IP: Lindows could give Linux life and worry Microsoft

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Michael Robertson started his IBM notebook computer. He launched a 
Microsoft PowerPoint slide presentation about a product he hopes to be 
selling soon.
The product was the operating system he was running. Hint: It wasn't 
Microsoft Windows.
Robertson was using Lindows (www.lindows.com), a version of the GNU/Linux 
operating system designed to run major Windows programs as well as software 
written for Linux itself. If he and his team pull this off, they could give 
life to Linux on desktop computers -- a genre that has been slow, at best, 
to emerge as a challenger to the Microsoft monopoly.
The Linux community is skeptical about Lindows. Some extremely smart 
programmers -- such as the ones working on an open-source Windows 
compatibility project called Wine (http://www.winehq.com) -- are making 
slow, if steady, progress. Making this idea work in the real world is, as 
technologists like to say, a non-trivial task.
Robertson says his team's focus and passion -- plus his ability to put real 
money behind the notion -- will prove the skeptics wrong and bring Linux to 
a more mainstream audience soon.
He has money, no question. Robertson started and ran MP3.com, a company 
that did much to popularize the music file format but which drew the 
fanatical ire of the music industry. The record companies sued and won a 
copyright-violation settlement, and last year MP3.com was sold to 
entertainment giant Vivendi Universal.
Now Robertson is back with Lindows.com, a San Diego-based company into 
which he's invested $5 million so far and hopes to raise considerably more. 
He wants to persuade corporations to upgrade older PCs with low-cost 
Lindows, not expensive new versions of Windows, and to get the software on 
some new computers as well.
Robertson is also back in court. This time Microsoft has launched the 
lawyers, claiming that the name ``Lindows'' might be confused with Windows 
and thereby violate Microsoft's trademark.
Robertson has one word for the claim: ``absurd.''
There are thousands of computer-related products with ``Windows'' in their 
names, he says. Yet Microsoft has left those products unmolested.
What does that suggest? ``This is about Microsoft's continued pattern,'' he 
says, ``to do everything they can do to smash perceived competition.''
It's easy to see why Lindows, at least in theory, might worry Microsoft. If 
companies can keep running their Windows applications and get off the 
Microsoft upgrade treadmill, some will surely consider it.
Microsoft's dominance of the applications-software business actually works 
to Lindows' favor, Robertson says. That's because Lindows is focusing on 
just a few applications.
``You can make a case that only 10 programs really matter to a majority of 
people today,'' he says. Those include Microsoft Word, Excel, PowerPoint 
and other programs in the Office suite; Quicken, America Online and just a 
few others. If Lindows runs those well, it can capture some users.
The way Lindows runs those Windows programs, he says, is through a layer of 
software in between Linux and the applications, which normally run directly 
on Windows. The layer translates certain instructions -- the so-called 
``Applications Programming Interfaces'' (APIs) -- used in Windows software 
into instructions that Linux will understand.
This is a difficult task. There are thousands upon thousands of APIs, and 
Microsoft doesn't fully disclose what it's doing under the covers. But 
Robertson says Lindows is getting close with the major software.
He ran several Microsoft Office applications on his IBM ThinkPad, though 
some functions of those programs still aren't working properly under 
Lindows. They'll come in time, he says.
Running Windows programs is only part of the task, Robertson says. So is 
preserving the user's preferences, data and operating system look and feel. 
Lindows, on installation, will give users several choices. One will put 
Lindows alongside Windows. The other will delete Windows. Both will save 
the user's configuration to make the transition as comfortable as possible.
Adding and upgrading Linux applications will take place using an online 
system designed to make installation simple and painless, according to 
Robertson. Maybe users will start off only running their major Windows 
applications, but then they'll discover some of the excellent Linux 
software, too -- and Linux developers will be encouraged to come up with 
more consumer-oriented products.
Sometime in the next few weeks, Robertson says, Lindows will release a 
``Sneak Preview'' version of the operating system. Upon release of version 
1.0, it will cost about $100 for a single user, with discounts for people 
or companies buying in bulk.
Robertson says the stars are lining up for a product like this. Linux has 
come a long way in its quality and, with new user interfaces, ease of use. 
Fast Internet connections are becoming more widespread. Microsoft is widely 
mistrusted, and keeps raising software prices and treating customers like 
serfs despite the plummeting price of hardware and tough economic times.
While Lindows will be constructed on top of open-source software, some of 
its key elements will be proprietary -- a strategy that will not make some 
open-source advocates happy but which Robertson says is essential to making 
the business work. Lindows won't be the first to meld proprietary and open 
code, but the potentially high visibility of the project will spark a 
strong, continuing debate.
If Lindows works as promised, it'll add diversity to a near-monoculture. 
More choice is always better than less.
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