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Can Ordinary PC Users Ditch Windows for Linux?
Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "Mark Golden, a reporter for Dow Jones Newswires, tried to switch from Windows to Linux, and found it too complex for his liking. He writes: 'For me, though, using the Linux systems didn't make sense. I often send documents and spreadsheets between my home PC and the one at work, which uses Microsoft Office. And the files are sometimes complex. Meanwhile, for both personal and professional computer use, I want access to all multimedia functions. While solutions may exist to almost every problem I encountered, I was willing to invest only a limited amount of time as a system administrator. Claims by some Linux publishers that anybody can easily switch to Linux from Windows seem totally oversold.'"
Gnumeric is a better choice than OpenOffice. It is a better Spreadsheet than Excel. Unfortunately, everyone wants a suite instead of a superior standalone application.
Just a Tuna in the Sea of Life
Imho Linux itself is not the problem. Just take a look at a recent Suse Distribution. I would even say that the whole system is much easier to control and configure with such tools as Yast.
However there is just a lack of software under Linux. Sure there are a lot of programs. But people usually want to have a choice and they want the program to be as easy to use as possible. Most people are then even willingly to pay money for that, just to avoid the hassle. To make a program very usable and to think about terms as User Interface etc... that's just the stuff that's quite boring and tedious and Open Source programmers usually avoid it and try to do the more "edgy" stuff. Or why are there dozens of distributions available but very very few solutions for online-banking?
Sometimes the Opensource model comes to its limit and that's where the commercial software development comes in, which is especially true for End-User Desktop software.
I take myself as an example: If I look through my programs that I have installed on my windows box there are several things where I don't have a nice linux solution:
1.) Games
2.) PaintshopPro. Sure there is Gimp, but I'm using Psp since 1996 or so and I just don't WANT to learn a new software
3.) JWPce - a tool for learning Japanese
4.) Hauppauge WinTV Software - last time I've checked it was very difficult to get it running under Linux and I just want to watch TV...
5.) sensor software to read out CPU temp etc. - I just don't have the time to fiddle around with lmsensors...
List could go on... We need more software software software... simple as that imho
How to install and uninstall (most) software? Drag and drop. Need to restart after an install or uninstall? No, in fact restarts are a monthly occurance at worst.
When I installed Firefox on my ex girlfriends Mac, it created a virtual drive which proceeded to uppack everything before finally running the app. It did this every time you ran the app. Sure, the "install" was simple, only it wasn't an install at all, but something inbetween that traded a shorter initial setup time for longer load times.
Furthermore, it was not clear how I could hide this from the desktop and put a shortcut in the main menu structure. Or better yet, how could I decompress it permanently to get better load times?
Now I'm sure vetran Mac users are chuckling and saying something like "(giggle, giggle) he doesn't know about the three shells?!?! (giggle, giggle) What a moron!" But you just can't have it both ways. You can't say with one side of your mouth, "Macs just work" and "Macs are easy to use" and then with the other side give some poor PC user a hard time because making apps work better in the long run is so non-obvious.
Linux is no better. I like Linux because I'm a tinkerer. Linux is the ultimate tweeker OS. But the first few times I went to install apps, it was as non-obvious as could be. I learned what I needed to learn eventually, and I even came across some nicely packaged apps that made instals much easier, but it took me a while to get where I was going.
So what about "joe average"? Joe will need to install apps. Joe will need to install drivers. He'll need to easily find all the shortcuts and settigs panels he'll need after doing so. He should not have to rely upon the family geek to do these things. Windows is not top-notch in these areas, but it beats Linux. This is an opportunity for improvement.
TW
No. Next question...
Ask me about my sig!
The masses take the Blue Pill everyday because that is what they are suposed to do.
Those that take the Red Pill do so because someone encouraged them to do so.
It's the FUD promoted in TFA that encourages people to continue taking the Blue Pill.
This article is just one writter who was instruced to write a Linux article.
FTFA: And getting some of the systems to work required more time and effort than I was willing to exert.
The saying goes you get what you give. He was not willing to give so he got nothing.
You can't just wake up one day and say, "I am going to take the Red Pill." Doing so will only result in dissapointment. Each person must come to the conclusion on their own through encouragement and support.
The writter would have been better off a if he had sought out someone who has taken the Red Pill and said to them, "I want to take the Red Pill."
"Why do you want to take the Red Pill?"
"I want to see the light."
I like-a do-the cha-cha.
I've been using Linux for about 12 years now, and I would NEVER give it to someone as an alternative to Windows
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.txt, and it was too much of a pain to look at these files via "Open with..." or similar, so dropping to the commandline was easiest
.txt (I never have any problems with these files on Gnome) even on CentOS 4.3 which is not a desktop distro. The situation you describe is what happens on Windows. But I know already you're a troll.
I've know Linux for 7 years only, and I have already installed Linux successfully as an alternative to Windows for several people.
Difficulty installing software and hardware. Having to RTFM to do anything. Difficulty in viewing common formats like PDF
All of this is false and an obvious troll.
The GUI is still early 90s feel at best
Another blatant troll. Except on Amiga or NeXT, I don't recall the early 90s GUI being multilingual, auto-adjustable to size, fully customizable, using vector graphics,
OK, now it's obvious you're a troll.
But he is not anal retentive enough to get the mouse "just right" to manipulate the GUI
The only situation when this does not work out of the box is with some KVM.
We had a bunch of text files that did not end in
Which is real BS. Linux OS do not need extensions to recognise a file type, and on the GUI, this has been true for a long time. There was only one problem before : the difference in what type of apps would be launched by default for some file types, between Gnome and KDE.
Nowadays, Gnome, that you talk about, goes further, and prints a big warning in case the extension and file type detected are not the same. So you should have had no problem with a text file not ending in
Lord forbid if you want to do something like watch a DVD or video clip. I haven't tried it yet, but I'm unsure if flash works
A newbie Linux user learns about all of this in about 6 months time at most. And you dare talk about your 12 years Linux experience ? You're definitely not suited to talk about desktop Linux. If what you say is true, you use Linux like an underpowered Unix shell, and not a lot more.
DVD, Flash and other closed formats problems are well known too.
It will probably take 10+ years for Linux to get a decent GUI on top of their excellent OS
You even managed to miss this milestone. Get out of your cave or basement please.
Linux is way past getting a decent GUI. In case you didn't get it, commercial distro makers are working on bringing the Linux GUI to more users right now. Which means breaking the barrier of reluctant ISV, closed media formats and closed drivers.
First of all, as I'm sure many people will point out, Linux doesn't have all the multimedia support we'd like it to have, because of all the legal issues involved. If the laws were changed, I guarantee it would be a matter of weeks before Linux could do all of what you're asking. It would be a big enough deal that Red Hat and Novell would probably drop whatever they were doing and make it work.
Second, it's not like Windows is without multimedia issues. Just yesterday, I was trying to make a video on my Windows machine with Movie Maker (complete piece of shit that it is). When I wanted to save the completed video, I was offered the choice of about 15 different formats. Which one was missing? The universal standard, of course: mpeg. Yet, I can take the same video and do the conversion, with no trouble, on Linux.
Personally, I think that, alone, should be enough to get Microsoft back in court. Linux's issues are caused by outside forces; Microsoft's issues are deliberate attempts to make it more difficult for users to switch.
Sit, Ubuntu, sit. Good dog.
Speaking of being blinded to alternatives... It damn well does matter what is running and what isn't. Every program you have spinning its wheels in the background is eating up memory.
Hahahahahaha! spoken like a real Windows user. When running Windows I care what programs are open. When running OS X, usually I don't give a rat's ass. My powerbook from work has 512 Meg of RAM in it (way too little for much of what I do, like manipulating very large files in resource hungry Adobe applications). So this morning someone requested I edit a few images. I opened photoshop up and several images and some reference materials and realized I needed more info. So I sent some e-mail and have been waiting for a response all day. Did I shut down photoshop? Nope. "But what about the memory" you might say. It is not a problem. Even while using the resource hungry Adobe InDesign file to manipulate a huge file, photoshop can sit quietly in the background without a problem. Ditto my e-mail, 4 terminals, calendar, two Web browsers, a proxy server, a PDF viewer, two text editors, a chat client, and some assorted widgets. This is called decent resource management, something Windows has not managed.
Windows shapes your workflows around having only a few applications open, especially major ones. Whether it is gaming of image processing, it is one at a time. OS X does not force you to work around the same deficiency. I'm always amused at LAN parties when Windows aficionados gasp when I don't shut down all my work programs before firing up a game.
when I close it, I want it to close. If it doesn't close, or I leave it open, I want an indication of that.
There is a little triangle next to running applications in the dock. There isn't one next to ones that aren't running. Most people figure it out in about 5 minutes.
As for the start menu, it is basically just another implementation of the same functionality as the dock. Until indexed searching/launching became a reality (with Quicksilver then Spotlight) most OS X users just dropped their applications folder on the dock- presto all your applications in an ever-present hierarchical menu. Now of course it is faster to keyboard it with cmd-space-letterletterletter-arrow-enter. seven quick key-presses to launch anything you know the name of. We adapt our workflows to the tools provided to us, but you have to be careful not to be so hung up on tools that you forget about the goal of your task.
The truth is, the dock makes a lot of sense for most users. Most people only use a handful of programs, and it is faster and easier to have an ever-present menu with just those applications you use, that doubles as a task monitor, than it it is to have a large, hierarchical menu of everything. Open windows obscure the desktop, so launching from icons there is a pain in the butt. It requires less fine motor skills and is just plain easier. More advanced users can always adapt the system with ease and build the interface that best suits them.
I'm going to have to disagree with you almost completely on this one. I use Windows, OS X, Linux, and NetBSD pretty much daily. They all have their strengths and weaknesses, but Compared to the OS X dock, the Windows start menu is certainly not one of Window's strong points.