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Making the 'Best' Desktop Linux System
NorhLoudspeaker writes "Michael C. Barnes gives DesktopLinux.com readers an in-depth analysis of the technologies that make open source a great alternative to proprietary operating systems. Examining the various components that constitute a complete system, Barnes provides practical advice and instruction on how to improve your desktop experience and productivity with freely available software. He reviews desktop environments, communications using voice-over-IP, common applications, and more."
IMHO the way we stare into a little window and operate things with a mouse and a keyboard is very very limited, and so no matter how hard you try, any desktop will basically suck....
I want the actual surface of my desk to be the desktop, one very lage touch sensitive screen.
It's pretty hard to explain to a user who doesn't care about such things why the look-and-feel is so different among the KDE desktop, the Mozilla browser, OpenOffice and Evolution. It's hard to explain the maddening complexity of clipboard issues among these apps. "Oh, you can't cut and paste between X and Y because X is a ___ app, but Y is a ___ app." That's fine for those of us who understand the differences among X, KDE and GTK, but ordinary desktop users shouldn't have to be aware of such things.
Fortunately it looks like there is a project to make OpenOffice fully integrated with KDE/Qt. Also, with both Evolution and Suse now owned by the same company (Novell) hopefully there is going to be some better integration there, too. I was somewhat disappointed when I installed the latest Suse 9.2 that there still is a confusing choice between Kontact and Evolution, and presumably Evolution isn't fully integrated with the KDE desktop, but I expect (hope) these things will be fixed in the next release.
Think more about seamless integration, less about apps. The apps are there! But the user experience is not.
These are my observations as a five-year exclusive desktop Linux user.
The problem is that there is no "best" linux distribution. Everyone has a different definition of "best", so how can one be best for everyone? The article praises SimpleMEIPS. Except for the installation, the features he mentions are all available in a stock Debian install (he simple apt-get's the programs).
In my opinion, the article has a very "look ma, see what I can do" approach. He praises many open-source applications, but they are available the same way in any distro, and manages to knock all other distros in the process. Maybe for a newbie, SimpleMEIPS is a good distro, but it certaintly isn't the "best desktop distribution".
For the everyday family - small office user, Linux is more than ready. If everything you need to do is reading&writing documents - browsing the internet - managing email - IM - chatting - listening to music and viewing videos, well, Linux is there. Do you think it's just nothing? Well,it's just what most computer users need.
Professional users need something different,of course. I wonder why doesn't Adobe port its suites to Linux (or at least support them on WINE). And music editing and production on Linux is still at zero.
-- Patent no.123456: A way to personalize
Typo in your URL, should be: http://www.ubuntulinux.org/ :)
liqbase
I have offered to several people to put on a different browser, and make their bookmarks work. I get the dreaded face of 'no' from them.
Wow. You probably know more morons than me, and that's impressive :).
When I hinted people to switch to Firefox -without offering any help about their bookmarks!- it was enough to talk about simple features like tabbed browsing and pop up blocking to see my whole lab switch in mass.
I can't see why Firefox and Thunderbird are not as simple as Outlook and IE. Frankly I think Thunderbird is much more user friendly than Outlook. That's not the problem. The problem is not OO.org vs Word (OO.org is OK for 90% users). Is much more the crappy Gimp vs Photoshop, or NOTHING vs FruityLoops, or NOTHING vs Macromedia Flash, or poor little Inkscape vs Illustrator. The challenge is on professional, large suites, IMHO.
-- Patent no.123456: A way to personalize
How is that an excuse? It sounds like a valid point to me. If people are comfortable with the system that they use, how can you deduce that they are "suffering?" Just because you can't stand using Windows, doesn't mean that it can't be a perfectly enjoyable enjoyable experience for the rest of the users.
Nine out of ten people I know who use Windows aren't suffering because of it. They'd be suffering more by spending a rediculous amount of time learning how to use Linux when the truth is that they just don't need to be.
The way I see it, is too many small businesses choose to use packages like MYOB and more importantly Microsoft Access and do there own databases. What kind of linux alternatives are there for software like this? I think if this question could be answered satisfactorily, a wide section of the market could more easily be persuaded to linux based systems.
Mixing desktop environments, with the resulting incongruities, overlap, etc is exactly the wrong way to create a coherent environment. At that point I would tell an arbitrary user to use either KDE or GNOME, but not "both".
What I've found is that the important things for general-purpose corporate users are these:
- Driver support - One of the biggest problems has always been, as the article mentioned, driver support. It's terrible that after over a decade of this being one of Linux's biggest issues (overall), in this day and age we still have some problems with "mainstream" hardware support. That's going to take desktop Linux moving from early adopters to leading edge stage.
- Slim down, stable apps - For a corporate user, there's very few apps that most IT departments want everywhere. Those few programs should be highly stable, integrated, well-tested, interoperable, and easy to use. For most users, those applications are an Office suite (OpenOffice and/or MS Office via CXOffice), e-mail program (Evolution or Outlook/Lotus Notes via CXOffice), web browser (Mozilla and/or IE via CXOffice), and file and print - usually provided by the OS or UI (KDE or Gnome). Naturally, every user has additional apps they need, but these were the core.
- Interoperability - Of course, any corporation of a significant size cannot afford to migrate every desktop at once. One big requirement of a Linux desktop is that it must have the ability to seamlessly interoperate with the existing infrastructure and systems. That means using existing directories (AD or eDir), accessing file shares, exchanging documents, and enabling user collaboration (e.g. IM, shared meeting spaces, etc.).
There are plenty of more issues and requirements, but those were the big ones. Also, along those lines, I expect a big advance in Linux on the corporate desktop from one of the big vendors very soon -- the existing capabilities appear to be creating "the perfect storm" for just such a release."Adventure? Excitement? A Jedi craves not these things."
I've tried Linux several times, and each time I've suffered greatly - no drivers for all sorts of hardware - nics, displays, cameras, etc. Sure, you can get Linux "to work" if you stick within the bounds of what all the propellerheads are using but most of them aren't using high end gear so there aren't drivers for a lot of nice hardware. And no, I (and most user's) don't want to code or support our own driver implementations, thank you. That's another thing that Linux just doesn't provide - a reliable support model. Maybe IBM will help with that but somehow I suspect by then IBM won't be seen as a benevolent Linux player any longer by the
On my Mac, everything just works. That's _not_ what I call suffering. Sure, Apple isn't perfect, but they do support a lot of high-end gear and it's still a nice Unix platform too. Frankly, Linux has a long way to go before it can match the OS X desktop IMO.
Either of GNOME or KDE qualify. Both have "good enough" apps across the board. Both are well integrated. The real problem is that you still cannot plug your digital camera in and have something intelligent happen. Devices are the roadblock.
Some things are just as easy in Linux as on Mac and Windows. Once you have a system setup with applications you use etc it is not a problem for most users. They just click and run their things. Be i OpenOffice, Word, Mozilla, IE doesn't probabbly matter. IE does have one advantage.
:) great!
Internet Explorer is an intuitive name, Mozilla, Epiphany and Konqueror aren't. So it will take a few extra minutes to learn about that for a totally new user. It is expected and nothing to worry about IMO.
Other things are more difficult. Installing new software for example, or worse, change hardware settings.
There simply isn't a powerful enough, yet easy to use tool to change hardware things post install. Just adding a new mouse with more buttons is rather difficult for many users.
There is one field where Linux has a far way to go still. It is for photography, art and painting things. For example there is no colour management and colour calibration support for cameras, scanners, printers and monitors. Those are absolutely nessesary for this kind of work. They exist in Windows and on Mac. This is where Mac has shined for many years....
oh... just saw that Scribus has some support for colour management
I don't know where you're buying your boxes, but some major video types (WMV and DVDs, for example) are currently illegal to support under Linux in pretty much any form, except possibly Crossover. Wide format support is possible with Linux, but anyone who sets it up "out of the box" is asking to get sued.
It's hard to be religious when certain people are never incinerated by bolts of lightning.
For me if it can run apt-get then the version of it's Kernel is totaly irrelevant.
Linux does not run 3ds Max or Photoshop, or programs that come close to their functionality (nevermind the fact that I own legal student licenses for both of these programs and that's a further incentive to get my money's worth out of them). Until it runs graphics software that is aimed at professionals instead of hobbyists and open-source teams making logos for their mp3 player...Linux is not useful to me.
I migrated to Fedora from M$ a year ago. I find linux faster and more secure, and I like being able to configure everything. And I like the fact that everythings free. But I've crashed my hard drive three times cuz I didn't know what I was doing when I took the plunge. I still find the shell cumbersome sometimes. In the U.S. anyway, most of the Cheeto-munching, reality-tv-watching, Coors-drinking communications majors are just going to want to point and click.
What the hell was I supposed to be doing? I was going to do something, and now I'm on
Anyone I've tried to talk into using Firefox has not switched. Anyone who I've installed Firefox for and shown them how easy it is has switched. No exceptions.
People hate to change or commit themselves to anything. It means that they have lost control. They 'just want to have it fixed'. When you asked, you asked if they wanted to change...and the obvious response is 'no...just fix it'.
Here's my suggestion;
Now, show them Firefox and how nice and simple it is to have the group of tabs.
Let them know that Internet Explorer is still there and is the default browser...but if they want, they can make Firefox the default by answering the question that appears when they start Firefox.
Works like a charm.
A firewall can not protect you from yourself. Turn off what you do not need. Do not use the firewall to do your work.
i have been using different variations of redhat for almost 5 years (6.2 - fedora 2). i'm impressed by the advances but none have come close to what i consider desktop ready. the average user doesn't want to think. they want to play their mp3's (not supported in fedora 2?), they want to edit office documents at home (open office is close, but not there and why should they need to know the different programs like abiword and gnumeric?) linux will be desktop ready when people stop supporting their favorite distro and begin to support common software. take the lesson from apple - the less a user thinks or needs to know the happier they are. before you release software do a user test with your grandmother, if she can sit at the machine and browse the web, play music, send email, and use office apps without ever needing to think, linux is ready. until then i'll keep my iBook, i like getting stuff done, not worrying about dependencies, libraries, or if my laptop will see my windows machine
You said: "THEN YOU ARE NOT A DESKTOP USER. THIS WHOLE ARGUMENT IS ABOUT USING LINUX AS A DESKTOP, NOT A SERVER. It's a fine OS for serving."
I don't often see desktop systems run high-end hardware. If you are using high-end hardware, you are probably not running a normal desktop system. For this reason my response assumes that the grandparent was talking about a system that you would actually put high-end hardware into (certain workstations or servers). I've done many crazy things with computers, but I've never, for example, put a $15,000 digital signal reader card into a $2,000 box. I've never even heard of that happening (though someone has done something like that, I'm sure).
Now if you are using a $50,000 custom workstation that has sold only 500 systems in a year, there is a good chance Linux is going to give you some hiccups. But then again its not a desktop system.
Suddenly, the hairy finger of a familiar monkey tapped me on the shoulder. It was time.--G. T.
A little bit of basic marketing will tell you that there's something called "market pull / technology push". The first is when the consumers seek certain qualities (e.g. GHz numbers). The second is when technology pushes new qualities (e.g. dual core systems).
The first one, you really only have to satisfy. The second, you need to market. You need to actively go out and explain to them why this would be better (on the ex facto assumption that it is, that's another discussion). Linux is very much a technology push. If you don't market it, people will not know that a better alternative exists.
Ever had one of those features/services, that you never requested (that is, up front you wouldn't be willing to pay for that feature), but turned out to be wastly superior to old ways of doing things? Because of that, it is right to market Linux despite there being no market pull.
Of course, that is under the assumption that Linux is better. If you look at general usage, I'm not entirely convinced. Remember that most people have *one* PC. If you come to a situation where "Uh oh, Linux does not support this (at all)", we would run it on our Windows box. They would wipe Linux and install an OS that does what they want (less EULAs and DRM, oh well).
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
This is a Catch-22. Without Linux being mainstream, hardware manufacturers feel no need to support it immediately (especially the more obscure companies). But without complete hardware support, Linux cannot gain mainstream acceptance. This looks unsurmountable.
Not so. On the server and workstation side, Linux has alot of support (because it is mainstream there). Once Linux crushes the rest of the Unix brands (as it appears is going to occur) and cuts into Windows Server spaces, it can start to leverage into the desktop realm (similar to how Microsoft got into the server realm).
One of the key points in this fight is to cut out the FUD on hardware support. For small servers, it is very good. For desktop systems, it depends (but it is typically much better than is often portrayed). But most desktop systems aren't built out of random parts. They usually are sold prebuilt with operating systems installed (and with no obvious conflicts). With this in mind, Linux vendors may be very sucessful in the future on converting businesses over to Linux (which was how Microsoft won the desktop war). If they follow the Dell or Gateway model, peripheral support will not be an issue either. Other markets will follow, and hardware support will become better.
As far as support for family computers (other than for computer geeks): wrong war, wrong time.
Suddenly, the hairy finger of a familiar monkey tapped me on the shoulder. It was time.--G. T.
There are two issues which I've come across with convincing people to stick with a desktop linux.
1. Too much choice for an un-informed audience. When you install a distro, you get choices of what you want to use for a task. Which is great, for an experienced user. But when a new user is presented with 4 programs to perform the same job, they tend to get frustrated. There's nothing worse than using something wondering if it's actually the best tools to use for the task. Personally I'd like to see a desktop linux with a select version of each app installed, a single window manager, single browser, single word processor. Once the user gets the hang of it, build their confidence, then they'll look for alternative applications and improve their linux knowledge a little bit futher.
2. Integration. Make everything talk to each other properly. Fix the clipboard issues between applications. Windows users are used to being able to select stuff in one application, copying, and pasting it into whatever they want. All of a sudden they're faced with the problem of not being able to do this anymore.
Task Mangler
Hell, I can even use KDE instead of Aqua if I wanted to.
You have two hands and one brain, so always code twice as much as you think!
I'm glad that your hardware works under MacOS X. After all that is the target audience. If you read the specifications page for your monitor, you would note that Linux was not supported. This is an important point when buying high-end hardware. Some things aren't supported for Linux. But as another poster pointed out, many things aren't supported for MacOS X either. No big deal, life goes on. If you research (note: I put that in bold before) before you spend $5000 on a monitor, you will get a system that will perform correctly. Saying Linux has poor hardware support is unjustified because high-end hardware typically has a narrow audience. Covering common hardware used in systems is probably more appropriate (and Linux performs very well there).
Suddenly, the hairy finger of a familiar monkey tapped me on the shoulder. It was time.--G. T.
Now, some things like out-of-the-box suspend to disk are needed, but the essential issue is perceived performance.
.xls files) was a very pleasant surprise. Sure, it has its quirks, and it's not half as pretty as a KDE desktop, but I manage to get work done.
Linux has objectively better performance in things like filesystems (going back to FAT32 is a pain, now that I've switched back to WinXP after a year and a half on Linux only), but the typical Linux desktop tends to be very processor-intensive, screen redraws will be very slow when doing basic stuff like scrolling a long document in OOo, application startups are painful and there's often no hint (even with KDE and app wait cursors enabled) that they're starting, boot up times themselves will be painful, there is no generalized copy-and-paste for nontext objects, etc.
I really like unix as a concept, I like the power that comes with it, but I actually need to get work done on my computer now. And after getting used to the general pain of being a Linux desktop user, going back to WinXP (a change first triggered by OOo piss-poor rendering of
Stuff works, already.
Yes, I tried every single performance hack. I used all kinds of experimental kernels, did all sorts of prelinking combinations, even did a stage 1 Gentoo install. With all the eye candy on (including some really pretty stuff like true alpha blending), WinXP runs cleaner/faster than Gentoo+ion3. I mean, there is something very wrong going on with Linux desktop.
Part of the perceived difference in performance might be that Linux is very very demanding in processor, and less demanding in memory (maybe Linux coders like doing things the niftier way?), while WinXP is much more forgiving processor-wise, but will take up more memory. As I have relatively abundant memory (384 megs) but a piss-poor processor (a K6-II 500), that might be a significant part of the effect.
But I've used Gentoo in P4's, and while the bootup times are civilized, many of the performance pitfalls are still there.
All in all, it was good that I got around to learning how to use a unixlike and saw the pretty sights of KDE/Enlightenment/Fluxbox desktops, but time comes when one becomes an adult.
And with all its faults, WinXP is a desktop for us adults. (Cue in predictable joke about garish colors in Luna Blue).
Maya does not come close to 3ds Max functionality?
Analogies don't equal equalities, they are merely somewhat analogous.
Nine out of ten people I know who use Windows aren't suffering because of it
No, but then they require other people to come and do the other stuff which has to be done (virus cleanups, spyware purges, etc. etc). And when it has to be done manually, it is not a pleasant experience.
If there's joy to be had in Linux, it's not in the administration thereof.
I spent too many sleepless nights trying to do administrative tasks in Linux that were trivially easy in Windows.
In my experiance the remark:"I comfortable with my windows" is always closely follow by questions like:"Oh and by the way could you reinstall my windows or at least get rid of all these pop-ups, virusses and spam, And I keep getting this blue screen with letters on it from time to time. What should I do?"
b /zoom/
To get me through the holidays I've got my special shirt. http://www.thinkgeek.com/tshirts/frustrations/388
My response to:"I like my windows" is "Well then fix it yourself!"
This gut has shown that there are many programs that make a useable Linux environment. That's nice, but I think the main advantage Windows has over Linux is that in Windows it's very easy to transport data from one program to another using the Copy and Paste functions. In this way it's a breeze to copy a picture from ACDSee to Word, for instance. Now try to copy a picture from GQView to OpenOffice. As long as this doesn't work in Linux it will not take off. People need this kind of functionality. On the other hand, we Linux users have gpm which works a lot better for copying texts that the Copy/Paste system in Windows!
-- Cheers!
someone complains about bloat...
Sigh.
crappy gimp? i am a profesional computer graphic user, spending a lot of time with photoshop. i am using it for years, the first version i have been using was 0.9 (and i still have it for fun). and i use gimp too (from 0.99 :)). And i wouldnt say taht the Gimp is crappy. It still lacks some features (for prepress mainly), but for jobs that can be done in it (and it can do some things Photoshop cannot, if you still count Cinepaint as a Gimp version) i strongly prefer the Gimp. It has superior (but harder to learn, may be) interface that makes me 300% more productive.
SHE does throw dice.
Most windows apps, even the ones out of redmond, have well kinda the same UI, but with a weird mishmash of funcationalty and styling.
.
/etc/init.d/mydeamon restart to find out that there's a typo in the config file, since you can validate it against the dtd/xsd first.
Dockable menus, or non-dockable menus?
does crtl+insert work in this edit box, can I copy that text?
Try changing you background to something other that white, or deleting a default font and seeing how windows apps cope then windows is just as crap.
Oh, and take a look here
What do I think should be done, well, standards need to be written and addeared to, a light xml parser needs to be put into stdc libraries allconfiguration files need to be moved to XML using dtd's (yuck) or xsd's to document and validate the format that those XML files must be in,
no more
Command line apps also need standards, is that -v -V --version -version, is that -help --help -help something.
is the help myapp -xyzABC or is the help
myapp
-x --xsomething here is a description of what the flag does.
is that quit, exit, crtl+c, escape ahh...
Linux, GNU et all need a kick up the arse, standards need to be written, and everything needs to be harmonized.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
Once I can fulfill my computer needs on Linux
I'll switch (yes gaming=needs).
Buy a console. An Xbox would probably suit you best if you are into pc gaming. Mod it, so you can run emulators and stuff on it.
>until it is ready do not push it down the throat of
>the general public
nobody is forcing anybody to switch to linux. People are just stating that they think linux is better than windows. from my personal xp, it is. Really.
A ferrari is not the cheapest, easiest or better suited for traffic jams car. But many people say that it's better than a renault.And it is.
Many people are happy with their renault. Some people would not prefer the ferrari even if the price was the same. That's ok.
But that doesn't mean that people shouldn't point out the fact that ferrari is a better car.
>the amount of viruses, spywars, adwares depend on
>the market share of the operating system
This is a myth. Windows would be on the same magnitude with linux today if they had proper user/administrator setup.
The whole point of a virus is to infect the system. In linux/unix it cannot do that because the user is discouraged from using the root account for everyday tasks. On the other hand, in windows it's the default setup, carried along from the old days when it was a single user OS.
It's a clear matter of choosing convenient over security. Linux will have this number of viruses only if it suddenly becomes a single user system like windows and macos used to be. But i don't see that happening...
Washington bullets will simply be known as the "Bulle
What's amazing is that you got a reply at all, to a post that's nothing more than a regurgitation of Microsoft talking points.
The fact is that as shitty as Microsoft is, they have far higher standards for finished products than the Linux community does.
I have to disagree with you there. Sure, Windows is pretty stable and heavily supported by third-party hardware and software vendors (it *is* like, 90% of the market, after all). But then, it's taken a LOT of years to get there, help from IBM along the way (how much OS/2 is left in the NT kernel, anyway?), not to mention tons of cash to hire the best and brightest to work on it.
You're also going to have to qualify what you mean by "finished products" (after Service Pack 3?), and by "higher standards", for that matter. Microsoft definately has a high standard for "ease of use", and they pursue it vigorously, and it's evident in their products. Other important features, though, such as cross-platform compatibility, are non-existant in Microsoft's software, and it's interoperability is shoddy, at best. Active Directory generally works fine if every machine on your network is Windows, but if you want it to work with NDS or an 'nix implementation, it's, well, sub-standard.
I wonder how many people have been driven away from Linux by Linux Advocates pushing half-baked software onto them.
I, for one, am frequently driven away from Windows software because of half-baked products that I'm charged exorbitant prices for. At least the half-baked Linux software is (1) prominently described as "this stuff is half-baked", (2) free (as in beer), and (3) provided with source code so that I can help "bake it some more". Or, I can just report bugs and *they will be looked at*. Have you ever tried reporting a bug to Microsoft? If so, do you know what happened to it? Did it ever get fixed?
Speaking of half-baked software, have you tried anything from Microsoft other than Windows or Office? How about Host Integration Server 2004? I did, and I should have waited for Service Pack 3, because it just barely qualifies as half-baked. Lots of software is released by MS as "production" quality, and turns out to have a lot of bugs. If you have a service contract with Microsoft Support, you can help them debug it without paying extra.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia