Linux Usage Increases in Two Key Areas.. & Canonical Bumps LTS Support to 12 Years..

[GrtLksTechie]

This has to be Good News : 

I’ve been used to Linux usage in single digits for years. Before you get too excited,
Linux hasn’t cracked a double-digit market share on the global desktop scene.

However, two metrics could have a meaningful impact on the future rise of Linux’s popularity.
First, Steam on Linux is inching closer to two percent (https://www.gamingon-
linux.com/steam-tracker/#:~:text=For%20an%20estimation%20of%20
the,users%22%20for%20Linux%2BSteam.).

The first month of 2024 saw Linux reach 1.95 percent for Steam usage, which is almost back at the open source OS’s highest point of 2.0 percent. That climb dropped a bit in February but then climbed back up to its current percentage of 1.94.
That’s the overall numbers. If you go with English only, it hits a high of 4.66 per-
cent.

To get an idea of the actual numbers, according to Valve, as of March 2022,
there were 132 million total “monthly active users,” which would equate to roughly
2,640,000 Linux users.
But Steam wasn’t the only Linux metric to see a climb. According to Statista (https://
www.statista.com/statistics/265020/pc-processor-usage-on-the-online-gaming-platform-
steam-by-vendor/#:~:text=When%20looking%20at%20the%20distribution,AMD%20
processor%20was%20being%20used.), the percentage of Linux usage on Steam with
AMD processors was 33.66 percent in December of 2023.
Fast forward to now, and Phoronix states that number is 72.10 percent. Compare that
to Linux users with Intel CPUs at 27.9 percent and the picture becomes quite clear.
Of course, these numbers reflect gamers and not average users. According to
Statcounter, the Linux desktop market share is holding steady at 4.05 percent. That
is the highest market share Linux has seen to date.
Hopefully, if gaming on Linux continues to rise, we’ll finally see it hit double-digits
within the next five to ten years. 

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Canonical is no stranger to support. With every Ubuntu LTS release, you get five years
of standard support (which includes all packages found in the main Ubuntu repository). If
that’s not enough, you can subscribe to Ubuntu Pro to get another five years of security
support along with support for apps within both the Main and Universe repositories.
It gets better. Canonical has just announced (https://ubuntu.com//blog/canonical-
expands-long-term-support-to-12-years-starting-with-ubuntu-14-04-lts) that they’ve
added Legacy Support, which expands long-term support to a whopping 12 years
for all distributions starting with version 14.04. This is especially important to busi-
nesses who have deployed systems and need to depend on them for years.
To that, the official release announcement states, “Running the latest operating
system (OS) offers new features and enhanced performance, which is a good
choice for new deployments.

However, for large, established produc ion systes, the transition to a new OS version presents a challenge as it may involve updating the entire software stack running on top of it. This complexity is amplified by modern software architectures that incorporate containerisation, microservices, extensive data management features, as well as integration with third-party APIs.”
The one catch to the new Legacy Support is that it is an add-on and, from the way
the release reads, it’s not going to be free. There’s no mention of the Legacy Sup-
port add-on within the Ubuntu Support page (https://ubuntu.com/support ), so it’s
hard to say what the price will be.
To find out pricing information, use the Contact Us form (https://ubuntu.com/sup-
port/contact-us?product=support-overview) or wait until the official announcement.

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Hope this information is helpful..  Diid you see an email from Scott stating that he wishes to re-start Cleveland LUG ?