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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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Sure, Windows is easier to use than Linux. But eventually you just get so frustrated that you have to take an angle-grinder to your computer, and it really takes a long time to get all the little bits of metal out of the carpet.
Reason number one: Linux is too complicated
.conf file on Linux crash your system? Maybe, maybe not, depends on what you're doing. But the likelihood that someone would have to do that editing is higher on Linux.
:) Maybe they have the sense of humor! :)
Linux *is* too complicated for a good many people but it doesn't have anything to do w/the system design or how it works. It's too complicated because it's different from what they use every day at work and at home.
Yes, it doesn't take that long to learn how to move around in the UI and find the alternative software that Linux runs. It's just different. People don't have enough time to eat, sleep, pay attention to their kids, or take their garbage cans in... They aren't going to have the time to install, adapt, and change the habits they learned using Windows for the past 15-20 years.
Compare that with Windows where, it's possible -- not likely, but possible -- that you'll need to use a command line now and again, or edit the Windows registry, where, as they like to tell you, one wrong move could destroy your system forever.
You know, I consider myself knowledgeable with computers. I run multiple OSs at home and have run many more over the course of my life. You know how many times I've edited the system registry since its inception? Less than 5. I really doubt that anyone *needs* to edit their registry ever.
You know how many times I've had to edit a configuration file on Linux? I just did it 12 times yesterday alone for two different programs. Will editing a
I love Linux. I use it on my servers, I use it on my desktops, and I use it on my entertainment center, where it powers my HDTV TiVo and my D-Link DSM-320 media player, which turns my network into a media library with terabytes of storage. Heck, I even run Linux on my Linksys WRT54G Wi-Fi access points, which hook the whole shebang together.
When was the last time you had to edit a configuration file with a text editor on your Tivo? I never have. When was the last time you had to fire up your WRT54G and wonder what all the fsck messages were? Never. Just because Linux is being used to power the device does not mean it wasn't designed to be user friendly. Most people don't surf the web and write research papers with a remote control or by hitting a recessed hard-reset button.
I realize that this was a tongue-in-cheek article and I realize that it was mildly humorous but I just really felt that it was just as bad as Microsoft claiming that Linux costs more. This bullshit where Linux users fault non-Linux users for not switching because of the lack of difficulty is just bullshit.
Linux isn't easy and it does have a learning curve. Most people just don't care to take the time to learn it.
I wonder if Microsoft just releases their "research" to give us stuff to make fun of
It's a pity we can't moderate stories as flamebait
Then how come OSX is so freakin' easy for everyone to use? It only takes a few minutes.
Actually, I find OS X the most difficult to use at times probably because it's the most "different" for me.
Games.
1. OpenServer 6 Costs Less
2. SCO Has a Superior Kernel
3. OpenServer Has Better Security
4. SCO Has a Customer-Driven Roadmap
5. OpenServer 6 is Backward Compatible
6. SCO Allows You to Focus on Your Core Competency
7. SCO Owns and Warrantees its Products
8. SCO is Unifying its Code Base
9. SCO UNIX: Legendary Reliability
10. SCO Has an Award-Winning Support Team
Read TFL for buzzwordy drivel and meaningless tripe from Darryl himself. Didn't know he'd registered a website in his name to spout his n0nsense.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
Also, when trying to discuss the benefits of alternative operating systems, it does not help the argument if you (by this, I mean the writer of the article) come off as being sarcastic and condescending.
My $.02 anyway.
"Teleporting Rodents with D-Cell Battery Displacement" theory -- IgnoramusMaximus (692000)
It's bad for the economy!! Imagine buying a computer system and having it still usable for modern applications nearly a decade later. The various Linux distros allow for this. That cuts into profits for desktop and server sales. That's why Windows is the better choice. It pushes the hardware requirements up so quickly that you need to get new hardware every two to three years. This is good for the economy. Therefore Linux is UnAmerican.
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
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.
Familiarity is by far the largest factor in ease of use.
Anything can start to feel comfortable given enough exposure. Why is popular music popular? Because they play it over and over and over. (People often confuse cause and effect in this one: it's usually popular because of the repetition, not the other way around.)
Use nothing but OS X for a year and everything else will seem awkward. Same goes for any other OS.
OSX is polished and has a singular top-down vision from Jobs and his unholy cult. There's no scattershot design by committee of blind idiots which is but ONE of the things hobbling Linux.
The biggest obstacle to Linux is that it is ruled, dominated, infested and infected with a "difficult is beautiful and better than easy or correct" mindset. There is active resistance to any sort of architectural framework promulgation beyond the kernel and even that is challenged by people second-guessing Linus. Never mind that easy to use GUI design is eschewed by Linux writers who seem to be inherently unable to grasp that what is easy for a techie geek is NOT the thing that the common end-users need or want.
The arrogany egocentric attitude of introvert geeks still rules: it should work the way I say and not the way those n00b lusers say. Microsoft doesn't work that way and look where they are today. Look where Linux is by comparison. EASE, not FREE or OPEN should be the buzzword of Linux.
If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)
Oooohhh - did you notice how strongly biased the article is against Windows? It's even outright lying:
"And, Microsoft also has Microsoft Office, which -- oh wait, you don't get that with the operating system, do you? You also don't get a Web page editor either, do you?"
Windows comes with full office and web editing capabilities for free: wordpad
Do you know how your car runs ? Do you care? When you switch cars, do you switch to a manual transmission just for shits and giggles even though you don't know jackshit about shifting gears (supposing you use an automatic)? I would think you would look for a car that's as simple as the previous one, but faster, cheaper - better! People view their computers as their do their cars - goods beyond their comprehension that they can USE.
I never spellcheck and I freely admit it. Save your karma for more worthwhile "lol erorrs" replies
What you simply don't get is that with Linux most people write the software to use it themselves.
He gets it.
He also gets that that is one of the reasons Linux seems to have "scattershot design by committee of blind idiots"...
``Take a look at Apache. A server widely acclaimed for its up-time, and yet you can't even change a single setting without restarting the server!'' /etc/init.d/apache reload
Reloads the configuration without taking the server down. Many Unix daemons do this when you send them a SIGHUP.
Please correct me if I got my facts wrong.
Just to pick one out-and-out lie from the general confusion of your posting:
Well, lets see, Apache was based on NCSA httpd, which was a rewrite of the original www consortium httpd, which was written originally by Tim Berners-Lee. (all of which were open source). Now lets look at the original HTTP protocol standard -- what do you know, the authors are Tim Berners-Lee, and R. Fielding, from UC Uvine. And look at the Apache core team -- Roy Fielding!So, in fact, the open source folks who wrote Apache and its predecesors are the folks who wrote the standards.
So as I posted on your site, the above statment is downright slanderous, and you should retract it.
- "History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men" -- Blue Oyster Cult, 'Godzilla'
"The only intuitive interface is the nipple. Everything else is learned".
I forgot who said that, but it was some UI designer a few people have heard of.
1. Linux is too complicated
/. about a million times, but as you don't seem to be aware of it:
/.
"Suppose I install Gnome as default and want to install KDE and use that as the default. How easy is that? Well, every time I try, I have to search through several configuration files with 100s of lines to find the one that specifies the default GUI, and then it often doesn't even work."
Ehm, install it and choose KDE as the default session the next time you see a login screen. Not really hard.
2. Linux is too complicated
"How many patches must you apply to SuSE right after install for all the security fixes? Dozens. Windows? Dozens. Hmmm... Seems about even there. To be safe, you ought to be behind a firewall in either case. I've never found a recent Linux distro that didn't have patches ready to install as soon as I finished installing to OS."
Jesus...
For starters having to download security updates doesn't really have that much to do with what the guy you are answering wrote and with ease of setting an OS up.
Second, this has been discussed right here on
Comparing Suse, which comes with thousands of programs with Windows, which comes with barely anything and then pointing out that you also have to download updates for Suse is pretty dumb, as you compare Apples and Oranges here.
3. Linux doesn't have enough applications
"Let's compare apples to apples here. Windows is an OS, not a set of applications."
Why now and not before?
"You Linux fanatics get on Microsoft for bundling apps with their OS"
Small correction, most of the time it's not us Linux fantics, whoever this may be, but law enforcement agencies that get on MS for abusing their monopoly.
"Windows as an OS isn't inferior just because your open source app doesn't run on it. If you are so big on choices and freedom, why don't you write your app to run on both? "
Well, everyone is free to choose to take the source code and port it to windows and as you pointed out yourself, many people port or devlop open source software for Windows. So what exactly is your point here?
"Finally, the price you pay for Microsoft Office is worth the money, if your time is worth anything."
Ouch, sounds like the latest MS marketing blurb and no, though my time is worth a lot, MS Office certainly isn't worth the money for me, sorry kiddo.
4. Linux isn't secure
"And frankly, applying patches in Windows is easier than in Linux. Linux is pretty easy, but Windows is still ahead, I'd say. Argue all you want. But a properly configured Windows box will successfully apply patches to itself better than a Linux one will. At least for me. And if you disagree, just know that most users don't know how to configure Linux like you do, and so your opinion doesn't matter to 98% of the computer users out there."
Jesus...
Press on the little update notification on your panel and have _all_ your apps updated. Now that's incredibly hard, you are right.
About your other drivel. You are aware of sudo and acls, aren't you?
And you are aware that you can share folders on modern linux distros by simply clicking, just like you described for windows?
5. Linux is more expensive
"For the common user who just wants to be productive, and just wants their computer to work the way they want, Windows is faster, and faster means cheaper!"
Please show me the study that a) supports your conclusion b) finally shows me who this common user is
To sum it up, your blog entry is probably one of the dumbest things I read recently. Not one good point, only senseless drivel.
But the worst thing is that a tongue in cheek article, that sets out to debunk some myths about linux let you into a francy that drove you to write your stupid blog post and the proudly anounce it on
Relax kid, nobody's going to take your Windows away from you, even if some prefer an other OS.
One point you make that is dead wrong in my experience is when you say, "And frankly, applying patches in Windows is easier than in Linux." Now this may be true if you're actually manually applying kernel patches and recompiling the kernel or something, but actually if you're just talking about normal (binary) system updates, one of the big reliefs for me about switching to Linux was that updates are so much less painful.
If you have a system that uses the apt package manager, then updating your system is as simple as typing 'apt-get update; apt-get upgrade;' at the command line. Or if you don't like that, you can use several of the graphical tools (like synaptic) where it's just a matter of two or three clicks. On the distro I use, Ubuntu, there's actually an applet that periodically checks for updates and allows you to install them with a few clicks. In short, it's quite similar to Windows. Certainly, it's no more difficult.
Where the advantage comes in is that every damn update in Windows comes with its own EULA. Sure, you could randomly accept legal obligations without trying to figure out what you're agreeing to (though you still have to sit around and click "I agree"), but if you're actually trying to be responsible, it's a real pain. In Linux, updates to the OS, and most of the applications, are covered by the same license, the GPL, and you aren't confronted with a new EULA to accept every time you want to do an update. What a relief! In addition, the updates in Windows would often request a reboot, which never happens in Linux. Even if I update the kernel, I know I can keep using the system (with the old kernel) until I feel like rebooting.
If you're using a modern package management system, then updating in Linux is no more difficult than in Windows. In addition, there are a lot of things about the updates in Windows that may actually make the Linux process a lot easier.
"You call it a new way of thinking; I call it regression to ignorance!" -- Operation Ivy
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
You know, there's a lot of truth in that. The Mac, and the entire Apple experience, is intuitive for a certain kind of person. Artists, fashion mavens, leftists, and other creative personalities can sit in front of a PowerBook and just "get it," but accountants and everyday pencil-pushers don't have a prayer. Squares should stick to Linux and Windows. Macs are for different thinkers.
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Evidence?
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Versus:
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http://img270.imageshack.us/img270/7789/linuxnylu