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Dvorak: Linux too much like Windows
inode_buddha was among a handful of folks who submitted linkage to Dvorak's latest column where he talks about Linux being to much like Windows. It's not really a slam, just a challange to be more innovative and look beyond feature creep and UI concepts that are old and tired. Hard to disagree with most of it.
He slams the Mac constantly for not being enough like Windows. It's innovating in a different direction, and that's an issue. Now Linux is copying Windows too much, and that's an issue.
I think this guy just bashes everything to get people riled up and to have people read his articles.
... Believe me, buddy. I wouldn't be using linux right now if it wasn't quite as good as Windows. Windows came with this computer, and I'm not using it. That isn't because I'm some kind of linux religious freak. It's because I'm more productive on a linux box.
The same old command line? Somebody go tell this guy that linux (or any unix variant) doesn't have the same old command line as Windows. It's so obvious that they are different that I'm not going to type about it anymore
I'm getting the feeling that linux and windows are the same because they both run on computers. So they must be the same, right?
Sex - Find It
Not to mention the fact that any differences from Windows are likely to get slammed by the users (and by pundits such as Dvorak) as being incompatible. Good, bad, or indifferent if Linux is going to take over the desktop it is going to have to be easy for the current group of Windows users to understand.
I like my WindowMaker. It's not a Win95/XP clone like KDE and Gnome tried to be. But they aren't fully Win95/XP clone that they tried for either, they all moved on. Gnome has multiple panels, as does KDE(ok, they keep up with each other instead of diverting, to me that is kind of pointless), as does Windows. But with Gnome and KDE is makes more sense to use the multiple panels, with Windows there really isn't a reason except to make it look better.
I do agree with Dvorak that WIMPs is a bad idea, but I do think that it is one of the best concepts out there. Although I don't have icons except when I minimize a window. What I would like is a scrolling desktop(and a CPU that could even support it if I coded it). I want to watch my MPlayer Window _over_ the Mozilla Window, but if I move the mouse towards the scrollbar(where MPlayer is covering), the Moz window would move over or the Mplayer window would dynamically shrink, to transparency would occur allowing me to use the scrollbar without having to move the mplayer window.
Everyone thinks that 3-D Window Managers are next. I say 3-d accelerated Window Managers, but having a box with windows on each side _really_ doesn't cut it in my book. It's neat. It's neat to program. It's neat to play with. Gotta get back to work now, good-bye. Just because 3-d is a big gaming thing and not used for regular Windows does not make it "The Next Big Thing(tm)" in my book.
What I would like to see, and this is off-topic, is XML menu specification. So you can download, install a program, and then install a menu item for it with whatever Window Manager you are using. It just needs a few fields. If someone wants to go with this idea and wants me to help(put my money where my mouth is) just e-mail me and I've got no problem.
What I also want to see is the death of X-Windows. It's served it's term, but it isn't getting any better. I want to see DirectFB succeed, but it needs to be multi-platform. I'm on FreeBSD so I can only run it under SDL ontop of X-Windows. But FreeBSD has something similar in the works set for probably 6.0 or whenever the person finishes it.
Communication and features between other type of hardware, specialized, would be great. And the framework to support it. Example, FingerWorks has some great products and great concepts. Once I get the money I'm going for their keyboard. I'd like to see a framework to make it work with any GTK, Gnome, KDE, GNUStep, and a generic library to add support for it to any program. That way have a custom gesture(when it is created) that will allow you to launch a program. I want to be able to hit numlock twice(Example) and type in 0805040206 and launch a program of my choice. For me, memorize 5 numbers, adding a '0' before it, and typing that in is much faster than moving the mouse, opening the menu, finding it, and clicking it. The generic framework, standardized would be best, would add the ability for, say, Mozilla to receive the two numlocks, to realize that it is a registered event handler, and to pass it off to the framework and do what is asked. Say, even passing it off to the 'server' so to speak to figure out what to do, although I think if it was implemented on a window manager level it would be best. That way you have a generic framework to work with as far as developers go, possibly a generic XML exporter of all your functions that you've specific(scanning the bar code, with your CueCat, of your favorite foot powder say, brings up userfriendly), and a generic XML importer to bring into the Window Manager. But having it Window Manager based, so that it fits in with Accessibility theory(I believe?). It _is_ a part of KDE Control Panel, it _is_ a part of Gnome Control Panel, it _is_ a part of that little WindowMaker configuration program. Easy for developers, easy for users, easy to switch between.
Sorry for the long post.
The fact is, any window environment must be similar to windows or users will get confused. New entrants must cater to the existing standard. Try building a new car with a different interface or maybe publish a book that reads up -> down. These items will fail. Look at the new BMW 7 series, all they did was add a dial that has extra functionality instead of a normal automatic shifter. Even though the traditional pedal acceleration and stop system remained. many buyers were completely put off by the idea.
Keeping Linux like windows is a good idea, getting rid of point and click makes no sense right now, but that doesn't mean in can't be done. With Linux people can write all types of crazy interfaces and environments, test them on a wide scale, and receive feedback. Apple and Microsoft can't afford to research 100 different window managers, but with Linux this is possible. The only problem with Linux is the developers, usually make decisions on the UI and look and feel. There needs to be a system in place where artists can make significant contributions to the DESIGN of open source software.
Like a mainstream political party, Microsoft has firmly occupied the center, as that is way to maximize the allegiance of customers. John wants Linux to go off and be totally experimental and new - presumably so he can recapture that excitement of the early years of the PC revolution - but what happens is, as soon as you move away from center you lose appeal to those who don't like the direction you moved in. So John's recipe for Linux's success is really just a recipe for marginalization.
Another point he's missed so far is that Linux doesn't just move in one direction, it moves in many directions at once, so that you have a number of complete, well-developed environments each of which caters to certain tastes, all the way from text mode consoles to kde, which is more-or-less Linux for windows refugees, to experimental 3D environments. I suppose he would come back with the usual argument about how it doesn't make sense to divide effort across all those different projects, but then he'd just be ignoring one of Linux's great strengths, which is the sheer number of coders involved. In fact, trying to get them working obediently all on the same project at the same time would be shear insanity.
John, if you're reading this, and I guess you will, what you have to realize is that you do get to escape your boring old desktop metaphor and try something different, like a Tivo, which doesn't look like a desktop at all, plus you get to keep working the same way you always did, if that's what you want. It's about choice, and that's what Linux has. How's that for something new?
Have you got your LWN subscription yet?
Methinks that Dvorak has been reading Slashdot too much and is starting to let the Soviet Russia jokes get to him.
"The objective of securing the safety of Americans from crime and terror has been achieved." -- John Ashcroft
The interaction sucks. Users have to perform many unnecessary actions. Why do I have to press "OK", read the "field value missing" dialog box, close it, fill the damn field and repeat the whole thing? Don't tell me that graying out the "OK" button untill all the required fields (which should be clearly marked as such) are filled is "dumbing down". It's a shame that document editors still need the "Save" button (this is an old example), when the edited file could easily and transparently get saved in the background. Irreversible changes? Why should they be irreversible? The disk space taken by saving the whole undo buffer is microscopic compared to modern disk sizes. Well, perhaps "label version" should get there instead of the "save" button, so that i can conveniently roll back to an old version without hitting "undo" 100 times. These are just a general examples that can be found in almost every application. Specific application have even more inconvieniences.
We got used to this so much that we don't even notice how crappy the UI is, but it is crappy and it can get better.
It seems to me that over the last year or two, there has been a flood of commentary focusing on what Linux should become in order to be useful, helpful, nice, good value, etc. etc. etc.
And all the while, each time I read one of these stories, I am secretly thinking to myself that I am quite satisfied with Linux as it is now. Linux+KDE3+OpenOffice+Mozilla+GIMP gives me the most enjoyable, productive computing environment I've ever had -- and I've had a lot of computers over the years (I was a 128k Mac owner, $3500 for a tiny monochrome scren and a 400k floppy!)
I sometimes wonder if there isn't a silent majority of Linux users who aren't at all interested in Linux-chases-Windows or Linux-chases-MacOS or Linux-needs-XYZ and who instead are just using Linux on a day to day basis and being glad it's the system that it is.
I'd hate to see this silent majority gradually lose the system they love as Linux is transformed into a Windows clone by vendors and project leaders who give too much credence to the voices of pundits (many of whom probably don't use Linux as their primary desktop anyway).
My $0.02.
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Yes...indeed. I remember one of the major critcisms of the linux desktop in '97-98 (think Redhat 3.0.3) was that "I can't find anything", and "Where's the start button? This thing is broken!"
Shutting down free speech with violence isn't fighting fascism. It IS fascism!
Allright, that - in essence - what the article is all about. Yet, we know that the desktop metaphor is really the MINIMAL thing to implement before you can go on to other things. Because
1) users that were running Win/Max before don't want to change their way of working that profoundly
2) I for one think that the desktop metaphor will EVOLVE instead of just being killed and replaced completely
So, clearly with X/KDE/GNOME we are behind of MS/Apple by a more or less far shot. But I agree with the author, that - as some of us still are working on perfecting the desktop - we could work on possible "evolutions" and advancements.
One thing, for example, which will definitely be coming along in the not too far away future, is the "one-program" paradigm. The general idea behind is to
a) essentially have one "framework" interface for more or less all applications
b) really driving application-to-application interaction and data-transfer to a new level
c) employ new ways of browsing through data and software
d) making it possible to access the same data with multiple software modules while they are interacting with one another in a meaningful way
e) further degrade of the data-software boundary
So I guess we COULD put a lot of things together, if only OSS would focus more on the user side...
Yes, the whole article is an ignorant slam. It's so stupid, that a starting point of constructive criticism is hard to find. He describes the whole free software world as a windoze deriviative born on x86 by "boring coders" and other uncreative types that lacks "features" of the only true software, Microsoft. That's the kind of insight you might expect from someone who's only experience with the free software world comes from having popped a CD into his machine for five minutes or so. Of course not one word is correct. True to the pure troll, he offers no useful alternatives to the things he does not like, except to stick with the M$ word of undefined features.
For those of you who might not be aware of this, the millions of free and open software coders of the world are much better researched than Dvorac. GNU/Linux has taken the best sofware concepts from all operating systems. It takes it's multi user security model from the Unix world. WIMPs came from Bell and Xerox Park, and many different GUI systems are available as free software. The most prominant and one of the most powerful is XFree86, a network aware base for many fine Window managers. Window managers of all descriptions and sources are available to run on top of X. You can get Virtual Reality and 3D desktops if you want them. Yes, it's true that you can make these window managers act just like M$ junk, but you can change that with a press of a theme button. Some prominant window managers come with a default that looks like M$ junk so new users can learn how to make the thing work at their own pace. You see, choice is what free software is all about. Developers and users are free to follow any fancy they have and it all works together. Most free software has been ported to other hardware and even different software platforms. I have not even mentioned the Berkely Software Distribution universe and it's derivatives in use by many including the very artsy Apple. Free software is also being adopted by the opposite end of the computer using specturm as well - the dull likes of IBM and Wall Street Bankers. You can take it and make it what you want, so anyone and everyone is now doing just that. They are are generally happy and wonder in time how they ever managed to get along in the coiceless and ever more rapicious propriatory software world.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
What is it with people and their seemingly insatiable need to reinvent the wheel? The irony is that Microsoft's OS's caught on as well as they did not because Bill Gates is an Evil Genius *chuckle* but because Gates was dumb enough to write operating systems for the lousy x86 hardware paradigm when it began--the historical fact is nobody else wanted to. (The fact is that the guy IBM originally picked to do their OS decided to play golf instead of meet with IBM representatives as scheduled by appointment, and Gates was second on their list and he was in at the time.) Literally, no one else wanted the job.
Flash forward to the mid-late 80's. No one who was "anything" in the personal computer scene at the time would be caught dead using an x86 clone or DOS--they used Macs and Amigas which were brilliant concepts at the time, the Amiga especially literally being ten years ahead of Gates and Windows and x86.
Ironically, especially in light of the recent DOJ hearings, the reason the Amiga died and the Mac became a butt for jokes and received permanent niche status had absolutely nothing to do with Gates and Microsoft and IBM. The reason for those events was internal--for Apple it was a short-sighted and greedy Steve Jobs who did not want to license Mac clones; with Commodore it was a greedy and short-sighted Mehdi Ali who did not want to license Amiga clones (I recall at the time hearing from a source I trusted who informed me that Commodore had actually gotten a cloning agreement penned with Tandy and Radio Shack, where the company would have sold its machines in its thousands of retail stores under a clone name, but that Commodore pulled out at the last minute.) Both Apple and Commodore felt they could make more money by being the sole distributors of their hardware--neither company foresaw the incredible boom that would hit the personal computer industry in the 90's.
So it just so happened that Gates was the guy who grew up writing OS's for the one, single hardware standard which was open to tons of competition within--the IBM-PC clone hardware marketplace. In it you had dozens of companies all competing with each other to sell systems and peripherals--today there are hundreds of such companies all devoted to a single standard--the one that allowed clones--x86. Some people to this day do not understand that it was the hardware engine that drove x86 to vast supremacy--certainly not Gate's software--which back in the late 80's absolutely sucked compared to other OS's at the time. But because so many companies were selling x86 hardware so much cheaper than companies like Apple or Commodore, it was the x86 clones that were bought (most of the time Apple and Commodore could not meet demand for their hardware, which is exactly why they should've liscensed clones early on.)
And everywhere an IBM-PC clone went, a Microsoft OS was sure to follow. It's pretty simple to understand how Microsoft got to where it is today even though it was selling one of the worst OS's in existence for several years. Gates has never made a secret of it--there's the famous Gates-Jobs memos in which Jobs asks Gates what he needs to do to get the Mac into the mainstream and Gates writes back "License clones." It was advice which Jobs declined (which he now admits he should've taken.)
That's why I think Dvorak's bored...he wants something "new"...yet the only thing *he* can think of is some *old* crap nobody ever really pursued years ago *chuckle*...;) There's some inkling in his opinion that an OS should not be "functional" but "something else"--whatever the "else" is, Dvorak doesn't say....
It seems to me that Dvorak is forgetting that most if not all of the "new" ideas as to what an OS should be and do have all been tried and the GUI is the best that anybody's been able to come up with. Maybe when the hardware gets here we can have 3D holograms on the desktop that will work in fundamentally different ways, but for right now and the foreseeable future we're stuck with a 2D display (even our "3D" is just simulated in a 2D display.) And the GUI seems to be everybody's consensus of "what's best" for an operating system interface (of course some people still prefer the command line, but that's not what Dvorak is talking about.)
Dvorak talks about "wintel roots" without realising that "Wintel roots" had roots of their own which came out of earlier computing projects--and accusing one company of "copying" another simply because it chose to adopt something as fundamental as a GUI is pretty ridiculous. It's like saying GM and Ford "copy each other" because they make cars with four wheels and rubber tires. Is it really that they "copied" each other, or more like the fact that these things are as fundamental to the design of a car (or computer OS) as doors are to houses? Of course, that I agree with the latter should come as no surprise.
The trend in Linux today toward workable GUIs that happen to "look like" Windows was not intentional, nor was it subconscious as Dvorak contends. Rather, Linux advocates and developers have always worked toward creating a better OS than Windows and a different OS than Windows. But the fact is there are only so many ways you can skin the GUI cat--only so many ways to make a GUI which is intelligible. Dvorak's "look and feel" arguments are pretty funny--I thought we'd gotten past that bit of nonsense years ago. It's like saying Goodyear should sue Firestone (or vice-versa) because the tires the other company makes "look and feel" the same *chuckle* The whole "look and feel" argument was atrocious from the beginning and it's gratifying to see it never got anywhere.
Here's the thing Dvorak forgets: so what if Linux versions "look and feel" somewhat like Windows? Who cares? The fact is it *isn't* Windows regardless of what it looks and feels like. If anything such superficial similarities might actually help spread the acceptance of Linux (if the community can ever get over the factional splintering of distributions--which is the one thing that could doom its ultimate success as a competitor to Windows--but that's another story.)
I guess Dvorak forgot the simple admonition that contains worlds of truth: don't judge a book by its cover.
The best user interface that I have yet found is still a command line.
When you figure out how to draw a picture with the command line, or edit a video, or make a 3D model, or even play checkers, let me know. Until then, graphical interfaces are here to stay.
I write in my journal
I'd hate to see this silent majority gradually lose the system they love as Linux is transformed into a Windows clone by vendors and project leaders who give too much credence to the voices of pundits
Erm, have you been using any Windows recently?
I am made to use Windows at work, and the interface is just plain freaking backwards.
STILL no virtual desktop, making it awkward to develop with an IDE in full screen mode while keeping some documentation open at the same time.
STILL no way to control, resize, or move a window at ALL if the app is busy (or frozen, for that matter)! I mean, it's, what, almost year 2003? On what is supposed to be a friendly OS?!
In terms of GUI convenience, KDE is a fucking order of magnitude ahead of Windows, man. Still much lagging behind MacOS X, but then, what isn't.
I don't know for Gnome, but KDE is freaking NOT being turned into a Windows clone. Take a look at the KDE framework, one day. That thing is fucking brilliant. Want to make it look and behave like Windows (without such retarded 'features' as the windows unmovable when busy)? Sure, you can. That's how my mother's account on my box works. And guess what, she can find her way around it out of the box. Want to make it completely different in the way YOU need it? Sure, you can. Want to lock features to make an easy to use but impossible to corrupt kiosk? Sure, you can!
What is it with people bleating that we shouldn't keep running after the Windows world? We've passed them MONTHS ago, people!
Now Linux as an OS still has some serious usability issues (primarily, there's no global software installation system that Just Works[*], that's the biggest showstopper right now), but in terms of GUI, the Windows world is severely lagging behind. I switched to Linux out of laziness, for crying out loud!
[*] I've tried to stir up discussion about that a couple time, but most of the Linux community seems to have an inertia you wouldn't believe. The answers were basically, "Shut up and use apt-get", "Shut up and use RPM", or "shut up and use configure; make; make install". Erm, hello? I can and do use any of those. But my mom and my (now ex, sigh) girlfriend can't. Now, why should it matter? Well, we want people to port their software to Linux, and that implies, giving them a way to make it easy to distribute their software in a global way. I've spent a while thinking about possible solutions to that most hairy problem, but I guess that's food for another thread. This post is long and ranty enough as it is.
Anyway. Rant over. Flame with moderation, thanks.
-- B.
This sig does in fact not have the property it claims not to have.
There is no way for a single consistent desktop to appease all power users and noobs alike.
There is: sensible defaults with varying levels of customization, and a clear but informative interface by which to perform that customization. I'll give you an example of what I'm talking about (yes, it does exist):
For those of you who have used ximian's gnome distro with the sawfish window manager, you may have already experienced this. Ximian goes to great lengths to make desktop look & feel -- by which I mean the file browser (nautilus) and window manager (sawfish) -- a pretty simple experience for those just getting into it. The first time you log in, you're presented with a few choiced about what you want things to look like (sawfish & gnome themes), but behaviorally, you're given the defaults (reasonable and simple behaviors).
After that, most (at least everything even an advanced user would care about) of the behavioral / visual modifications can be done using one common interface: the gnome control center (please ignore KDE for the point of this discussion for a moment).
If you've ever used this interface to change the behavior of sawfish, you know what I'm talking about. Sawfish has several different screens (for different areas of its behavior & appearance) in the control center. In its "Meta" screen, one can even set the level of complexity regarding the other sawfish configuration screens. If I'm a novice (the default), I am only presented with a few options. More complex options are presented when I choose intermediate or expert.
To me, this is an outstanding way to provide simplicity as the default behavior with the configurability that power users demand. I hate window managers that don't allow me to remap modifier + mouse buttons to different behaviors. I've found a combination which I believe is much more efficient (and intuitive) for three-button mouse users as far as moving, resizing, etc. goes. If I'm not allowed to set this up, then that particular window manager (to me) is bunk.
This is one of the reasons I hate the RedHat 8.0 UI so much. The user interface is one of imposed simplicity. It's really difficult to find out how you can change metacity (if that's even possible). RedHat's new preferences interface is just as lobotomized. What's worse is that if you switch back to sawfish, all kinds of functionality (like logging out of an xession?!) breaks (thanks guys, real slick).
The problem is that power users are in the minority of desktop computer users. This is an unfortunate reality with which I still have not yet come to terms. The problem? Baby-boomers. There are so many people like my parents who are not technically proficient, who "just want the damn thing to work", but "don't want to have to understand or think about it". These are the people with the money, and these are the people to whom companies must market their products.
This is the reason why usability (real usability from the sense of the power user) takes second seat: FFM (Focus Follows Money). I hope sawfish continues to be integrated into the major distros (properly). I hope the technically proficient of the world will continue to donate their time and write free software that is usable by more than the common idiot. I hope that Windows will not define what is included and what is not in the desktop just because most of the desktop users are used to it.
But I'm not holding my breath, and I hate it.
moto411.com
That's true, but the average user probably considers Windows to be "free" anyway. When he/she bought a new PC, the odds are extremely high that it was shipped with some version of Windows. The average user buys a PC with Windows, never reinstalls his OS, and uses it to get things done. They rarely have to contact their hardware vendor, let alone Microsoft, so support and support costs are immaterial to them. They just want a machine that works and does so in a way that they understand.
"It's too bad stupidity isn't painful." - A. S. LaVey