Big things are coming to Linux in 2024, but don't expect too much...

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#Linux #linux2024 #linuxdesktop #linuxdistro #opensource

Timecodes:
00:00 Intro
00:41 Sponsor: Squarespace
01:42 Goodbye X11
04:00 Open Source Nvidia for everyone
05:52 10% market share with ChromeOS added
07:33 Gaming: more Linux gaming devices
10:11 Packaging formats: still messy
11:37 Immutable distros: not mainstream
12:51 App support: no changes
13:57 Parting thoughts
15:27 Sponsor: Tuxedo Computers
16:25 Support the channel

First, X.org will be even more abandoned. I'm not saying every distro will drop it entirely, but I'm expecting way more distributions and desktops to announce in 2024, that X.org won't be a supported platform anymore in 2025, or at the very least won't be the default session.

I would be surprised if, in 2024, Ubuntu didn't announce something similar for the following year.

The second thing I think we'll see is a fully open source stack for nvidia being available for Linux users. With the Linux kernel 6.7 bringing support for the GSP firmware, letting Nvidia GPUs be reclocked by the open source Nouveau drivers, and NVK now part of Mesa, and providing decent performance already, I'd say 2024 will be the year where Nvidia users can finally enjoy a good experience on Linux without anything extra to install.

In terms of market share, we've seen some healthy growth in 2023, ending the year on a potentially anomalous 3.8%, the highest the Linux desktop has ever been. In 2024, I'd expect this trend to continue: people don't seem to enjoy WIndows 11 that much, and they already didn't enjoy Windows 10 all that much either, and with Microsoft cramming more and more ads in their OS, and potentially moving to a subscription based model for Windows 12, I'd expect more people to give Linux a go, and mathematically, some of them will stick with it.

All in all, I don't think we'll jump to something like 8 or 10%, but I'd be surprised if the Linux desktop didn't reach 5 or 6% on its own, and about 10% combined with Chrome OS.

I would also expect 2024 to see a standalone release of SteamOS for any computer, and I'd say our market share will probably rise to about 3, maybe 3 and a half percent, but it won't be a major change, and the situation in terms of how many games we can play will be relatively stable, with major names still missing.

Now let's talk about the things I feel will stay exactly the same in 2024: starting with packaging formats. What we might see is more distros deciding to provide specific apps using the official snap or flatpak, like RHEL is doing with LibreOffice, because for some apps, it simply makes no sense to repackage them all the time, but that won't change the status quo.

Same thing for what we generally call Immutable distributions. I don't think they'll gain that much popularity in 2024, because they're often linked to using either flatpak or snap, or Nix packages, can't forget about Nix or I'll get comments again, and since we're not making these formats the only choice any time soon, I don't think this group of Linux distros will conquer the general Linux desktop audience either.

As per app support, that's another area where I feel we're not going to see much progress. And I'm talking big name apps, like Office, the Adobe Suite, Autocad, and the like. Even if my predictions for Linux market share come true, the potential revenue from supporting Linux is still low and will still be low, compared to the effort of porting the app, finding a packaging format that allows you to do everything you want, and then supporting that version.