The Chinese are seriously considering what the open source movement has been taking about for years and making Linux on the desktop viable. Every year starts with the mantra that <insert year> will be the year of Linux on the desktop and it never really happens. However the Chinese are so miffed with US spying that they are seriously considering imposing it.

Chinese Government news agency Xinhua published an article claiming Chinese vendors are using a ban on Windows 8 to push Linux-based OS variants. According the reports, Chinese developers may receive "preferential policy" treatment and official support for developing Linux-based operating systems. The Linux distributions and other locally developed programs are often "are created in accordance with Chinese people's habits" and as such "beat foreign rivals", the official news agency recorded.

There are three Chinese main Linux distributions, Ubuntu Kylin, Deepin and StartOS. StartOS – has a GNOME desktop environment which has been tweaked to look like Windows XP and has low hardware requirements.

Earlier efforts by Chinese developers to create a Linux-based operating system failed. The Red Flag distribution closed down this year after the Chinese Academy of Sciences withdrew funding for the project, citing general mismanagement and an inability to complete specific projects.