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Desktop Linux Mass Migration
Rob writes "With many Linux vendors attempting to push the open source operating system as a
desktop alternative to Windows, Computer Business
Review reports on Novell's migration to Linux on the desktop. From the article: 'Changing any mission-critical technology is a daunting task, and despite the growing maturity of Linux as a desktop operating system, it is little wonder that the vast majority of businesses are sticking with Windows.'"
Until this problem is solved, Linux will be an outsider.
despite the growing maturity of Linux as a desktop operating system
I would have agreed if I hadn't seen that Slashdot article about X.org being available on Debian. Now that I've "upgraded" and messed up my X config, I'm not so sure about that...
"A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
is probably the single most important reason to use Windows,
Outlook 2k3 + Exchange/SBS + ACL is a good business solution (even if it is >2000$)
until Linux can replicate the suites functionality and ease of use (for admin+users alike) our enterprise will be sticking with a Windows thanks
of course if *nix can replicate it you will find biz migrating pretty quickly
How the hell do you read that stuff? ;)
Seriously though... anyone got a good link for a primer for perl?
<conspiracy theory> Microsoft is paying everybody to stay on Windows<conspiracy theory/>
My company (~800 employees) migrated to Linux over the last two years. It was easier for us since before we mostly used Solaris or Irix. The marketing guys still use powerpoint on their laptops, but I think the rest of us get along OK. It took a while for Linux to achieve the stability of my old Sun box, but it's rock solid these days.
We have a windows terminal sever in house in case someone needs to get on Windows for a while. I have never logged into it.
Since Linux is so hackable it can be modified for whatever task you want it to do.. desktop, workstation, server..etc
||| I still can't believe Parkay's not butter.
Until this problem is solved, Windows will be an outsider. Fix'd
...is explaining why the java-based Linux (and OS X) GroupWise client has reached near parity with the Win32 version in GW 7 (and in terms of caching mode blows it out of the water for its updating speed). I can see where Joe or Jane User would have complained LOUDLY with the 6.5x version.
With the BSD ports collection, the slick Apple interface, many great OSS options being multi-platform anyway, and virtualizing XP for the few XP apps I can't let go of... Why not just go MacTel when I buy my next PC in '06 or '07?
IMO, MacTel could be a Linux killer, or at least help keep it a niche OS instead of a major mainstream competitor.
- Greg
Start a happiness pandemic
Note that AOL builds an ISP dialup client only for Windows, not Linux.
If we expect Linux to make a dent in the desktop market, Linux distributions must change radically. They must be as simple to install as MacOS X, a very-simple-to-install UNIX variant. We need the ISPs to board the Linux train by building dialup clients. Yes. Much of America still uses dial, and in the dialup market, AOL is still #1.
I absolutely admire Linux, and if my ISP would provide the same kind of support, for Linux, that my ISP provides for Window, I would switch my AMD-powered desktop over to Linux. Otherwise, I'll wait for the Apple x86 box and switch from Linux to FreeBSD. I prefer Linux; it's got the cooler icon: the penguin.
By the way, some hackers will likely provide the necessary software patch to enable x86 MacOS to run on any IBM PC clone. If the Apple x86 box garners 10% or more of the market, then most of the ISPs will gleefully provide support for UNIX connectivity. Perhaps, the title of this article should be "Simplicity & Connectivity & A Matter of Time for the UNIX Juggernaut called Apple".
Device Drivers Applications that don't work under Linux Software Installation That's it. If my video card (ATI), Mouse (Logitech), Nostromo (gamepad), all worked under Linux and responded the way they do under Windows, that would be the first step. If I didn't have to find replacements for FairUse, ACDSee, GetRight, XFire, Ulead Video Studio, Photoshop, etc. etc. etc. that would be step two. If I could just double click a file, maybe read a quick note about the software and hit next a time or two, that would step three. Unfortunately, to switch right now I have to deal with substandard drivers (I don't give a $hit that this isn't Linux's fault), a bunch of half finished applications that are ALWAYS betas and typically start with K this or G that, and "installs" that require me to go to a command line, hack up config files, and hope like hell they don't jack XWindows ('cause I'd rather install the OS again as to fight that). There you go. You want the other 98% of the PC's out there to run your OS? Get to work.
My Tech Posts on Twitter
What a coincidence, I was just about to switch my XP for linux for the first time.
In soviet Russia, Linux compiles YOU!
One thing that I think would help a lot is a unified clipboard. And I'm not talking about the X clipboard eithor. There needs to be a clipboard that unifies qt and gtk based programs AS WELL AS commandline. As more people switch there will be better apps, however the unified clipboard needs to be worked out as soon as possible...
Why is moving to open source software such a great issue for people? Microsoft employs tens of thousands of people, isn't this a good thing?
first of all, most of the old people here can barely figure out how to open a file in windows. they are about to retire. if you move an icon on their desktop to a place it wasnt before, they will get confused. it makes absolutely zero sense to retrain these people and waste their time and our time and taxpayers money.
second of all, our 'public' computers connect to several multi-thousand dollar databases, many of which will not work properly on mozilla.
third of all, multimedia has to 'just work'. no fiddling around with installing/running plugins or special players, which i know for a fact is a pain in the ass on linux no matter how much time you spend tweaking it. our users are not there to waste time figuring out how to save a file then open it with some kind of binary compatability layer with a command line program. most of them still dont understand the concept of 'where a file is saved to'.
now the standard linux philosophy is that these people are worthless and shouldnt be using computers. thats fine for nazi germany, but not for america. the people i work for dont have a lot of money and their government denied them a hot shit education like most of you have had, but that doesn't mean they should be denied access to information important to them.
in other words, the number 1 problem of linux is the problem of social class and elitism. this has also been the number 1 problem of computer science over the years, and from the first compiled language to the first open peer protocol (tcp/ip)... it has been the rising tide that lifts all boats, not some genius CS idiot with their pet project or ideology.
now, microsoft is not our friend. its a decent business to buy from, not too shabby in many ways. however, like all kings, microsoft can get a big head and screw things up. so can linux companies and linux 'underground' distros without corporate backing. the ordinary people will just use what they can of all of these things, mixing and matching the way they have always done, and they will be the final arbiters of what survives and what perishes.
"it is little wonder that the vast majority of businesses are sticking with Windows."
Sticking that on Slashdot is like waving a red sheet in front of a bull.
You have tried to support your argument with faulty reasoning! Go directly to jail; do not pass Go, do not collect $200!
By first having a dual-boot period, they can catalog each task that cannot easily be done with Linux (I bet there are few, if any). The experience gained would be very valuable.
Also as a competitor to Microsoft, running Windows could be considered a security risk.
"It's too bad that stupidity isn't painful." - Anton LaVey
The real problem with mission-critical systems is that they need some sort of accountability. With Windows, you have a large accountable orginization. With linux you have a web of developers. Even if linux is 10 times better, it is still a harder sell because of the accountability. Especially if the system at all deals with public safety, the system needs to be signed off on by professional Engineers (hence more accountability)
Voice your opinion!
http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3348057a28,00. html
New Zealand's Ministry of Education has inked a deal to provide GNU/Linux under the Novell banner for public schools.
I feel that this is nothing other than an incredible breakthrough for us Kiwis. By giving our kids the opportunity to become aware of alternatives, we could definitely see some great change coming soon.
I got a trial version of Novell Linux Desktop and have been using it for 4 months. It beats the hell out of RH9 that I'd been using. Detected all hardware during install and runs smoothe and seemless. It's easy to search the other drive(WinXP) and copy file in OO and use them there. Makes me want to try Suse 9.3 as a bstter version for home. NLD is not a home solution but nice for business use.
Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.
Hey, the desktops only migrated about a foot and a half.
"Derp de derp."
...well mostly, not.
I've got a Sales/Service/Repair/LAN Gaming shop in a small (>5k population) town. 18 months ago, I began a test. I sold two of my clients (an 80+ year old grandmother and a mid 40's professional) a custom built box w/ Gentoo installed. (Actually, the formula was a gentoo install w/ a dyndns service so that I could remotely update the system and install packages -- with their knowledge and consent, of course).
To this date, I have not had their system back in the shop.
Two months ago, I began selling low to midrange systems running (k)Ubuntu. The systems are built on Asus mobos and AMD Semprons (higher end CPU's available upon request). The distro detects and configures all devices on install... and auto detects just about every USB device I've thrown at it (from input devices (read gamepads) to scanners).
As far as application support. Crossover Office handles the needs for Photoshop, MS Office (not 2k3, yet...), Dreamweaver, Flash MX, iTunes, IE, etc...
And, using (k)Ubuntu, application installation is easier than ever with Synaptic. Open the app, click an application and install. No depencies, no mucking around w/ CLI's, no problem.
I'm also moving quite a few Thinkpad X21's w/ Ubuntu and Crossover office. At an average price of $350 for a preconfigured linux based thinkpad w/ all the snazzy little thinkpad keys working... they move well.
Anyhow... I just wanted to chime in with the obligatory "Hang on, it's getting there" remark.
#SickNotWeak
as a desktop alternative to Windows Why is it always an alternative to Windows, why not an alternative to Macs. Macs has its share of problems as well.
There is a great initial cost of switching. This cost is pretty much the only thing that keeps companies away. Except for companies that don't have some application that is windows only and wont run in citrix/wine/other.
If you make the assumption that your company wont ever go out of business, then the initial cost of switching to a free OS is immediately defeated. Infinite free upgrades and such for life saves more money than it can possibly cost.
But we live in a world where the short term is more important. People want stuff now. Pro-active you say? Bah, only reactive is good for me.
The real question I want to know is why brand new companies don't use something other than windows? I mean, you have nothing to port over. No existing applications that need to run on a different platform. And if you're a new company that means you probably have a pool of startup money you want to be very frugal with. Forget about existing companies, they are hopeless. The new companies are where it's at.
The GeekNights podcast is going strong. Listen!
The biggest problem facing Linux is the complete lack of integration between the different components. It's no single flaw, it's a collection of small problems, some which would require massive shifts in thinking to fix.
The biggest problems I see facing Linux are:
1. A lack of integration between desktop components, and between GUI world and Console/Kernel world.
X is to Linux as Win 3.1 was to Dos. The Linux console rules, even as a desktop operating system. While bootsplash vaguely attempts to hide startup messages from the user, they can still press Esc. But it's still there. And the SysV init procedure still asks questions of me - for example harddrake2 runs each time the machine starts. If it detects new hardware, woohoo, Console!
Then we have configuration. Configuration is handled almost always using plain text files on the filesystem. Every application handles its configuration differently, with most choosing a semi-structured format. XML may go some way towards solving this, but it's no registry. People also resist XML - it's easy to read, easy to tweak, but not as easy to manage by hand as semi-structured files are. However on the flip side, it's much easier to parse and edit.
Neither Mac OS X or Windows handles startup or configuration in the way Linux does. It would be an almost impossible task to write a GUI to manage all the disparate Linux components as elegantly as Mac OS X or Windows does.
Linux needs some integration, some elegance. Hardware detection should happen in the background, configuration should happen within a GUI. More of a Windows approach would be nice.
A device management framework is needed, to detect devices, manage hotplug events, store details of present hardware, and to fetch and store hardware configuration options. This should include graphics card options.
It should be trivial for a user on any Linux distribution to manage hardware.
Look to Mac OS X. Perhaps by adopting Launchd, and implementing a "Registry like" configuration system, may help. Here's a thought - make the configuration system have a "storage API" for storing/retrieving configuration data. Users can then select where the configuration data gets stored. XML Files. Database. You name it.
2. Developing on the Desktop
At present, there are simply too many widget toolkits and desktop environments present. Motif, GTK, QT, KDE, Gnome.. and none of these are strong enough for there to be a clear winner. They are all tied to X, and perhaps that in itself is a problem.
A single, unified, high quality toolkit is needed, that makes development on Linux as attractive as it is on Windows or Mac OS X. While choice is good, sometimes it can cause more problems than it solves. Perhaps a solution such as Y Windows (http://www.y-windows.org/) may help.
To emphasise the problems facing developers.. GTK looks terrible. QT is nice, but it's a fully blown development environment. Most OSS QT apps are KDE apps, which places a dependency on KDE, which is also undesirable. Developing GUI apps on Linux is far from ideal.
The Linux platform is excellent when developing non-gui based programs. It's an excellent server based platform. But as a desktop solution, it's weak. I use Linux every day, and I can tell you, I fully understand why people hesitate to adopt it - despite the fact it's free.
beginning perl
"if my ISP would provide the same kind of support, for Linux, that my ISP provides for Window, I would switch my AMD-powered desktop over to Linux"
And what exactly would that support be?
Everybody who uses Linux has Internet connectivity. Linux is a network OS from the ground up. What doesn't work on Linux concerning the Internet that you need ISP support for?
Are you saying your ISP doesn't provide help desk support for Linux? So what? When have you or anyone else ever needed that?
Any current Linux distro will connect via dial-up/DSL/cable in a matter of minutes (once you figure out the stupid little connector app with the cable plugin icon in the System Tray, which seems to be a really stupid interface that I wish they'd fucking get rid of since it's brain-dead.) After that, I've never needed any sort of ISP support for Windows or Linux.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
Seeing what Novell is rolling out and supporting internally would offer insight into which desktop they are going to ultimately go with externally. They have acquire two companies that champion different desktops. SuSE has long been a stronghold for KDE, while Helix/Ximian employed some of the key GNOME founders.
What toolkits are they targeting with their internal apps? What is the default desktop for the corporate image being rolled out?
Becuase vendors must sell Windows on their hardware, with the rare exceptions of some which might sell Linux preinstalled to only businesses, Windows is now seen as COTS; i.e. it came with the machine so use it.
Businesses are all about using COTS. They don't want to download third party software or utilities if such functionality exists already, even if the functionality is below par. An issue arose at work, where Solaris falls short in many ways to the utilities available on modern FreeBSD/Linux boxes. A "solution" existed for the particular task with generic Solaris, but was subpar. My idea to expand it's functionality was shot down simply becuase what was available already for Solaris.
I refuse to believe that drivers are an issue for Linux, as so many claim. I don't run into any more driver problems on Linux than I do on MacOS X or Windows. Sure, my MOTU 828mkII doesn't have Linux drivers, but it's Windows drivers aren't worth a flip either[1] and, well, that's why I have a Macintosh. There is only one peace of hardware I have that I don't use in Linux and that's a certain 802.11g mini-pci card in my laptop. I can use ndiswrappers for it, but I choose not to. So, there is a solution, I just choose not to use it.
Nonetheless, the two main problems with businesses adopting Linux is it's speed of development and the fact it's not distributed on a mass scale by the hardware manufacturers. Speed of development is a real issue and warrunts a paper in it's self, but it is a real issue. For a sum up, the problem is that companies often verify their configurations, and some applications absolutely requires it. Anyone who has worked with real life crypto can attest to the poor technology floating around the crypto industry. Hand held key generators that are slow, clunky with 1980s wrist watch LCDs... but they are certified for that task by the government, military etc. Air traffic control systems, power grid systems... Linux moves to fast, Microsoft, Sun can extend support on a particular version of their OS long enough for a configuration using Solaris or NT to pass through all the paper work and still be of age. Meanwhile, if you don't update your Linux box for six months, you are seriously behind. I don't think this is a problem and would never want to change it. But, it is a reason why a lot of systems don't adopt Linux. I bet the version of Linux that might be currently used in a mission critical application is really old.
[1] Now that Apple has purchased Logic and killed the Windows development, and MOTU refuses to port Digital Performer and/or Audio Desk to Windows, drivers for high end audio equipment is more a joke for Windows as Windows only has crap consumer level audio software. It's funny, Audacity for Linux is probably better or just as good as anything off the shelf for Windows.
You cannot connect to AOL via Linux. AOL does not provide an AOL client for Linux and has no plans to do so.
That might help you out with your problem with drivers..
Upgrading is often the issue, no matter what the operating system. You're using Debian, and upgraded to X.org. Presumably, your old XF86Config file was modified during the process, and something went wrong.
Also, presumably, you have the option of temporarily reverting to a standard VGA driver and configuration, then trying to use Debian's configuration utility to get X.org working properly.
However, it appears you're taking this issue as evidence that the Linux desktop isn't mature. By these standards, no desktop really is. I've upgraded Windows 2000 PCs to Windows XP and perma-bluescreen'd them. I've attempted upgrades of Solaris workstations that ended similarly. I've broken Linux several times simply by upgrading as well.
This is a major issue, certainly, and it's a major stopping point for upgrades. But it equally applies to all operating systems, not just Linux. If you want to do a more realistic comparison, contrast your Linux upgrade with upgrading a Win2K box with a bunch of applications installed to WinXP SPK2, and see what results you get.
Most office drones that I know and work with seem to have rather simple needs on their business PC. They use Word for documents, Excel for spreadsheets, Outlook for email and IE for surfing the Web.
As long as those programs work and the navigation is similar to Windows, they're happy. The fact that they don't have to worry about virus infections, spyware, random crashes is a bonus.
From the CIO standpoint, it's a win (as long as all your core applications work and people can transition easily to the new "look and feel." The CIO/CFO are now off the forced upgrade merry-go-round each time Microsoft decides to foist "upgrades" on their customers.
I have converted my company to the following:
CentOS 3 (clone of RHEL 3)
OpenOffice
Thunderbird for email
Firefox for web browsing
We have a few people with Compaq presario laptops that didn't seem to mix well with Linux (driver issues) so we're swapping in Linux friendly notebooks and donating the Compaq units to charity. The tax credit for the charitable donation makes the purchase of the new notebooks pretty much a wash. We also had to punt a couple of printers and replace them with Linux friendly postscript networked printers. That was rather painless and surprisingly cheap. (Again, we donated them to charity and took the tax credit.)
The next step is to migrate all our servers off of Win2K server. That includes office file servers and web servers. We migrated mail and DNS to Linux a few years ago so that will be a painless move (to CentOS). So every system in the company will be running the same OS and we'll maintain our own internal yum repository to keep things in sync and up to date.
Prior to this, we were probably spending a few hundred thousand dollars a year just in software licensing fees. The IT folks are pretty happy about the change since it makes their life easier in terms of support (we sent the entire group for "RH linux certification" as an incentive to be good sports about the change. After some initial grumbling from the hard core MCSE guys, the overall mood seems to be one of relief...both from the "guys on the ground" and from the "guys who pay the bills."
Cheers,
Don't they put out their own flavor of linux ? Why wouldn't they use that in house ? Why would anyone buy linux from them when they have to go to red hat for their own desktops ?
"Most people are not technically savy like the SlashDot crowd."
No, they're not. But they _are_ getting laid.
It summarizes the article with "despite the growing maturity of Linux as a desktop operating system, it is little wonder that the vast majority of businesses are sticking with Windows." and then provides two examples.
The first states "Novell had made savings of $900,000 on Microsoft Windows and Office licences as well as maintenance costs from the move." and "A voluntary migration also saw the company beat its goal to get 50% of users onto Linux by the end of October 2004." and the second says ""We came to the conclusion that our requirements are really only met by a commercial distributor" - that commercial distribution being RedHat.
How the fuck did any of this get spun as 'vast majority of businesses are sticking with Windows'?
-- I care not for your foolish signatures.
First off let me say that the desktop situation is abysmal on _every_ OS. Their are fundamental decisions stemming from the earliest GUI's that slow the speed of the interfaces and allow for entirely unneeded errors.
All this is _provable_. Speed of an interface can be modeled using the GOMS framework. If you are new to GOMS do not argue its accuracy here, there are several newbie mistakes that have been explained and would only serve to cloud the debate. Ever get annoyed at how fast the terminal is to use, and GUI's only seem to get in the way? GOMS explains it, typing is much much faster than the _multiple steps_ involved in using a mouse. Not to say that GUIs or mice are bad, but poorly implimented. GOMs can show when to use mice, when to use typing, and how to structure the size and conceptual model of an interface to be as speedy as possible.
But GOMs in and of itself is only a tool. Not a guide on how to create an interface. Liken this to racetracks. Once can sure build a fast car when their motive and only measure is speed, but can be more expensive, unsafe, unreliable, etc, etc, etc.
So where can one reliably make an interface that works well with humans? Most use "intuition." But this "intuition" is genrally nothing more than familiarity. And familiarty does not fix the current, demostratable problems.
So where does one turn? To the science of how humans think, their limitations, and the subset focusing on human computer interaction. Cognitives cience
Using this one can construct an interface based on what humans can do. It has exposed our limits and abilities. What mental models we handle better. Folders and Files? A model based on our desks, not a model based on how our brains handle information and computer interactions.
Using these tools we can end up with an interface faster than the terminal, easier to use, and less error prone than either GUI or terminal based programs. Don't believe me? Try Archy. It is a nearly total departure from standard interfaces. Thus for anyone familiar with comptuers have to retrain their muscle memory. One will constantly reach for the mouse in a vein effort to select text. It will piss you off. If you habituate it's use you will find how much harder and more complex the other text editing interfaces are.
Interfaces are a thing we can fix that Windows and OS X can't without major losses. We have upserped Windows in security and stability. Things Windows _cannot_ fix without breaking everything. OS X has poor performance. In fact horrific proformance thanks to the MACH core. The interface is one of the last major thing in OSS software that MS and Apple are beating us at.
BUT ITS FREE!! Which is a lie. Yes, it is not their higher costs of administration, vendor support, and retraining. It is also the worst selling point. Ask any professional sales person. The only people that hooks are people you don't want to deal with. Just reimagine that mangager that was a cheapskate manager who pinched every penny and lost dollars in lost productivity. The old pinch pennies, trip over dollars.
We have to beat them where they are sore, and believe me, their interface sucks. I use OS X. It is only less annoying than windows or UNIX.
Okay, I really have to go, this thing needs to be edited in half, correct the spelling, etc. but I have dinner calling me. Agree, disagree but interested? Email me, we can bitch over the finer points : ) aal357 REPLACETHIS sent dot com
Is there anything better than clicking through Microsoft ads on Slashdot?
Lets say you are a biz and you are looking at alternative desktops to Windows. The alternatives are....OX X or the plethora of LINUX distros. It's unlikely you'll choose one without paid support, so the price per seat for licensing a supported version of LINUX is not going to be free.
So...looking at what you get if you are PAYING..which you will be if you want support, OS X is SO much farther ahead than ANY linux distro on the desktop it makes NO sense to choose LINUX over OS X.
Now..if you are NOT paying for support and are willing to have a team of LINUX admins support the desktop users then LINUX desktop might trump OS X...or might not depending on how good your admins are.
I've been LINUX users since 1994 and frankly after starting to use OS X 6 months ago for every day tasks, firing up KDE or Gnome just disappoints me.
When I want to plug in a USB mouse I have to hack the XF86Config. When I want to change screen resolution I have to do the same thing. Copy and paste is hopelessly broken as different applications seem to use independent copy-and-paste buffers. There's no consistency between one GUI application and the next. The 'productivity' apps are very poor imitaions of Office lacking countless features useful in everyday life. Printer support is horrendous. Linux is not the most pleasant option for your desktop. I don't mind being forced to use it - I spend most of my time on the command line, and the main GUI app I use is pretty good (ie. Firefox, though Thunderbird can't touch Outlook). And it's great for working on machines remotely. But I pity ordinary users who have to put up with it for ordinary everyday tasks. At least in my company they have the sense to give admin staff Windows machines.
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
if you move an icon on their desktop to a place it wasnt before, they will get confused. it makes absolutely zero sense to retrain these people and waste their time and our time and taxpayers money.
People who are truly this computer-illiterate won't even notice the difference between Windows and Linux because they are only scratching the surface of their OS anyway. If IE disappears and is replaced with Firefox, their web-browsing experience doesn't change (except for the lack of pop-ups). Power users obviously have no difficulty adapting to a new OS. What I think you're trying to say is that intermediate users will have grown accustomed to certain aspects of their OS (actually their GUI), and will thus find it hard to switch. Still, there's no reason to believe they are not up to the task. Moreover, isn't it good to see that private companies are testing the waters? (i.e. NOT wasting your time or your tax dollars...)
second of all, our 'public' computers connect to several multi-thousand dollar databases, many of which will not work properly on mozilla.
I don't understand this at all. If by mozilla you are referring to their web-standards compliant browsers, I really don't understand what the problem might be.
multimedia has to 'just work'
Well, speaking from real-world and recent experience, I would not say that multimedia "just works" on windows. On a recent XP box, I downloaded an avi, tried it in WMP, it didn't work. Then I downloaded DivX, still didn't work, but at least DivX told me the problem was with DirectX. Updated DirectX, tried again. Didn't work in DivX. Switched back to WMP, and it worked now that DirectX was updated. Windows, out of the box, does not have full support for all codecs and filetypes. You have to put in some work to get it all working properly. Is the situation better on linux? Well my recent installs of Mandrake were able to play most file types without any issues. Using the command line to get new software may seem arcane, but by and large it "just works" if you know what you're doing.
the number 1 problem of linux is the problem of social class and elitism
There's some truth to that. But honestly, it's only a portion of linux users who are snobs and make others feel stupid. The elitism (or perceived elitism) is one thing that made it a bit difficult for me to make the switch... but once I did, I found a huge community of volunteers that were willing to help out and contribute. In truth, the majority of linux users now are not snobs... they are passionate about linux, and are eager to help. You just have to give it a chance.
Anyways, just my opinion(s).
This article (and reality) are about converting enterprise desktops from Windows to Linux. In a 5000+ seat environment, "simple to install" and AOL compatibility are just not issues at all!
Linux at home is not going to be at all common for a long time yet. But in big business, Linux on the desktop would be very interesting. The lack of viruses and needing to keep track of licenses could save a lot of admin headaches. Of course, the current love affair with Exchange and MS Office, the lack of native support for big enterprise software, and reliance on VBScript-filled apps in Access and Excel are the real reasons for difficulty in migrating a big company to Linux on the desktop.
Look at the tomato! Isn't it sad? He can't dance! Poor tomato!
it's been said before, and i'll say it again now: microsoft's dominance on the desktop has nothing to do with windows; it's all about Office. there are just too many people who need word/excel et al, so as long as their document formats are closed, they'll be able to maintain their death grip on the desktop.
things like openoffice.org and abiword are noble efforts, but they just aren't 100% yet, and, of course, MS changes their formats with every new release just to prevent the FOSS alternatives from catching up.
let's face it; most people, techies and lay people, agree windows sucks, but as long as MS continues this monopoly-abusing practice of anti-interoperability ("does not play well with others"), we're all stuck with it.
if i'm a grammar nazi, you're an illiteracy nazi.
I'll think about the Mac option when the new Macs are actually available for purchase. I certainly wouldn't stick my neck out (or other body parts) today and buy a current generation Mac knowing that Apple is going to leave the PPC behind. In spite of all the "don't worry, we'll support you" warm and fuzzies from Apple, I still remember the 680X0 --> PPC switch and many companies dropped the old architecture like a hot rock soon after the new machines were available. Cheers,
AOL Dialer by Linspire.
Source code.
Spread the word :)
Woah man, what year are you from? This was fixed so long ago, I can't even remember when...
Oh well, what the hell...
the blame for linux's lack of desktop maturity and lack of driver support for nvidia etc, lies squarely on the pre x.org group, XFree. nvidia were submitting patchs as were ati and they were being ignored. just look at how the whole project stagnated for YEARS, people screaming out for features, developers submitting patchs, wanting cvs commit access, and it was all ignored. the whole linux/gnu/bsd desktop situation would be years ahead if it wasn't for those turkeys
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
The average American likes Windows because it is relatively simple to install
The average American doesn't install Windows. They buy the computer with Windows preinstalled, and when their copy of Windows gets to the condition that it needs to be reinstalled, they throw out the computer and get another one.
On normal office desktop machines, the graphics are just too slow, at least the one I have. I have run SuSE 9.1/9.2, since it became available, at the office and it is perfect except for the graphics.
:D). It was like I got a much faster PC.
I run 1600x1200 on my 21" screen and the graphics are just too slow.
We run all our MS apps via Citrix so I have all the programs I need. Although the Citrix graphics performance are horrible under Linux, I could live with that(and the flaky cut'n'paste between MS apps and Linux, that only works sometimes), if just the graphics speed were OK with Linux apps.
After 2 years on Linux, it was refreshing/less stressful to boot up on Windows again(note that I do not run our windows network
And that bothers me because now I got used to Linux on the desktop, and I would REALLY like to run it, but the graphics just annoys me so much. It is just too slow that makes me think sometimes that I work on a 500MHz machine and not 2.6 GHz.
I don't mean that as a silly statement. Look at OS X - Apple has created a very strong image for their product. It's 'sexy', 'stable', 'lickable', etc. Every John and Jane Computer User knows what Windows is; it's the software which runs computers. But what's Linux? Is it a kernel? An operating system? A series of distributions? A free operating system?
To me, marketing this is the biggest weakness of open source. Now, we all know that marketing has nothing to do with which OS is better, but in a market in which the actual differences between operating systems from the view of an average computer user are growing smaller and smaller, Linux doesn't have the kind of mindshare OS X and Windows do. What Linux really needs is a Steve Jobs, someone who will obsessively proselytize the OS to any and all.
I am a believer of momentum and curves.
You peeps moaning about wireless, this is what I did.
D/loaded DamnSmallLinux and burned that to a 3in. CD. Detected my wifi/pcmcia card. Probably the fastest d/load of Mozilla I ever saw when I got online! And this is on an old Thinkpad600 (with a Pent266) and 300+M RAM, it'll keep me happy with my surfing & email needs. In fact, with the 'toram' option, this notebook is blazing fast for my needs.
To see if your wifi would work why not give DSL a spin, or for that matter other live miniCD distros from distrowatch.com? You'd be like checking to see how far Linux has gone in playing nice with the wireless card. They could be using that ndiswrapper but hey, hats off to those guys.
Damn Small Linux is Damn Impressive.
WARNING: Smartphones have side effects--most of them undocumented.
Browser Compatibility - IE in the corporate world is your only choice. I use Firefox but for most web surfing but most corporate built apps that require a browser won't work on anything other than IE :-(
Mail and Collaboration - MS did a damn good job with the good integration of Outlook, Exchange and the OS.
Text Documents and SpreadSheet - Tie, OpenOffice and MS Office both compete equally well here.
Price - Linux wins here by a land-slide.
Viruses, Spy-Ware, Trojans - Linux wins here but that will only change as more users migrate over. Hackers & virus writers show no mercy to any OS or platform. They do it because they get high every time they cause mass chaos and devastation }:->
Linux is just starting to compete as we have heard of foreign governments completely switch over. This is a good and healthy threat to MS. I for one use both and love both. I will migrate 100% the day Linux, Unix, or whatever the next craze is. Until, then I'll continue to use and run a mixed environment.
Most people are not technically savy like the SlashDot crowd. The average American likes Windows because it is relatively simple to install and to connect to the Internet.
:P There are plenty of people bigger in the *nix filed than Apple. Even though Apple has been dabling in nix for over 10 years now. Apple is at best a niche UNIX vendor. I must admit I see things I like in their product. But it's not all that special.
Ok for one the average American does not install "any" OS what so ever. Second "any" current major distribution of Linux is easier to install and supports more hardware out of the box than Windows ever did/does.
Note that AOL builds an ISP dialup client only for Windows, not Linux.
Yes because dialup is a booming market. Blows DSL/Broadband out of the water. IIRC AOL has consistantly lost subscribers for the last several years. As people learn that AOL is not the internet just like the big blue E is not. Switching isn't that hard.
If we expect Linux to make a dent in the desktop market, Linux distributions must change radically. They must be as simple to install as MacOS X, a very-simple-to-install UNIX variant.
Have you seen Debian, Redhat, SuSE, Mandriva, Unbutu, Knopix, or any of the hundreds of other distros with super simple point and click distros? Or in some cases don't even have to be installed at all! In what way is Mac OSX easier to install other than most of it's users don't have to install it much like Windows?
We need the ISPs to board the Linux train by building dialup clients. Yes. Much of America still uses dial, and in the dialup market, AOL is still #1.
Last I saw Linux has supported dialup since the early 90s. Second dialup is a dwindling market where AOL is number one (when did they get to be number one again? I thought MSN had them beat) simply because that is their main/only real market and everyone else is leaving.
I absolutely admire Linux, and if my ISP would provide the same kind of support, for Linux, that my ISP provides for Window, I would switch my AMD-powered desktop over to Linux.
If my ISP provided the same kind of support for Linux as they do Windows it would generally be worse than providing no support at all. Actually they are getting better. TimeWarner's AMS system is now basically platform and browser agnostic these days. But still their techs are a clueless bunch. Back when the guy was supposed to come out and install RR he couldn't get anything right. He schedualed another appointment for someone to come out and take another look at it and see if they could get it to work. 10 minutes after he left I had solved the problem and called them up and told them to cancel the service call. Ever since then I have not needed their tech support outside of issues on their end. Which are still painfull to work through.
Otherwise, I'll wait for the Apple x86 box and switch from Linux to FreeBSD. I prefer Linux; it's got the cooler icon: the penguin.
Ok I like OSX and all. But that whole argument sounds retarted. Second OSX is BSD based. Not FreeBSD based. Silly newb. And if you are so hot to trot about switching to BSD then just do it. FreeBSD, OpenBSD, NetBSD, or Darwin. It's all good and just as functional as Linux FTMP. Though I still preffer Linux. The only thing I would change is to create a universal driver architechture so that outside of binary differences the same driver source could be easily used for all *nix systems.
By the way, some hackers will likely provide the necessary software patch to enable x86 MacOS to run on any IBM PC clone. If the Apple x86 box garners 10% or more of the market, then most of the ISPs will gleefully provide support for UNIX connectivity.
Most already do support nix as much as it needs to be supported.
Perhaps, the title of this article should be "Simplicity & Connectivity & A Matter of Time for the UNIX Juggernaut called Apple".
"Unix jugernaught called Apple?" I see someone here is a hopeless/clueless fanboy. As well as a similarly clueless AOL fanboy
I don't know others but I have been trying OpenOffice.org with high hopes every time a substantial new release is out. And every time I was disappointed. Like it or not, we need (and expect) excellent MS Office import/export capability. We are doing business at the end of the day and most of our biz partners are using Word/Excel/PP. Until now, I still see lots of glitches here and there when I am importing some MS files. How can I expect my users to accept these glitches when they switch over to Desktop Linux or even just OpenOffice.org on top of Windows?
3 answers ;)
./ ;)
1. Ubuntu does provide a build of wpasuplicant (latest version is 0.3.8, I believe), which provides WPA support.
2. When I have them. I picked up a lot of Thinkpad X21's (700 MHz PIII's) and a handful of NC4200's (1.8 GHz P4 Compaq subs). I'm down to the last of the 4200's right now and am searching for my next supply. Regardless of the OS installed (Linux or Windows), any laptop we sell is ready for war flight.
3. Not really. Our website is sorely out of date and doesn't currenty handle any commerce. I'm just beginning to focus on sales. If I can move another 5 to 10 units as quickly as this last lot... I'll look into the whitebook market. At this time, it's primarily EOL and rebuilding for local clients.
However, if you'd like some help moving in the right direction... I'd be more than happy to offer any assistance I can. Pop me an email at serviceATcompletepcDOTbiz.
Funny thing about all this... I just spent nearly an hour on the phone Friday w/ MS propoganda division. The nice lady on the other end of the phone was trying to make sure I had all the information I needed to help convert any Mac and any Linux clients over. Everytime I look at my MS Action Pack, I get a wee shiver down my spine. But I suppose it's good to have one foot in the shadows... if for no other reason than to bring it up on
Nice site, btw. Love the "Got Evil" bags. Might have to pick one up for my wife.
#SickNotWeak
The average American likes Windows because it is relatively simple to install and to connect to the Internet.
First, I submit that "Windows is relatively simple to install" is just a myth. Not only it is a myth but one that is contrary to reality. In fact, anybody who could make such a statement a) has never installed Windows (any version) in his life b) has never installed a recent Linux distro (Fedora Core 4 is a good example) in his life or c) is simply a MS fanboi. Anybody who has done a clean installation of Windows XP (say) and RH FC4 (say) knows that FC4 installs much easier and faster than XP. (Okay, not quite, if your computer has some esoteric hardware, but this simply is not the case for corporate desktops).
Second, it is not easier to connect to the Internet using Windows than using Linux. However, this should be a non-issue in corporate environment because the Average American doesn't need to touch any networking issue. All he has to do is turn on the computer and go.
It is much more complicated to install XP than my favorite distro, SuSE. SuSE is largely a point-and-click-and-voila! (but you can go to advanced options and change pretty much anything). It installs in 75 minutes on my old laptop- slow for Linux but smokin' fast compared to XP. XP has a pure text-mode installer until the base system (PE) is installed anyway, few Linuxes besides Gentoo and some Debians don't have a fully-GUI installer. With Windows, I have to dick around finding drivers. It's darn near impossible if I don't have my restore CD because my Ethernet NIC (Intel PRO 100/VE intergrated) is not supported in XP out of the box. So I have to either find the bloody CD or get somebody to get me the driver on a floppy or CD from the Intel site. Can't download it myself. In SuSE, everything fired up perfectly right from the start. Which is easier for you?
Just "gittin-r-done," day after day.
Try again.
As a token effort to make this post on topic, I'd like to say that it's great to see Novell making another show of faith in linux's ability, this time trusting that it is usable right now, rather than in the future. My father installed ubuntu two days ago after a bought of frustration with Microsoft's planned abandonment of 2k and he seemed fairly impressed with Evolution (now a Novell product). Novell have done many good things, particually with gnome and it will be great to see them reaping the rewards of their contributions in their own office.
When Argumentum ad Hominem falls short, try Argumentum ad Matrem
I guess the lesson for linux users in all this is "stay the fuck away from olympus gear and buy something with halfway decent linux support instead"...
There's plenty of devices that work just fine with linux, so there's no sense in wasting any time on vendors who aren't with the program.
Okay, dinner, dishes, bathing kids: done.
Let me clarify a couple points.
"Most use 'intuition.' But this 'intuition' is generally nothing more than familiarity. And familiarity does not fix the current, demonstrable problems. "
The last line should have read "Familiarity is generally just the reuse of old paradigms, which reimplemented the same demonstrable problems."
The benchmarks showing OS X's problems are here. There are several articles on why Mach (and to some extent the original microkernal design) is poor at handling lots of things at once. Just go read up on microkernels and MACH. New microkernels are better at handling this. L4Ka::Pistachio is well known as it was chosen for the resurrected GNU HURD OS.
I would like to reiterate that I was a die in the wool, cut me I will bleed green, yellow, orange, red, purple, and blue IN THAT ORDER, M$ SUCKS, Mac Freakboy. Then I learned how we interact with computers, what our limits and abilities are, how to fix the current problems, and eventually just got pissed every time I use an interface. Which includes locks, cars, dishwashers, ad infinitum.
As a final thought I would like to interject that we design programs knowing the abilities of computers. To a large extent the best software is the one written by those that understand the fundamental things that are going on with every new thing we tackle in programming. Those who design with the fundamentals in mind get good results. Why are we borrowing from MS blindly? Who are known to screw up how they engineer interfaces from the start. We don't do that with any other major part of the OS unless _forced_. To the user the interface IS the operating system, the hardware, to a great extent it is wholly the computer.
Is there anything better than clicking through Microsoft ads on Slashdot?
No enterprise will achieve full Free *Nix migration (*) unless they solve the whole puzzle. That puzzle is called "workflow management", which is the process through which an enterpise integrates all their document workflow, substituting paper for eletronic formats. The reason enterprises stick to the Windows platform is mostly because of MSOffice. Microsoft realizes this, so recently they decided to turn it into an open standard, because they were afraid of the Massachussets' state ruling against closed formats.
You need to seemlessly integrate and import any Microsoft format they may have. You need to have applications that integrate seamlessly with your office software. Anyone who's seen this kind of software on Windows knows what I'm talking about (stuff like OnBase, Meridian, etc.) You need to be able to write applications that integrate with the desktop. This is something MFC allows. you can have great interoperability among third-party softwares. You can just drag-and-drop widgets and custom-built GUIs that will work seemlessly with your document management software. That way I can, for instance, independently develop a software for medical clinics that will just couple with their content management software, which could potentially cause a sprint for open formats/FOSS solutions.
OpenOffice is a small first step to achieve that kind of document integration, But then you look at Novell and RedHat. One's betting on Mono. Its competitor invests in Java. There's also the issue of KDE and GNOME. What's the commonality here, what's the standard? None. That's why so many developers turned to Java. Truth be said, Miguel de Icaza already envisioned these problems when he chose to develop Mono. Mono aims to achieve cross-operating-system compatibility, and this probably is the quantum leap. Once you get to the point where you get a Windows developer to make software that runs on Free unix, than you've crossed the invisible line. You've assimiliated them.
Sadly, because RedHat competes with Novell, it boycotts Mono and pushes Java. I don't believe anything will be achieved with Java, in that sense. It's been around for a while now, and we didn't see enterprise level integration software, except for OpenOffice.
Too many people in the open source community care about such things as servers, operating systems, etc (system-level software) and miss a huge window of opportunity on other types of software. This is probably because they don't know the needs today's corporations. And there's the license problem (some won't touch the GPL with a flagpole). You can't sell something the customer doesn't want. Except if you're Microsoft.
Main difference between the BSD license and the GPL license: one is from California and the other is from Massachusetts
Except that the lesson that the vast majority of people will learn is that Linux is not worth it.
"There are plenty of devices that work just fine with Linux, so there's no sense in wasting any time on vendors who aren't with the program."
Most people are not going to buy special hardware just to try Linux out and most are not going to waste time finding pages on the Internet that list what hardware is compatible. Average Joe isn't going to research all this stuff for nothing he's just going to buy something that he's familiar with and that he can get working right away. Most users don't even realize they pay for Windows as it comes bundled with there PCs.
I'm not really sure why we have all these people new to Linux that are obsessed with making it the number one desktop operating system. Most of the people that have been working on it for a long time don't want it to become that because then the focus changes and we have to worry about peoples perceptions of it and making it compatible to every piece of crap out there. The day Linux becomes the number one OS is the day it dies in the eyes of the true hobbyists and part time coders. When if this happens people will then go work on the newer more interesting projects where they can experiment and not worry about all the crap Microsoft currently has to worry about.
Really cares if your parents/neighbor/friends use Linux or not?
All this is _provable_. Speed of an interface can be modeled using the GOMS framework.
Nice to know. Now, a question for Novell and GNOME: How can they expect to win on the desktop when they don't invest a single penny on usability studies, having something reminiscent of the human interface guidelines of MacOS 7 or 8?
When Eugenia Loli-Queru complained on OSNews about Gnome, she got seriously burned...
Main difference between the BSD license and the GPL license: one is from California and the other is from Massachusetts
This is actually great, if they switch completely and "stick to it". One prerequisite, though, is that they should allocate significant R&D resources to fixing the problems with this migration and afterwards. FOSS developers, PLEASE take their patches and merge them in. This trial by fire is invaluable, and may uncover problems that are not obvious to you.
I used to be a great fan of Turbolinux on the workstation, especially when it was available free of charge. Indeed, it was quite a capable distro. But then they stopped providing a freely available release, and I moved on.
Has anyone used it recently? How was the experience? I see they're up to Turbolinux 10 Desktop. But they use XFree86 4.3.0 and KDE 3.1.5. They are just slightly dated, no?
Cyric Zndovzny at your service.
Any version of SuSE beyond 8.2 is easier to install than any version of Windows, hands-down. IIRC, it takes all of three mouse-clicks and not a single reboot.
The people who complain that Linux is harder to set up than Windows have apparently never used SuSE.
Max
My god carries a hammer. Your god died nailed to a tree. Any questions?
Nor have they ever installed Windows :)
An interface I feel just fits in the Unixspace is Ion. Because, as you said, the interface must deal with how we work/think/opperate. And how do we work on Unix? We do use CLI. We probably will never stop using the CLI, because it allows us to use a foreign language called Unixspeak.And Ion fits right in that mental space, controlling the space layout. That is, with Ion, you don't have to think where the window will go, or where it is. It deals with those trivial matters for you. I just wishe it had round corners for a 21st-century fox look.
I remember, a long time ago reading/looking at Archy, but it's Windows-only. Fuck that. Will never win, because Windows is a land of monopoly. Free Software is the wild frontier...Too bad for the old guy...
This CLI thing, BTW, is something I very often think about. Can we really live without it? Should we? The fact is that languages allow for an infinite of constructs, much more compact, and transmissible over the wire than GUIs. So there you have algebra and information theory for you. How can we instruct people to perform 50+ instructions via a GUI? We can't. We must use a phone line, or write a document. Click 50 times. Go crazy.
I would much rather have something like Ion, but more advanced, a GUI that really does the space-fitting job for you. However, it should have case-based reasoning built-in, some sort of AI. It learns with your habits.
OTOH, I would like to have some sort of CLI/Visual hybrid. But I don't think in terms of the mouse, or any traditional interface. It would be some sort of logography, a language with visual compositionality, like Blissymbolics or what APL achieved in terms of programming languages (an aspect somewhat preserved in Perl operators, in a way). This is because humans use language. When will orality substitute written language? It hasn't happened with radio, TV, or the Web. Probably never will. To assume it would happen would be to assume we would go back to a pre-language era.
On that topic regarding visual aids versus pure language abstraction, there was an interesting article this week of which I quote the relevant part:
So the author contrasts a language capable of great orthogonality and abstraction versus visual-aids tools like Eclipse, for instance. I believe this is a real experience for people who program in Lisp, Haskell, SML, Ruby, etc. vs the Java, C++. C, C# crowd.
I guess my point is that there's too much fixation on merely visual things. And on that note, it sucks. Why a mouse and not a Joystick? How's going wild on the keyboard with Ctrl-X Ctrl-F Meta-X shell on the keyboard not using your hands? I'm not defending the CLI, but I think HUI people are heavily biased towards a culture of stupid visual metaphors. In the 80s, I dreamed of sketchpads and touch screens, because all I had was a Commodore64 and the Apple ][ at school...Never happened. The mouse came along. And Windows. I wanted the whole wide open.
Main difference between the BSD license and the GPL license: one is from California and the other is from Massachusetts
if I had someone to help me when it breaks. I've dallied with Debian and now Gentoo, but each of them has ended up broken (due directly to my own ignorance) to the point where fixing it to make it usable was beyond my knowledge. I'm not a stupid person. I know how to google, and I know that the best answer to a question is a source of information, rather than a set of instructions, but it's not always easy to know what to ask or how to get the responses you need, and even if you do, often you're ignored anyways. I'd love to see a distro step up to address this, maybe with some kind of voluntary mentor/buddy system, where an experienced user 'adopts' a newbie and offers periodic, light email or chat help when needed, till the new user gets sufficiently knowledgeable to fix things herself (at which time, said user could become a mentor for a newer user if they so choose, perpetuating things). This is what keeps me on Windows, and a bit of my soul dies every time I turn the thing on, but I can fix it if it breaks (which, of course, it does).
Stasis is death. Embrace change.
I think it's more subtle than any particular fear of termination; except for those working with either classified or strongly proprietary information (including financial information/predictions), simply discussing your work in general terms in public wouldn't be grounds for termination, yet people seem to avoid this. I think it's more that people want to keep their work lives separate from their personal ones, and their online ones from that.
Plus, if you work at a tech company, chances are you're not the only person at your firm who reads Slashdot. If you give enough personal details, eventually it becomes obvious to someone else in your office who you are online. Even if you never say anything that you wouldn't stand behind in public, it defeats the purpose of a semi-anonymous/psuedonymous forum.
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Hey Microshaft...what was that you were saying about total cost of ownership?
"Anderson estimated in September 2004 that Novell had made savings of $900,000 on Microsoft Windows and Office licences..."
But many are completely Free.
The most appropriate of these for a corporate desktop environment are probably Debian and Ubuntu, because of the long-term commitment to security updates. Others will certainly fit the bill, too.
Lx 13:2 Behold! The salvation of thy system is at hand! Of the operating systems that shall be sold both from within and amongst the nations around you, of them none shall ye buy. 3 For thou shalt be but one way to enter the Kingdom of Heavenly Operating Systems. Thou shalt purchase thee a disk burner and keepeth it close to thine heart, just as thy keepeth thy karma close to thy heart. 4 From thy fattest data pipe, which is known as broadband amongst the heathen, shalt thou download and burn thy Linux the Christ, for Linux redeemeth almost all hardware. Thou can't worship Linux the Christ until thou first install thy Linux the Christ and Savior CD onto thy computer. 5 From thy computer shalt thy wipe the most evil and depraved Microsoft from thy hard drive, infested with more diseases than all of the harlots of Babylon! 6 Once thou has cleansed and purified thou hard drive from the evils of the Satan Gates, then shalt thou install thy Linux the Christ and Savior CD onto thy computer and the Kingdom of Heavenly Operating Systems shall be yours forever and ever, at no cost with no support. 7 If Linux the Christ shall not be installable on thy hardware, thou shalt follow BSD for he is risen! Thus saith Father Torvalds. Amen
its happened to me before
For you it just fits becuase you are habituated to the CLI. Ion is like fluxbox, something for people who constantly use the terminal. Archy uses command line interfaces to a great extent, but it is not a window manager designed to make the current interface paradims easier to use. I could crtique the rest of that paragraph but you obviously don't grasp the concept of GUI's and what they are doing.
Archy is written in Python. Its more portable than Java. The only reason their isn't a Linux and Mac binary is becuase they have problems redefining keyboard inputs. If anyone can help, please do so.
You have the same problems in pure CLI's. The real problem is that they don't reuse instructions. Think of how many different text editors you have, literally every place you input text seems to have a different set of rules. If there was one way to input text it would be habit, instead we have to learn what habits to use where. This isn't just for text, nearly every type of operation has multiple ways to do basically the same thing.Okay, after that I kinda loose you. Archy is a hybrid CLI/GUI. You want it based on a different language? And why the hell on a weird icongraphic one? So we have another load of shit to memorize? Icons without labels are useless for beginers, let alone the entire thing based on some wierd ass language made of them.
Steve jobs was sold on the mouse. They tested joysticks, force inputs, and more in the early development of GUIs. I can't remember if any of them tested better. But really, have you ever used a touchscreen or sketchpad? I could imagine an interface for a joystick that might be usable, but those things _suck_ to use. No physical feedback, harder to habituate, etc.
I could go on but this is a rather uninformed post so I just hit on what is some more common misconceptions. I am tired, so forgive the lack of spell check again.
Is there anything better than clicking through Microsoft ads on Slashdot?
There's one thing I don't get. It seems like the aim here is to dominate, not coexist. For instance, Linux vs. OS X.
I don't perceive Apple as being an enemy to open source development and yet there's this perceived duality. Could someone explain what necessitates that view?
1) you buy from RH, RH is accountable. Whether there is stuff there not supported by RH is analogous to your situation with MS and using Photoshop - MS doesn't support that.
2) Also, with the modifications, there is no need to do that. If you modded/hacked Windows, would MS support you? No, they'd probably take you to court.
3) If you run with drivers not siged by MS, then they cannot provide full support even if you've paid for it.
"the ordinary people will just use what they can of all of these things, mixing and matching the way they have always done."
Contrary to your elitist opinion, "ordinary" people can and will learn, if they want (or need) to. Additionally, some of the best programmers I know barely finished college (if at all).
There was a pre-Windows & pre-MS Office period, if you're old enough to remember. DOS users didn't believe in the "pretty" Mac OS because it was unrealistic for business use; Microsoft mimiced the Mac OS (circa 1984) to create Windows on top of a DOS-platform for PCs in 1987.
Having worked for GM during their migration from Harvard Graphics, Lotus 1-2-3, and WordPerfect to the both Windows 3.1 & MS Office in 1994 was painful--although the "old-timers" appreciated MS Word's adoption of WordPerfect's keystrokes. The operability of the "integrated" software was an effective marketing scam, as inter-operability between Word, PowerPoint, and Excel in the first release was unreliable (much improved over the past decade, but the first bundle sucked). Having dozens of diskettes to install for each upgrade (even MS Office 97 had 45 floppy disks) didn't ease the end user's immediate dislike for the new system, as it required hours of downtime to install the necessary programs, as well as weeks to learn to use Windows and a mouse (Solitaire was brilliant). The end users also had to waste time translating or recreating individual files which were already organised in their convenient DOS directories.
Most current integrations and upgrades now occur without the end user even realising it. RedHat does need to improve its GUI protocol for Linux to become more widespread, although you might want to review your knowledge of how things have always been.
--Old timer (born '72)
" if my ISP would provide the same kind of support, for Linux, that my ISP provides for Windows"
... how come?)
Your ISP is AOL? Right?
OK - here's how to crack AOL (I did this about 5 years ago when I was moving about a lot and wasn't in one place long enough to justify a permanent ISP agreement)
First - ask yourself the following question: "Do I want to be part of the AOL walled garden, or do I just want IP connnectivity?"
If your answer is that you just want IP connectivity, then follow steps 2 & 3:
Step 2. Get one of those freebie AOL disks and sign up for a free account. Start up the AOL client.
Step 3. Minimise the AOL client, and double click on the FireFox icon, type "www.google.com"
That's it. You are now using AOL as a regular ISP - someone who provides an IP packet switching service.
Granted, this requires you have Windows as a host for the AOL client - but you *have* completely bypassed AOL's crippled internet-with-training wheels.
You see the only proprietory bit with AOL is the connection establishment/user authentication bit. Once connected it's *all* just vanilla IP
Now if you want to use Linux - the next step is to fire up Ethereal and sniff those packets to see what the AOL signon protocol actually is. (I must admit to being a bit surprised that no-one has actually done that yet
"The average American likes Windows because it is relatively simple to install"
*Nobody* installs windows, that's a complete myth.
Last year I was working with this guy with about 5 years IT development experience - ie. he knows what he's doing - bought a vanilla PC *without* windows.
He then tried over the next week to install Windows on it (from a CD he already had), and failed miserably.
First he couldn't figure out how to make a boot disk to start from, then he didn't have the CD drivers to read the installation CD, then he didn't have the video drivers, then the mouse wouldn't work, etc, etc, etc.
He ultimately had to crawl back to the vendor and beg them to install Windows for him.
During that week, I spent quite a bit of time ribbing him about how much faster it would be to install Red Hat and be done with it (about 1/2 hour and only one reboot).
Would he listen? No.
Fact is, if installation ease is your criteria, Linux is a hell of a lot easier - but then when you're competing with "impossible" I guess the bar may be set too low.
I am a nerd.... Yes, I admit it - openly.
....
...thats not enough. They want to be in control with very little effort.
But here's my take on why Linux will NEVER make it to the mainstream marked as a desktop computer Mr. and Mrs. "John Doe" will use in their everyday lifes
For 8 years ago I was a Linux enthusiast, I just wanted an alternative.
For 5 years ago I was still trying out various distros, but eventually caved in when I couldn't get my paid for games to work properly and had to work 2 weeks straight just to get the Nvidia drivers up and running
For 2-3 years ago I realized that the Linux distro's actually where getting useful - and I advocated Linux like crazy to Mr. & Mrs. Average Joe.... I was pretty good at it and got quite a few to take the plunge and switch.
No-one of them passed the 14 days test. (you know...survive without windows). And They felt handicapped, Support calls all the time because just like everyone else Mr. and Mrs. Average Joe...needs new mainstream software that their neighbors are running. Uninstall
For a year ago I was starting to realize that the Average Joe never will run Linux....But I didn't want to belive that because why shouldn't they? Everything is fine, lot's of good alternative software - free too!
Today - I realize - Linux will *NEVER* be mainstream. If any chance for switchers at all... It'd be Apple's OS X....because it's made for the everyday non-caring users --> Emphasize on USER.
Too many times I've had to fiddle with drivers for this and that. For years ago it was the Nvidia 3D issues that plagued the Linux users (the newbies)... and today it's the Wireless drivers that are driving us nuts... and that's the issue...there's always something not working, always something buggy...and the attitude of the Linux experienced users to go FIX IT YOURSELF...lazy windows user. No self respecting longhaired Linux expert would be caught dead wasting his/her time supporting the Average Joes...simply because it's too bothersome, too cumbersome...and the average joe's need FAR too much education in order to stand on their own two feet in LinuxLand.
Sure "package-x" works clean from the install CD... But you still need to learn to script and BASH your way trough the terminal if you want to actually be able to service your own system. otherwise you'd be dependent on your "favourite" distro's install-packages. And for the average joes
I do not advocate Linux anymore.
But I do use it as my main OS every day
And it took me ages to get just a basic grip of it, even if I've been coding in assembly back in the C64/Amiga days and had my fair share of long-haired computer geekery.
What this world is coming to - is for you and me to decide.
Linux is about as ready for the desktop as ice cream is ready for the oven.
For instance yesterday I put a CD in the drawer of my Ubuntu machine, copied some data from it and tried to eject it. Would it eject ? no. Did right clicking on the CDs dsktop icon and choosing "eject" eject it ? no. Did either "eject" or "sudo eject" commands in a terminal get the fucker out ? no.
The only way I could get my bloody CD out was to power off the machine and remove it during boot. Now if I'd have mounted the bloody thing as root I'd understand why my regular user couldn't get the bastard out but I hadn't. What's more I was pressing the hardware eject button on the drive and the O/S was overriding it and preventing me getting my fucking CD out.
Later on in the day I used K3B to burn a CD. And how do you change the label of your CD project ? You press "Ctrl & R". Not "F2" like in every other bloody program under the sun.
I could go on but the slashdot hive mind won't appreciate me complaining about its pet O/S so I'll save my fingers. Suffice to say that these sort of day to day usability issues is why Linux lags so far behind Windows as a desktop O/S. Windows may be a shoddy, insecure mess of an O/S but it's a consistent usable shoddy mess of an O/S.
Linux has so far to go. So so far to go.
The code says: "perltris\n"
DISCLAIMER: as with any perl obfuscated code there might be evil backdoors, use at your own risk and never trust code snipplets from *anyone*
I've also seen the switch to Linux fail miserably, when the customer was promised everything in the world would run better under Linux and not a single piece of the client's core commercial software had actually been tested with that hardware and that Linux distribution. The client wanted improved security, no ability for their users to transmit their secure files outside the building, and 64-bit performance. What they got was a lot of half-baked, half-assembled, untested computers that mostly didn't work, and a lot of big promises about usability and features that never worked, with the engineers specifically prevented from spending any time working with the users to find out what needed tweaking to ease the transition.
The switchover failed miserably: the Linux engineers and their manager all resigned from the Linux vendor, and the client turned all the machines to Windows. It was horrible to watch, because it could and should have been a graceful switchover to more power and more security, but actually doing the switchover was ignored in favor of adding new, exciting features that they didn't actually need.
While I agree with you over this, it glosses over the real time consuming part of a windows install - all the damn application installs to get the system productive and usable. I have a usb key with all my current xp packages on, but it takes a couple of hours to get them all configured and ready to rock. FC4? Oh, they're already there!
Yes the Linux dialer works just fine.
Any current Linux distro will connect via dial-up/DSL/cable in a matter of minutes
Some ISP's, like MSN, require you to "log-in" via a browser after certain time lengths. Some ISP's, like MSN, will only accept these "log-in's" via IE. You can not log in using Firefox.
I made the mistake once of going with MSN, because I had just moved to the area, and needed an ISP. So I took the first one available, and I learned my lesson.
I was just using my browser one day and suddenly I was greeted with a log in page. I couldn't get around it, I called MSN and they told me I had to have IE to log in. I told them I was using linux and they claimed to have never heard of it.
So yes, sadly some ISP's do not support Linux or other non-IE capable OS's.
If we don't make light of everything, we are just stumbling in the dark - Blank
When the article deals primarily with Novell and what Novell is doing regarding their desktop solution, it's really a waste of my time to wade through responses regarding Debian or Ubuntu or whatever else. Are those designed for an office enivronment? Not that I've seen.
When we talked about users in an office enivronment, we're primarily talking about a bunch of people who use an office suite, perhaps instant message others, and access a lot of web-based apps. Assuming that those web-based apps are platform-independent (i.e. not dependent on Internet Explorer), then the majority of people in an office setting will be perfectly fine with using a Linux desktop.
Having managed an IT infrastructure, I can tell you that I would not want users to be able to do most of the things people complain about with Linux. I do not want them playing Sims 2 at work. I don't want them playing Doom 3. I don't want them trying to install new programmes at all, let alone new drivers.
I have SUSE 9.3 at home and it works very well. Can I do everything I want to do at home yet? No. Did I have to tweak my install? Yes. But would I have needed to do that to do office-related work? No.
For the business desktop scenario, I would say that Linux IS ready. With proper user security (don't give them all root), Linux would actually cut down the number of support requests for supported software (because they wouldn't be able to install unsupported software).
Linux - because it doesn't leave that Steve Ballmer aftertaste.
Something smelled fishy with the details.
While the initial story lacked a date, I found another story, with basically the same info on Novell (same status, same projected dates, etc.), dated back to March 10th of this year.
Basically, this is not news.
Linux - because it doesn't leave that Steve Ballmer aftertaste.
Install? You're kidding, right? You do realize that the people you're talking about don't understand that there even is anything other than Windows, and I'd be willing to bet that most of them don't even know what Windows is. Most computer users use what was installed on their computers when they bought it. At a company, installs are done by IT. How exactly does the ease of installation have anything to do with usage?
It doesn't.
Most major ISPs already provide support for Macs, and have for years. There are even many that are providing Linux support.
Ease of installation and connecting to the Internet really aren't as much of an issue as software availability. The simple fact that for most people, The Gimp is a "good enough" replacement for Photoshop doesn't matter when it isn't on the shelves of Best Buy. If they can't install and play Deer Hunter 4000 on their shiny new computer, it doesn't matter what OS it is running. To Joe Sizpack, his computer is either "broken" or "sucks", whether it runs Windows, Linux, MacOS, or any other OS is of no consequence.
Can't say that I agree. I advocate dual booting and a slow transistion from Windows to Linux - there is the problem of Windows applications which the user has the habit of using in order to be productive. I try to have Linux from the start on new sites though.
How many beans make five, anyhow ?
Never heard of such nonsense.
Obviously time to dump your ISP.
If SBC DSL doesn't have any such requirement, even though they don't support Linux either, obviously you're using a lame ISP.
Oh, wait, MSN - well, that explains it, doesn't it?
You actually called MSN and told them you were using Linux? How curious...
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
I'd like to see Microsoft dual boot into Linux. The difference between your situation and their situation is that they actually sell the OS they're migrating to, and suggest to others to migrate to it as well. So they MUST eat their own dogfood, every day, no matter how bad the taste is at first. That's the only way to truly improve it.
> And what exactly would that support be?
...and just because you've never had to call your ISP for support doesn't mean that no-one else ever has either. OK, there's Usenet, and yes, there's solid gold support there for anything Linux if (a) you know it exists and (b) you can get online in the first place.
Well, how to get winmodem hardware working might be a start...
Thankfully winmodems are becoming less of an issue because broadband is getting more widespread. Network card support on Linux has "just worked" for me since around 1994 and the Intel wireless built into my run-of-the-mill Dell did too (along with all the rest of the hardware). Not sure about USB ADSL adaptors, though...
Also, don't foget that some ISPs don't have a problem with Linux support - I've used two in the UK and both have provided "how to connect" info for Linux in their support pages.
Well, the OP was complaining he wouldn't switch his desktop to Linux until he got "support".
I don't consider swapping out a winmodem for something rational to require much "support" from an ISP. If you're going to try to keep such a POS modem in the machine, then, yes, I guess you'd need support.
In other words, I don't see a winmodem as much of a justification for not switching to Linux from Windows. Especially if you're smart enough to know what a winmodem IS in the first place.
Now I understand Comcast cable requires you to register your MAC address using a proxy server of theirs, which I guess might be a tad more difficult to do on Linux than Windows - and Comcast probably doesn't provide any Linux instructions for that given the number of Google hits one gets for the topic of getting Linux to work with Comcast. So that might be a showstopper for some people.
Still, it's a one-time thing and on Linux at least, once you're set up you're set up. I don't think Linux users need to worry about their TCP stack suddenly getting corrupted by Browser Helper Objects and porn dialers and the like like Windows IE users do - not to mention simple Registry corruption.
So I still say lack of ISP support is a moderately lame reason for not switching from Windows to Linux.
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
One way to keep specific versions of packages without affecting the rest of the system is to use apt-pinning. That allows you to use packages from one version without actually having to change your entire system to that same version.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.