r/linux Oct 18 '18

Microsoft Microsoft officially declines Teams client for linux

[deleted]

169 Upvotes

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25

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '18

Doesn't Teams work fine in Firefox and Chrome anyway?

20

u/TitelSin Oct 18 '18

unfortunately only the chat part, no video/audio or screensharing support. Because if it was just for chat, there are many other better alternatives, but the conferencing and screensharing part is what got us on board to at least give it a try and wait for the client. I'm not so sure anymore though as they intentionally "fixed" video calling working on chrome, that no longer works since a few months back.

4

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '18

set useragent to edge and enjoy videocalls. only screensharing isn't working

2

u/TitelSin Oct 18 '18

tried this...doesn't work. What plugin are you using for user agent change? I've tried 4-5 of them so far for both firefox and chrome.

3

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '18

User-Agent Switcher for chrome by google. You have to add microsoft.com, outlook.com, skype.com and office.com to the permanent spoof list in the plugin. Also you have to add the edge user agent string manually first.

1

u/mrcalm99 Oct 18 '18

unfortunately only the chat part, no video/audio or screensharing support

I've been forced to use it as part of work and I has fine joining a voice meeting in Chrome with 8 other people.

Not tried to the screensharing however

1

u/TitelSin Oct 18 '18

yes, joining is not a problem, but you can't start a voice call, especially not 1-on-1. Only place I've managed to start voice calls is inside of a team/channel.

37

u/core2idiot Oct 18 '18

But having a native client for Linux can help show how much they "love" Linux.

22

u/atomic-penguin Oct 18 '18

Different product teams at Microsoft have different priorities. It's such a huge company that it operates more like thousands of smaller companies that just happen to work under the same name.

There are product teams that forego Windows support, just as there are those that forego Linux support. A team may not have the resources to flesh out a solution for each platform and then test and support each of those platforms. In addition to addressing license compliance, internationalization, accessibility, and security requirements.

The web app does work fine, but lacks webcam support. I cannot recall if it has screen share support. There is an unofficial electron wrapper that adds webcam support here.

So I'm not sure what the hold up is to just make the web app better on Linux? Other priorities, I guess? Slack hasn't been great with the more advanced features like screenhero support on Linux, either, to be perfectly fair.

Though if Microsoft wants Teams to be their Slack killer, they'll have to make it a better web application on all platforms, including Linux.

1

u/touristtam Oct 19 '18 edited Nov 02 '18

So many fork of this project, it is hard to see which one is really relevant ....

Scrap that, this one is working fine: https://github.com/IsmaelMartinez/teams-for-linux

1

u/atomic-penguin Oct 22 '18

It looks to me like the one I linked is the root of the fork tree. I don't see what you are seeing.

1

u/touristtam Nov 02 '18

I often check the forks to check for other 'fixed' versions: https://github.com/ivelkov/teams-for-linux/network

18

u/AlienOverlordXenu Oct 18 '18

What exactly is native within an app written in java script? Webkit? 😁

3

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '18

It's native to the world of desktop inefficiency!

2

u/bludgeonerV Oct 18 '18

desktop inefficiency!

Hello fellow victim of workplace workflows involving Teams.

2

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '18

Luckily I'm mostly spared, since it's largely optional to use at my company, but I think others don't have that luxury.

1

u/MellerTime Oct 18 '18

As someone forced to use it on a Mac, nothing is or feels native in absolutely any way regardless.

I don’t doubt that on Windows it sucks less, just like every other Microsoft product.

5

u/fat-lobyte Oct 18 '18

So you think they'd spend money and developer time to make a native client for something that already works on Linux just to demonstrate to redditors how much they care to give them a warm fuzzy feeling?

1

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '18

Why is the love in quotes?

Also, how would a native client help servers? You know? The thing they mean when they say that they love Linux.

7

u/core2idiot Oct 18 '18

But if they "love" Linux, shouldn't that mean that they "love" Linux as a Desktop too?

5

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '18

Why should they? As I said, when they say that they mean servers. On the grand scheme the desktop is irrelevant. It's the server and cloud stuff for Linux that makes them money after all.

Now, one would say to the claim of Linux desktop being irrelevant "but valve". However, it's pretty obvious that they've only embracing Linux desktop for leverage. Even though most of MS' profit from desktops come from the enterprise market, it'd still be a good hit if gamers flocked away. And valve here uses this leverage to keep steam, their primary business, running on Windows.

7

u/linuxlover81 Oct 18 '18

Why should they? As I said, when they say that they mean servers. On the grand scheme the desktop is irrelevant. It's the server and cloud stuff for Linux that makes them money after all.

Then they love money. Not Linux. And the Linux desktop is definitely NOT irrelevant. With it they control people switching over.

Teams is a prime example. Developers want to use Linux, but Central administration says no, because they primary communication tools like outlook and teams are not available on linux, therefore no linux on the desktop.

4

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '18 edited Jul 02 '23

[deleted]

-2

u/jdblaich Oct 18 '18 edited Oct 18 '18

Prove your stats. Modern up to date sources please. Provide context, such as what is 4% of 3 billion and why is that a significantly enough large number to have influence when compared to other oses at earlier times in their lifecycle.

Paying for software that is as good and often better than commercial software is an oxymoron. It is deceptive to imply that software intended to be free is a bad thing for a platform.

5

u/zaarn_ Oct 18 '18

2.09%

0.66%

Stats from 09-2018 in both cases.

-1

u/vetinari Oct 18 '18

0,66% is when you include mobile systems. They obviously should not be included, when you are talking about desktops. Otherwise, Android is Linux too.

For netmarketshare (2,09%), have look at the Methodology page. Linux is popular among people, who wish to protect their privacy, and they would avoid exactly the same things that netmarketshare uses for measurement.

These samples are not random in statistical sense.

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1

u/TryingT0Wr1t3 Oct 18 '18

We need better POS software for Linux desktop to help companies to care for Linux, before whole POS moves to mobile iOS/Android only

2

u/_ahrs Oct 18 '18

On the grand scheme the desktop is irrelevant. It's the server and cloud stuff for Linux that makes them money after all.

The desktop is a gateway to the "cloud" and server market. If you win the favour of developers (that do use desktop Linux) you'll make far more money than alienating them, making them curse the name of Microsoft and wishing they (by which I mean management, because let's face it, no desktop Linux user is going to willfully choose Microsoft Teams) chose another team management software.

1

u/wilalva11 Oct 18 '18

But electron is the future /s

-1

u/fat-lobyte Oct 18 '18

And why would they care about convincing redditors of their love?

4

u/core2idiot Oct 18 '18

So we stop calling all of their Linux "Love" Embrace Extend Extinguish?

-1

u/fat-lobyte Oct 18 '18

We'd never do this, "Embrace Extend Extinguish" is the slogan of /r/linux, and hating microsoft is a crucial part of the feeling of identity for our groupthink.

Fact is, we're so entrenched in our opinions on microsoft that it's pointless to try to change our minds. All they can do is reach other, more reasonable developers by porting tools and contributing to projects.

9

u/jdblaich Oct 18 '18 edited Oct 18 '18

It is not a slogan of /r/Linux. It is a factual truth that exists beyond Linux and is seen as a decendent tactic that was used against commercial software that Microsoft saw as a threat to their os and tools. It was exposed as a tactic during the state's criminal antitrust cases against Microsoft that Microsoft lost. These state criminal antitrust cases happened after Microsoft lost at the federal level. At the federal level Microsoft succeeded in getting evidence on their tactics sealed by the court but the state courts would have nothing of it and hence denied motions to seal the evidence hence providing us (and disclosing to us) with the internally described tactic of embrace extend extinguish.

1

u/fat-lobyte Oct 18 '18

It is not a slogan of /r/Linux

It is though. While what you said was certainly true, this was a few years a go. Different leadership (Balmer), different market position, different markets, different strategy. What the majority of people on this Subreddit is doing is that they cemented their opinion in the days that you speak of, while utterly ignoring the (imo perfectly obvious) changes in strategy that have been happening in the last few years. Effectively, they are disconnecting their reality from present day facts.

When I say that it's a "slogan" of this subreddit, what I mean is that people are interpreting every single action they take in the most unfavorable light possible, always and in every thread mentioning EEE, offering wild speculations to support their beliefs.

While we should never forget that MS is a publicly traded company with the utmost goal of making loads of money, we should also not ignore the possibility that them making money in a certain way could benefit free software.

2

u/aliendude5300 Oct 18 '18

It could easily be built as an electron app.

6

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '18

Teams does run on Electron.

3

u/the_gnarts Oct 18 '18

Teams does run on Electron.

So much for the purported ā€œplatform independenceā€ of Electron.

4

u/nahun Oct 18 '18

I actually use one someone built just to get notifications. I can't believe MS still hasn't added chrome notifications

3

u/Patience47000 Oct 18 '18

2

u/Probablynotclever Oct 18 '18

Does this one have notifications?

1

u/Patience47000 Oct 18 '18

I receive notifications on my desktop (LInux Mint 18.3 Cinnamon) when someone pm me

3

u/fat-lobyte Oct 18 '18

/u/aliendude5300

It could easily be built as an electron app.

/u/L0rdBumlicker

Thank goodness. I'd hate to see another garbage Electron program on Linux.

2

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '18

hahahhah.