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OS X Vs. Linux On The Desktop
saintlupus writes: "There's an interesting article about the recent web browsing stats of Linux by Charles Moore, a fairly well-known web journalist in the Mac community. He asks whether OS X is the deathblow to Linux in the desktop and scientific computing markets. He also touches on the perennial "I'll run it on my Athlon or not at all" mindset of current Lintel hardware owners. Definitely worth a read." The article that Charles uses as his jumping point is the recent stats on Linux on the desktop. That article cites .24%, but Charles article has some pieces on why that number could be wrong.
It is my opinion that while OS X has a better interface, Linux will only continue to progress because of its lower cost, and the Open Source nature of it.
That said, Aqua is smooooth!
Mandrake is pretty good for desktop users, and SuSE is pretty good for Windows "Power Users" and above.
I think there's a place for both OS X and Linux. Macintosh has a very loyal following, and so does Linux, so I don't see either team dying out any time soon. Personally, I'd rather have source code than fluff.
A solution to the problem with music today
Well, I might consider OS X if Steve Jobs didn't have a perennial "You'll run it on our overpriced, single-sourced, proprietary, artsy-fartsy hardware or not at all" mindset.
The only way you can really fairly make a comparison here is by comparing OS X vs. Linux on Macintosh hardware, because most people and businesses, no matter how good OS X is, will not simply move their desktops to OS X because it requires the purchase of Macintosh hardware.
:) (and there probably won't be any time soon either)
I think OS X vs. Linux on PPC hardware is easily won by OS X. PPC Linux does not give you the ability to seamlessly run Windows software and games in an environment such as Wine like x86 Linux does. Sure, there is MacOnLinux, but Mac OS X's classic environment outclasses MOL's feature set and speed in nearly every aspect.
You also must consider the target of each OS. OS X is truly designed to be a desktop OS, with server use as a secondary function. They even offer a higher priced server version of OS X that would be more of a comparison for Linux on the server market.
I think with Macintosh hardware, OS X clearly wins over Linux. With x86 hardware, Linux obviously wins, because there is no OS X for x86 hardware
Its all in the hardware platform.. not the OS.
Three points.
... ha!) can close the performance gap with commodity x86 hardware, the scientific computing market will stick with the bang for the buck that the beige box world provides.
/never/ be ported to x86. Firstly, Apple has no interest in alienating MORE developers with yet another giant architectural switch-over. They're going to have enough trouble getting people to drop Carbon in favor of Cocoa without having to try and convince ISVs to start their projects over on a whole new hardware platform. And secondly, Apple makes the lion's share of their money from HARDWARE sales. Their position in the industry is unique, and they're not interested in being either Be (a dead OS provider for x86) or Compaq (a soon to be dead assembler of beige boxes).
1. Unless Motorola (ha!) or IBM (more likely, but still
2. Neither Linux (currently technically incapable) or OS X (incompatible hardware) are in a position to challenge MS for the commodity desktop. This situation is not likely to change any time soon.
3. OS X will
Peace,
(jfb)
To spur "enterprise Linux," Big Bang, the distributed two-phase commit.
I'm going to go buy an OSX equipped G4 right this minute! Well, as soon as I sell some organs to pay for it...
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
But normal people don't need these things. Who the hell needs MS Office except business zealots? Nobody needs anything more than vi or emacs and an encyclopaedic knowledge of the command line. With a bit of effort, I can do simple things like post emails, browse newsnet and rip mp3's too, and as nobody but closed minded GUI maniacs need some brain dead pointy-clicky interface, I don't see how retrogressing into the early 90's fraudulent GUI paradigm can do anybody any good.
GUI's are a productivity waste for dummies. Think how long it takes to move the mouse around and select some obscure option in preferences, as compared to editing rc files with sed. Any decent user worth his salt can make his PC sing with eternal, messianic, orgasmic glory as he ./configures, makes and make installs his way to ecstatic, orgasmic destiny.
Fuck this GUI shit. Look at my uid, I've been around since 1969 and used Unix since 1972, after graduating from Multics, and I still curse the day that the closed sourse idiots in Xerox started getting lofty ideas.
Sorry, but I just had to rant. This stuff makes me see red :-)
Had OS X become Apple's default years ago (presumably in the form of NextStep), perhaps Gnome and KDE wouldn't have gotten off the ground and *Step would've become the single dominant Unix UI. Now there's no holding back Gnome or KDE.
I'm slightly tempted by Macs now that OS X is shipping. I have mixed feelings: I hate MacOS, far more than I hate MSWindows, but I loved NextStep. Apple's hardware prices decide the issue for me at this time: no OS X.
Even if iWhatevers where cheap and I ran OS X, many of the applications I'd want to run would be Unix or Unix/X apps that I could also run under Linux or BSD.
That we will start seeing more variety in Desktops again, due to the larger number of standards compliant systems being put out.
.Net into the mix, and Ximian's product may be quite useful. Again most of this that will run on one system will run on all.
.com explosion, They are going to be buying machines a few at a time, and will attempt to maximized short term utility. If OSX makes sense for their business, and they can get a good price, and they can get the support , they will choose it. If 3 months later something makes more sense, they will choses that. So long as they avoid vendor lock-in, they can vary things up. Yes I know the costs involved in going between multiple systems, so Companies are going to stay primarily with one set of systems. But even during my time with a medium size consulting Firm, we had all flavors of Windows, a huge chunk of Linuxes, and did development for and on Solaris. So Variety seems to be a real possibility. Damn that is cool.
If something runs on a X server, you can run it remotely on any machine, so a large organizations base level software will be served off of a central machine, and each person will run it on their local system. If something is Java based, it will run on the desktop of any system. This goes for any toolkit that can be run cross platform, so Tcl/tk, Perl, Python etc..If something is based on a cross platform Librarys, like Qt, it will run on any machine that supports it, albeit it with a recompile. And with Cygwin, if I write my apps to be Unix-compatible, they can run on a windows box as well. Throw
So software can and will be built that runs on multiple platforms. As a developer, If I were to write a desktop application, I would choose something that could run on as many different end systems as possible, so the difference between Windows, Mac OSX, Linux, Solaris, etc will be minimized.
As an IT person, I am going to look for systems I can deploy cheaply. Unless we have another explosion in growth like many companies expereinced during the
Open Source Identity Management: FreeIPA.org
Everybody seems to have already jumped on "Well, OSX isn't universal".
The thing though is that this article isn't looking from the geek or computer programmer perspective...
It's looking from a World Market perspective, which is what companies willing to fund the development of a Linux GUI will be looking at. Linux isn't going to gain popularity on the sole basis that the public has no reason to like it. They have OSX for the Mac (which the educated public looking for something user-friendly will opt for) and WinXP for the PC (which everybody else looking for something user-friendly will go for).
Linux remains the domain of those who want to be able to tweak and toggle with the OS itself and want to play around with their friends' computers relatively easily. So the apocalyptic Linux-is-going-down attitude is harshly erroneous.
That being said, the point the article is _making_ is that Linux in a user-friendly form most likely isn't going to be made, because on the most part, Linux users can probably be quite happy with a hack-and-slash GUI and still can make quite the use of command-level prompts.
There is no market interest in doing a stable GUI for Linux... at least not to the extent that there is in having a clean and user-friendly GUI or WinXP or OSX. OSX is looked upon as the "ultimate alternative" because it's unix-based.
In reality, the only way Linux would gain worldwide popularity would be if Microsoft devoted its efforts to making Windows a Linux-based GUI shell.
But, with M$'s attitude towards Linux and the general geekdom attitude towards M$, it would be both inplausible [sic?] and most likely regarded by the geeks as a Bad Thing.
Karma: Non-Heinous
The data research firm says that Microsoft's Windows and Apple?s Macintosh operating systems, hold a combined global Web usage share of more than 98 percent
And how much exactly is Apple's specific share of that 98%? 8%? 10%? Assuming it's 10%, that makes it 10 times more than linux's 1%. But that leaves Windows with ~90%, which is 9 times more than OSX!
So, not only should Linux users jump ship for OSX, but, based on the numbers, OSX users should jump ship to windows! Does tha sound right Mr. Moore, since popularity seems to be your major gauge?
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
I don't think that OS-X (which I am running now) will kill Linux in any markets. There are two distince groups of users; one is composed of mac users and those who never want to touch anything other than a GUI, and those who enjoy having far more control over their operating system. I'm not saying by any means that there won't be some crossover from Linux to OSX, but I don't think it will be too signifigant. Apple has done a lot open up the Darwin Core, but some people will never be happy with an Apple supplied Aqua GUI.
Good greif, ;)
I love OpenBSD and FreeBSD, but I'd hate to have them take over the world. Diversity in computing is cool and fun. Would we really be happy if Linux took over the world? There'd be no more Amiga users to poke fun at
Moneyed corporations, non-working 'poor' and criminal prisoners are turning productive citizens into tax-slaves.
To quote "Sean Connery" on SNL's Celebrity Jeopardy ''My time has come, Trebek!''
I've been ranting about this for a few weeks now, ever since purchasing my first Mac to use, and my rather surprisingly pleasant introduction to OSX.
Linux has always had two major things going for it. Free as in beer and speech, and the open source development model for the kernel. But at the same time, what it's had going against it were a difficult install (not difficult for me, difficult for grandma) and the clunky, quirky system that is X11. (clunky compared to what it -could- be, not necessarily the current competition)
Linux isn't ready for prime time just yet. It could be, but it's not ready yet. Say what you will about Mandrake, but grandma can't use it.
Now, OSX has the advantage of a pretty decent Mach/BSD core, and an incredibly impressive and functional GUI. Aqua, for being as young and closed as it is, does a damn good job at innovating in the 2D paradigm. Transparencies, dialog boxes that attach to the affected window, an actually useful style of windowshading. And all this with the environment of *nix beneath. With OSX, more than half the work Linux needs to do to make it on the desktop has already been accomplished. People may call for Apple to open the GUI, or they'll whine and complain that it's not open enough. So be it. If you want it that badly, make your own that's better. Open source doesn't have to simply follow other ideas, it can innovate too.
My own pointless vanity vintage computing page
Ok, first off... 0.24% is not bad. I personally don't care, because that number can still go higher. I know Linus isn't aiming for world domination, nor is Redhat, Debian, or anyone else really (maybe RMS, but that's Ok.) The point is, it's there, it's usable, and people can move to it if they choose.
.24% or more or less, but it will still be there. So I personally don't care about what this article is talking about. I felt screwed by apple, and I'm never going back, no matter how nice their stuff is. There's a reason people push free as in speech, and it's because you will not get screwed over when some company like apple decides you're not worth the effort because you don't use photoshop.
As for OSX, yeah it's a fantastic product. The best OS in the world for desktop in my opinion. But that doesn't mean it'll stay that way.
Anyone remember 1984? Apple was the best desktop OS then too. They were really something to cheer for then. It wasn't just a new pretty and slick interface, it was a whole new way of working with computers. Sure, it was clunky in some ways, but Apple had the best system on the market for years.
So what happened? Well, most people know about this, but they got greedy and lazy. They overcharged. They stopped building the coolest stuff. They let the OS wither and die as we salivated over the ill-fated Copland. 3rd party developers abandoned us and unless you were willing to fork out hundreds of dollars for dev tools and docs, there was no way you were going to help the problem. They still had their strengths, but they were a shell of the vibrant company that they once were.
So here we are now. Apple's fixed things. They've got the best system on the planet. They've got slick hardware. They give the dev tools and docs for free again, AppleII style. People gush about the system left and right, and they should! It's really nice.
But who's to say that it'll be that way in two years? Apple could get lazy again. They could get greedy again. They could fire all their talent or let them leave again. And then everyone with macs will be back where they were five years ago, fretting over whether or not to move to windows.
And you know what? Linux will still be there,
I love Linux because it frees me, not just to work and learn, but to work and learn with confidence that my skills will be worthwhile, and that I will never be a commodity because I can contribute. I'm proud to be part of that 0.24% because that 0.24% isn't just something to be treated like pennies that someone is afraid to lose. It's 0.24% people who care, who can and do contribute. Linux is that 0.24%: it's people not stock options.
So you can keep your flashy system. I'm staying right here where I'm not just revenue on a balance sheet.
"I may not have morals, but I have standards."
The point is that you are a minority. Most people don't want to go to the trouble of building their own computers. (Have you ever had parts that were DOA?) They also don't want to install the operating system themselves, and then prey that all their hardware works. They are willing to pay extra to make sure it works when it arrives.
Personally, I think Mac OS X is very attractive. My only complaint is that Apple hardware is a tad too expensive. Maybe once I have more money, I will purchase a Mac.
I've got to tell you, KDE kicks Aqua's ass as a GUI. The multiple desktops, configurable hotkeys, tabbed Konsoles (with keystrokes for opening new tabs and switching between them), Konqueror, and KMail (with its ability to use gvim for editing) just stomp on the single-desktop, click-to-focus, barely-keyboardable Aqua for sheer productivity value.
I run OS X mostly to play. The ability to (easily) play DVDs; iTunes (hands down the *best* mp3 management software I've ever seen); Fire.app; and the fun of tinkering with a new OS.
For the past couple of days at work, I've booted the powerbook into OS X, but to actually Get Work Done I've fired up OroborOSX and run Konsole and KMail off of my desktop Slackware machine. It's not the prettiest desktop in the world when I do that, but it gets the job done and I get to toy with OS X when I need a break. I'll probably go back to booting it into Linux when I get back from vacation, though, as it's just so much easier to get around in.
Maybe those "it's the applications!" weenies are right... but OS X still seems to have a GUI that's designed around the idea that you'll probably be doing, at most, two things at a time. For a lot of people this isn't the case, and KDE addresses their (our) needs much better.
Incidentally, if you drop below the GUI, I still generally find Slackware easier to work with... it uses a lot more of the GNU software I know and love, which tends to be more featureful and flexible than its BSD counterparts. OS X also feels a bit like you're not really supposed to be running around down there under the GUI, but maybe that's just because I'm not comfortable in it yet.
I have an OSX box and a Linux box. My iMac run OSX, my Tosh laptop runs Mandrake.
Comparing the two is silly. Their objectives aren't the same. Their 'customer' targets aren't.
1) The pseudo 'common' part is barely common at all, most of the BSD-ish tools on OSX are several years sometime behind what is available on linux.
For example, 'm4' is barely usable on OSX, it lacks all the FNU extensions that makes it usable nowadays.
Apple also has decided that the GPL was dangerous, and systematicaly removed everything that was GPLed. Bash went first in the DP series, while wget went rather recently out of OSX 10.0
2) On the other hand, OSX *does* have applications and development tools that are, as far as human interface is concerned, way ahead of what is available on linux.
The reason is simple: There are no Xlib vs GNOME vs KDE vs whatever dilution. Development is focused on one target, even is there are two way to reach the target (Carbon & Cocoa)
And, bless them, there are still people at apple who aren't geeks and try to focus on the end users, instead of on being 'customizable' or 'skinable'
That said, OSX sucks speedwise compared to a linux box. Just generally sucks I mean. Play an mp3 on iTunes, it eats *30%* of your CPU while on a slower laptop xmms will eat barely 1%. That might look like a cliche, but it's verifiable on many other 'serious' tasks. I have applications running on both.
So, well, 'desktop' is probably OSX major plus, and will stay that way. While 'OS/server' is probably where linux is better, and will stay better for a long time
Cost and openness are the key. Linux will completely dominate the non-US markets over the next 5 years. Desktops and servers alike. This squabble between OS X and Linux is laughable US-centered viewpoint. Neither OS X (nor M$ for that matter) will ever see the non-US growth that Linux will see. Cheap software on cheap hardware will win in the long run. Third world nations aren't interested in paying Apple for its hardware or M$ for its software. Nor are they able. Yet that's where ALL the people are.
I use Mac OS X on my Mac and I love it. I think it is the best Unix-based OS for my needs. I love the slick Aqua interface and the rock solid command line goodness underneath. I also use Linux on my IBM laptop and I must say the two are aimed at vastly different markets. There is nothing wrong with this; each has their strengths and weaknesses and I use (and love) both.
CDE open sourced! https://sourceforge.net/projects/cdesktopenv/
I am one of the linux -> OS X converts. I dont use MS 1) because I dont trust them, 2) Weak CLI -Cygwin, while nice, still feels like too much of an afertought. OS X really is the best of of both worlds I ran run all the Linux type Apps I want with rootless X Windows, and still have access to all this geat Mac Software both old and new. Links 2002, Tax / finance, etc. And the wife wife can and does use it. The one drawback I see is that the hardware costs twice as much, but for me that hasnt been a show stopper. I dont have a problem giving $ to apple.
I dont know why everyone has this carbon versus cocoa debate. Carbon and Cocoa are just different API's for the same functions. Carbon. actually is a framework on top of Cocoa, and you can access most, if not all the features through Carbon This article, is the first one i found on it, google will probably turn up more in the carbon versus cocoa debate.
Yes, and being "stuck" with Aqua is just what a desktop needs - a standard interface. Without a standard interface, users won't be able to expect the same exact results on whatever machine they use with that OS.
Also, you -can- run make. All you need to do is install the Developer Tools (Free download after free registration with the Apple Developer Connection) and there you have it, make, cc, gcc, Cocoa, everything you need to not only compile applications for commandline and Aqua, but you can even use a nice tool like Fink to download and install X11.
My own pointless vanity vintage computing page
This offers a great advantage in that you can pick a WM that fits your style, unfortunately X11 is a very weak and, as the author put it, "clunky" base that they all must run on, and none of the choices offer the desktop ease of use and incorporation of graphics desktop users demand. It is childish to call OS X a "KDEish environment" when KDE cannot hope to offer an interface at the level of Aqua.
the only other "cool" thing i noticed with it is that you can switch back to Mac OS 9 (which takes about a good 2-3 minutes to do that)
43 seconds on my G4/466 MHz, which should be fairly middle-of-the-road Mac hardware (it's mostly disk operations anyway); I don't know any Mac that would take more than a minute.
unix shell in Mac OS X is nothing special... it's really limited to what you can and can't do in the shell
There are very few limits to what you can do in the CLI; it is essentially a full BSDish system. You can complain about what comes preinstalled, but I think it's fine considering most users will never touch the terminal; power users will most likely want their own favorite tools so it's just as well to let them download it themselves. Apple doesn't bundle make because almost all developers are going to do all of their compiling in Project Builder (why would you want to do it at the CLI when you they bundle such excellent DevTools?)
"Reality is just a convenient measure of complexity" -Alvy Ray Smith
No, it isn't. Learn to recognise the difference between satire and truth, though it can be close, I grant you.
I suppose if all you do is view email and browse the web, then that isn't the case, but more advanced computer usage yields many cases where command line tools (not just a command line, it's actually the tools that one has access to that's important, like a base linux system) are many times faster.
YES! I absolutely agree, it is nice to see some people have sense and cling on to the old ways.
yes but the problem is that Slashdot have more Windows desktop users than Linux desktop users.
I would have to say that it is easier to write the GUI for an OS X application since it doesn't involve writing any code.
"Reality is just a convenient measure of complexity" -Alvy Ray Smith
So Satan was actually Steve Jobs all along?
They already tried and it was too much of a challenge for them. Going from supporting Mac Only hardware to supporting thousands and thousands of PC peripherals was a nightmare for them.
Well, even the article stated the obvious: Apple has zero interest in doing this. Their money comes from hardware, and they don't do x86 hardware. Dominating desktop OS marketplace is useless if it doesn't bring in money.
I like paying taxes. With them I buy civilization -- Oliver Wendell Holmes
OS X runs on Unix, that's true. But it doesn't really apeal to the same market as Linux. It doesn't have any more games that Linux does. I personally like OS X, but most of my classmates still mock anything to do with Macingtosh, so OS X is not l33t. Finally, Apple has expensive hardware.
Windows XP is a far far bigger threat to Linux on the desktop. Face it, Windows 9x operating systems were utter crap. They were the biggest reason to use Linux ever. With Windows XP, Microsoft has finally created a operating system that doesn't fall over every three minutes.
Of course, Windows XP, isn't going to stop Linux on the desktop because Linux is cheaper. In the next couple years I expect more and more coorporations to use Linux on the desktop to save money.
Why doesn't Slashdot take a poll of the OSs that hit it?
Well, for one thing there is this little problem that some of the HTTP proxy junkbuster packages can block the UserAgent information (like mine does) and so the numbers would be skewed.
Nice thought, though.
I take exception with Kimbro Staken's statement:
"the engineer community is abandoning it left and right for Mac OS X."
I work for a government weapons lab and have seen no great move to OS X. And we are the largest Mac site in the world. What I have seen is people dropping their Macs, Windows boxes, and commercial Unix desktops for Linux in DROVES.
Linux is doing a good job of grabbing commercial Unix desktop and server market share; however, there have been practically no inroads into the Windows desktop/server space, and I don't expect to see it. Rare is it the Windows/Novell sys admin who shows any great interest in learning Linux. Face it, mousing around and figuring stuff out appeals to lazy people MUCH more that reading man pages. Thus, I don't see Windows/Novell IT shops dropping their platforms for Linux.
As for the common denominator desktop, do not underestimate the power of Office. A platform can not hope to succeed in the commercial desktop space without Office. Microsoft's contract with Apple to provide Office for the Mac at parity with the Windows platform has either ended, or ends soon as the 5 year contract was announced at MacWorld '97 in SF. Unfortunately MS holds the power to kill OS X as a viable commercial desktop because it controls the number one productivity package. And since the Bush administration has pussed out with the suit against MS, our only hope is that the hold-out states will get MS broken up into OS/App divisions with provisions preventing/limiting their collaboration, and a mandate to provide Office for other platforms at parity to Windows. I seriously doubt this will happen, but one can hope it will. Or pay enough bribes to counter-weight MS's payola to Bush....
OK, I guess I've ranted enough....
By buying a mac you lose choice, you lose performance, you lose money. What you gain is a very very nice UI. OTOH when using an emulator you lose less money or none at all, you lose some performance or none at all (compared to mac, that is) and you don't lose choice. I know that two ppc mac emulators are in the works (but neither support dynamic recompilation AFAIK), so why bother with osx now?
The question is, if an emulator with respectable performance comes along, will people stick to native open desktops or use osx on their linux boxes instead? I, for one, will run osx, but I don't think I will be among the majority.
Gentlemen, you can't fight in here, this is the War Room!
Why can't they be fun? Or better yet, why can't they be fun tools? For someone who likes to brag about how smart they are, this was a pretty poorly thought out statement.
"I may not have morals, but I have standards."
I decided to do my own little research on OS statistics
based on hits to two non-biased (OS-wise) websites: an anime
site I run (www.reimeika.ca), and the Math Department
website at University of Toronto (www.math.utoronto.ca).
The following results are completely unscientific, make
of them what you will:
reimeika:
linux ---> 3.91%
mac ---> 4.46%
win ---> 84.10%
other ---> 7.53%
utoronto:
linux ---> 3.24%
mac ---> 2.75%
win ---> 75.84%
other ---> 18.17%
These stats are for the last 22 days.
- None of those times include the time wasted typing out those excessively long commands.
- Dragging and dropping is better than rsync, because with rsync you have to know and type out the name of the directory ahead of time. GUIs provide a nice spatial representation of the directory structure, and are very quick to scan and find.
- In order to know how to use any of those commands, you would have to spend years learning the intricacies of all the various commands, options, etc. Setting up a for loop and pipeline takes an excessive amount of thought and care to ensure that everything works as it should. A single typo can have catastrophic results (cf. "rm -Rf *.o" and "rm -Rf *
.o")
- Most people's needs are simple. They don't need to sync massive directory trees or save webpages or any complex bullshit like that. For everyday tasks like web browsing, WMA playing, and writing Word documents, the GUI is superior.
The CLI is fine for a few highly specialised tasks and little else. It is fine for batch jobs and remote administration where a Telnet prompt is all you have. For day to day use, the GUI is simply faster."The problem with the French is that they don't have a word for 'entrepeneur'." -George W. Bush
At the pace the Linux desktop is moving, 2 years from now it will be at OSX's level.
Its already at the level of WindowsXP and some people even say its easier to use. Linux easier than XP
As far as OSX, its not quite there yet, Linux is struggling to do what OSX does with ease right now. However in 2 years, expect to see a Linux far superior to the current OSX in terms of ease of use.
Remember, OSX has most likely been in development since before KDE and Gnome projects even exsisted, and WindowsXP is just Windows with a nice skin on top and in that case, it sucks.
So the point is, its only a matter of time, just like its only a matter of time before Mozilla is better than IE in everyway, if it isnt already.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
You know Cygwin isn't written by MS, right?
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
You know, all the rebuttals to the various "Linux has ...% on the desktop" stories miss what I take to be the most important point those reports make. No matter how plausible the arguments about statistical bias may or may not be, the key thing which needs to be understood is this: no report, no matter how biased towards claims of Linux' usability on the desktop, is making the claim that Linux is being seen more frequently in browsing surveys. Both the LowEndMac report and the WebSideStory report show that the frequency of Linux hits on the sites being tracked is not rising.
.24% or 1.0%. If Windows stays at 90%, that's stability -- after all, Windows can realistically only fall. If Linux stays at less than 10%, that is irrelevance -- after all, Linux can realistically only rise.
Most of the predictions that Linux would be a factor on the desktop were based on the rapid growth that was seen two or three years ago. That shift has stopped. And that is far more ominous for "Linux on the desktop" than arguing over whether the actual adoption rate is
The article by Moore wasn't bad. I liked his frank and realistic observations. But Kimbro's quote within the article is so petty it hurts. Linux has always been the underdog, hype or not. Kimbro's "WE WIN WE KILL LINUX HA HA HA" attitude is astounding considering the history of the Apple corporation and its fall from grace.
Much of the Linux software comes from GNU and friends and much of that worked its way into OSX. Kimbro's "OPEN SOURCE IS DEAD NOW!!!" statements are disgusting.
These statements are just sour grapes from a man who was insulted at insinuations that Linux could possibly be overrunning MacOS. Kicking around the underdog is embarassing.
Sure there might be a bit of a double standard here, but, really, how often do Linux evangelists come out and say, "Take that, Amiga! Die Atari!" The suggestion of such is ridiculous.
I'd like to see the number of Linux users browsing Slashdot. Just to see what a "utopian" Linux future looked like...
-Russ
Me
I'm using OS X right now (along with debian on my vaio). It's very nice, but NOT better than OS 9 as a GUI. Mac OS 9 had cleaner borders and icons. it uses window shade. the mouse is accellerated (well). I don't know why the AQUA interface is so big! I know that we're all suppose to have 20" monitors, but I don't want it to be my fault for not buying a bigger monitor!
There are hacks coming out for customizing the features, but not for all of them. I just bare it and grin. Thank gawd there's a BSD subsystem on this thing.
I stuck X-Windows on here and was happy to see wmaker again. The only problem is that this only helps with X-Window applicaion.
Okay, It is easier to intall than Linux with KDE or GNOME. All you have to do is get a mac and click on some buttons. No fuss, as long as you have that mac. which most of you have right? *cough*.
bah. start over
You are a troll.
HTML is crossplatform, easily parsed, and is only being phased out in favour of XHTML which forces it to be a fully parsable XML document.
PDF and Flash are garbage, proprietary.. they will never be able to take a foothold. Javascript (or better yet, ECMAscript) is standard and is ok, although potentially annoying. However, [Java,ECMA]script is totally reliant on HTML; The others, although good for media or layout, are NOT viable alternatives to HTML.
Why don't you go learn something about the technology rather then looking at banner ads and trying to twist your hair into points.
But more specifically, it's no secret that Apple is the leading computer supplier for educational institutions. Soon, schools are going to transition from MacOS 9 to MacOS X. In the longterm, this has huge benefits for everyone. What better place to learn open source than at school? OS X is a pretty snazzy OS to learn it, too. It's got, of course, darwin, and a really slick GUI to fall back on. The kids, the ones who know they want to go into a tech, they'd probably stay after school just to learn the ins and outs of darwin. The skills learned from that are transferrable to Linux. And Linux is used in the real world. Yes, I know. Real world experience in SCHOOL. It's a first. But anyway, of course there are some major differences between the two. For example, I don't think installing MacOS X is anything like installing Linux. But nevertheless, OS X is a great starting point for kids, to expose them to the power of open source.
As for why Apple needs Linux, lets see what Linux has that Apple didn't have before OS X. The whole slew of technologies that *nix utilizes. Preemptive multitasking, protected memory, SMP. All of which are VERY important. A command line, which allows for unprecidented control of an Apple OS. A million and one Linux apps which are easily portable to darwin. And most importantly, the open source model that Linux shares with OS X. This will hopefully ensure that OS X doesn't fall behind in speed(slowness is in Aqua, not open source), stability, security, etc.
But where they both miserably fail is product recognition. Apple's trying to correct that with their retail stores, and hopefully they will succeed. Because a win for Apple is a win for open source. Well, only a win if the consumer knows that MacOS X's core is opensource, but that sort of goes with product recognition.
Windows ISN'T whats packed with every PC though. Apple's PCs come packed with MacOS9 and OSX, and Apple represent 5-10% of sales. Apple are trying to build market share to maybe 10-15%, figuring that nothing succeeds like success, and that's what the Apple Stores are all about. As to MS having shares in OSX (??) well, they do have a stake in Apple Computer (not a very big one though), but I'd be stunned if Apple Computer didn't hold SOME equity in MS stock - it's only professional portfolio management after all. Apple are one of the VERY few companies that compete head-on with MS in several markets, and they deserve respect for being able to maintain a strong business doing that.
That was classic intercourse!
However, the iBook is a different matter. I can see how an engineer would be interested in one of those. Unix on a small, relatively potent laptop with lots of I/O for network use (firewire, ethernet, USB), decent battery life (5 hours or so), and reasonably priced. So I would definitely consider an iBook running OS-X (but with 256mb of RAM.. the 128mb is too puny).
Perhaps my attitude is not that uncommon, given that most reports of "engineers switching in droves" were based on watching engineeers who were away from their office (at trade shows) using laptops. But no one is moving me away from Linux!
I use Linux on my desktop for 99% of my job (and it will be 100% when we get a Citrix box running). I use Linux on a laptop for 100% of my field work. We had a loaner MAC with OS-X on it to look at last summer and we all liked it fine... but no one switched to it. We set up a VNC so I could get a MAC desktop on my KDE desktop... that was kinda cool. But when it came time to return the MAC no one cried... we just packed it up and hauled it away.
My work habits are sloppy enough to need the four desktops KDE gives me (or more if I wish) and I much prefer the KDE desktop to the OS-X version. Maybe when I can justify paying the $800 (and up) for a iMAC versus the $500 for a comparable PC, or when I can give up the clear path to hardware upgrades, or when more of the cool network tools one gets with a Linux distro appear on the MAC I'll switch. But I don't see that happening soon.
No one ever had to evacuate a city because the solar panels broke!
Although you are right about your parent poster being a troll, it does not mean you are right.
:)
If time is money, and you KNOW HOW to type the commands at a CLI.. then the CLI will be incredably faster then doing it via a GUI. Knowing the CLI is a valuable ADDITION to the GUI. I find it a lot easier and faster to have the ability to pipe commands into each other and perform 'batches'. Sometimes a GUI will be a lot slower or you will have to have custom software written to do that batch via the GUI.
A GUI is NOT faster, but it is stupid and people like stupid. Simple and Visual tasks are more easily accomplished in a gui; but anything complicated or requiring batch processing is definately and certainly faster and more easily done from a CLI.
I love using the Gimp, a graphical tool. But I also love bash, which can aid me in producing art of another kind
Hi,
If anyone wants to know why Engineers might want a powerbook, look at the specs of the Titanium Powerbook - 1 gig ram - and the fact there is a clean Nix underneath.
A few months ago I did an experiment with OSX 10.1 -- basically I got my company's entire tree built just fine in 2 days. No code changed, just a few softlinks needed to be set up (Perl for example was in usr/bin instead of usr/local/bin. This tree is normally only run on Linux or Solaris's box.My next laptop wil be a TiBook -- especially now they have the CDRW/DVD combo drive.
I have been evaluating getting a PC laptop -- I can't find anything close to the TiBook -- try finding a slim design, with a 15" display and 1 gig Ram -- Sony slim Vaios max out at 512 or 384. Toshiba at 256mb. Please will someone point me at an x86 with those kind of specs, and I might go with Linux instead. I'd be totally convinced if it came with the cinema-scope style screen (2 emacs sessions side by side).
Now, for Desktops a whole different story -- we just got a rack mounted box for $4k -- twice the power of a E420, at 10% of the cost (and a 1/4 of the footprint and weight). I just couldn't fit it in my rucksack (close though, maybe in my 70 litre one)
Winton
p.s. This isn't a troll. I want a laptop with a gig of RAM (we're doing some hard memory intensive work)
does your 1GHz laptop use Speedstep by any chance? If so, how much faster is it (really) than the 600Mhz iBook. I believe it IS faster, but not much, and not much cheaper either all things considered. Playstations are for games, although there is a small selection of games like Quake 3, Oni, Wolfenstein etc available for OSX. I play those plus X-Plane on my machines (plus all my PS1 , C64 and MAME favourites under emulation...) but my PS2 is always best for gaming on my 28" widescreen TV.
That was classic intercourse!
Remember when some users got together and tried to make a theme creation app for the Mac?
They were threatened with a lawsuit from Apple.
Remember when Apple didn't want to let their users upgrade their machine?
They were sent a firmware update that "accidentally" blocked upgrades.
Remember when some people made Apple parody sites?
They were threatend with lawsuits.
What happens if you want to upgrade your video card?
Ask Apple. They're trying to make all video card production in-house. $250 for a Geeforce 2 MX. Yeah....whatever.
What did Apple do when iMac analog video boards started to fail en masse?
Nothing.
Apple has some nice products, just don't for a moment think you're saying goodbye to having your computing experience dictated from some corprate office on the West Coast.
"do not underestimate the power of Office. A platform can not hope to succeed in the commercial desktop space without Office"
This is exactly the reason OS X will never have more than a minority share of the desktop market and will never be ported to x86 (aside from the nice hardware profits). Apple is hostage to Microsoft. If they ever pull the plug on MS Office for MacOS, Apple is dead in the business market. If there was ever a backroom deal where MS threatened this if Apple ported to x86, that would have been an antitrust violation, proposal to divide markets.
Microsoft sold it's (non-voting) shares in Apple the first day they could legally do so. At a large profit, at that. Ask Shawn King @ The Mac Show Live, he's got the goods on this.
woof!
If anything OS X will finally bring the Mac back to a level to compete with Windows at every level. This, and the growing strength of Linux (and FreeBSD, etc) will help convince hardware developers that they need to make sure their hardware works with more than just Windows and software developers that their software needs to be designed around portability.
OS X will pull both current Mac users and Windows users into the Unix world and as any Unix geek knows once you learn it on one OS most of it translates pretty easily to any other Unix OS. After all these people learn Unix enough to accomplish their daily tasks they'll be much more likely to consider the free (as in beer and freedom) alternatives they keep hearing about.
Software ported to OS X should be easy to port to FreeBSD, Linux, and any Unix OS so this should mean a lot more commercial apps and games available for these Unix platforms and more programmers remembering the things that make Unix great.
Both Gnome and KDE are very strong platforms these days. They don't have the polish of the Mac GUI but it's my experience that they are more flexible and lighter in general. They are improving rapidly. Much more so than I would have expected possible a couple years ago.
Almost every basic home or business app that could be desired now exists for Linux, mostly as opensource, including games. With the extra pull Mac OS gives us we can seriously expect to start seeing the Windows empire crack even in their desktop stronghold.
I don't think Windows or Mac OS is going anywhere any time soon but if anything Mac OS and Linux will work together to end Microsoft's monopoly. A solution to fit every need.
At what price learning? At what cost wisdom? The price is a man's peace of mind, and the cost is his life.
Never had a stable Linux system? I've never had an unstable Linux system, unless my hardware was on the fritz.
If you like OSX, then please use whatever you want.
People who think droves of people will leave Windows for MacOSX, or leave in droves from Intel/Linux to MacOSX are taking something strong. Unfortuantly a lot of people are accustomed to MS environment to the extent that they fear to tread outside of its influence.
Going to Kinko's I have not seen anyone use any form of OSX.
Matt
As another post has pointed out on here, OS X has essentially one for the moment. The GUI goodness of Aqua alone mops the floor with Linux.
Wait! Before you mod me down as a troll, let me explain.
First, I love Linux. I've used it for 5 years, and for the last 2 or 3, I've used it exclusively on my computer here at home. However, and I say this in a parent-who-loves-their-kid-but-has-to-punish-them- anyway kind of way... Linux's desktop GUIs suck.
Don't get me wrong - KDE is a good looking and extremely functional desktop. It's really slick, and I like a lot of the KDE apps. The same goes for GNOME, although it still doesn't feel quite as polished to me. The problem is, these desktops are all clones of Windows. One of the reasons I left Windows in the first place was the annoying GUI, and these "desktop environments" do little more than mimic it.
I want a Mac simply so I can play around with Aqua, because it's such a neat GUI, and I know from others that it is as efficient as it is beautiful. I want something like that on Linux, and unfortunately no existing project really gives that to me. Most window managers are, to some extent, Windows clones. As long as that's all there is, Linux will not penetrate the desktop market much further.
Major open source projects have gotten to the point where we're playing catch-up. Clone Office, clone IE, clone the desktop, and so forth. We need to innovate if Linux is to keep momentum. Simply playing copy-cat with everything that looks neat is not good enough. Don't copy Aqua - improve on it. Winning users over from Windows isn't happening at a very rapid pace anyway, so instead of worrying about alienating them with a frightening interface and copying the one they're comfy with, why not create something new? Something so cool, so pretty, and so functional that everybody will want it? That's a big chunk of what MacOS X has going for it, and Linux should have that too.
Mozilla's a nice operating system, but it needs a better browser.
My point was specifically about specific tasks, one of which was 'batching'. I would really like to see you drag and drop hundreds of things when I can just run a long, complicated, but (to me) simple command. I can do it much faster by writing a small batch then you can click the same things 2,000 times. Also, it depends on how fast you can type and how well you know your CLI and corrisponding tools.
Of course, a good GUI tool MAY let you do it faster then me, but the problem is that if you have a very specific need you will need to write custom software to do it. Meanwhile, it is more likely that the existing commandline tools can be used together to perform the function without any additional time being spent on developing a GUI tool.
"the engineer community is abandoning it left and right for Mac OS X."
I work for a government weapons lab and have seen no great move to OS X. And we are the largest Mac site in the world. What I have seen is people dropping their Macs, Windows boxes, and commercial Unix desktops for Linux in DROVES.
It depends on the area, I suppose. I was at the big Human Genome Project meeting this spring and there were OS X laptops everywhere. (Linux was the only other OS in attendance.) Molecular biology is a Mac-friendly area and there were a lot of Japanese attendees (another big Mac domain) so the jump to OS X for coders and informatics people is smaller than it would be in areas where Macs are unknown.
(why would you want to do it at the CLI when you they bundle such excellent DevTools?)
I don't know. Easy scripting? Familiarity? Simplicity? Not wanting to have to take one's hands off the keyboard to use the mouse all the time?
Its a matter of personal preference, and (AFAIK), OSX provides both options.
I beg to differ, my webpage used to render perfectly fine and IDENTICAL in all browsers and I didn't have to do anything out of the ordinary to make it work; I just write pure clean html the way I always have, learned by reading the W3C's specifications.
;)
:)
This past week, however.. I did do one that that makes one section render a little differently, I moved my "news" section from tables to CSS. It isn't a big deal, it renders in both new and old browsers; although older browsers such as NS4 render the news as text without the tables. I am considering moving it back to the way it was, however.. but the new CSS-enabled one looks so pretty
But it renders in Amaya, thats all that matters.. right ?
We know OSX has a better interface than Linux.
Please excuse me from the "we" in your comment. I quite honestly don't know that OSX has a better interface than what is available for Linux. In a head to head comparison of both Aqua and KDE, for instance, where does Aqua excel exactly?
When evaluating OSX for some Mac users I support I ran into serious difficulties in how to make basic changes to the GUI. Dumb things, like the background graphic, system colors, and other stuff along them lines.
On the other hand, my first experience with KDE (back on 1.12 as I recall) I managed to locate all kinds of tweaks to the UI with mostly all the control center objects being where I expected to find them. Add to this seemless multiple desktop support and I just don't see the all the phu phu graphical effects from Aqua comparing.
I guess I may be trolling a bit here, but I get a little irritated at comments that suggest that either KDE or Gnome are somehow inferior products to what MS or Apple shell out. If anything it seems that both those companies have a ways to go to work in even a portion of the real usability features found on the *nix desktop.
The line must be drawn here. This far. No further.
Don't get me wrong. I think the Linux kernel is ready it's the software that runs on top of the kernel isn't.
OSX is a nice idea. Take a powerful kernel and put a nice happy face on it. It doesn't solve any new problems though. The closed hardware still costs a fortune. The closed software can't be ported. This is comodity software, (the OS, Web browser, email program, word processor.) This is software that should be free. Eventually it will be, it's just a mater of how long it will take.
I use Linux in the server space almost exclusively now. It works great there. It is good at web-browsing and email but it isn't good enough. I'm a Netscape 4.72 user and I won't even switch to the Linux version of Netscape 4.72. It's worse. Outlook+IE users have even more functionality missing if they try to switch over.
But! At this rate that won't last long.
Linux needs a good open source email/calandering client-server application that can interact with Outlook clinets and exchange servers. Then it will be ready to start creaping onto the Desktop for real.
When Linux is ready for the desktop it will go there and there will be no turning back. We are getting to that point and the changover is starting to happen already. I know some programmers and sysadmins who use Linux as their primarry desktop. I predict that next will come the power users/early adopters. Then the desktops will slowly start changing over.
In the middle there will be some failed attempts at selling Linux based computers in BestBuy and CircuitCity type stores for $400-$500. Then some clever company will figure out a really cool package to put together and it will sell like hotcakes. Not because it is Linux but because it is cool. Linux will simply have made it possible.
The changeover to Linux on the desktop will not happen until all the everyday things (reading email, web browsing, calandering, word processing) can be done better than in Windows. People won't switch unless the reasons to do so outweigh the reasons not to.
It's not really about having Linux on the desktop for it's own sake. The kernel doesn't care where it is. It's about having a better desktop. The Linux kernel is just a way to get there.
set softtabstop=4 shiftwidth=4 expandtab nocp worlddomination
See my request earlier for a TiBook Equivalent x86 box. The closest I could get from DELL (thanks to a follow on post), came out at this price.
$3,795.00 (combo/drive, internal wireless, 1gig RAM). Maybe if I didnt have to pay the dumb Windows fee it might be cheaper.
However, this is with a 12.1 inch screen...
Apple, I can get the same for $3,948.00 -- and this is with the 15" cinema scope...
$200 bucks difference ? I have an Educational discount which wil bring this down to the same price (3700).
Winton
Why do people think the Mac is easy? Because user-friendlyness is the main point of Apple marketing.
I suppose my post up above is destined for Flamebait moderation for not joining into the group think that all things Apple are automatically the standard for ease of use.
For what it's worth, your dead on with your assessment. KDE is a far better, easier, and more flexible environment to work in. Yes, I am including newbies. I'll never forget trying to explain the whole drag the CD to the trash bit to someone new to the Mac. Or how about why the app is still running even after all the windows are closed?
I guess if you say something often enough it must be true.
The line must be drawn here. This far. No further.
Now the Dell is $500 cheaper, so i changed the specs to try to get it to compete with the 2,299 TiBook: 256MB RAM, 20GB HDD and CD-RW/DVD drive, and the result cost $2,226.00, so price is about the same. But you get the screen of an iBook!
"Reality is just a convenient measure of complexity" -Alvy Ray Smith
Many people have said in response to this pile of stats that: I'd love to see the stats for Slashdot! Well, you can. It was mentioned in an interview done near on 23 months ago:
I've added the emphasis, and note that the figure quoted here is both anecdotal and severely out of date, so take it with an entire European salt mine. The guy who posted the question still has an account, but he's been AWOL since mid 2000.
It may have changed. I know that over the time since the comment was made that I've changed from using IE4 to IE5 to Mozilla, then over to Lnyx on OpenBSD and Mozilla and Lynx on Linux and now I'm writing this in Galeon on Linux. (I was testing it out - I recommend Mozilla and Skipstone).
To change the background graphic, could it be more intuitive than opening "System Preferences", and then selecting the "Desktop" control?
Yeah it could, as OSX provided no options for selecting your own background graphic. I understand that this got fixed in the newer release. At that time you could only pick from the themes that Apple put together from anywhere in the control panels.
This may sound like minor nit picking, but the person this was going to had a very specific requirement to have a 50% gray background so as not to influence on screen colors.
I left out the really fun part about actually installing OSX on a G3. Spent hours dinking around with it. I finally called up Apple tech support about this. According to Apple I had to create an 8gig partition in order for it to work. No more, no less. Nothing in any of the documentation could I find information about this, and I would have thought others would have different partition sizes. Didn't explore it further after that.
In contrast, I slapped a Mandrake install in a blank PC and it was the single sweetest installation routine I've ever seen. Picked up on all the hardware, handled the partitioning, and essentially held my hand all the way through.
Heck, Linux even has more apps NATIVE to it. Until Adobe starts porting apps to OSX like Photoshop and Illustrator I'm not even going to bother looking at another version of OSX. What's the point?
The line must be drawn here. This far. No further.
That's absolutely ludicrous. Do you know how Microsoft makes so much money selling an OS without making the hardware? They don't fucking support it. When they sell an OEM copy of Windows to an OEM that company takes on the responsibility of supporting both Windows and the hardware they sell. If you buy a new Dell with Windows XP and something on it goes wrong you have to first call up Dell to get them to fix it, they may or may not consult Microsoft but you sure as hell don't call Microsoft first. They will forward your call to Dell or charge you 200$ for support fees. The only time Microsoft supports their OS is when you buy it directly from them which costs you a pretty penny.
Apple tried to license its OS to clone makers a couple years ago but ran into problems support wise because it ended up being that they were just subsidizing the manufacture of Mac systems to other manufacturers. This brought a temporary bounce in Mac market share but ultimately cost them money because they had to support all of the clones sold. So they tried increasing the licensing fees and the clone makers balked and Apple stopped licensing the OS. Software licensing is simple when you've got no stake in hardware.
If Apple didn't support the OS on OEM licenses (like Microsoft does) no one would buy the licenses because it would require tens of millions of dollars for them to build an entirely new support infrastructure for the new OS (which is also an argument against sticking Linux on their hardware). These OEMs would also be at the whim of hardware manufacturers that supported the new OS with drivers and support themselves. PC OEMs make their money because they can get components from just about anybody because everybody writes Windows drivers for their hardware. If Apple did support their x86 system they'd have to charge OEMs beaucoup cash or else they'd end up losing serious money having to support all the jackasses who couldn't understand the differences between Finder and Explorer. Why the fuck do you think Taligent and Rhapsody fucking fell through? Rhapsody (which started life as NeXT and eventually became OSX Server and so forth) was originally meant to be cross platform but would have meant Apple would definitely lose the hardware business. Apple is not a software company and I don't think they ever should be.
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
that he was mapping out the human genome on a few G4's--his supercomputers on a chip--in his basement in his spare time and was scheduled to be finished in about 2003 and start a bio tech company. Oh, then he said that with the raging speed, and blazing performance of his mega-cool, and tantalizingly awesome G4, he already rendered all the animations to his next 284 movies Pixar will release in the next 1024 years last night while he was just "taking a dump." Sure enough! "Hot fscking damn" he said--"I'm getting bored--I think I'll calculate the position of Pluto in 3026--the year a complex simulation on his G4 told him Microsoft would see its demise. You see, I'm going to be cryogenically frozen and revive myself in 3026--that's the target date. That's the plan." Meanwhile, I've left Pixar in good hands and will will brainwash the youth of the planet with the films--laden with subliminal propoganda-- I just rendered and pave the way to my triumph. I will use the genome to create hunter-killer types that will go after Microsoft. When asked if he thought Gates had plans for cryogenic storage as well, only a soft audible grunt--aparantly some veiled explicitive or insult could be heard. He was noticibly angered. He then muttered something about using his G4 to find a new element or something.
So grandma can't install Linux, well she can't install windows either.
Show me a group of people who can sucessfully install windows and all of the necessary drivers, and I'll show you a group of people who can also install Linux. Technical ignorance plagues the Windows world just as much as it does the Linux world, just ask anyone who does tech support. If systems didn't come with windows pre-installed the barrier to entry for it would be just as high as for Linux.
Lee
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
According to the Google Zeitgeist for August, Linux accounted for 1.8% of it's hits. Macintosh's had 4.18%, and Windows 98 held 54.34%.
I think Google is a better indicator than the Hitbox stats.
August Zeitgeist
--------
I can feel my sanity, beyond my reach and slipping...
Bullshit. You aren't even in the top 5, there isn't any government facility in the top 5. The largest Mac facility in the world is Disney Imagineering in Burbank CA. Disney has a contractual obligation with Apple to never reveal the extent of their Apple CPU purchases. I know this because I negotiated that contract, and I was their sales rep. But now I don't work there anymore so fuck the NDA.
Old, obsolete arguement against Macs.
IEEE-1394, USB, IDE, Ethernet, PCI, AGP.
The hardware isn't any more propietary than anything made by a PC vendor like IBM or Dell, and alot less proprietary than boxes from Compaq.
The core of the OS is BSD, it will run all those tools that are there for UNIX and Linux.
Old, tired arguement.
Having done a fair bit of legging about in China, Thailand and Cambodia, I'm afraid that the facts don't square with your optimism. I have never seen a computer in an asian country that was not running Microsoft Windows. Not in government offices, not in businesses, and certainly not in the corner internet cafes. I don't imagine that the situation is much different in South America, Africa or the Middle East.
Of course, whether those copies of Windows were paid for is a different question entirely, but probably not as important as your average slashdotter would suspect -- Gates and Ballmer aren't stupid, and they know damn well that if they turn a semi-blind eye to piracy of Windows in developing countries now, they can make bank when those countries finally have the resources to pay up on what will by that time be an unshakable monopoly.
Plus, not to be blunt or anything, but linux's foreign language support is laughably bad. Microsoft's entire product line (or close to it, and certainly all of the major packages) is available localized into Mandarin, Korean, Thai, Japanese, Tagalog, Arabic, Hindi and probably more. On a good day, AbiWord might get translated into German.
The triumph of cheap commodity hardware in the third world is, yes, inevitable, but that really implies nothing about Linux's odds of success there. Linux may be "free", but profit margins on software are almost infinitely elastic: "free and in English" will not necessarily beat "really cheap and in my native tongue."
News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters? Like hell.
In vi:
/that/.
/doesn't/ make it faster in general.
/what/ I want to do, and let my muscle memory do the work.
:%s/e/|/g
:%s/|/e/g
That runs almost instaneously on an arbitrary sized file - I'd like to see someone with a mouse do
Saying that using a CLI is slower than using a GUI is stupid - it's not that one is better/faster than the other, it's which is better suited to the task at hand. The major difference is that the GUI requires less remembering and more recognising in order to use - this makes it easier to start with, and superior for some tasks, but it
I've devoted many hours over the last few years to learning to use emacs (my choice of programming environment). I can remember most of the commands I use regularly, and I can type them in without having to actively think of the commands - I just think
You might think a modern GUI is the be all and end all of interfaces, but I'm afraid that's a very blinkered view. Personally, I'll stick to using the interface that I find best for my needs - whether that's mousing around happily in mozilla, or chording away madly in emacs.
himi
My very own DeCSS mirror.
This misses many of the points, and like many Mac users I'll point out the obvious first:
1)The Tibook is 1 inch thick and 5 pounds *WITH* the battery, the dell is 1.6 inches thick and over 6 pounds *WITH OUT* the battery. This is a big difference in size.
2)processor speed is a joke, your HD speed and graphics card make a more noticeable difference in any high end machine, PPC, Intel or AMD. Unless your grinding down massive files humans can't see these differences.
3)Why do people post screen resolutions when they talk about monitors? Color accuracy, now that is important, and can be checked. Screen resolutions are only useful when seenng how any OS chooses to draw the screen.
4)Macs can be more expensive, the dell is a butt ugly black slab, the Tibook is super cool. Yes, sexy costs. A lap dance from a super model will cost you more than a common stripper.
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http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=
* Support for dual display and video mirroring: Millions of colors on the built-in display and an external display at up to 1600 by 1200 pixels
* Support for a single external display: Millions of colors on a single external display at up to 1920 by 1440 pixels
Hyperbole is the worst thing ever.
"So go screw yourself"
I'd expect more from someone with your education.
Muslim community leaders warn of backlash from tomorrow morning's terrorist attack.
"I'll run it on my Athlon or not at all" mindset of current Lintel hardware owners.
.. AMD isn't really == intel.. atleast not last time I checked.. AMD chips aren't even intel clones anymore and require different motherboards than intel chips.
Doesn't Lintel imply linux+intel
Can I move to your planet? I would love to live in a place where web designers make half a million a year. Hell where any tech job makes a half mil would be great. Or maybe jest let me know you your boss is. They are paying a half a million to a guy who thinks shell scripts are pointless I bet I could get them to pay me a million dollars.
/var/log/somelog | grep something" I can't think of any gui tool that would make this easier or faster. I won't even start with how you would duplicate the functionality of find with a gui.
BTW. Just yesterday I did this. "grep eth0 *" and do this all the time "cat
War is necrophilia.
This is a good article. I appreciate its depth and its honesty. The reasons for OSX become a real player (and better player) in the desktop market are distinct and clear. And perhaps this article is right. GNU/Linux may not be a real contender for a majority of desktop users.
But reading the article, behind every statement said is the assumption "popular; therefore good". Now don't get me wrong, its not a bad assumption. We all know what advantages being popular have. Popular platforms get better hardware support, get more software, are better supported, and typically get better press. It often means that using software is no longer an uphill battle.
But such an assumption has its flaws as well. Its of course important for owners of intellectual property to own popular propery. Like businesses such as Apple and Microsoft. So Apple users are constantly watching for Apple software to become more popular and thereby ensuring the livelyhood of the software they use.
But what happens when intellectual property doesn't mean much? Thats the idea behind the copyleft. And that is what happens with GNU/Linux. The assumption "popular; therefore good" isn't so easily applied. Look at the loss of Eazel? Its obviously sad what happened to such a noble business (and perhaps too noble) but their software is still being improved upon. Its still part of the greater whole.
Something the article mentioned that I'd like to offer a counterpoint to is the idea that when there are less users of open source software, development slows down. But if you look at the new users of GNU/Linux--often they aren't developers. Many of them don't know what channels to offer bug reports. The core developers often won't abandon their projects (or maybe I am wrong?). And if you haven't notice, it is still these core developers who put in the most significant work into a majority of free software projects.
Another fault of the axiom "popular; therefore good" is the qualification of desktop environment. A desktop is good if it is easy to use. It is easy to use if more people are able to be productive in the environment. If more people are able to be productive in the environment, its reasonable to say that more people would use the software and it becomes more populare. Popular; therefore good. And we come full circle.
So then you see numerous rants about the average user who typically means that if you appease this user, you would appease a majority of users. And this, in itself, is good. But it would be another rant altogether about the myth of the average user. But my point is that free software hackers perhaps shouldn't be so desperate for users. Perhaps it is enough that the software is good in other more technical ways like efficiency and interoperability. When you see people advocating GUIs around command-line tools you must imagine me thinking "what a warped perspective!" Somehow there is this belief that the interface of a program is more worthwhile than its function. And as we have already seen, this is from the axiom "popular; therefore good" !
So when you consider the greatness of operating systems, when you take away the assumption "popular; therefore good" you add a completely new dimension to its judgement.
But I just had an enlightenment...how this sort of follows ethics. While any sense of morality may seem inappropriate when talking about software, instead consider a judgement of merit. The axiom "popular; therefore good" could be said to follow the utilarian philosophy "the greatest good for the greatest number of people". Consider cases of the egoist philosophy "satisfies my own needs; therefore good"; the virtue philosophy "allows for a better character (you can share it, copy it, make you a better programmer, cause you to think more); therefore good" -- perhaps there are more relations.
I should provide a conclusion to this ramble---after continuing to read from digression to digression. Even though I haven't made any real solid points here and my logic is perhaps flawed, hopefully I have successfully offered a different way of judging software systems. But not following "popular; therefore good" you learn that perhaps GNU/Linux may not be in such a bad position as you might think.
There is nothing wrong with proprietary, as long as it is not considered STANDARD. It is like making (government fianced) roads which require you to have Microsoft Car, or you cannot drive it.. and Microsoft Car costs hundreds of dollars and cannot have any competitors. Now, if it relied on an OPEN standard like ordinary rubber tires.. anyone could make a car and freely join the market place.
It is about being able to have competition and to make it compatable for those who don't always follow the crowd (such as linux or mac users)
Why do Apple people keep going on about how they will kill Linux off?
When you say "Apple people" you make it sound like employees of the company, which isn't the case.
poor Apple will have to find out just what they are dealing with is not a corporation, but a very large evolving user community
I think they're familiar with the concept. Their software team has a long history with Unix software. Jordan Hubbard works for Apple. They also have several open source projects going.
- Scott
Scott Stevenson
Tree House Ideas
OS X will never seriously compete with Linux.
.24 (?) percent of internet users use Linux. That is the biggest bullshit I've heard for a while
This is sort of vague. What do you mean?
Linux is tecnically superior to OS X
Oh boy.
I guess it depends on what you care about. Mac OS X's graphic system is "technically" superior" to anything available on Linux, or probably any other OS, for that matter. No to mention the architecture for audio, video, Java, etc. Linux probably wins on raw speed in many areas. Different design criteria.
funny to read that only
Yeah, surveys like this do suck. People extrapolate all sorts of things from data taken out of context.
- Scott
Scott Stevenson
Tree House Ideas
Don't forget all of Jobs' mistakes.
He brought in Scully, who wound up having him fired anyway.
His first baby was the Lisa, if you recall. We all know how well that one did. Only when he got kicked off of Lisa did he take up Macintosh. Raskin deserves a lot of credit there.
He insisted that the original Mac have only one floppy and 128k of RAM, both of which made it almost useless. He also had these grand delusions of how well the original Mac was selling, and made up his own projected figures and treated them as real. This helped precipitate his firing.
While I'm on that one, he didn't want the 3.5" floppy at all. The original engineers literally had to hide the sony representative selling the things in the closet when Steve popped up unexpectedly. The team saved his ass there.
Jobs didn't have color in that first Mac. The Mac II really sold a lot because of the color.
No games originally. These new Macintosh things are serious machines. He didn't fight this one at all.
No development environment free until OSX. This sort of thing stifled a lot of free/sharware that could have really helped things out. Thank god for Bill Atkinson and Hypercard!
The G4 cube.
Not that Jobs' return hasn't done great things for the company, but I think one of the things he's learned is to leave all the technical stuff to Avie Tevanian, and just run the show. The man isn't a saint (stole some money from Woz in the early days too) and he doesn't have a crystal ball. There's no guarantee he'll maintain his lead, and there's no guarantee that his ego won't push everyone with a mac in a direction they shouldn't be going. And if that happens, or if he leaves, then you're up a creek again. It's Ok though, Linux will run on all those old Macs that cost a fortune to upgrade.
"I may not have morals, but I have standards."
OSX is a nice system--for consumers
No, not just for consumers. Also for designers and developers that want things that Linux (or even Windows) does not provide. The label the *nix community has given Mac OS X is "a nice face on Unix." And it does do that quite well, but that's only one part of what makes it unique. Not that Linux isn't great. But it's a mistake to assume only consumers would value what Mac OS X provides.
- Scott
Scott Stevenson
Tree House Ideas
Nice try, but I'm a 38 year old software engineer with 20 odd years of computing experience, and a still warm PhD student Id. True the pay helps, but I also need the gig of ram so I can run experiments in hours rather than days.
Winton
Hi,
//ization.
Here's the DELL I was pointed to Latitude C400-- looks quite close -- but it comes with nothing for the $1800 base price. Sorry I can't grab a URL for a maxed out C400 -- just check the boxes yourself, and press update price. I think we are basically talking cross-purposes. No doubt you can get a maxed out chunky black box for $2500, but not a lightweight TiBook/VAIO style one. A lot of the extra cost is in the engineering to get it down that thin.
Follow the customization, give it 1 gig, a combo drive, a builtin wireless card etc. Delete XP, and put on cheapest M$ os, and take the 3 year warranty. Oh, and the disk should be set to 30Gig. It starts to add up. I don't know whether the -$200 for the 866 is
worth it, I would go with the 1.2ghz cpu anyway. That might outclass the G4 on my tasks (I dont have specialised code that would take advantage of the G4's
For Apple go here: Take the TOP END configuration Here, hope this works
Incidentally, you are working on old data. The high end TiBook is 667 mhz.
Winton
Sorry this is a late reply, out to LOTR for the second time.
Lastly, The 1 gig of ram thing, how as if you need 1 gig of ram ofr a laptop,
There are very compelling reasons to max out your RAM on a notebook computer:
1. 2.5" notebook drives tend to be slower than 3.5" desktop drives, so the RAM speed vs drive speed is much wider on a notebook than a desktop, meaning that any dependance on drive speed (say for swapping or re-getting something that could otherwise be cached), makes the notebook slower than the desktop. The speed gains of adding RAM are higher for notebooks than for PC's.
2. Those little 2.5" inch drives are expensive and have higher failure rates, they don't generally last as long as a desktop drive. With more RAM, there is less head movement due to caching, which can lead to longer drive life and...
3. less head movement = better battery session life.
I was sold on the i8000 until I saw the G4 TiBook. I am glad the TiBook can support up to 1GB RAM and when I get mine, that will be the first thing I upgrade it to.
and the powerbook doesnt come with 1 gig of ram either.
At least it is capable of supporting 1GB.
I will take more RAM over Mhz any day. I cringe when I see people complaining (at various work sites I attend) that their P3 750MHz Dell notebook is slow (and they demand an upgrade), when it only has 64MB RAM, so they get the latest machine which is only 30% quicker as far as CPU goes, yet has 256MB RAM, and they think the enormous speed gain was due to the quicker CPU. Blah. Of course, being executives, they're not interested in what I said about the cheap RAM upgrade, they want whats on the pretty web site.
the 2.5k dell totally destroys the TiBook in every area, better processor, better monitor, more ram, (Tibook comes with 512 megs of ram)
Destroys? The P3 1GHz is close to the G4 600MHz in the benchmarks I've seen. "Destroys" seems to be a school kid way of saying, "my PC is 15% quicker than yours!". I like the TiBook screen for what it is (wide screen), but I also like the i8000 screen and the TiBook is capable of supporting more RAM. "Destroy" is something a 2GHz Xeon does to a 4MHz 8080.
Prove you arent biased
You were'nt replying to me, though I can tell you, after 12 years with x86 (some of that repairing notebooks for NEC and DEC), am I much more impressed by what Apple is offering. They offer extreme stability and usability thanks to high quality hardware, limiting what hardware they support and their efforts of extending the super workhorse OS, BSD.
It's the package, the hardwareOS+app meld that works so well. After all these years putting up with x86, my next machine will be PPC. I will probably never buy another x86 again (besides SBC's I use for firewalls, etc, although I might look at PPC SBC's for them also).
War crimes, torture, lies, illegal spying... Would someone give Bush a blowjob, already, so he can be impeached?
The point is there is no widely accepted and standardised interface for these sorts of things on Linux. To pick up on a point I saw mentioned by an AC, how would I go about changing the screen resolution on a typical installation?
/etc/X11/XF86Config. Granted there may be a gui app installed in that particular distribution, but can you guarantee that if you move to a different distro? The consistency is not there.
:).
The typical Windows user would start looking in the desktop properties. On a Mac it's in control panels. On Windows it's in control panel. On Linux it's in
The open-source ethos seems to dictate that many smaller applications from different authors are better than a big all-consuming application. I like this idea, but it means that every single unix GUI setup has different settings and applications, and this is not a good thing for the end-user.
This is why I don't like the idea of Linux on the desktop. OK, it may seem simple to the user, and this may be all well and good, but in actuality it *isn't simple*. Continuing the old refresh rate theme, what happens if the user's monitor isn't detected properly and the horizontal refresh range is set too high. If you say to a newbie Linux user "Oh, you'll need to reboot into a lower runlevel, login as root, and edit the appropriate section in XF86Config", they're not going to feel particularly confident about this Linux thing. Most Windows users wouldn't know what a horizontal refresh rate is.
The differences between OS X and Linux are huge: The Linux GUIs are programmed (mostly) for hackers by hackers. They're based on the huge estoteric heap of junk known as XFree. Whether it's the appropriate solution is not the point. The point is, it's yet another layer of complexity onto an already complex OS.
The OS X GUI is developed by a company loved by some for it's gorgeous design. It's developed by paid engineers for non-technical users. It's a window manager and desktop environment in one. It's vaguely based on an existing OS. And most importantly, it's designed so the user should never see the command line, unless they want to. Oh, and it's bloody gorgeous
I'm rambling now... I wonder if any of the above made sense...
I think these guys get a worse rap than they deserve. Remember, the original Mac wasn't selling for shit becuase it was underpowered. The Mac Plus was the computer they should have released (a full meg RAM was so necessary) and Scully presided over that. He also helped push the low cost color macs that really earned Macs their place in the educational market. All those iMacs in elementary schools are spiritual descendants of the lc. Before that, all Macs were way too expensive.
Say what you will about the Newton also, but it's still a great platform. I love my Dad's 2000, it's just too damn big. The one (name escapes me) that the guy who designed the iMac made, the one that had a keyboard and was like a tiny laptop, now that thing was cool. I wanted one so bad even though I knew the platform would be axed. Newton was a great idea. Scully doesn't deserve all the crap he got over it.
There are some other great things these guys did too. They started bringing game developers back with Gamesprockets and Quickdraw3d (pre OpenGL/DirectX dominance). They shepherded the fantastic transition to the PPC. They really moved the multimedia stuff, with things like video editing which are really major areas for Apple now. Quicktime is a major fruit of those labors, and it's still a big part in what they do now. Truetype fonts were largely an Apple thing, and they were critical for the publishing market. Hypercard too, went counter to everything Jobs wanted in his Mac, so Scully was the champion for that wonderful program.
I think all Macheads (me included, in the past) tend to idealize Jobs and demonize everyone else. It's really not fair, as Jobs wouldn't have nearly the same flexibility to build up Apple with if he didn't have raw material like color screens and Quicktime.
"I may not have morals, but I have standards."
Ok, here are some random thoughts of mine on the subject.
.24% figure hitbox came up with: Is it possible that many of us *nix users are blocking cookies from Hitbox? I just checked my blocked cookie file (.galeon/mozilla/galeon/cookperm.txt) in Galeon and found I was rejecting cookies from 3 of their servers (ehg-sportsline.hitbox.com, hg1.hitbox.com, hitbox.com). This would explain the insanely low figures. Doubt many people on other systems block cookies.
First off Linux has come a long way in an incredibly short amount of time. Wasn't more than 3 years ago I was messing around with RedHat 5.1. No GUI install, Netscape as a browser, no GNOME, etc. It would be folly for anybody to say OS X will be superior to Linux in 5 years. A lot can happen in that short amount of time.
The Mac OS used to keep people away from Apple hardware. Most of the Macs with OS 7 were horrible with crashing. I didn't go with a Mac when I came to my college (which is a Macintosh campus (or so they say)) for two reasons. One was price (of course) and the other was stability. I instead built my own machine with windows, became a heavy drinker, then installed Linux. I'm still using Linux. Will making a more stable OS make more people willing to pay for Apple hardware? I think so, but people looking for a stable OS can save a lot of dough by going with Linux.
I read a Scott Hacker (the BeOS bible dude) story about OS X. He said it felt slow. I can't help but wonder if people are going to be satisfied plunking down money for a machine that feels slow. Most people probably won't notice, but still.
Macs are great. I love them. I own one (old 9500). I can't see buying another for a good while. I still got a fully functional *nix box, and I just built a new one. Macs are too expensive for me to consider at this time, especially when their success hinges on Microsoft (Office and IE). If you got the extra money for a new OS X machine go for it. I'll be perfectly comfortable using Linux.
One last idear on the
Sorry for me rambling.
Everytime you look at porn a devil gets their horns.
I am typing this on a TiBook, which i must say is by far the best laptop i have ever used. The screen is great, battery life is great, size and weight are great, keyboard is good, trackpad is good. I always use an external 3-button optical mouse with mine, so the trackpad sees minimal use,
I run OS X, to primarily so I can use Photoshop, Freehand and Flash without needing to dual-boot (Though I still have to use Classic for Photoshop and Flash) along with XDarwin to run rdesktop, Nedit and WindowMaker, as well as to run various apps remotely on my Linux servers when necessary.
I also program with OpenGL and C using ProjectBuilder, which is a pretty nice Development Environment (this is a genuinely great MacOS X feature)
However, i miss Linux for a couple of major reasons:
1. SMB and NFS connectivity - Linux is so, so very much better for connecting to a Windows or UNIX network than OS X.
Apple are either trying to be funny calling what they have done with samba and OS X 'integration', or theyre living in a dream world populated only by Macintoshes, none of whom would ever need to connect to an existing Windows share.
Mounting NFS shares practically requires a third-party shareware GUI app (which seems overcomplicated anyway), and nfs shares that fail to work (for seemingly inexplicable reasons) can't be unmounted, even by root. Despite using the supposedly 'More UNIX than Linux' BSD core, NFS support in MacOS X sucks bigtime.
2. The UI makes you feel like you have your hands tied. You can't actually turn off the superflous window animation antics entirely, which i find completely idiotic.
I miss multiple workspaces greatly. If its such a good idea to support multiple monitors ( a feature Apple has touted for years), then surely it's both easy and a good idea to support multiple 'virtual' workspaces?
Aqua has some good features - it is very consistent, but this certainly seems to be at the expense of flexibility. 'WindowShade' is a useful thing to have, and i can't believe there is no option to enable it on OS X.
After using Linux almost exclusively for the last year or so, i find OS X both a breath of fresh air and a set of candy-coloured chains for my computer.
The biggest (actually useful) feature Aqua has over something like a heavily tweaked Window Maker is the sensible and consistent cut n paste system.
This is the thing I find most liberating about it, as i never have to worry about whether the piece of text i copy from one app will actually paste successfully into another like i do on Linux (though i think my beef is largely with Mozilla's cut n paste)
Konqueror is easily a match for the Finder in terms of functionality, and frankly i find the 'Home', 'Favourites' etc. icons in the Finder downright ugly.
I think OS X is a solid foundation on which to build (it is pretty stable, though prone to annoying problems - See how much fun it is if you accidentally associate the extension '.app' with an application.
Quicktime and DVD playback is handy, though the 'Register for Quicktime Pro' message is not what i expect when i purchase a NZ$6000 machine.
Fuck you Apple, I bought your computer, if i wanted Quicktime Pro, don't you think i would have ordered it with the machine?? This kind of intrusive advertising makes you truly appreciate Free and Open Source software.
And theres no way it can compete with my Hollywood+ equipped Linux machine for DVD playback.
All things considered, I like OS X, but if anything it has impressed upon me just how well-matched Linux's desktop functionality is with Apple's flagship OS.
I won't be replacing Mandrake-PPC which runs on my iMac with OS X anytime soon.
I gots ta ding a ding dang my dang a long ling long
My time is worth money;
If so, how much is the rest of your life worth? Maybe I would prefer to pay it to you now rather than to have you around all that time.
The truth is, time isn't worth money, time is the most expensive and irreplaceable thing a human may have. Money may worth or not worth the time spent on them, but this is a different story.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
Given that assumption, at any given level of performance on Unix-like things, you can beat any given Mac at a much lower cost.
Yes, these are new with Mac OS X but since when did Linux have anything to do with it? Mac OS X is based on the Mach microkernel and BSD. You seem to be making the assumption that Unix==Linux.
Yes, all command line or X windows based. The CLI ones are obviously important and useful to Mac OS X. The X Windows ones are mostly useless. Mac OS X doesn't have an X server. Sure, you can download one but, at > 40MB, how many will? I have one but I'm not average.
By the way, and I know you didn't say this, a lot of people seem to think that Mac OS X is going to help bring more apps to Linux. How? CLI possibly but I think that transfer is going to go in the other direction. GUI apps? Impossible. It'd be no easier than porting them from Windows. The GUI APIs are entirely different. If you want Mac OS X programs (Cocoa ones anyway) on Linux, go help out with GNUStep.
After saying all that, Linux and Mac OS X do have things to learn from each other. You just gave some bad examples. Linux could learn a lot from Aqua and Apple could learn a lot from the power of the open source model.
Maybe Linux isn't supposed to end up as a desktop OS and maybe Mac OS X isn't meant to be a server OS. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe we should take a lesson from biology: diversity is good. Monopolies run by ANY company or group are bad. I don't want everyone to be using the same OS as me, Linux, Windows or Mac OS X, the potential for virus and worm plagues is too high. Not to mention the stagnation that usually follows. I see the ideal as lots of standards: GUI API standards, networking standards, etc, etc. Then you'd have a very heterogeneous mix that is still largely compatible with each other
To pick up on a point I saw mentioned by an AC, how would I go about changing the screen resolution on a typical installation? /etc/X11/XF86Config.
The typical Windows user would start looking in the desktop properties. On a Mac it's in control panels. On Windows it's in control panel. On Linux it's in
Actually with Linux it's more likely a case of pressing a key sequence. One very big problem with the Windows design is that it puts things end users generally should not be fiddling with in amongst cosmetic changes. Does the OS X model avoid doing this?
To change the background graphic, could it be more intuitive than opening "System Preferences", and then selecting the "Desktop" control?
The term "System Preferences" sounds rather "techie" to someone computer illiterate. Also they might think it is something the "system admin" will tell them off for messing around with. Wouldn't something like "user settings" be a better term? Especially on a machine which can be used by more than one person. After all OS X does support working as a network workstation with each user having their own personal settings, dosn't it?
Most people don't want to go to the trouble of building their own computers. (Have you ever had parts
that were DOA?)
You can get prebuilt computers which are DOA anyway...
They also don't want to install the operating system themselves, and then prey that all their hardware works.
Outside of the home market you'll quite often find the first thing done to new computers is to wipe off whatever the OEM might have preloaded them with. Rather than having to spend lots of time and money explaining what needs to be loaded on them. There was a big fuss a year ago about Microsoft trying to charge twice for licences in such situations.
Well, for one thing there is this little problem that some of the HTTP proxy junkbuster packages can block the UserAgent information (like mine does) and so the numbers would be skewed.
Also remember that any open source browser can easily have any user agent. Until websites stop using the user agent string as a capability (even as an access) criteria you will get user agent spoofing.
If it's easier than this, I'll eat my hat.
Yes, but it's more than 0.25 percent (in my logs, for my company site, it's 5% Linux - which is impressive, I think).
- Which company, Redhat?
- Corel, but don't tell the boss
Hmmm, so a company that owns/maintains Corel Linux OS and sells Corel Draw, Photo Paint and WordPerfect(vers 8 and 2k) for Linux only has 40 PCs running on Linux(based on latest headcount)?
Today's vices may be tomorrow's virtues.
This is a documented problem at Apple's Knowledge Base.
It's analogous to problems PC BIOS had with larger hard drives, and only occurs on older G3 and iMac machines that came equipped with IDE on board. It's also similar to LILO having to be within the first 1024 of a drive..
Apple also told you incorrectly- the system folder has to be in a partition within the first 8gb of a drive. So I make a 4gb for OS 9, a 4gb for os X, and a huge partition for data (slice it how you like it) and it works beautifully. It's all a matter of getting the system folder anywhere within that first 8gb.
This is not a big deal.
Shoot, when newbies in Win do this, I have to say,
reboot, hold down F8, select safe mode, boot up, ignore the warning about being in safe more, control panel, display properties, reset the resolution to a lower setting on the slider control, now go to the monitor, and make sure it's set for your display...
They can't believe that Win would let them set a resolution that it can't boot to.
Confronted with xf86config, they'd choke!
KDE kicks Aqua's ass as a GUI... tabbed Konsoles (with keystrokes for opening new tabs and switching between them)
I'm typing this from OS X. I think it's a hell of a system -- I've tried OpenBSD, Yellow Dog, and LinuxPPC on this iMac and OS X stomps the hell out of all of them. But that's not why I'm writing this.
Despite my non-programming background, I spend a lot of time at the command line playing around. And Terminal.App, the default OS X version of xterm, is absolutely fucking _dreadful_. Can anyone suggest a replacement?
--saint
I also have an iBook and I love it. I guess you could say that I "abandoned" Linux for OSX. I have made the switch.
The reason that I switched was that I need a notebook with nicer fonts and 802.11b support. This iBook is perfect for me. (BTW, this screen is awesome. I've never seen viewing angles so good.)
My opinion on fonts is that msft and OSX are both good. I thought the general opinion is that msft cleartype fonts are actually better. However, I have to really try hard to see any difference.
That which does not kill me only makes me whinier
Here's why-
Preface: I love AbiWord, and use it on Win and Linux.
XDarwin is a pain to set up, and a pain to set up rootless. It needs to be a simple installer, install to ONE and only one directory, so I can trash it easily, and work reliably. Updating it also needs to be easy.
AbiWord is great, but I wish it could use the Quartz/Aqua part of OS X that is native to OS X. The less things that require clunky old X-Windows, the better.
I'm a big advocate of AbiWord, installing it on every platform I use. I used to it write my M.A. thesis. On OS X, it's just too hard for 99% of users to get X-Windows properly up and running, and for what? A light Word Processor? Come ON!!
Get it to work with Quartz, you'll have a winner.
You *should* learn the text files, as they are what give you the flexibility and predictability needed to properly configure a system. The GUI config stuff in linux can definitely hose your system, so I generally stay away from it.
I propose the term "Lamdux".
:)
Lame ducks? Ought to go great with that Greased Turkey from last month, eh?
Anyhow, as the submitter, I probably ought to clear up what I meant by "Lintel." Obviously, I meant people running Linux on x86 hardware. Also, I believe the lintel is the top bit of a window frame, the part above the window itself. It was just a little pun, that's all.
So people can stop typing the "An Athlon is not an Intel product! j00 suX0r!" posts. Thanks.
--saint
Of course Apple is dying for that sort of publicity. That's exactly why Disney doesn't want any. Disney wants a monopoly on all publicity relating to itself. They figure that if anyone wants to use the Disney brand for publicity, they'll have to pay for it. And pay big.
Now, OSX has the advantage of a pretty decent Mach/BSD core, and an incredibly impressive and functional GUI.
Mac OS X's Quartz layer is very nice, but in following Steve Job's quest for a unique visual "hook" for X, Apple has rendered the system far less usable/functional than either KDE or Windows. Window transparency is a cool trick and it's wonderful that the graphics engine can do it, but the processor cost for actually turning it on is astronomical. The dock has been widely criticized as being tuned to make a cool demo more than to actually be useful.
Mac OS 9 and before had a really functional GUI. Mac OS X is still a bastardized system that's optimized to look cool on TV more than it is to use.
For my money, the only real advantages that Mac OS X has over Linux are 1) commercial polish, in that all adjustments can be gotten at through the GUI, and all Mac OS X systems will do it the same way, 2) the ability to run your old copies of Dark Castle and SuperPaint, and 3) Quicktime.
For commercial polish, check out Mandrake or the latest Red Hat. They still show more UNIX than OS X does, but they are getting better and better. 2 isn't a factor for me, and as for 3, well, I wouldn't care to run a given OS just because Apple is trying to hold online content hostage to their choice of platforms.
- jon
Ganymede, a GPL'ed metadirectory for UNIX
My goodness. Why do people insist on comparing linux with other OSes that are entirely unlike it?
First off, the name or this article is flawed - OS X isn't any more a linux than Solaris is.
Second, people need to stop getting all pumped up over marketshare. It simply needs to be realized that the success or vitality of linux can not be determined by how many people have it installed in a dualboot configuration and use it every one in a while to 'dick around' - no matter how few people use linux, there will always be the developers that love linux, and will continue to develop for it. I'm not talking about the VMWare variety developers, I'm talking about the everybuddy, GNOME, Enlightenment, and kernel type developers - the ones that do it for love, mostly. (Yes, I know there's Cox, but he's an exception, in general.)
~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
That was true three years ago, but most folks (at least I'd hope so :-) using Flash plugins under Linux are using the actual Macromedia Flash plugin.
If you think it's too slow, complain to Macromedia.
Stating on Slashdot that I like cheese since 1997.
Yes, it is.
Smokes the hell out of Windows and I'm sorry, but Linux looks absolutely clunky compared to it.
Sure, why not.
That's from a 6 year Linux advocate getting to play with a Powermac G3 running OS X for 1 day. I'll still keep my Linux box around to play with but for a desktop I'm absolutely obsessed with saving money for a Mac now.
Well, that's cool, but I hope you're doing it for technical merits of commercial-software availability, and not just for a pretty interface. If you need a pretty interface . . . well, may I be the first to suggest that maybe you don't even need a computer?
Seriously, once in a while I feel like bashing people like Rasterman and Arlo Thomas over the head for getting people obsessed with pretty interfaces--right now, I'm using KDE 2.2.2 with the Qt Motif toolkit look and the KDE1 window decoration--and I find my productivity level to be far higher than it was when I was using silly windowmanager look-and-feel interfaces, as well as ridiculous toolkit themes/styles.
I feel pretty much the same about the OS X interface--and I've been using it a while. I'm sorely tempted to install the Sosumi theme (very Platinum-like) when I get back to work on Wednesday.
Stating on Slashdot that I like cheese since 1997.
You had no power to say "I want OSX to support my older Powermacs!"
Incorrect. Not only can you do just that (since the core OS code is available openly), but someone has already done it for you.
Many of your comments about Apple, while on-target, refer to a very different company than exists today.
News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters? Like hell.
Marking a response to an on-going discussion as a "troll" is begging for the hammer of meta-moderation. Think carefully in the future, lest your toys be taken away.
News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters? Like hell.
Here are the relative strengths of these platforms:
OSX:
1: An enterprise-ready office suite (MS Office).
2: Lots of other apps written for UNIX or Mac. 3: The stability and power that Linux and other UNIX-compatable OSs have.
Linux:
1: Lots of native software of varying degrees of quality.
2: Office suites which are still not ready for the enterprise but are getting there.
3: Stability (probably comparable to OS X).
4: Cross-platform (this is a big one).
5: Customizable to be optimized for any task.
So OSX is ready for all kinds of desktops while Linux is only ready for the small-to-midsized business. That means that OS X will do much better in the desktop market in the near future.
However, the weaknesses that Linux currently has are not systemic weaknesses. They are ones that will disappear with time and Linux has made amazing strides in the last 2 years even. This progress will continue and Linux will eventually be a creditable threat to the corporate desktop market.
The flaw with OS X is not a technical flaw, but one of business models. Apple is in the business of selling proprietary hardware and the economy of scale makes this difficult. I think that Apple will be making a serious run for the server market in the next few years, where this model is still very profitable but that they may still be unable to hold desktop market share in the next few years (the upcomming G5 chip is awesome and would work well in the server market). I think that this will provide the impetus for the ability of Linux to fight for the corporate desktop.
But OS X may help to pave the way...
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
An operating system where I can't cut from my text editor (KWrite) and paste into my web browser (Galeon) is definately not ready for the big time.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
OK. I think you were modded Flamebait fairly, but I also think that there are a couple of real truths in your points:
1: Command-line is MUCH more efficient at asking the computer to perform complex and obscure tasks than the GUI ever can be. How do I use a GUI FTP front-end to download something to a floppy disk and change its name? In the windows/DOS command-line FTP, it is as simple as get myfile a:\archive1.txt This is because user -> computer information density is higher on the command line.
2: You are right that most people don't need MS Office, but the large businesses do, and that is one thing that really drives that aspect of the market. Therefore, MS Office has many features that need to be added to Linux office suites.
But here are the reasons for a GUI:
1: Learning curve is lesser for common tasks.
2: Infomation density of the information the computer is submitting to the user is much higher. This means that surfing the web is a more pleasent experience as is viewing a report of, say, security logs (if done right). Computer -> user information density is much better.
Again, I think that OS X is more ready for the desktop than Linux, but that Linux beats OS X in the next couple of years.
LedgerSMB: Open source Accounting/ERP
Actually with Linux it's more likely a case of pressing a key sequence.
God I was asleep then... yeh it's mostly -- or which I love. However, when I came to Linux desktop from Windows, it's not very clear it's that easy.
One very big problem with the Windows design is that it puts things end users generally should not be fiddling with in amongst cosmetic changes. Does the OS X model avoid doing this?
Good point there. Not entirely sure whereabouts in Windows it would go if not in Display Properties - it is in a different tab from the cosmetic stuff.
I totally agree with you, and indeed I love the way it's done, which is where I feel most prospective Linux users are being misled into believeing it's all as smooth and as easy to use as Windows. It's not.
There may be a thin veneer of smoothness, but if you're actually *using* Linux, you need to know the command line and files like the proverbial back of your hand. In that respect Linux is a kick-ass OS.
This "study" is not a comparison of GUI vs. CLI - it is a comparison of two ways to move a cursor around in a GUI - mouse vs. arrow keys. Even within that limitation, it is of dubious value.
The task is to replace the '|' character with 'e'. Most hackers wouldn't even use a text editor for this: just perl -pi.bak -e's/\|/e/g'. Within vi, you would type
In any event, I actually agree with "Tog" that arrow keys aren't that useful. hjkl are in the home row and work better. However a good text editor should not force you to navigate by spatial position - it should assist you in navigation by content.
I disagree. Although "Tog" claims this slant, the test is in fact geared to a "sharecropping" task, akin to picking apples or pulling weeds. In other words, a task that rewards the ability to move the cursor to a precise position rather than the ability to symbolically express the task. I don't do those kinds of task on a computer - I tell the computer to do them for me.
In the context of Mac vs. Linux, we have to presume that the user is fairly sophisticed technically, and so has no problem buying a case, motherboard, CPU, etc., and spending a half hour assembling it themselves.
Given that assumption, at any given level of performance on Unix-like things, you can beat any given Mac at a much lower cost.
I don't know about that. The times I've built my own box I've generally ended up spending more than if I bought an off-the-shelf machine. After all, ala carte carries a cost penalty with it.
The big advantage of build your own is that you get to specify exactly what you want in your box. That's particularly useful if you are going for compatability with a non-windows OS.
How do you base the CPU speed?
Gigaflops? The G4 wins
Photoshop? The G4 wins
Quake3? The TiBook wins over the dell laptop
The G4 has MULTIPLE altivec, meaning performance not unlike multiple processors when running calculations.
Finally there was something that really delivered on the promise of freedom. Unix gave you a platitude about freedom embossed on a license plate; Linux gave you the actual freedom.
So people who are comparing OS X and Linux nearly a decade later simply don't get the point. Taking BSD code and making a proprietary layer on top of that is old hat. What do you think SunOS was?
Take a look at some family trees:
here
here
OS X is another SunOS, another Ultrix, another NeXTStep. From the point of view of someone who values freedom, not only technical excellence, it is just as irrelevant as these predecessors.
Which is slower or faster also depends on the kind of work you do. The G4's Altivec component was designed to do the kind of DSP stuff that lots of Mac users are doing in audio, video and graphics work. Final Cut Pro 3.0 on a PowerBook G4/667 is doing things that can't even be done on a desktop PC of any kind without a dedicated processing accellerator card. PowerMacs are routinely doing high-quality 1x software MPEG-2 encoding (making DVD's), and in fact, come with the software to do that out of the box. Encoding and encryption are also faster on Macs in general. My PowerBook can encode high-quality MP3's faster than the data can be read off the audio CD. Apple added Media Cleaner Pro Mac/Windows shootouts to their demos last year because of this, too. Encoding movies for the Web is twice as fast on Macs.
You can play with your SPECmarks and other questionable stuff, but I'm more impressed when I see Machine A (Mac) beat the pants of Machine B (other PC) at the desktop tasks that I do all day, with the same applications that are important to me, that affect my own business. Bring the machines out of the lab and let's see what they can actually DO. That's why all the machines at the Apple Store are up and running, on the Web, connected to peripherals, and you can use them to do stuff before you decide to buy one.
Unless there are people buying machines just to run SPECmarks all day long. In that case, Microsoft has a PC and the world's most insecure general purpose operating system ready, just for you.
> For most laptop uses having more than 256 megs
> of ram is useless.
Well, you just disqualified yourself from talking computers with most Mac users. I routinely create and access files that are much bigger than 256 MB, so naturally, I like my computers to have more than that in RAM. As another poster pointed out, you want as much RAM as possible in a notebook especially, because the hard drives are slower than desktop hard drives, and RAM uses less power than spinning hard drive platters.
You're just knee-jerk trying to sell us that the Dell is better, when it's not. It's WalMart, buddy. It's cheap and that's good when it does the job for the user, but if it doesn't do the job, it's a fucking curse. I know a lot of people (myself included) who got their first Macs in the last couple of years (post-NeXT) and we are all spoiled now for anything else. I would rather have one Mac every three years than a new PC every year. It's more productive, it's less admin work, and my Mac OS X box has NOT been open to anyone on the Internet for the past couple of months, like EVERY Windows XP box was, and still is until the user patches it. Apple's security patches are downloaded by the OS (it just asks for your permission to install them, and this can be disabled if you like), so even Grandma's iMac has the latest patches (not that there has been anything even remotely like the recent Windows XP holes).
You can pick on the price of Apple's desktops, even though they come with a ton of hardware and software included that you don't get with other PC's (FireWire, DVD-RW/CD-RW, Gigabit Ethernet, iMovie, iDVD, iTunes and much more), but it's ludicrous to pick on their notebooks. The PowerBook and iBook are a whole class ahead of any other notebook computer there is. Even if you only look at battery life and wireless capability (5 hours and built-in wireless card and antennaes vs. Dell's 2 hours and no built-in wireless card or antennaes) you are in a new world with the Mac. When you factor in other connectivity, there's no doubt (built-in Ethernet on iBook, built-in Gigabit Ethernet on PowerBook, built-in FireWire on both, built-in TV out on both, built-in REAL modems on both, built-in IrDA modem on PowerBook, built-in VGA out on both, plus both can act as FireWire hard drives for easy connection to a desktop computer).
Every once in a while I take a look at "what I'm missing" since I went Mac-only, and I honestly can't get past the fact that there are PC notebooks out there that don't have Ethernet built-in (my PowerBook has Gigabit Ethernet, and I use it all the time, connected to my PowerMac, which also has Gigabit Ethernet built-in). How can you call it a computer when it doesn't have an Ethernet port? That's not what PC Card slots are for (they're for occasional stuff like CF cards and unexpected stuff like Ricochet modems).
PowerBooks all have DVD/CD-RW ("Combo") standard, now. A combo drive that fits into the 1" enclosure was just released a couple of weeks ago by the OEM. Prior to that, there just wasn't a way to put one in there.
That's something that gets overlooked a lot in Mac vs PC notebook comparisons. The PowerBook and iBook are getting on for subnotebook size. The iBook is Apple's low-end, $1299 "kids and consumers" notebook, and it is 1.3 inches thick and 8x11 depth and width and weighs less than five pounds (including the 5-hour battery). An interesting comparison that I read once put it up against a 3 pound Sony subnotebook, and the Sony weighed more in total, because the "3 pounds" didn't include the battery, external optical drive, and the PC Cards you needed for Ethernet and modem and such, which weren't built-in.
Apple is kicking ass in notebooks. You really owe it to yourself to check them out very seriously before you make any future notebook purchase. You pay one price, put in some more RAM since it is so easy to do (user-accessible RAM doors on all Macs) and then you just go about your business for a couple of years with no worries at all.
> I AM a Mac zealot, but you're wrong here.
> The desktop Powermacs use the MPC 7450 CPU
> (or MPC 7451) whereas the mobile machines are
> fitted with the MPC 7440 (or MPC 7441). Thus far,
> the G4 series has seen the MPC 7400, 7410, 7450,
> 7440, 7451 and 7451 chips.
The guy's point is that a PowerBook G4 has a "real G4" in it, whereas Pentium Mobiles are seriously crippled. A desktop G4 runs about 15 watts, while a notebook G4 runs about 10 watts. A desktop PIII runs about 50 watts, while a notebook PIII runs about 20.
P4's are in the 60-70 watt range, same as Athlons. The low-power and heat of the G4 is why Apple's desktop boxes can power the display, FireWire, two independent USB busses, AirPort, and still have four empty PCI slots and room for four hard drives all on one power supply. With an Intel box, half your power supply and cooling is just for the CPU.
> [Apple's] money comes from hardware
The other side of this is that Mac OS X is well supported by revenues from hardware. In other words, the software project that is Mac OS X has a constant source of funding, money coming directly from users and going directly to the OS development effort. This means that when Apple started building CD-RW's and DVD-RW/CD-RW's into Macs, they had a good reason to build the software support for those features into the OS and have done with it. They purchased a company that made disc burning software and they absorbed that into Mac OS X, and now working with writeable optical media is as easy as working with floppies used to be. And it's good, good stuff, not some cut-rate attempt to give you something that won't survive the next Windows rev and thus drive you back to a third-party solution just for basic data, audio, and MP3 CD's. That capability should come with the hardware (the drive) not be some add-on that you get so you can use the hardware.
"Reality is just a convenient measure of complexity" -Alvy Ray Smith
Yeah re-read it again during cold light of day and I did get a lot wrong, but I think that there is a good chance that Mac OSX may in fact create more users who want to try Linux. Plenty of people use Windows and Mac, so maybe, just maybe some will think about using Linux too.
Matt
Technically, that's ALL you need to "make a computer sing (especially if you put an old AM radio close to the board and tune the busy loops to the right frequency...), but I think even you would agree that some of the recent advances in UI technology make things easier to do.
The essence of bigotry is the assumption that, "Everyone else should be just like me!"
Your Servant, B. Baggins
The link you provided is to the old version of Darwin (the one that came with Mac OS X 10.0); The home page for the new version is at http://www.opensource.apple.com/projects/darwin/, and the installer CD image of Darwin 1.4.1 for x86 is at http://www.opensource.apple.com/projects/darwin/1. 4/release/darwinx86-141.iso.gz.
"Reality is just a convenient measure of complexity" -Alvy Ray Smith
(Sorry to post this again, but it appears people are copying the bad URL :) The link the AC provided is to the old version of Darwin (the one that came with Mac OS X 10.0); The home page for the current version is at http://www.opensource.apple.com/projects/darwin/, and the installer CD image of Darwin 1.4.1 for x86 is at http://www.opensource.apple.com/projects/darwin/1. 4/release/darwinx86-141.iso.gz.
"Reality is just a convenient measure of complexity" -Alvy Ray Smith
MSIE runs under GNU/Linux. Ways, means, and degrees vary. Older versions are relatively easy to get up under WINE, with appropriate Windows libs installed, even newer versions are rumored to run relatively well. There's also Lin4Win and VMWare, but the first is somewhat a borderline case, and the latter I'd say really doesn't count, as the virtual system has nothing to do with GNU/Linux.
What part of "gestalt" don't you understand?
Just adding a point that seems to have been missed.
You do something in a GUI, chances are high that:
A good CLI provides the ability to do "here" documents and command-line scripts (vi mode in bash) which can be used to compose complex (or dire-consequence) commands, which can then be viewed, desk-checked, or "neutered" (echo command...) and then recalled and run for real. If it turns out you actually wanted to save the command, you can script it.
My own claim to fame was processing some 125,000 files which were part of a web archived I'd snarfed (with a wget script). Tasks were to correct nonstandard HTML, rewrite URLs to point to local references rather than a remote site no longer in existence, and to fix some badly broken HTML and files. A combination of tools and scripts got me through this in a matter of hours. I don't care to think what the GUI equivalent would have been.
CLI and GUI both have their place, but for work which can be expressed algorithmically and which contains repetitive elements, a scriptable CLI kicks Tog's ass.
Yes, I know this is a troll, I'm writing for the rest of ya.
What part of "gestalt" don't you understand?
Agreed, but I have a hard time believing that OS X is that, either (note that I agree that Gnome's interface is crud, too...which is why I stick with KDE) especially since Apple felt the need to take the new system's native interface (N*xtStep) and their legacy interface (MacOS) and stir the two together, and combine it with eyecandy that's there primarily to show off their new display tech.
I've worked with it for a while, and find it to be an unintuitive pile of crap.
Give me my NextStep look-and-feel! :-P
Stating on Slashdot that I like cheese since 1997.
Yeah, you need to have an office to be able to work. I don't know why you capitalized this though.
But you also need a productivity software package (word processor, etc) like Staroffice or Lotus Wordperfect Office for Linux, The long term goal is not to gag yourselves with proprietary file formats so that you are _able_ to switch if you _want_ to.
I heard Microsoft makes a single-platform, single-proprietary-file-format office suite as well, which doesn't fulfill this requirement.
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Coupla points:
1) Actually, 3D meshes perfectly with absolute measurement systems, since 3D has never used pixels. OpenGL, for example, is enitrely based on abstract units.
2) I think Berlin does this.
A deep unwavering belief is a sure sign you're missing something...