India's $35 computer

India has announced a $35 computer for students. The Linux-based machine is intended to give Indian students at all levels, starting in grade school, access to an affordable computer. I proposed a $100 computer twelve years ago--at that time, no one took it seriously, but I'm glad India thinks it's a good idea.

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I wonder how well the increase in Liunx-based systems will be handled by software developers. My only real gripe about Linux is that very few games or other peices of software are developed to run on a Linux system, without having to run a Windows emulator first. The increase of Linux-based systems sort of reminds me of the beginning of the PC era where there were literally dozens of different operating systems based on each manufacturer, until Apple and Microsoft developed the two most standardized and widely adopted versions.

We have 2 computer that run Linux, one with a dual-boot Windows option. The other 2 are Windows only. I find that as much as I dislike certain aspects of Windows, it's still my go-to OS. Linux is smoother, simpler, and far less buggy...but I am mostly limited to browsing, e-mail, streaming content, photo editing, and office software. I can't do any PC-based games, and several peripherals are not compatible with it either. Perhaps as initiatives like what India is doing with increasing the number of Linux-based systems, there will be more of an effort to actually design hardware and software specifically to run on a Linux OS.