Slashdot Mirror

What I'm not getting - what does Enlightenment offer that the others don't do better?

Cool window decorations!

There are some nice and clean themes for KDE/GNOME, but the theming system in both seems a bit lacking in flexibility. All the themes look kind of the same but with different colors.

Back in 1999 Linux desktops were horrible mismashes of different widgets and applications that didn't fit together, but the window title bars had beautiful pixel art vines running on them and stuff like that. That was fun, I miss those parts.

relevant Doomed to Obscurity

For the Slashdot crowd, surely *THE* Linux geek webcomic is a hit?

Obligatory Doomed to Obscurity ...because why think of your own joke when you can find one on the Internet?

Aha! This looks like a job for Captain Logical fallacies Man !

Actually, it was Penguin Pete's prophecy. He gets so pissy when he doesn't get his way that everybody decided to give it to him this time.

You're wrong -- toolbars are awesome...

Doomed to Obscurity beat you to it, by minutes.

This has been ongoing for years, as recently lampooned in Doomed to Obscurity.

All trails lead back to Phoronix.com. Your Daily Radar one cites Phoronix. The Linux Journal story cites Phoronix. Every single story you will find Googling "steam linux" will all point back to Phoronix.

They pulled it out of their ass.

Doomed to Obscurity already made fun of this yesterday. Cold coffee today.

Actually, a better Monty Python comparison is the Black Knight who never gives up... Obligatory Doomed to Obscurity credit.

TimesOnline says FitFinder was started a month ago. Almost a month ago today, the webcomic "Doomed to Obscurity" posted this strip launching a story arc about a character joining a "Twitter dating pool." Later strips even imply that somebody used it to post a NSFW image. The timing is eerily close, so either the app inspired the strip or the strip inspired the app.

The Kloud Komputing Konference that just ran in Doomed to Obscurity. That's what I'd like to see more of.

> "Anyone asking the question "what is the best way to become a game designer" will never make it."

I wish I could just give you a magic gun that would let you shoot your wisdom into the head of every stubborn idiot out there.

You have no idea how many times "How do I learn programming?" gets posted again and again and again and again, all over the Internet. Now I just link them here.

It's like Perl (only less regular)!

"Perl is like French: Everything in you say in it sounds dirty"

Link: "Seven Reasons Why Beef Is Not Ready For The Dinner Table"

Pardon me for intruding with an AC post, but I just kicked that "ease-of-use is holding Linux back" argument to the curb not long ago. Where I point out that Microsoft Windows 3.1 took the world by storm in 1992 even though new users of Windows had to deal with .BAT files, .PIF files, DOS, Norton Commander, and so on.

Microsoft got where it is because its CEO was a millionaire whose mum was chums with the CEO of IBM, period, end-of-file. Ease of use has nothing to do with it. If Microsoft made Babbage's difference engine and you had to put it together yourself, people would buy it because they had to to keep up with the industry.

I'm all for the continued improvement of the Linux desktop experience, but really, trying to tweak the desktop to magically bring the market running is barking up the wrong tree.

I just got a worse scare: Imagine Uwe Boll making movies out of free online games.

Run Debian and install a variety of window managers. Debian makes it easy enough to do.

http://penguinpetes.com/XWM_Guide/index.php?mode=Intro

Sorry about the formatting of my reply. Here's the same rant, with the preview button!

More choice and freedom isn't always better either, they don't want to make choices because that takes consideration of the options and a decision-making process. For consumers, it's better to go straight to getting what they want

The whole concept of "consumers" is antithetical to what Free Software is. It's Free Software. It's about choice and freedom. It's not about being #1, or having the most users. Choice and freedom. Inevitable world domination is just a fringe benefit.

I think Linux would see wider adoption if it targeted "noobs" instead of power users.... I think that an idealogical shift towards making OSS easy and familiar would greatly expand it's adoption, but I also find it highly unlikely for such a shift to occur.

So what you want is... Windows? I don't say that to be an asshole, I'm serious. If what you want is "something that is exactly like Windows," please use Windows. Linux is not a free version of Windows. ReactOS is a (work-in-progress) free Windows, and good for them, I hope they succeed, there's a place for that. Linux is a free Unix. There's a place for that too.

There are some efforts to simplify things, but I still find myself driven back to the commandline, because not everyone is on-board with that effort.

Do you honestly think that the people who make this software, who are the same people that use this software, are actively trying to make it harder on themselves? As a guy who I admire once said, "stealth bombers are more complicated to operate than tricycles because they can fly! It's trying to make complex things "simplified" that leaves us with the broken mess that is Windows. You can have click-and-go install.exe files, but jackoffs will write viruses. You can have binary click-and-go hardware drivers, but they'll leave the system a smoking radioactive pit when they break. You can have upnp, but you're gonna get your ass pwnt. That's what happens.

Sometimes shit is hard. Sometimes you have to learn things. Sometimes you have to oh-my-god type things. If you want the payoff, you have to do the work. Do the work, man. It is worth it, I swear.

It's probably my fault for not knowing better... I'll bet my ignorance is to blame...

No, and being hard on yourself and calling yourself stupid isn't the answer. You have to do the work. Break it. Fix it. Breatk it. Fix it again. That's how we all learned. Do the work. Read the fucking manual. Then read it again. Get on IRC. Scour the forums. Hone your Google-fu. If after all that you still don't have the answer, email the package maintainer and say "What the fuck is the problem here?!" Read the fucking manual again. Fix it. Then break it again. The only way you're to blame is if you quit. Give yourself a chance.

Every time a n00b marks a thread "solved," an angel gets its wings. Good luck.

More choice and freedom isn't always better either, they don't want to make choices because that takes consideration of the options and a decision-making process. For consumers, it's better to go straight to getting what they want

The whole concept of "consumers" is antithetical to what Free Software is. It's Free Software. It's about choice and freedom. It's not about being #1, or having the most users. Choice and freedom. Inevitable world domination is just a fringe benefit.

I think Linux would see wider adoption if it targeted "noobs" instead of power users.... I think that an idealogical shift towards making OSS easy and familiar would greatly expand it's adoption, but I also find it highly unlikely for such a shift to occur.

So what you want is... Windows? I don't say that to be an asshole, I'm serious. If what you want is "something that is exactly like Windows," please use Windows. Linux is not a free version of Windows. ReactOS is a (work-in-progress) free Windows, and good for them, I hope they succeed, there's a place for that. Linux is a free Unix. There's a place for that too.

There are some efforts to simplify things, but I still find myself driven back to the commandline, because not everyone is on-board with that effort.

Do you honestly think that the people who make this software, who are the same people that use this software, are actively trying to make it harder on themselves? As a guy who I admire once said, "stealth bombers are more complicated to operate than tricycles because they can fly! It's trying to make complex things "simplified" that leaves us with the broken mess that is Windows. You can have click-and-go install.exe files, but jackoffs will write viruses. You can have binary click-and-go hardware drivers, but they'll leave the system a smoking radioactive pit when they break. You can have upnp, but you're gonna get your ass pwnt. That's what happens.

Sometimes shit is hard. Sometimes you have to learn things. Sometimes you have to oh-my-god type things. If you want the payoff, you have to do the work. Do the work, man. It is worth it, I swear.

It's probably my fault for not knowing better... I'll bet my ignorance is to blame...

No, and being hard on yourself and calling yourself stupid isn't the answer. You have to do the work. Break it. Fix it. Breatk it. Fix it again. That's how we all learned. Do the work. Read the fucking manual. Then read it again. Get on IRC. Scour the forums. Hone your Google-fu. If after all that you still don't have the answer, email the package maintainer and say "What the fuck is the problem here?!" Read the fucking manual again. Fix it. Then break it again. The only way you're to blame is if you quit. Give yourself a chance.

Every time a n00b marks a thread "solved," an angel gets its wings. Good luck.

From the summary: "This may not seem like a big market, but it's getting bigger every day!"

Amen! This site:
http://penguinpetes.com/b2evo/index.php?title=isn_ t_it_time_we_forked_the_concept_of_a&more=1&c=1&tb =1&pb=1

just mentioned a need for this the other day, albeit not focusing on seniors but low-skilled users in general. When is some company going to see the market?

Just to ring in (along with the pounds of responses you've gotten) from a die-hard Linux zealot: everybody is fretting over what GUI toolkit to use, except Linux users. I have three machines, they all run major distros that include all of the common desktops and even the really weird ones. For what it's worth, I have a screenshot in my gallery of the panels for KDE, Gnome, and Xfce all running in TWM!

When I go looking for a program, I could honestly care if it runs as KDE, Gnome, Xfce, GNUStep, Tcl/Tk/wish, or any crazy thing. Does it get the job done? Then it's great to have it!

...and thank you for thinking about us!

"buy gimp mask"

Photoshop! Uh, no, wait, wrong context.

Nice description of me, Sonny, but you forgot, "impeccible taste, balls of steel, and able to eat sawdust and shit two-by-fours at will".

And the bonus-round jackpot answer iiiisss: "Not behind your desk, Mr. Dahlen!" But rest assured, the counter-culture press is thriving like a pot-garden in South Central. You just go back to ignoring it and we'll do fine! And I'd be careful bandying Hunter S.'s name about with such wanton ignorance. Hunter may be miles above you on a cloud in Heaven, but the man always had damn good aim.

Every time I see a comment like this, I refer people to this link.