected to give it away all the time. At this point, there are very limited methods for distributing software for Linux. Precompiled binaries simply don't work across multiple distributions well.

I am not a coder, but it seems like there is a possible solution here, hopefully someone can explain to me why this could or could not work. There are two major package managment systems out there (and some minor ones), DEB and RPM. What is keeping Linux developers from coming up with a standard for those? I'm finding it hard to be clear here, but it seems to me that it should be possible for there to be a standard out there so that any .rpm based distro could use any .rpm file? Currently, if I search for an RPM, I find hits for Suse, Mandriva, Fedora, RHEL, RH9, etc etc etc, and if I search for a .DEB, I find hits for Debian, Ubuntu, etc etc etc.

If we had universal packages (obviously we couldn't combine .rpm and .deb into a single file), then a software company that wanted to generate a new accounting software package could create two files, accounting_software-5.1.1.deb and accounting_software-5.1.1.rpm. Maybe four files, to include x86_64. They could then distribute them on one CD.

Using an installer like Fedora currently uses to find dependancies would work, and it would encourage development on OSS platforms. If people could easily get their packaged software that works the way it does on Win and Mac, then they would be more likley to try OSS operating systems.

As Linux distributions become more and more user friendly, and as Gnome and KDE get prettier and prettier, there will be more people like my mother. She is perfectly williing to try anything I want to put on her computer, and she could easily learn to use FC5 (what I use), but she can't buy Quick Books Pro for it, and has no desire to learn new software. She also can't buy TaxCut for Linux, and FreeFile isn't an option for her like it is for me, she has 3 businesses that she files quarterly taxes on.

Software like YumEX, Pup, and Pirut has closed the gap for regular users keeping a Linux system updated, and Gnome 2.14 and whatever the current version of KDE is have crossed over into true usability. NetworkManager is getting there for wireless usability (though I'm having trouble with it, somone please answer my post about it, lol), and modem utilities are even getting better. Unless someone encourages commercial software development and distribution on GNU/Linux, we'll never have great end user market share. Once we get software companies writing on Linux, then we can more redily migrate people to free versions.

Okay, I'll end this rant now

Livewire,

I am not sure that it holds what you say.

Is the availability of Linux software really due to the many distributions?

There are few precompiled, (and I assume also pre-linked) programs I installed, like Opera, QCAD, Acrobat Reader and Crossover Office which work like a charm.

For all other programs I install (.deb) thru dpkg, 95% of everything which fails is due to dependencies.

When I compile something from source, in 50% of the cases that fails, and that is either due to a dependency or due to my system. Only when libraries, packages or paths do not adhere to what the writer of the makefile assumed we have a true distribution problem.

That means at first that pre-compiled of pre-linked packages should work.

Your suggestion about defining a common package format is a good one, but dependency problems should be handled properly. And with this I mean that you should be able to bring your system [back] into a well-defined state. Here might be work to do and results to gain.

About source packages, well, maybe we should accept that the problem exists.

Summarizing, I fear that not the various distributions are the problem. But if you want to reach the large public, you choose what most people use.

jlinkels

Google Earth.
Our Earth.
QT3,GUI,GTK....

Just a little graphics shouldn't stop a software.

I just went to the Opera website, and to download (it already figured out I was running Linux), it prompted me for which distro I was running. First, it asks which distro name, then prompts for version, each linking to different binaries (also providing options for which version). I couldn't take the .rpm file sitting in my home directory, put it on my flashdrive, and give it to my friend running SuSE and expect him to install it.

I don't know about other distros (or even other versions of Fedora), but FC5 has a graphical installer that launches when you double-click on an RPM. This installer checks for deps and offers to download (via YUM) them and install. Very slick. Since I do most of my updating via commandline, I just noticed it. And, of course, I rarely install from downloaded RPM, normally it involves yum install "packagename" or yumex doing the same.

This brings up a couple of points. First, if I'm producing commercial, closed-source software, I don't want anyone compiling it, 'cause they need the source to do so. Not that I wouldn't personally love the source to be available for every prog out there, I think thats what's holding GNU/Linux back when it comes to adoption.

Second, you and I may be comfortable compiling from source, but I'm willing to bet that most of the ppl we know that call us when their browser crashes are not going to compile. Hell, I work support, and most of the time it's almost impossible to get someone to type 'cmd' in the run menu on Windows. . . and I don't really think there's anything wrong with that. If everyone was a power user, I would be working in construction.

Third, your example is precisley what I mean. We're not going to move Linux to the desktop until people don't have to compile. How many common (or not-so-common) Windows applications and utilities need to be (or can be) compiled from source? End users want to double-click, click OK, and then run their app. And we should work toward giving them that. Then, if they (we) want to compile something from source, we can.

Thank you. Using a system like I'm suggesting would provide just that, a well-documented and defined method for installing new software with two files for each architecture (and since x86_64 can run code for i386, this is even easier), that can be removed easily and painlessley. If properly implemented, this can easily be far more efficient and effective than Windows' Add-Remove Programs. And would be able to do both add AND remove. . . how many times has anyone actually used that control panel to add something? Now, with the tools currently available this can be done in Linux. All we need is universal packages of some kind.

It wouldn't be hard for the "installer" that's there to double-click on to be a simple script that takes the output from "uname -a" and then launches the correct package, i.e. packagename.i386.deb or packagename.ppc.rpm

I don't think having multiple distributions is the problem, or even _A_ problem. We just need to handle them a little differently, and then Linux can BECOME what most people use, without having to have another multi-billion dollar corporation to do it. Until then, Microsoft has the market advantage, and my mother will be stuck using Windows XP, and I will be stuck carrying around another HDD for my notebook.

Tim

You are right. I had forgotten that.

That is the way it is _supposed_ to work in Debian as well. And it does if you have a pristine installation. But after two years mixed distributions, an unstable version which became testing, and being forced to install something from unstable, alien packages and packages from source it does _not_ work like that anymore.

And for the other parts it seems that we mostly agree...

jlinkels

Well I think that the version windoze as an a alphaversion and when it's enough tested will be compiled to linux STABEL!!!

See, what happened to you is something that has happened to me before. I've managed to avoid it latley by sticking to RPMs, and the number of third-party repos out there has really helped me do that. Of course, I've usually got a testbed up that has some really exotic and alpha software on it, but my notebook and server are both pure RPM based (other than the NVidia drivers).

The great thing about Linux in the world I'm imagining, is that there would be a Linux for everyone. Grandma and the slow could easily use it by sticking to YUM/Apt installed packages, people with specialized software needs would be able to buy software from the store on CD, and people like us could build the Frankenstein-like distros that we love to play with.

Now, how do we get ppl to start making it? It would require everyone that uses RPM or DEB based package managers to communicate. . . that would be a lot of work in and of itself.



Sören, you might be on to something there. . . but I think it's about time we scrapped it. package management is terrible, the interface is slick but missing some vital components, and packages frequently interfere with each other. And there are so many bugs and holes in it that pretty much anyone can take over a windows box. You have to download "Virus scanners" and "spyware removal software" right away, and the default firewall is almost useless. I think if they added IPTables and started working on getting the codebase out to the OSS community, it might be stable within a month! :-D

a little too much time is being spent on trying to figure out a harmless sentence which had no intentions of any sort.

It's our time, we'll waste it as we see fit

Though this turning into a fun thread.

Hello,

I started this thread and I am glad to say that NOW we do have a Goggle Earth Linux version.

The beta version 4 http://earth.google.com/download-earth.html
is there to be downloaded.

Of course this doesn't change a lot of the problems people was talking about here, like it doesn't means that Google will stop contributing for chinese censorship, but it is of course good news.