I have not used Linux - ever! But I''m starting to think I should install it on my desktop at home. Reason? Firstly, most of my development work is in Java - so I don''t need proprietary. Secondly, I''m starting to get a little concerned, in a "fascist corporate hell" way, about the future. I don''t want Palladium. I don''t want the big corporation accountable to no-one sniffing my buttie for cash everytime I hit the power button.

Really, for me that IS the issue. Its about control. I want to have control over my computer.

Reasons why I use Windows and not linux:

I don't have to RTFM for a week and post on run-down, unmaintained forums to figure out how to do the "simplest" thing in Windows.

For all the time linux people writing their freaking window managers and gui apps, they need to invest some time in making their freaking configuration stuff EASY TO CHANGE. Ever heard of "Options -> Preferences"?

and... wtf... don't they know how to integrate help INTO the program you're using instead of "man app" ... only a true (explicit negative connotation) geek could come up with this stuff.

Oh yeah, I give mad props to linux source that you can actually read. You think people might actually want to change your code or something...

ETC.

I don't gripe about Windows -- the people who develop for it actually worry about what the end user is going to need.

[edit to clear extra edit tags]

[edited by - Nypyren on June 20, 2003 4:21:16 AM]

I think your point is valid. Where Linux fails is with consistency of UI. Since everything is made by committee you tend to get a lot of ideas and little direction.

On the other hand, its that building of ideas that often makes OSS software an ideal choice for sys admins who need some odd ball setting or scenario to fit into their network or systems concept. NAMED and DHCPD are incredibly customizable.

I think Linux could make it on the desktop if:

1) Distributions start building consistent management tools and UIs. RHat''s Blue Curve sounded promising, feels more consistent, but still suffers from that annoying "Ok, how many preference folders do I have in this Start menu?"

2) Someone builds UI guidelines and manages to force the OSS community to actually use them.

While having to RTFM is annoying at times, usually the documentation in the FMs are much better than in WIndows Help files or MSDN/MS Support. Again, its a good system for network services and system admin functions, horrible for end user application usage.

I think the reason OS X has gained so much attention from the geek crowd is the same points you raise. Most of us love Unix/Linux for its powerful, adaptable nature, but hate it for its UIs. OS X UI is consistent, slick and still lets you dig into the Unix side of things when needed.

But Linux is definitely popular, I doubt there are few companies out there who don''t use or at least think of using Linux. And being in a Development shop, it''s constantly a topic of discussion for many sites as well. But not often for it''s UI.

Interim

quote: Original post by Oluseyi
If the "Linux developer community" (also a semi-oxymoron; "community" isn''t a word I''d tie to strongly to a rough, anarchic amalgamation of individualistic geeks) isn''t ready to or interested in making a user-oriented desktop, then shouldn''t the focus on the desktop die once and for all? (Good riddance, Mandrake, etc?) Since it obviously hasn''t, I''d posit that your point is non-existent.

I don''t use Mandrake, i don''t like it, and i wouldn''t care if Mandrake would "die". But still, the people who use Mandrake are people interested in computers, even though Mandrake is meant to be friendly to the new user.

I don''t see people like my mother using Mandrake everyday (do you?). So Mandrake''s place in this world would be for the people who''s interested in computers but doesn''t want to go messing with something like Gentoo, Debian or Slackware (even though i think Debian is easy to use...). Therefore Mandrake is a good desktop for the computers-people, which brings me to what i said in the first post...

Yes, yes, maybe the guys who develop Mandrake actually are interested in making a Linux distro easy for the common user, but you said it yourself: "Linux development is driven by individual need and curiosity; few are the useful tools written in response to perceived consumer use."

I don''t understand why you seemed to get so mad at what i said.

Victor.

what about the MAC OS/X

hehe

quote: Original post by Nypyren
For all the time linux people writing their freaking window managers and gui apps, they need to invest some time in making their freaking configuration stuff EASY TO CHANGE. Ever heard of "Options -> Preferences"?

and... wtf... don''t they know how to integrate help INTO the program you''re using instead of "man app" ... only a true (explicit negative connotation) geek could come up with this stuff.

I''m really not sure what software you use. All the graphical apps I use let you do significant configuration via the GUI. And they have integrated help files, not man pages. Console mode programs are different, but that''s to be expected.

quote: Original post by Nypyren
I don''t have to RTFM for a week and post on run-down, unmaintained forums to figure out how to do the "simplest" thing in Windows.

Agree totally here.

quote:
For all the time linux people writing their freaking window managers and gui apps, they need to invest some time in making their freaking configuration stuff EASY TO CHANGE. Ever heard of "Options -> Preferences"?

Agree here. I dislike how you have to learn a file format (such as XF86Config) to even modify stuff. I''ve tried modifying this stuff from the GUI, but it never makes any modifications (resolution doesn''t change), and then the GUI promptly refuses to even load the next time.

quote:
and... wtf... don''t they know how to integrate help INTO the program you''re using instead of "man app" ... only a true (explicit negative connotation) geek could come up with this stuff.

Disagree. ''man'' is no different from the Help system in windows really. You click on a help file (or click ''Help->Contents and Index'') and you get a GUI help system as opposed to a console help file. The ''man'' system seems a little old since it''s still purely console based, but that''s another issue. You have to remember where linux came from (unix, console based). If you want to complain that it''s behind the times, that''s fine, but drop the "only a true @#$%^%# geek could come up with this stuff" crap. If you don''t like things that geeks come up with, kiss all OSs goodbye, as well as your car, air conditioning, and basically any other technology you can think of. For it''s time, ''man'' was great, and it still is great, but perhaps there are better solutions now (maybe only slightly better though).

quote:
Oh yeah, I give mad props to linux source that you can actually read. You think people might actually want to change your code or something...

Until Microsoft releases their source (i.e. "never"), sloppy source beats no source. Linux 1, Windows 0. It also may be a matter of not being a stubborn ass. I''ve looked at code that at first look, I thought was ridiculously unreadable. After taking a while to get a feel for the author''s style, it became quit easy to read his code and see what he was doing.

quote: I don''t gripe about Windows -- the people who develop for it actually worry about what the end user is going to need.

I think the linux developers could really use some of this. Worrying about stability and business applications is good, but they''re going to have to do more if they want linux to become a viable desktop solution for the average computer user.

quote: Original post by Nypyren
Reasons why I use Windows and not linux:

I don''t have to RTFM for a week and post on run-down, unmaintained forums to figure out how to do the "simplest" thing in Windows.

There''s a good and a bad side about that. You only see the bad side. The good side is that when you read manuals, search on the internet, you learn a lot of other related stuff. Some people (me included) find it fun figuring out how to do things, it''s like a challenge.

quote:
For all the time linux people writing their freaking window managers and gui apps, they need to invest some time in making their freaking configuration stuff EASY TO CHANGE. Ever heard of "Options -> Preferences"?

Hmm... yeah, that''s just a matter of finding someone with patience to implement that. But then again there''s a good and a bad side about that. And you''re only seeing the bad side... the good side is that since the configurations are human-readable files, you can configure via ssh, or you can write scripts to making something automatic, etc; which you can''t do with the mouse. Ok, you *can* do, but it''s not that simple.

quote:
and... wtf... don''t they know how to integrate help INTO the program you''re using instead of "man app" ... only a true (explicit negative connotation) geek could come up with this stuff.

Oh, ''man'' is so great, why change that... again: you can view man from ssh (for example), which it wouldn''t be so easy if it was a gui application.

quote:
I don''t gripe about Windows -- the people who develop for it actually worry about what the end user is going to need.

Well here''s the nice thing about Linux: you (yes, you!) can be "the people who develop for it". So, you think Linux should have these features? Go for it, implement it. I bet many people will be greatful.

Victor.

quote: Original post by -vic-
The good side is that when you read manuals, search on the internet, you learn a lot of other related stuff. Some people (me included) find it fun figuring out how to do things, it''s like a challenge.

But some of us what to get on with doing the thing that we switched the PC on in the first place for!

I had a friend that was doing some very interesting work for his last year. He told to implement the software side of Linux, whilst other worked on hardware. In 9 months he literally spent 8 of them battling with linux, rewriting other peoples buggy drivers and generally having to learn so much on his own since the documentation was so poor/nonexistent.

I''m a great fan of Linux and it''s abilities (at heart) but it''s suffered from no clear design apart from playing catch up to Windows by getting a lot of the ground work done. Along the way instead of learning from the mistakes of Microsoft etc it''s ended up producing a cheap clone in terms of GUI (for example). If only work had been slower or with more care so that you that a technical person could pick it up easily.

I bet in Microsoft virtually every minor decision is looked at in some detail, examined by a team that thinks what would be the best. By linux''s development these teams have been so small or so intent to forfil there own needs that the end produce is difficult to use by virtue of it being is super focused in one mindset or hopelessly generalised to the point that you can''t get anywhere in it.

quote: Original post by Anonymous Poster

quote: Original post by -vic-
The good side is that when you read manuals, search on the internet, you learn a lot of other related stuff. Some people (me included) find it fun figuring out how to do things, it''s like a challenge.

But some of us what to get on with doing the thing that we switched the PC on in the first place for!

I had a friend that was doing some very interesting work for his last year. He told to implement the software side of Linux, whilst other worked on hardware. In 9 months he literally spent 8 of them battling with linux, rewriting other peoples buggy drivers and generally having to learn so much on his own since the documentation was so poor/nonexistent.

I''m a great fan of Linux and it''s abilities (at heart) but it''s suffered from no clear design apart from playing catch up to Windows by getting a lot of the ground work done. Along the way instead of learning from the mistakes of Microsoft etc it''s ended up producing a cheap clone in terms of GUI (for example). If only work had been slower or with more care so that you that a technical person could pick it up easily.

I bet in Microsoft virtually every minor decision is looked at in some detail, examined by a team that thinks what would be the best. By linux''s development these teams have been so small or so intent to forfil there own needs that the end produce is difficult to use by virtue of it being is super focused in one mindset or hopelessly generalised to the point that you can''t get anywhere in it.

So let''s see the final results:

- Your friend rewrote buggy drivers, and he definitely had to learn a lot of stuff to do that.
- He had the chance of making the documentation of something that hasn''t been done yet; so this way other people wouldn''t have to go through all he went.

That can''t be that bad... and by the way, why did he choose Linux? If it was so hard, why didn''t he switched to Windows?

But i agree with the "cheap clone in terms of GUI" part.

Victor.