--- /dev/null
+
+<p>
+It is fairly understandable that existing proprietary DAWs do not run on
+Linux, given the rather small (but growing) share of the desktop market
+that Linux has. However, when surveying the landscape of "popular
+operating systems", we find:
+</p>
+<ul>
+ <li>older versions of Windows: plagued by abysmal stability and
+ appalling security</li>
+ <li>newer versions of Windows seem stable but still suffer from
+ security problems</li>
+ <li>OS X: an amazing piece of engineering that is excellent for
+ audio work but only runs on proprietary hardware and still lacks the
+ flexibility and adaptability of Linux.</li>
+</ul>
+<p>
+Security matters today, and will matter more in the future as more and
+more live or semi-live network based collaborations take place.
+</p>
+<p>
+Let's contrast this with Linux, an operating system which:
+</p>
+<ul>
+ <li>can stay up for months (or even years) without issues</li>
+ <li>is endlessly configurable down to the tiniest detail</li>
+ <li>is not owned by any single corporate entity, ensuring its life
+ and direction are not intertwined with that of a company (for a
+ contrary example, consider BeOS)</li>
+ <li>is fast and efficient</li>
+ <li>runs on almost any computing platform ever created, including
+ old "slow" systems and new "tiny" systems (e.g. Raspberry Pi)</li>
+ <li>is one of the most secure operating systems "out of the box"</li>
+</ul>
+<p>
+More than anything, however, Ardour's primary author uses Linux and
+wanted a DAW that ran there.
+</p>
+<p>
+Having written a DAW for Linux, it turned out to be relatively easy
+to port Ardour to OS X, mostly because of the excellent work done by
+the JACK OS X group that ported JACK to OS X.<br />
+Although OS X has a number of disadvantages compared to Linux, its
+ease of use and its presence in many studios already makes it a
+worthwhile platform.
+</p>
+
+
projects / ardour-manual / blobdiff