I use three different operating systems on a daily basis – Windows, Mac and GNU/Linux – yet my data is always the same and I often use the same applications. Here's what I use on a regular basis:
| Task | Open Standard(s) | Free Software Application(s) |
|---|---|---|
| IMAP | Thunderbird | |
| Calendar | iCalendar over WebDAV | Mozilla Calendar |
| Contacts | LDAP | Thunderbird address book |
| Documents | OpenDocument | Open Office |
| Music | Ogg & MP3 over HTTP | VLC Media player |
| Pictures | SVG, PNG, JPEG | The GIMP, Inkscape |
| Code | Subversion | Eclipse & Subclipse |
| News | OPML, RSS, Atom | Thunderbird news reader |
| Chat | Jabber & IRC | Gaim |
Sometimes I'll use an OS-specific app if it provides a better experience, but still uses open standards. For example, I use iCal, iChat, iTunes and Address Book on the Mac with iCalendar, Jabber, MP3 and LDAP respectively (I know, MP3 isn't entirely open). I can easily chop and change which application I use, or even use different ones at the same time because my data is stored in such an accessible way.
Although I believe that desktop Linux is very important and Ubuntu is my first choice of OS, what's more important is the open standards it uses for managing data. Free software won't fend off proprietary software by building a better desktop, it will win by making the operating system a user is running almost irrelevant.
What I'm working towards at the moment is hosting all of my data across web servers and having a web application to manage each type of data. That way I can access my data on any device with a web browser – including my phone and Internet tablet. I've had a web server at home for a couple of years now which I store some of my data on.
Web applications I've been using include:
- Horde IMP
- GMail
- PHPiCalendar
- Google Calendar
- Google Docs & Spreadsheets
- Ampache
- Flickr
- Gliffy
- Trac
- Gregarius
- Google Reader
Some of these are hosted by companies, some are hosted on my own server, but what's important is that they use the same open standards.
One of the aims of Moya is to create a home server which manages all of these types of data and provides a web interface, making the client operating system irrelevant.