It's been almost a year now since Promethean revealed that they're working on Linux drivers for their range of ActivBoards and still no news of when and if it's to be released to the public.
Through piecing together information I've googled, it seems that Promethean advertised for a Linux/Mac software tester back in March, it's unclear if they managed to recruit anyone for the position. Now they're again recruiting for a similar position :
Software Tester: "You will be responsible for testing the full range of software & hardware products on Windows, Mac & Linux platforms. You will assist with maintaining the issue database & will liaise with other departments to qualify issues raised from internal & external users."
This is becoming quite a problem for us because as I've mentioned before it's the school's intention to make the transition to FOSS. There is certainly more demand for Linux support from Promethean, especially this year, but the exact numbers are unclear. I would therefore urge Promethean to adopt a platform-agnostic approach within a reasonable time frame to satisfy this increasing demand.
4 comments:
- At 22 October 2007 at 13:02 Dughall McCormick said...
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Steve, I attended a Promethean event last week in my capacity as a PCAP member and was relentless in my insistance that Promethean address this (ever-growing) issue with their product and cross-platform/OS compatability. I was given every assurance that 2008 would see the advent of a 'converged' solution in support of MAC/Windows/Linux etc. However, they did cite the problem of the 'variety' of Linux platforms being a potential stumbling block.
- At 30 October 2007 at 15:10 Stephen Walder said...
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That sounds promising Doug!
Unfortunately the wide variety of distributions/platforms is a challenge for any company developing software for Linux - again and again you hear the same problem crop up. It usually ends up that just the main distributions are supported which is a good start. Thankfully NABB uses Ubuntu which is one of the most popular distributions, so I would imagine this will be supported. - At 30 October 2007 at 15:14 Stephen Walder said...
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I was quite suprised to see this blog come first place when I googled 'linux promethean.' so your comments are invaluable - perhaps I could create a post with this new found information?
- At 24 October 2008 at 18:20 Anonymous said...
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I was looking into this very problem. I have an eee that I'm interested in using with Activboards but I want to keep the Linux on it. I think the Ubuntu distro is a great handle on the Linux market. I know that there is new Activ software that is going to be released soon. Maybe we'll have Linux support then.