What I do, and have done, for a living
I am a member of Dell Technologies’ developer relations team, focusing on Open Source, Linux and DevOps. While at Dell I have word in variety of groups including, central marketing, professional services, corporate strategy, product management and three different CTO offices. I am also the founder of Project Sputnik, an Ubuntu-based laptop for developers, now in its 12th year.
Prior to Dell I was at Sun Microsystems in a variety of roles. My last three years there I spent as an Open Source evangelist, avid blogger, and driver of Sun’s GNU/Linux strategy and relationships.
Before Sun, I spent a year at Johnson & Johnson consumer products marketing dental floss (remember, you don’t have to floss them all, just the ones you want to keep). New Jersey winters got the better of me and after the 16th snow storm in one year (literally) I left J&J and relocated to San Francisco.
I began my professional career out of college with a four year stint in Tokyo where I worked for Sony working with ISVs for their UNIX-based “NEWS” workstation.
On the personal side
Born and raised in Honolulu, Hawaii, I headed east for higher education and attended Williams College and Harvard Business School. I am a single father of three, residing just outside of Austin. We emigrated to Austin from Silicon Valley over decade ago and have never looked back.
Disclaimer: The views expressed on this blog do not necessarily reflect those of my employer Dell EMC, or any other organization with which I have an affiliation. These are my own thoughts and opinions.
Barton's Blog 
I see you scored some ink on the Register’s pages:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/10/07/barton_george_quits_sun/
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hey Barton,
It was nice to read your Blog and notice your credible work in Opensource while you were at SUN . Well, I want to present you an oppurtunity. We have a Technical Festival – Footprints (http://msu-footprints.org) on 20th, 21st & 22nd February 2009. The festival is the biggest in the state of Gujarat(India). It is held in our University Campus, Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda (http://msubaroda.ac.in).
You can come down and promote Cloud Computing & OpenSource at the festival. I am personally engaged in promoting OpenSource in many ways in this event. I will sincerely appreciate any kind of help from your side.
If you are interested, Please drop me an email, and we can work things out.
Looking Forward to a Positive response.
Regards,
Kshitij Shah
LikeLike
Kshitij,
Thank you for your kind offer. It will be a bit tough to make it out Footprints this time. Thanks for thinking of me. BTW I love the website very cool!
LikeLike
Hey Barton,
Glad to know, that you considered my request. Thank You very Much. Hope we can have you over here, sometime in the future.
Regards
LikeLike
Dude,
good to see you and great feedback from SWSX. good choice to enter the cloud and glad to see you are having fun.
How are the kids coming along?
stefan
LikeLike
[…] Intel Developer Forum y LinuxCon. Mientras visitaba las dependencias de Dell, fue entrevistado por George Barton, quien manejaba la estrategia en torno a Linux en Sun Microsystems y hoy es evangelista de Cloud […]
LikeLike
[…] Intel Developer Forum y LinuxCon. Mientras visitaba las dependencias de Dell, fue entrevistado por George Barton, quien manejaba la estrategia en torno a Linux en Sun Microsystems y hoy es evangelista de Cloud […]
LikeLike
Hello Barton,
Good Stuff. I recently came across your site here, and you have some very useful information. I’m curious, have you seen the OpSource cloud?(www.opsourcecloud.net) We have been at many of the shows you have been to recently, and I believe Treb Ryan and Jonh Rowell our CEO and CTO have spoken at a few.
In many of your postings you speak to enterprise requirements and security in clouds,and I would be interested to learn a bit more about your thoughts on how the OpSource Cloud is addressing these areas while still providing the flexibility and elasticity that makes public clouds attractive.
rlebherz@opsource.net
LikeLike
Hello Barton,
I was searching for ATT synaptic storage, Nirvanix and Azure on Google and I found your site, Then I read through all the articles …
I am a cloud evangelist too. Here at gladinet (http://www.gladinet.com), we develop software to do map network drive and online backup to ATT synaptic storage, Windows Azure, Nirvanix, Amazon S3, Box.net, Google docs and more. So I am farmilar with the topics you talked about in your blog and found it interesting.
Looking to connect …
Jerry
LikeLike
Hey Barton,
We are working on a new cloud standards initiative. I know – they are a dime a dozen – but this one is a bit different. The concept is focused purely on the buyer needs. We have been kicking the concept around with quite a few others.
I was wondering if you would have a few minutes to catch up on the subject.
Cole
LikeLike
Hello, Mr. George.
Midori Yamamitsu from the Consulate General of Japan in SF here. When you have a moment, would you please contact me at the e-mail address above so I could send you information about our event where Professor Naoyuki Agawa, Keio University, is a featured speaker. He asked us to invite you to the event.
Thank you for your kind attention.
LikeLike
[…] periodista que entrevista a Adam Hawley es Barton George, el evangelista de cloud computing de Dell y que sutilmente le da “caña” al […]
LikeLike
[…] made the move from gaming to HPC. In his current gig as Cloud Computing Evangelist at Dell, Barton is a good guy to get to know. While he blogs about technology, he seems to go out of his way to […]
LikeLike
Hello Barton,
I was looking for the user’s guide for SuperSPARC I CPU (Viking) and Multicache controller. It was previously found at http://mediacast.sun.com/users/Barton808/media/SuperSPARC_MultiCacheController_UserManual_edited2.pdf
Now, with Sun getting bought by Oracle, all their documentation has been discarded as of July 29, 2010. Please let me know if you happen to have a copy of that file. Thank you in advance.
Regards,
Aleksandr
LikeLike
Aleksandr,
When I left Sun I left all my files behind as well. Unfortunately I dont have a copy of the manual.
thanks
Barton
LikeLike
Barton,
I was not able to get a copy from anywhere else, but your response has allowed me to get approval to use the Sparc v8 for my project, which I completed successfully. Thank you very much for your quick response. I wish you luck in your endeavors.
Regards,
Aleksandr
LikeLike
Hi Barton, your better half highlighted your blog as part of the Top 100 Cloud Computing blogs so had to check it out. Am now doing business consulting at Juniper Networks (a lot of ex-Sun folks here now!) and working on some cloud-related projects. Hope Austin is treating you well. Still in the Rose Garden!
Regards,
Pat
LikeLike
Pat,
Good to hear from you, at Juniper say hey to Steve Troyer whom I played rugby with in college and Graeme Merry from Glasgow that I used to commute to Sun with.
Barton
LikeLike
Hey Barton,
I attended your session “Taking The Revolutionary Approach To Cloud Building: How To Architect For The Greatest Efficiency” at Cloud Expo 2011 and found it interesting. Could you please share the slides…
Naveen…
LikeLike
Naveen,
The slides for my presentation are up on slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/DellServices/taking-the-revolutionary-approach-to-cloud-building-how-to-architect-for-the-greatest-efficiency
You can find the slides for all the Dell presentations and more here: http://dellintheclouds.com/
thanks
LikeLike
Thanks Barton.
LikeLike
[…] next video is Barton George (Dell) interviewing Rob Hirshfeld (Dell). They start off talking about the Hadoop barclamp but […]
LikeLike
Hi Barton, Saw your tweet re the 3Vs of big data. Thought you’d be interested in the original piece I wrote @ Gartner first positing them: http://blogs.gartner.com/doug-laney/deja-vvvue-others-claiming-gartners-volume-velocity-variety-construct-for-big-data/
Cheers,
Doug Laney, VP Research, Gartner, doug_laney
LikeLike
Hi,
Read about project Sputnik! Awesome project. I am a FOSS advocate and have done quite a lot of work in the area of open source. I have also been a speaker for various international open source conferences. I would love to be a part of this project. If you give me an email id, I can send you my resume.
Looking forward to your positive response.
Best Regards,
Jayneil.
LikeLike
Hi Barton,
I’m the owner of a Dell notebook. I chose Dell as I consider it a nice brand and, at the time I decided to buy the notebook, with a hardware set very compatible with Ubuntu.
Project Sputnik reinforced in me this ideia, so I bought the notebook (not a Sputnik), even knowing it had a incompatibility with the fans. I thought it was just configure the package i8kutils (‘Utilities for Dell notebooks’) and use. And for me it was! But later, I discovered that the initial development of this package was done reverse engineering a utility from Windows, and it is Almost compatible with Dell.
I became the developer of this app, and now I’m searching for datasheets to make this Fully compatible with Dell. The site of development of this package is https://launchpad.net/i8kutils.
So, I’m here contacting you in the hope you can help me. I will be very glad if you can provide anything in this direction.
Regards.
Vitor
LikeLike
Hi Vitor,
thanks for reaching out. Let me check with the team and get back to you.
Thanks!
Barton
LikeLike
Hi Barton,
the i8kutils project and more than 10.000 linux community members need some help from Dell.
Please, have a look at https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/duplicates/5ypmqn/to_dell_project_sputnik_developers_about_managing/
We are counting on you!
LikeLike
Barton:
The new Long Term Support version of Ubuntu, 14.04, will release on 04/17. Should(n’t) we expect that the XPS 13 Developer Edition will incorporate the new OS? Please? Thanks.
LikeLike
Hi Charles,
we dont plan to ship the current system with 14.04. Sample size of one but today on the forum someone posted this
“RE: 14.04LTS support
Reply by naumrusomarov
The latest Ubuntu 14.04 installed flawlessly on my dell xps laptop with haswell processor. everything works fine.
thanks,
Barton
LikeLike
Official DELL outlet, Beijing?
Greetings again, Mr. George! As stated above, where would I find an official DELL outlet here in BJ? Iam looking for the XPS 13 or M3800 models.
LikeLike
Hi Barton,
any news on the next release of Project Sputnik (XPS 13)?
I’m looking into Ubuntu laptops, and just wondering if I should go for it now, or wait a bit for the next release.
Best,
Theo
LikeLike
Hi Theo,
We do have one coming but unfortunately i cant give any hints around timing.
thanks for the support!
Barton
LikeLike
Barton:
My 2009 Dell 1545 is literally falling apart. I’ve narrowed my replacement choices down to the locally available Lenovo Carbon X1 Touch or an imported Dell Precision M3800. I would happily pass on both of these options for a refreshed version of the XPS 13 Developer edition. Please expedite!
LikeLike
Thanks C.F.
Will do 🙂
LikeLike
Hello,
are there any plan to release a dell laptop 13 “sputnik 4” ? I was interested in the version3 but this last cannot be ordered in Be anymore, Thanks
LikeLike
@astapell,
we do have a sputnik 4 that is waiting in the wings. Sputnik 3, however, should still be available in Belgium, let me look into that. Thanks for the heads up!
Barton
LikeLike
Since the new XPS 13 was just revealed today and looks awesome, can we expect Sputnik 4 before the end of the month? 😉
Best,
Theo
LikeLike
Theo, all I can say is “soon” 🙂
thanks,
Barton
LikeLike
Hello,
Do you know when is the XPS 13 dev with i7 going to be available again? Thanks.
LikeLike
Hi @edugibert3,
All I can say is “soon”
btw, which country are you in?
thanks!
LikeLike
USA
LikeLike
Hello,
Do you know if the XPS 13 Developer Edition will be available in Australia?
Thanks
LikeLike
Unfortunately i dont think it will 😦
LikeLike
Hi Barton,
Hello I just bought an m3800 running ubuntu 14.04 and have two questions.
1. I bought it with a opal sed ssd. How do I set the key/know that’s it’s working.
2. It came new from Dell with a user called OEM already installed on it and automatically boots into it and unless I log out and switch to my user the computer is really buggy.
Thank you.
Mendel
LikeLike
Hi Mendel,
Let me check with the team on this. Myself or one of the other folks will respond to your comment on the forum.
thanks!
LikeLike
Thank you.
LikeLike
Hello Barton,
I am looking for a procedure to upgrde my “XPS 13 Laptop” buy in 2013 with the “Ubuntu Edition version 12.04” to the version 14.04 … without lose all the stuff add by DELL
Do you have a link for that ?
Thank you
LikeLike
Barton,
Thanks for all your outreach to those of us trying to get Dell computers to run Linux distros properly. Sputnik is an awesome project.
Some of us couldn’t wait for the official developer edition of the new XPS 13, and your info here is extremely helpful. I know there are still so many who are trying to figure out how to get Ubuntu running on their devices. Why is is that Dell tech support is clueless? Most don’t seem to know Dell sells devices with Ubuntu pre-installed. If only they had sent me to this website in the first place it would have saved a great deal of heartache. Any way to get good info to them to save future minions? Thanks,
Peter
LikeLike
Hi Peter,
Thanks for the heads up. I have sent this to the Tech Support lead.
Barton
LikeLike
Hey Barton I got my screen amd motherboard replaced by Dell for because I was having some issues. However now my webcam is not recognized and I do not see it in lsusb. I left a question on the forum but did not get any answers. Here is the link for some more info. http://en.community.dell.com/techcenter/os-applications/f/4613/t/19661187
LikeLike
Hi there, is there any way to update BIOS from Linux on M3800?
I’ve replaced the HD (no UEFI and no windows available) and tried everything I could find on the net (including freedos bootable usb) with no success.
LikeLike
Barton,
I stretched my budget to buy an earlier version of the XPS 13 Developr Edition with Linux. Advertising led me to believe that It would support display on two external monitors. That turned out not to be true even after Dell techs spent quite bit of time on the problem. My XPS13, sits unused, and I feel like I had been had.
So does your new model running Linux support two external monitors?
LRP
LikeLike
Lloyd, I apologize for your experience. Out of curiosity did you try a USB 3.0 dock?
USB 3.0 dock: http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/products/docking/productdetail.aspx?c=ca&l=en&s=bsd&cs=cabsdr1&sku=452-BBPG
Driver: http://www.displaylink.com/downloads/ubuntu
With regards to your question, the hardware does support dual external displays, and it works with more recent Linux kernel versions. To be certain however we would need to know what kind of displays, what OS (and version), etc… Thanks!
LikeLike
Hi Barton,
I much appreciate your response.
It would be great if we could solve this problem.
I’ll have to dig out the dock info. I used the doc that was advertised along with the XPS13.
I’m tight for time, but I’ll try to spend time on this next week and would much appreciate your guidance.
All the best,
Lloyd
LikeLike
Hello again,
The last e-mail I received re: my issue was from Ben Morgan. It followed on extensive phone and email correspondence and marked Dell – Internal Use – Confidential.
But a clip:
> We were unable to make any practical headway on testing DisplayLink workarounds and > since there are no other docks that we can support with the 9350 on Ubuntu I cannot > request any kind of un-like exchange to replace with something that I could reasonably > say works for this model of system.
So please send me an appropriate email address I send a full copy Bens’ email, and serial number of my XPS13, and OS info.
I see that the USB docking station that you mention costs more than $200. I’m reluctant to invest more in this project without sound assurance that it will work.
But we could clear away a big black cloud surrounding Dell brand in my mind if we could resolve this issue. I don’t believe I returned the docking station I purchase; just ran out of time trying to get the bottom of the issue.
Thanks,
Lloyd R. Prentice
LikeLike
Hi Lloyd, thanks for the detail. Let me fwd your info to our support team and see what additional info they might need to help you (Ben was on our team but has moved to another position).
I thank you for patience. Stay tuned.
LikeLike
Thanks Barton, It would be good to resolve this issue. Best wishes, Lloyd
LikeLike
Hi Lloyd,
I brought your issue up with the team in today’s meeting. The gentleman who will most likely end up working with you (on the same team as Ben was) said that the first step, in order for the issue to be officially tracked is to contact support by going to
http://www.dell.com/support/incidents-online/ca/en/cabsdt1/ContactUs/Dynamic?changeServiceTag=True
o Enter the service tag
o Select Other Issue
o Select issue is not listed
It will provide a link to chat/email link and a phone number to reach out to our technical support. Once its in the system the support folks should be able to access Ben’s email correspondence with you. the person you chat with will most likely pass you back to our back end support who should be able to help you.
I apologize for your having to go thru the front end support again but as i mentioned that way it will be officially tracked.
If you have any issues, feel free to ping me again.
Thanks!
LikeLike
Thanks Barton, > o Enter the service tag > o Select Other Issue > o Select issue is not listed Done. Much appreciate your help in resolving my issue. All the best, Lloyd
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hi Barton,
In prep for working with your techs on the failure to support dual monitors problem, I powered up my Dell XPS 13 for the first time since I was told that Dell couldn’t solve the problem.
Now something new— it powers up to a black display.
Why is my faith in Dell quality control sinking?
I do hope your folks can get this computer working for e without my having to shell out yet more dollars for support.
What a nightmare this has been.
Thank you,
LRP
Sent from my iPad
> On Jan 17, 2018, at 6:32 PM, lloyd@writersglen.com wrote: > > Thanks Barton, > > > o Enter the service tag > > o Select Other Issue > > o Select issue is not listed > > Done. > > Much appreciate your help in resolving my issue. > > All the best, > > Lloyd > > >
LikeLike
Lloyd I appreciate your letting me know and I apologize for your experience. Please keep me in the loop going fwd.
LikeLike
Thanks, Barton. No word yet from Dell techs and, now, my XPS 13 refuses to boot— dead in the water. No problem booting back when I was working with the Dell techs. But other than sitting on my desk these months I have done nothing that might have brought this about. Lloyd
LikeLike
Hey Lloyd, I brought up your case in today’s meeting and Justin from our team said he would reach out to you directly. He has your info from the existing notes in the system. Stay tuned!
LikeLike
Dear Barton,
I am struggling with reporting a firmware issue to Dell. I have reached out to others via Reddit and found someone who can reproduce this issue on his device, so it’s definitely a firmware issue, however the people at the technical support on twitter are telling me they can’t forward a firmware bug to developers.
I have written about the issue here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Dell/comments/kolmf7/how_to_report_a_bios_firmware_bug_to_dell/
Me and a few others would appreciate if you could help us out. Thank you very much!
LikeLike
Hi Barton, the UK Dell site is selling the XPS 13 with *32-bit* ubuntu 20.04 only. This has to be a mistake in the description… right?
LikeLike
Let me check with the team, stay tuned!
LikeLike