Centrafuse Linux

**VegasGuy** · 05-12-2011, 03:38 PM

So here's the official announcement:

http://www.centrafuse.com/ViewArticl...articleid=1042

I can say that it's a pretty straight forward install on Ubuntu 10.10 (Maverick). I have it running on a D510 Atom board with a 60gb ssd and 2gb RAM and it is very nice. I also have it running on a VM under 11.04 (Natty Narwahl), but you can't install it on that platform yet. I just did an in-place upgrade and everything worked fine. Same "look and feel" as CF on Windows.

In my opinion, the term "Beta" might be a tad optimistic, but you know these marketing types. The core is stable, media playback, web and a few other features are good, and as a starting point, it's really not too bad.

No guess on when this will be ready for general (retail) release. It will fully support the Centrafuse Market, so apps can be targeted for specific platforms.

Good times!

VegasGuy

**Chester** · 05-12-2011, 08:01 PM

Awesome, another platform that Centrafuse Inc. won't provide any support for, but will happily take your money!

Hope there are a lot of plugin developers who are up to spec on Linux, they seem to be the only ones these days who help users with problems on Centrafuse.

Good times!

**malcom2073** · 05-12-2011, 08:18 PM

So is it any faster than it is on windows? The main reason I never got into CF was how slow it ran on the atom processors.

**Tidder** · 05-12-2011, 09:21 PM

I'm a little disappointed to see that it's using mono vs a native app... I wouldn't think it would be any faster under linux vs windows.

**VegasGuy** · 05-12-2011, 10:04 PM

Originally Posted by Tidder

I'm a little disappointed to see that it's using mono vs a native app... I wouldn't think it would be any faster under linux vs windows.

There really wasn't any chance it would be native Linux. It's pretty hard to come up with any economic model that would justify the time and expense needed to re-write it all in native code. Not to mention the cost of support. Even with the mono framework, the availability of 3rd party apps is going to be limited, since most Windows developers are not familiar with the Mono environment and its requirements (myself included, I'm just getting started).

As for speed, I think it's just about the same. I know there are folks that will never be satisfied, but for the average user, its perfectly adequate. I think it's important to realize this is a very late alpha/early beta build (regardless of what the ad copy says), so there hasn't been any optimization done. I have now used Centrafuse on all three supported platforms (Win32, WinCE and Linux) and the user experience and feature set is very consistent. Not perfect, mind you, but in a fairly controlled set of circumstances, you'd be hard pressed to tell what the underlying OS is, and that's the primary goal.

Plus, it's just fun to dork around with.

VegasGuy

**tripzero** · 05-12-2011, 11:12 PM

Mono is slower than .NET in a lot of things (especially garbage collection). I wouldn't expect it to be faster. It'll also be interesting to see how they keep up with the fast pace Linux ecosystem.

This is good news though. More options on Linux is a win for Linux.

**RipplingHurst** · 05-13-2011, 01:30 AM

Originally Posted by VegasGuy

There really wasn't any chance it would be native Linux. It's pretty hard to come up with any economic model that would justify the time and expense needed to re-write it all in native code.
VegasGuy

Well, what about outsourcing? India, Buenos Aires, Prague, Philipines? Lots of good programmers out there, and cheap. (hummm....

)

This:

"It's an art form, like any other art form... I would spend time rewriting whole sections of code to make them more cleanly organized, more clear. I'm a firm believer that the best way to prevent bugs is to make it so that you can read through the code and understand exactly what it's doing… And maybe that was a little bit counter to what I ran into when I first came to Apple... If you want to get it smooth, you've got to rewrite it from scratch at least five times.

MacPaint was finished in October 1983. It coexisted in only 128K of memory with QuickDraw and portions of the operating system, and ran on an 8 Mhz processor that didn't have floating-point operations.

(Bill Atkinson, Apple McIntosh team, Computer History Museum).

---------- Post added at 11:30 PM ---------- Previous post was at 11:09 PM ----------

That's interesting. My Nook Color can run Ubuntu, I wonder if it can run CF too (I'm guessing not, but)...that could be fun...

**VegasGuy** · 05-13-2011, 01:52 AM

Originally Posted by RipplingHurst

Well, what about outsourcing? India, Buenos Aires, Prague, Philipines? Lots of good programmers out there, and cheap. (hummm....

)

This:

(Bill Atkinson, Apple McIntosh team, Computer History Museum).

Having worked on several outsourcing project, I can say that they rarely come in on time, and on budget. But that really isn't the issue here.

Having a complete, seperate codebase to maintain and develop for is insanity for a company with 2 full-time developers. Once the product is delivered, who maintains it? You still have to have an in-house guy to handle updates, bug fixes etc. And since he's the linux guru, that's all he does. You can't leverage him across your entire product line.

At the end of the day, arguments about the merits of native code versus frameworks, "perfect" code discussions and such are meaningless in the context of the market. As Microsoft, MacDonalds and Toyota have proven over and over again, the market demands exactly "good". Not "Best". Not "Perfect". Nobody confuses a Camry with a BMW M5, but they out-sell it 200 to 1 (probably more). Is a Big Mac the worlds best tasting hamburger? Hardly. And both Linux and the Apple OSs have features and merits that outshine Microsoft's offerings. But roughly 85% of all the desktops in the world run Microsoft.

Centrafuse runs just fine on an Atom board and Ubuntu 10.10 I'm confident it will get better as time goes on and the platform becomes more mature.

Just out of curiosity, is OM native linux code? How's that working out these days?

VegasGuy

**Sonicxtacy02** · 05-13-2011, 08:06 AM

Originally Posted by Chester

Awesome, another platform that Centrafuse Inc. won't provide any support for, but will happily take your money!

Hope there are a lot of plugin developers who are up to spec on Linux, they seem to be the only ones these days who help users with problems on Centrafuse.

Good times!

Thats kinda what i thought at first glance, but honestly i can see them providing a greater level of support for the linux product because it satisfies OEM/tier 1 company's requirements. Thats where Centrafuse Inc is really targeting. Think of the windows version as an ongoing exclusive test environment lol.

**VegasGuy** · 05-13-2011, 11:26 AM

Originally Posted by Sonicxtacy02

Thats kinda what i thought at first glance, but honestly i can see them providing a greater level of support for the linux product because it satisfies OEM/tier 1 company's requirements. Thats where Centrafuse Inc is really targeting. Think of the windows version as an ongoing exclusive test environment lol.

Joking aside, you've got it backwards. Having worked on the majority of OEM projects over the last 2 years, I can say with some certainty that the flow of development is the other way. The features and techniques created to meet OEM demand generally make there way into the retail product.

VegasGuy