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Five Reasons Not to Use Linux
UltimaGuy writes "Linux-watch has a humorous article about the top 5 reasons for not using Linux. It does provoke some thought aside from bringing a smile to our lips :)"
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That's a difficult question. After 10 years of being a viable, usable operating system, one would have thought that Linux would have made more inroads and become more mainstream. I think that Microsoft's blackmailing of computer vendors has something to do with it, but there's no single factor.
Where I work, for example, we are forced to use XP on the desktop despite the fact that the main tools that most of the core team use are available for Linux (Java, Eclipse). Ok, some of the tools that the core team uses are unavailable on Linux, like Photoshop, Lightwave, 3DStudio Max, etc. But a lot of people could be switched over tomorrow. Why, then, are the free *nixes relegated to the server-side? There are also issues with lockout on the server side, though, with some properietry packages such as our VPN software only running on Windows, yet Linux has still managed to gain a significant portion of the server market despite these factors. So why not the desktop?I think a lot of it has to do with the mindset of the managers at companies - for the most part they are not willing to give new technologies the go-ahead, even if it makes sense financially. The only way to solve this is to either get more technically competent management into companies (yeah, right), or to find a way to break Microsoft's strangehold of OEM and desktop markets.
Liberal Ontarians and French Quebecers are draining Western Canada's wealth. Stop them now! Support Western separatism.
I have never been a Mac person. I just don't get it. Then OS X came out, and all I heard was how awesome it was. More unixy? Sounds good. I went into an Apple store in a mall where they had all the cool, shiny goodness. I played with it for a while. Hated it. Frustrating. It didn't make any sense to me. A couple of years later, and I acquired a Mac at work as a test machine. My machine was down for a day for some new hardware, so I used the Mac. Horrible, unproductive day. To me, that intuitive interface is like trying to pound nails with a carrot. A bright, shiny, pretty carrot, but just a carrot.
I am not bashing it, I am just saying it isn't for me. And I hope that I am not the only one out there.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
I teach a class at work (Data Structures and Algorthyms or how to code). The other day, I put one of my students on my Linux box. He put in a USB drive and then spent 2 minutes getting upset. The drive was on the desktop marked in clear letters "SanDisk USB Drive" with only 4 icons on the entire desktop. Yet, it never dawned on him to click on it.
It amazed me that some things are very difficult for people due to it being ingrained.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
Was SuSe, I had only been using Windows for less than a year and had "heard of this linux alternative", I wanted to see what the hubbub was about. Coming from stricktly Windows, when I installed Linux I was surprised at how much easier it was to get on there than a normal 98SE install. Mine did most things for me, from configuring the drive to formatting and partitioning without having to guess. My first few 98Se installs were nightmares. Still give me cold sweats to this day.
I decided to go with KDE, though I had no idea what it was other than "some gui". Had I known then what I know now KDE would have gotten das boot. What a resource whore.
Well sometime passed and I have reinstalled the distro on the machine once since the initial install. And that was from user error. I had purchased a new larger harddrive and was very inexperienced and couldn't figure out how to install a new piece of hardware without a total reinstall. Sure taught me to RTFM. So for me, gaming aside, Windows 98SE installs in the early days --- 3 per month, my first linux distro installs to this day --- 2.
My personal experience with both os's and derivatives leave me with one conclusion, both OS's have their uses, Windows mainly for those who would rather be controlled by their computer, and those who would rather control their computer.
I still use Windows for stuff, gaming, video editing, audio mixing, but for tough stuff, security, networking I use linux.
Thank you to anyone who reads this that has worked on any OSS project, and especially the Kernel itself. It's nice to have more than 2 OS choices.
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
So what, exactly, is "easy to use" about Windows or other Microsoft products? Before you answer that question, tell me how many "n00b users" you know that use features in Microsoft products like mail filters in Outlook or change tracking in Word or can install programs in Windows by themselves.
Many can't. Maybe even most.
The perception that Windows is easy is ludicrious. I have no idea where it comes from -- anyone else know?
My blog
Not that it really matters for making the point, but modern Windows navigation conventions really date back to Windows 95. Windows 95 and Gnome have more in common than Windows 95 and Windows 3.1 did. Do you remember the "program manager" and the "file manager"?
Familiarity is by far the largest factor in ease of use
:P
Thankfully, WMs like KDE are softening the blow for windows users. I just set up a long-time windows using grandmother with a dual boot XP/Fedora box. She seems to find KDE just as easy to use as XP (and thinks that it's prettier, especially the screensavers that come with it)y . She's never going to reconfigure anything in *either* operating system. However, if she wants new software in Linux, all she has to do is open up the nice synaptic icon on her desktop (which I've labelled "Add/Remove Programs") and click on what she wants. I doubt she could manage a new installation of most products in Windows, and she'd probably have to pay for them to boot.
I still need to get her off AOL, though, before she can take advantage of that. Penggy doesn't work for any of her local access numbers
In Windows, she has almost nothing, because she doesn't have the money to pay for it and because of the time it would take to download and install everything (I took the time to install Mozilla, OpenOffice, Grisoft antivirus, AOL, and Gimp, as well as to set her up an email account on my mail server accessed through outlook). In Linux, she has tons of things. As an example, she has about thirty to fourty games of the types that she likes, because all it took for me to install them for her was searching for "games" in synaptic and clicking to add that many times.
I had more trouble with the Linux setup than the Windows setup, but that's because I gave Linux the scraps (much smaller root partition) and had to make it work with Windows (Windows is ignorant of Linux's existence). Thus, my time was spent on things like NTFS configuration (it took captive NTFS), grub configuration, et al, plus my successful but long configuration of intel winmodem drivers and failed attempt at AOL connectivity)
Rock Us, Dukakis.
My top 5 reasons for using Windows on my Intel PCs:
...well, ok, that's it.
1) Generally more software and games I like run on it.
2) More devices I'm interested in come with drivers and support for it.
3) Viruses and worms don't affect me, I have a firewall, and I don't click on phishing email links, I don't visit questionable web sites. So it is as secure as I need it to be.
4) My Windows XP is generally stable and free from crashes. I do use my computers a lot, and appreciate this. Its not perfect, though, but still, I have had bad experiences on other OSes such as OS X.
5)
I'm your huckleberry