Personally, I notice a rift between FOSS enthusiasts and the rest of the world that keeps this solution from happening outside of a corporate product.
FREE Open Source Software enthusiasts care about how software is made, under what licenses, that they have a vibrant development community that is ultimately mutually beneficial even when they work on solutions that do the same thing.
Free Open Source SOFTWARE consumers do not care about these things at all, or minutely. They will seldom complain when they open up ChromeOS or Windows and find Chrome or Edge waiting for them inside, because they just want to go to Walmart or Costco or whatever, spend a few hundred bucks, and not have to worry about a computer again for 4-5 years. As long as the software is easy and works for the tasks they need to complete, they are happy.
Heck, most people I know hate their phones for the same reasons. Upgrades give them anxiety. They don't like new things, because new things are different and take time to learn, and they don't want to have to do those tasks in the first place. Desktop Linux looks like a proverbial mountain of aggravation by comparison to a phone.
Choice, for the consumer world, is largely an aggravation. Yes, when someone cares about something, they will appreciate choice, but that's the point.
(ex: I set up a super simple GNOME setup for my dad with giant desktop icons named things like "WEB", "PICTURES", "FILES", etc, to try and help him with his comfort level on the computer, and he still hates it. Because he knew how to get his tasks, that he already hates, done on his last computer and the software on this computer isn't the same. So right now, he has a dying 9 year old Win 10 Surface Pro that he has to keep plugged in at all times and has slowed to a crawl... and it's his preference over his new, simple, fast, linux laptop. Next I plan on switching him to Mate and trying to imitate his habits as closely as I possibly can... but he just doesn't want to change.)
Forgetting for a moment all the problems with distros and the need to create different binaries for all the myriad variations of distros, ChromeOS makes money. Yes, it's free to download, but just like all the free Google software, they mine your data and sell it so they are making money off of it, just like they do with their browser. They are the absolute WORST when it comes to our privacy and we just continue to sign up for their services....
There needs to be a way to monetize linux distros before any hardware manufacturer would be willing to commit to a particular flavor. I mean, the distro would have to have a sales and marketing team to reach out to hardware companies and push the OS and there has to be some benefit to loading a distro as well or what's the point?
Basically, until someone can make money off a "simpler, easy, quick, snackable alternative", it's not going to happen.
Personally, I thought that Linux Mint was the distro that was aiming to be the "simpler, easy, quick, snackable alternative" in the FOSS world. It's designed to be a easy transition for Windows users, as the launcher is in the same place on the panel, changing settings is thru a gui and it's supposed to be Windows-like as much as possible. People that I have migrated over to LM or built them a refurbed system with LM, love it, they say that it reminds them of Windows 7 or XP depending on what theming you set up. So getting Win 10 users who don't want to use Win 11 over to LM is just a simple lay up. The distro that strictly fulfils that "simpler, easy, quick, snackable alternative" is Puppy Linux. Whether new Linux users would find it intutive is a separate point.
Anyway, from my perspective, this idea that "less fragmentation in the Linux world would mean more mainstream option" is just another corporate PR talking point to consolidate their control in the Linux world, as they can't really do EEE effectively in the FOSS world as someone can always just fork a project and move on. That's why there's so much hoopla over Xlibre even though the project hasn't really done anything spectacular yet. That's why the corporate world already shot back with the Wayback project, so don't underestimate them a bit. They have the resources to wage PR wars all day long. It's in their corporate best interest, as an old area manager used to say to me all the time. PR is just another useful business expense. Chrome OS is their "ideal" Linux distro, as it's mostly proprietary with some open source bits here and there. Whereas most Linux distros are mostly FOSS with some proprietary bits here and there. That's why they are trying desperately to push ChromeOS into the Linux distro category to blur the lines as much as possible. Just some advice, don't fall for their spin as that will destroy the FOSS community in the end.
By the way, have you noticed a controversy in attitudes of OSS/FOSS vs corporate? I mean that most quality, polished, popular products are made not by 'bazaar' style swarm of individual and independent developers but by full-time teams of employers which exercise corporate/industrial workflow and discipline.
Say,
- LibreOffice: " Dec 29, 2017 — On average, there are over 250 devs active on a yearly basis and over 75 active on a monthly basis, so we can estimate around 50 full time paid devs."
- " Nov 5, 2024 -- According to its annual tax filings, the Mozilla Foundation reported having 60 employees during the 2022 tax year. The number of employees at the time of the layoffs was closer to 120 people, according to a person with knowledge."
- Not to mention Ubuntu, RedHat, Suse, etc.
I believe those that make money off of Linux are mostly those that make an OS for businesses and servers and get paid for support. I will never go with the Google data mining and selling my information type of operating systems.
That makes sense since they have the most resources. My old area manager would agree with you. But most of these projects started out in the beginning as a small "bazaar" project that eventually became commercialised over time. This principle even applies to hobby businesses in the real world. It's actually amazing that in the FOSS world, that small niche projects are as polished as they are, even if they only have one or a small team of devs. Timeshift is a great example. It started as a hobby project and is now developed actively by the Linux Mint team. Linux Mint itself is another great example. The Linux Mint team have corporate backing & donations but the team or distro aren't very corporate at all. Canonical does a good job with Ubuntu even though they are fully corporate. So it cuts both ways. But the really good future projects are usually started by a small team of "bazaar" devs that are trying to solve a problem or fill a niche. That's what makes the FOSS world dynamic. Most corporates don't want to develop these types of projects as the investment return is uncertain, but will definitely co-opt the same project if it shows potential. That just makes good business sense. Timeshift & Firefox are good examples of how this works in practice.
My favourite Linux distro of all time was Chalet OS. It was a one dev project. It had no corporate backing and it just died when that dev gave up developing it. Which was a shame and I just went back to Ubuntu. Corporate backing does give the user more certainty especially regarding long term support and future releases, but some useful apps I use are developed by a small dev team, like Librewolf and Waterfox. These are just as polished as the corporate developed ones. So it really all rests with the dev team in the end how good or polished they want their final product to be.
BTW, this same principle applies to small businesses in the real world, some are crap and some are really good & professional. I'm a small business owner, so my bias against big corporates is fairly obvious and understandable. I'm assuming your not a small business owner, so you haven't experienced big corporate predatory tactics first hand. That's why it's easier for me to buy bulk refurbed lots at clearance auctions than from a manufacturer or from a big corporation directly as they already have their established "distribution channels" and "disposal policies" regarding that old equipment. The world is really divided into employees & small business owners/contractors and the divide is very real. It starts with tax/VAT/GST reporting, business expensing/amortising, then everything else. An employee doesn't need to concern themselves with these things and just collects a regular paycheck until they are fired or quit. My friends that work for the big IT corporates, generally work 2 or 3 contracting jobs at the same time. They need to put aside themselves 50% of their income from job 2 & 3 to make sure they can cover their tax bill at the end of the financial year. Usually this covers their tax bill, but sometimes it doesn't if they don't have the expenses, so they need to go on a payment plan. They are really two different worlds. So I can really relate to these projects with the small dev teams, they are like small business owners fighting for market share in a very competitive market.
No, I am not. I am retired nowadays. But I have been as an employee as a small business. The latter was nightmare race against bureaucracy, taxes and the need to earn something for living. 
Walk off grand slam home run right there! 
It's not just PR talk, it's Linus Torvalds.
Hi everyone
For people (like me) that are not native English speakers and that may be struggling to find the correct meaning of some of the acronyms and initialisms in @nemo's sentence above (specially the meaning of "EEE"), here are my guesses:
-
PR = Public Relations
-
EEE - Probably NOT meant to mean "Electrical and Electronics Engineering" in this context
I'm going to guess that, in this context, it means "Embrace, extend and extinguish": "Embrace, extend, and extinguish - Wikipedia" - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embrace,_extend,_and_extinguish -
FOSS = Free and Open Source Software
Feel free to carry on
Thanks Ric for explaining the acronyms to non-native English speakers, really appreciate it 
Linus is fully in the corporate bubble, so his opinions regarding the Linux desktop are perfectly in line with that. Linus makes some good points and some bad points, but I disagree with him here regarding the Linux desktop "fragmentation" and focusing development efforts on a few desktops to improve cross-system functionality.
Seriously, this is an UM forum. MATE is a fork of Gnome 2 because a lot of Linux distros/devs didn't like the loss of functionality & features in Gnome 3 and they were right. Every new version of Gnome takes out functionality and features, so that's why they have a billion extensions which need to be installed via a website to improve functionality and features, which isn't exactly secure. Even vanilla Ubuntu needed to add extra extensions to their version of Gnome to keep some of the old Unity functionality. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if they went back to the Unity desktop at some stage in the future. It's an official flavour now. This "Linux desktops need consolidation" argument makes sense on a Gnome or KDE forum as they directly benefit from this consolidation. Making this argument on a MATE forum, means you think MATE shouldn't be developed any more as it is a niche Gnome 2 fork. I don't want that to happen as I love the MATE desktop, it's the best Linux desktop next to Cinnamon & Budgie and none of these desktops are "mainstream" Linux desktops in any way. Even Canonical/Ubuntu tacitly agree with me that Linux desktop diversity is a good thing, that's why the official Ubuntu flavours exist. They don't believe in keeping all their eggs in one basket as they understand how fickle the Linux dev world is and they have a business to run. That just makes good business sense in my opinion. Vanilla Ubuntu has gone from Gnome 2 to Unity to Gnome 3 and if past history is any guide, it will probably be another DE in the future.
As Gnome 50 drops support for X server sessions, that will create edge & corner cases for Vanilla Ubuntu users, particulalry corporate users. Will it be enough for Vanilla Ubuntu to change to another DE, only time will tell.
PS Linus himself uses the Xfce DE, which isn't exactly a mainstream DE and relies heavily on the X server/Xorg for it's functionality. Will he move over to a more Wayland compatible DE in the future? Who knows. That's why all of these X to Wayland compatibility projects are critical and there's no real way to know which one will be successful or have mass adoption. That's why keeping all options available is a good idea. Unless "success" is defined as being fully adopted by Red Hat/Gnome. I use neither, so don't see this as "successful" adoption. I see Red Hat/Gnome as the Microsoft of the Linux world and treat them/their products/ their apps accordingly, i.e I only use them when there are no other suitable options available.
As a practical matter, I wouldn't be able to migrate one Windows user over to Linux or sell a refurbed device with Linux if my only Linux OS options were Red Hat & Gnome. The Gnome DE is definitely not intuitive to new Linux users moving from Windows, whereas the desktop options in Ubuntu Mate, Linux Mint and Zorin OS are, even the traditional Gnome 2 DE layout.
Linus is against "breaking userspace", that means against breaking apps constantly by changing API's constantly (deprecating/changing functions/syntax willy-nilly) which results in breaking forward and backward compatibility and not creating/using stable common/shared standards. This is the mess he describes. This has nothing to do with fragmentation but everything with disdain for both pro and hobby application programmers and that includes you and me.
How many Python versions do you need at the moment to be able to run a random collection of Python apps ranging from 2010 to 2020 ? Even sourcecode compatibility is not assured.
Do we have that problem with Bash ? No.
Do we have that problem with C ? No (except for some exotic libraries).
So why do we need to have that problem with Python?
Or all the Graphical toolkits ?
AFAIK only FLTK (and maybe Enlightenment) is stable.
Fragmentation is not a problem, but API stability and standardization is. (and I'm not even talking about ABI. Only sourcecode compatibility)
Finally a quote from the AI from DuckDuckGo:
Qt is generally considered more stable and less prone to breaking changes compared to GTK, which has faced criticism for introducing non-backwards compatible changes in its updates. Many developers find Qt's approach to be more user-friendly and consistent, making it a preferred choice for cross-platform applications.
Couldn't agree more!
You know what the irony is Eugene? It's the gaming oriented distros that are driving home PC user Linux adoption, as you get all of the performance benefits and none of security problems/malware associated with Windows. I just watched Jay 2 cents video about Bazzite, and even people like him like that fact that the distro is "immutable". He even has a Freudian slip and calls it a great simple "Windows machine" for gamers, i.e what a simple Windows machine should look like. And he's right on the money. A well setup beginner Linux distro on a home PC/laptop is what a simple "Windows PC" should be. I setup and sell these machines daily and some people actually think that Linux Mint or Zorin OS are some sort of "secret insider" Windows versions only available to OEMs as they replicate the Windows workflow so well. I explain to them they're not, that they're actually Linux distros but they still don't believe me. Anyway, I got used to these type of illogical reactions over time and now find them hilarious!
Good on all of these gaming oriented Linux distros carrying the Linux torch into the world. If the job was left to the "Microsofts" of the Linux world, not one home desktop pc user would be running a Linux distro on their home PCs. Which is sort of ironic, as the actual Microsoft does a good job pushing their OS onto home pc users, even though it has a myriad of problems & draw backs, with the constant data collection being the number 1 issue. So the "Microsofts" of the Linux world aren't even as competent as the actual Microsoft at getting home pc users to use their OS/distros. God really works in mysterious ways.
Couldn't agree more!
Going back to the point raised in the article referenced by Eugene in his first posting, do the following references offer up possibilities and new vistas regarding potential development fronts for a more inclusive (or capable) UbuntuMATE ?