Tuesday night.
Emeryville, California.
Fuddruckers, crazy-good burgers.
A guy stops us as we are walking to
our table. He looks crisp, clean with a Steve Jobs smile. He asks me
(a blond lady), “Do you really use Linux?” I am wearing my ultra
comfy all black hoody “ZaReason: Building Linux computers so you
don't have to.”
I love this question. I smile and my
eyes twinkle. I truly love this question.
I say, “Yes.”
My husband says, “Boy, do we know
Linux.”
The guy smiles and tells a story about
a geeky friend he knew who was “really into Linux.” With his
Steve-style smile he says, “I love the concept behind free and open
creation of the software. But did it plateau? I haven't hear about it
as much lately.” We say we also love the concept behind free and
open source software and Linux is alive and thriving.
He is sincerely happy to hear that
Linux is doing well. I tell him how the turning point happened a few
years ago, about how people who have never used Linux before –
people who barely know how to use computers at all – are buying
Linux-only computers just for the security and ease of use.
He smiles wide and expresses
congratulations. I say the computers “are now so easy. A person can
get a new Linux-only computer, plug it in, turn it on and be up and
running in a minute or two. It'll sense the printer, sense wifi,
everything.” Smiles all the way around.
I ask if the guy uses a Mac. Of course
he does. He is dressed like Steve himself. So, I add, “Ubuntu is
aiming to be even more beautiful than Apple.” He raises both
eyebrows and I can tell he's making a mental note to invest in any
Ubuntu-related company. Great conversation.
As my husband and I sit down to dinner,
it feels like the perfect Valentine's Day. That public recognition of
Linux = good is so delicious, sweet, fulfilling. But the real
Valentine's Day present came ten minutes later. As we ate, I had my
laptop open working on an article about the Secret Sauce for Building
Linux Computers, deep in thought. This gave my husband the brainspace
needed to think about what I had said about Linux being better than
Apple. We hear this comparison often and I know many who work
alongside those who use Apple computers sure are cheering for Ubuntu.
On his phone my husband went to
netcraft.com, a site that analyses servers. He found that Apple's
webservers are running Apache on Linux.
Apple's site is served up by Apache
running on Linux. Perhaps someone already told me this in the past,
but this time it really sinks in.
Apple trusts the foundation of it's
company to free and open source software.
What a great Valentine's Day.
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