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Linux Advocacy From the Trenches

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the duck-and-cover dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Tom Adelstein, longtime Linux advocate and consultant has spent the last year working closely with state, local, and federal government open source software initiatives. Tom launched Government Forge,spearheaded the Open Source bill in Texas and other programs. Tom shares the grass roots efforts that have offered him an insider's view of what is propelling Linux toward critical mass and the desktop. He shares his view of Linux "from the trenches" in this interview."

8 of 262 comments (clear)

  1. Ah, Linux / BSD / Unix in general... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Does anybody miss the days when Unix was respected? Back in those days, if you ran Unix or a variant, men would tip their hats at you, people would call you "Sir", women would approach you instead of waiting to be approached, and no one would question the decisions you made.

    Nowadays most any chump will try and recommend Windows, even if it's not the right solution to a problem, just because it's all they know and all they ever learnt. They don't have the uncertainty and fear of Ghod in their hearts like most people used to.

    A crying shame.

    1. Re:Ah, Linux / BSD / Unix in general... by soft_guy · · Score: 3, Funny

      And remember the days when you could get a free ice cream cone if you told the clerk at Baskin Robbins that you used an Amiga?

      Ah, the good old days...

      --
      Avoid Missing Ball for High Score
    2. Re:Ah, Linux / BSD / Unix in general... by Creepy+Crawler · · Score: 2, Funny

      Bull shit. All the VMS idiots were picking on me.

      But I fixed them, did I . I 0x'ed em. They came back as Windows NT.

      No wonder somebody said that Unix and C were the ultimate viruses....

      --
  2. Linux "Advocates" by Pave+Low · · Score: 4, Funny
    Slashdot Double Standard #50: Linux Advocates, Evangalists and Fans are pure noble warriors fighting the holy fight for good. The can do no wrong.

    Microsoft's defenders and supporters are almost always shills, corrupted, evil, immoral devils out to dominate the world.

    --
    SIG:Slashdot: indymedia for nerds.
    1. Re:Linux "Advocates" by mamer-retrogamer · · Score: 2, Funny
      The corollary to this is:

      Mac fans and supporters are clueless zealots who are easily influenced by Jobs' Reality Distortion Field.

      (Though this is starting to change).

      --
      Schrödinger's cat is not amused—maybe.
  3. Fix the gtk file dialog by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Then ill listen to you whining little zealots.

  4. Re:Big Bully by UtucXul · · Score: 2, Funny

    You aren't actually suggesting that Dell supports the computers that it sells with windows, are you? Back in the dark days when the old Dell I have still occasionally got booted into windows, my modem died. When I called Dell (it was still under warrenty then), they refused to replace it because they couldn't do "online trouble shooting" since I had WIn2K on it. How did they expect to do online trouble shooting on a computer with a broken modem regardless of the OS? With that kind of support, I don't think Dell would have any trouble providing the same level of support with for linux that they do for windows.

  5. Re:Linux is only lacking in the apps. by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 2, Funny

    Bah, I misspoke; I meant Windows of course. That shows how much of an MS lackey I am... these days 'a PC' is common parlance for 'a PC running Windows', and I've kind of accepted that meaning, inaccurate as it is.

    --
    If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...