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Linux is a waste of time?
Anonymous
Bastard writes "There's
an article
in today's Chicago Tribune suggesting that the effort
being put into the Linux operating system would be better
spent improving Microsoft's software. The author says that
Linux is trying to reinvent the wheel. Linux isn't a waste
of time, is it? " Oh my.
Well, I think the Mac OS and OS/2 interfaces are the UIs-to-kill-all-UIs, just because I've spent a good deal of time in them and have learned to love them both dearly.
:P)
However, I agree very much with your point that it's EXTENSIBLE interfaces that should be the focus of the future.
Apple's Appearance extension, beginning in OS 8.0 and greatly extended in 8.5.x, allows a good deal of customization. Even changing *every* interface element. That feature was available in the beta releases, and in an illegally distributed Drawing Board theme that completely overhaulled every element, but was dropped from the commercial release due to "quality control concerns"
Anyway, there's Kaleidoscope (www.kaleidoscope.net) that does this for a shareware feel. It's more complete than say WindowBlinds, but less complete than an X WM.
Mac OS X actually allows the user to *replace* the Finder-like-shell with any shell. I understand it also has an extensible interface architecture.
I think maybe the Big Ugly Corporations are finally coming around to the fact that user's have a basic need to personalize their work enviroment. Microsoft doesn't understand this. And never will. (No, those hideous toolbars that do nothing and get in the way don't count!
Anyway, I liked your observation and thought I'd jump in...
Furthermore, Microsoft Windows 2000, which made its debut in Chicago at last week's Comdex computer show, is a much more useful personal computer operating system than the dinky feature-weak, application-starved flavor of home-brewed Unix known as Linux.
How could a dinky operating system be used as the major operating system for web servers on the Internet today? How could a dinky operating system be used to create a Beowulf cluster more powerful than a Cray? How could a dinky operating system be used to create the special effects in Titanic?
You should never take life too seriously - You'll never get out of it alive.
Here comes some..
the dinky feature-weak, application-starved flavor of home-brewed Unix known as Linux.
He actually makes that 'home-brewed' comment once more in the article. What he fails to mention is that that 'home-brew' is being cooked up by some of the best chefs in the industry.
Now, I feel that Microsoft is a big reason why hardware is so cheap these days. And that's definitely a good thing.
He doesn't seem to understand that for the most past, folks don't use Linux to go against The Man, they use it because the Microsoft Way isn't so great. I hate when people send me Word documents via email. I hate using Microsoft's crappy development tools. I hate having to use tons of memory for OS services that I never use.
Linux isn't for Joe Six Gig. It will never be, even with the efforts of the GNOME and KDE folks.
The Internet was working swell on traditional Unix, Macintosh and Windows NT before Linux was much more than a glimmer in Linus' eye
*plonk* Unix, yes. Mac, kinda. NT? When was NT 3.1 actually released? '93 or so? I remember running Slackware just fine back then.. I guess our intrepid reporter hadn't heard about Linux until very recently..
Meanwhile, they would have us reinvent the wheel by wasting billions more hours creating applications to take advantage of Linux and make Torvalds' colleagues at Linux software houses like Red Hat Inc. and Caldera Systems Inc. rich. I have yet to pay for a Linux distribution. If I had to pull a number out of thin air, I'd guess that less than 25% of all Linux installs were purchased from RH and Caldera. Seems that those 'billions of wasted hours' are running countless web servers, ISPs, NT file and print servers, etc. pretty damned well. And I thank those people who have 'wasted' their time writing quality software. I have yet to see a product from Microsoft that lives up to any reasonable quality standard.
Bill Gates isn't evil. He's not the problem. The roving masses of moronic brochureware IT rejects are to blame.
He obviously attended the ZDFud school of
"how to draw attention to your work
by making asanine remarks about Linux."
Let me list some *real* ways to waste time:
1. Develop ActiveX controls
2. Write code in MFC
3. Use Visual J++
4. Install Windows NT with the intent on running
an enterprise web site.
5. Pursue an MS certification course
6. Use Visual C++
....and many other ways to waste both valuable time
and money can be yours for just $10,999.95! That's
right just $10,999.95 and we'll send you all
this plus the 5 piece stainless steak knife set!!!
Imagine someone saying, "if you don't like the Republican government, don't join, vote or speak for the opposition; join the Republicans and improve them". (For "Republican", substitute your favourite ex-ruling party that seemed hard to beat for a while.)
In a way similar to the establishment of "green" parties, open source became a movement because enough people want it, not merely as a better product but a better way of "doing business". That's the generational aspect the writer notices but fails to understand (and therefore resorts to mocking).
That comment was, of course, once made towards green parties. Fortunately enough people didn't listen.
I know most people will never read this, but after reading that article, I can't help but let my fingers fly and write something about what the author (Who didn't include his e-mail address, so I can't address these to him) said.
While the article has a nice pipe-dream inspiring it, the author makes a number of fairly critical mistakes. Additionally, there are several incorrect assertions. I'm not sure if these are unintentional ignorance, or malicious attempts to spin what we're doing.
In the article, the author asks the question "Why don't we stop development on Linux and all other alternative operating systems and concentrate on making Windows 9x / 2000 better?"
The short answer: We can't.
The long answer: Microsoft controls Windows with an iron fist. They add what features they want and ignore everything else. They have no economic interest in spending the additional [mb]illions of hours it would take to rummage through however many millions of lines of code Windows is up to and find the bugs that plague the system. They're raking in cash hand over fist, what would they stand to gain? Reputation? I don't think even the Microsoft Marketing Minions could pull that off.
The author states that we don't want to because we're anti-establishment and think we have something to gain by challenging the Microsoft juggernaut. Again, he is half-right. While there is a certain element of disgust rumbling through the computer world right now, that isn't unjustified.
I cannot count the number of times a bug in Windows or some Windows application has taken my system completely down. I have talked to literally thousands of people who have had the same thing happen. I cannot count the times I have heard people curse Windows, Microsoft, or Bill Gates directly.
We can't fix any of those because we don't have any of the source code. We can submit bug reports or requests for features, but from experience, I know that those are pretty much ignored unless it's something someone on the development team wants. If they even make it to the development team. Many times in large corporations, they don't; someone somewhere filters them out for some reason or another.
Why do we continue to work on Linux? Simple disenchantment with Microsoft isn't enough reason to work on a project this big. Why can't these people understand that?
Improvise, adapt, and overcome.
Right, this has irritated me for a while now. There are perfectly good apps for linux, perfectly well able to match the functionality of Office (well OK maybe not the office assistant though I hear KDE are working on it, but that's a piece of shit anyway).
Spreadsheet: abs (look on linuxberg for it), Star Office
Word processor: LyX (search on freshmeat), Word Perfect
Presentation tool: Magic Point (probably find it on freshmeat)
E-mail and news client: M, KDE's mail program etc...
Finance package: OK, this is the one weak area I can think of (in terms of free software) though I think there have been a couple of big-name enterprise business programs ported lately
Database: come on, this is what UNIX does best. There are loads.
axolotl
So we all can improve Microsoft products, without source, without complete API's, and then we can have the priveledge of purchasing the fruit of our labor? Good plan. Maybe re-inventing the wheel is only sane thing when the wheel is square.
Also, I would submit Microsoft re-invented the wheel first, DOS wasn't the best solution at the time, just the one that IBM threw thier weight behind due to convenience and some arcane back room deal. Here is to Linux, Round wheels, Free Software, and doing it right.
Insert pithy comment here.
I don't think he did a whole lot of research into programming practices. There are reasons that Windows 2000 is reaching an insane number of code lines and why people feel the need to reinvent the wheel. When people keep adding features to programs (for this example, we'll use Windows), they get bloated software with tons of features that were available in previous versions but have been obsoleted by newer functions. Thus, you get a word processor that's almost as big as an operating system (and I'm not talking about emacs here) and software that takes many more resources than it should.
/is/ over twice my age. :)
Enter the 'yoot'. They have free time and excellent motivations, namely, making things work better. They decide to simply "reinvent the wheel", rather than trying to port the current one or add more features to it. Code comes out cleaner, smaller, and with the same features that people actually need and use. I think we only need to look at the Mozilla project to see this in action. Sure, it's taking a long time to get the project out the door, but damn, what they're producing is slick, fast, and still has the same features as its predecessor.
The problem with the Microsoft wheel is it's really big and it's really flat. People are "reinventing" it because it needs to be. It's not working; it's not rolling along. Unfortunately, the enthusiasm for redefining the status quo can't be found in the old codgers in corporate America, it has to come from us 'yoots'.
I don't fault the author, though. He
News Flash: The Vast Majority(tm) didn't decide either way.
"Like" implies favor. Favor implies choice. For most users, choice does not exist.
Perhaps you just emerged from a deep freeze, or your mom just let you on the Internet last week, so I'll fill you in on some news stories covered in depth here and... well, everywhere.
First of all, it's been well documented that you can't buy a PC from a major brand unless it has Windows on it. This includes IBM PC's and IBM makes OS/2, one of Window's supposed rivals. Have you ever heard someone say,"When the sales guy at Gateway asked me which OS I wanted, I chose Windows, because it's the best." No, you haven't and you never will, because no Gateway sales rep is going to ask that question. Some major brands have announced that they'll "ship Linux," but only Compaq seems to be doing anything. Go to Compaq's website, however and they tell you how to get Linux from RedHat -- to install on top of the copy of Windows that they'll install on your machine.
Of course, you shouldn't have to pay for that copy, because the Windows End User License Agreement (EULA) says that you can get your money back if you refuse the license. Just try. Many have, only a few have succeeded after months and months of trying.
Before you argue that these hapless PC manufacturers are just responding to market demand, think again (if, in fact, you think at all). With a stroke of a pen, Microsoft could crush Dell, or Compaq or Gateway. How? By raising the rate it charges each company for Windows. You wanna ship Linux? Fine, you lose your sweet deal on your volume Windows license. These companies have margins so tight that a few dollars difference in license fees could spell their death.
Compaq steps out of line and invests in RedHat and (surprise surprise) its profits drop like a rock. Wall Street conveniently blames Compaq's corporate acquisitions. Meanwhile, Dell is so deep in with Microsoft, you can't even order a Dell with Netscape on it, no matter how nicely you ask. Tip: buy Dell stock now. Sell it when Linux starts beating NT in corporate use surveys (notice I didn't say "if").
Get over it and work for Microsoft. Wait, you cant can you - your still in school.
Well, I, for one, haven't been in school for a long time. They let me out once I finally mastered the difference between "your" and "you're." I've turned down several invitations to work there and I'll turn down any more that come my way.
Microsoft is teetering. When it falls, it will fall hard. When IBM screws up, it still has a dozen other legs on the ground, but Microsoft is nowhere near as large and diverse as IBM. When Windows 2000 turns out to be a dud (notice I didn't say "if"), then Microsoft's one and only leg will buckle and the giant will stumble.
Whether the stuff reporters put out is !@#$ or not, we must read it and check it, becuase if we start ignoring all anti-Linux/Unix/OSS/FSF/etc, we'll miss an article where they bring up an important issue worth addressing.
In the Binary Beat Article for 4/25/99, James Coates advocated further Windows development over use of Linux. I wish to respond to certain points within his article:
We never said he was. He's a business man, and a damn good one.
The complaints more have are areas where the PRODUCTS he sells are lacking. This is where alternatives like Unix, MacOS, and yes Linux, come in.
Has he ever utilized Linux? There are more applications showing up for Linux each and every day. There are CHOICES about what you use as well, as there isn't much choice with Windows.
Multiple desktop control programs. Multiple webservers, multiple database and productivity packages. Guess what, most of them are FREE.
How about graphic manipulation? For high end stuff you need to go burn a couple hundred bucks for a copy of Adobe Photoshop. The GIMP come free with Linux.
Weak? You're apparently referring to that study done that "proves" NT is 2-4 times faster as a file and web server than Linux is. What you haven't heard, or have ignored, is that Microsoft paid for a study proving that NT was faster.
That's what they got. A highly tuned (both hardware and software-wise) NT server is FAR faster as a file and web server than the base install (with poor tuning) of RedHat Linux.
In addition, a good deal of software from corporate *NIX environments can be ported into Linux with little more than a recompile. I'd like to see many of the NT applications ported to Windows 9*.
Also, I shall sound the "STABILITY" horn again. Yes, under some application NT is a fairly stable and solid OS. Unfortunately we have YET to see reports of an NT box coming close to the STANDARD uptimes reported by Linux. Also, downtime on NT boxes is measured in hours and days. Linux? Minutes.
As with any other issue out there, you have people who tend to take their positions to an ultimate extreme. Similar to the touted Mac-Zealotry.
Do not judge an entire community by thos few who must scream that Linux will eventually replace the toothbrush, the car, etc. A goodly portion of the Linux community are merely people who prefer using Linux to other OS's and don't particularly care about political/social rammifications.
This can be viewed in the same vein as "Bill Gates is a Monster". And what does your age have to do with you not liking him?
That's, again, a case of painting the entire community with the same, broad stroke. There are people out there, Torvalds included, who do not CARE what you use. Simply that there are options for themselves and others.
At his pre-Comdex Q&A at Fermilab, he was asked about gaming on the Linux platform. He recommended Windows as a gaming platform.
No, the best part about open-source code is that if it doesn't work, you can CHANGE it so it does work. The same cannot be said in the Microsoft Programming Model.
This is pure speculation on your part. About the only way most people find out they're running Linux is if they ask their networking admins. Usually, if it isn't crashing people have no reason to ask. This makes any REAL assay of Linux penetration very, very difficult.
The only problem with this view is, it eliminates choice. I'm sure there's a lot of little tin-pot dictators in this world that would LOVE for the US to "just go away" so that they wouldn't have to answer for their abuse of the civilian population.
Also, competition is GOOD. Do you REALLY want to have to go back to paying $300 for your operating system?
Actually this has been an issue within the Linux community for several years now. The only place where Linux has little support is in the Gaming market. There are several professional-level office productivity packages out there (one of which is Word Perfect). There are multiple choices for a desktop interface (you only need to use command line if you want to).
There are even applications for Linux that allow you to run Windows inside a window if you MUST have Microsoft Office or your game-du-jour.
Slim pickings? Hardly.
I think a small lesson is needed here. Microsoft's beginnings were every bit as "home brew" as a good deal of the Linux-based code. DOS (which Microsoft BOUGHT (not programmed) for a couple grand) was initially written as QDOS (Quick and Dirty Operating System).
QDOS was really only meant as a program for testing Intel-based hardware. Some of the major problems in Windows-based programs are STILL directly traceable to insufficiencies in QDOS.
Also, home-brew isn't necessarily BAD. These days, the people are very concerned about the stability of the product (as the developers are running it on their own systems, not a box paid for by their employer that can be replaced if it takes a dive).
Also, with the projects staying in a more personal sphere of development, it is usually far easier to gain tech support and report bugs than it is with a closed system such as Microsoft. Microsoft bug fixes come at random, multi-month intervals. Linux can, if the user desires or requires, be updated almost every day.
As for the lack of features implied by "home brewed". I have yet to suffer from any such perceived lack.
Time spent on a project doesn't make it any more or less home-brew. Since Linux' inception approximately 8 years ago, roughly 70,125 hours have passed. Let's say 1/3 of this has been spent developing just the kernel of Linux. That's over 23 thousand hours. Realistically only maybe 1/2 of this is time spent doing viable work. So 12.5 thousand hours.
That's probably less than the amount of time Linus Torvalds has spent working on Linux (by himself). Take into account all the people working on various projects and you have several million hours of development time. And in only 8 years. Right now they're beyond the point Windows was at in 1995.
Okay. I can accept the Unix part. As for Mac and NT? NT was barely beta in 1991. MacOS was NOT being utilized server-side. That's not it's role.
Will Unix work better? Look at the Unix philosophy. Tailor the environment to what you wish to do. So YES. Unix will work better. For NT? Yes. It'll work better with about 10 times the hardware.
Perhaps if the wheel and been invented square it too would have needed to be reinvented. And what waste? So long as we don't HAVE to take a DEFAULT, it's worth it.
In addition, I don't think the people at Caldera or RedHat are getting rich off Linux. Making money? Yes. But a large chunk of the money they make is poured right back into development. Linux distributions have their place. They are the people that assemble, test, and distribute complete systems to use, as opposed to searching the internet for each and every desired package.
Also, you complain that we're making them rich. Why make Bill Gates rich(er)? You, yourself are now "demonizing" people for making money in the computer industry.
Linux is about choices.
Is it for everyone? No.
Are we trying to push Linux on everone? No.
Thank you for your time.
Charles Borner
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
Chas - The one, the only.
THANK GOD!!!
When Rob links to idiots like this, he should simply inform tham that they've been linked to slashdot, and that they may read opinions of their article at slashdot, and could remind /.'ers that they don't need to flame-mail the guy since he already knows where to get his flames.
This would save bandwidth.
support gun control: take guns from cops
Hackers and students. Weren't there a couple of guys named Gates and Allen years ago who were sort of in this category who were trying to start a software company? Should be obvious from their rapid descent into obscurity that ahckers and students will never produce anything with a future.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
The problem is that in many cases, these people are middle-management. They make decisions that will affect your life.
You have a decent point here. One of the reason's we didn't end up deploying Linux more often, was because it was different, and perceived as a "toy" OS, lacking features/stability that other well established (eg. Solaris) Unices offered. This was a headache for me for quite a while.
The managers wanted a "Real Unix Sysadmin" for our desktop Linux boxes. I countered "Well, then why don't I have a 'Real NT Sysadmin' for my NT machine? I have more problems with that than my Linux box!"
All he could say was that upper management demanded it. Luckily the Unix sysadmin is a great guy, and only logged in once or twice. But giving him root made management happy, so go figure.
The solution to making management happy?
We used Linux under the table where managers didn't notice, because it always worked, just like countless other people out there.
Something which should be pointed out to the author (which I have done via private email, in as polite a manner as possible) is that the billions of programming hours put into Windows programs hasn't been anywhere near as efficient as Free Software promises to be.
By his own logic, companies shouldn't bother to compete, because we only really need one application to fill every niche. Anything else is wasteful of effort, right?
Free Software efforts tend to naturally select the most promising alternative(s) and focus programming effort on those. Programmers are free to borrow and share code as the license permits, making their projects develop at a staggering pace.
We may have already invested billions of programmer hours into Windows software, but if so, it's been a losing investment. At worst, Free Software fails to capture the mainstream market to any significant degree. Most of these programmers wouldn't (happily) code on a Microsoft platform anyway.
--
Ian Peters
I'm glad to see some calmer heads in this discussion. I agree, flaming this guy is, at best, a waste of effort, and at worst, playing right into what he wants.
...) which address the shortcomings of GNU/Linux already.
In large part, I agree with your breakdown of points for/against the GNU/Linux system. Where I have problems, though, is the slant he approaches this with. I think most of us understand current weaknesses with our operating system of choice. And steps are being taken to address it. KDE a very polished, useable desktop. GNOME, to which I contribute time and code (albeit not as much as I'd like!), is already impressive looking, if not as polished as KDE. Just the other day, I was playing with AbiWord, since it had been a while since I'd last looked, and was amazed by how far it has come. We're not there yet, but lots of people are trying.
The problem, for me, is his assertion that we're squandering valuable resources by trying. I have to ask myself what this man's point was in writing this article. It certainly isn't constructive to tell someone "Hey, your dinky little operating system is no good! Quit playing around right now and fall in line!", without making anything approaching a cogent argument. This isn't even very effective FUD, because it's so obviously biased.
Certainly, there are valuable messages we can take from this article, but these aren't new messages. The Free Software community, as a group, is a pretty smart bunch, and there are well-written articles in the mainstream press (maybe not as many as we'd like
--
Ian Peters
This article is written from the perspective (and experience?) of the "average" older computer user. I have seen this type of person in the workplace many times. Here's their profile.
About 10-15 yrs ago, they are forced to switch from his typewriter to a PC; they hated it. Over time, they painstakingly gain experience with the crap from Redmond. Now they are in their comfort zone; scared to death that they might be forced to learn something new. These people, if they are mediocre, feel threatened by their youthful co-workers who are extremely productive and capable of doing things that they can't. Too young to retire, too old to start anything new.
The problem is that in many cases, these people are middle-management. They make decisions that will affect your life.
I agree that we shouldn't feed the fire but maybe an article or two of the latests comparisons with orcal and the survey from last week that reported that nt was used on non mission critical servers. There was a lot of coverage of the mindcraft article i think it was on cnet but non of the following surveys/tests that showed linux was better was there.
I do think that the IT managers have to be shown that linux is a great server operating system and that it beats out nt show them what apps they get (server end) and maybe it will help IT managers serch for better servers. Lets face it it's not the peons that wrote this article and the many like it that run the world it is the decision makers that have to be proven which operation system is better.
Every article that bashes linux that goes main stream will help show IT managers that Linux is bad. For every article written about Linux that doesn't go main stream will show the programmers of the world which one is better (and we already know which one is better).
P.S. I can't spel
> He doesn't realize that a lot of the GNU software is older than Linux itself, and older than NT.
... Linux.
One of those pieces of GNU (or at least GPL'd) software that's older than NT is
The column was just so much flamebait to spike the hitcount. Had it even a smidgen of editing, fact-checking (see timeline note above), or even issues of substance, I might have thought otherwise. All we did was make the Tribune happy with the hitcount. People don't read articles fawning over Linux as much as they read articles that are critical of it. The demographics beancounters checking the hitcounts and the referer logs know this.
I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
The Internet was working swell on traditional Unix, Macintosh and Windows NT before Linux was much more than a glimmer in Linus' eye, and it will work better whether or not the true believers pull off a miracle and slay the dragon.
It seems that the author doesn't really know what runs the Internet. NT and Linux are roughly the same age, within a year or two. It has not been until very recently that NT was even used as a server on the Internet. It has mainly been larger Unix servers and as of the last few years, Linux servers.
As many have stated previously, this is pretty much a troll, probably intended to get this reporters name on the map and get hits generated for his papers website. It's people like this that have gotten the corportate computing world into the mess that it is in.
This is an excellent example of common reporting practice - in any field.
The name of the game is "Pick the opposit to current thinking" - the trick is if you turn out right - you get herold as a genuis down the road.
When 9 out of 10 times it falls flat on it's face as the pice of tripe it usualy is, most just ignore you and move on. No reall loss.
I especially love the cicular logic "There arn't any "good" applications ( read MS branded ) avalible, therefore it's a waste of time to write for the platform"
I'd love to research and see how many people said the same thing about the choice of windows/mac vs dos programs. Games bring this to mind the most, for years even up to win95 era, games were dos based.
As with all things, it's not applications that will make any platform or operating system - it's the avalibility of games.
Game development has been the driving force behind faster cpu's for years, and with the current vendor community turn around to linux - it's going to drive home linux as a consumer operating system.
Nothing in windows or the latest intel proccessor lets you do "basic office tasks" such as write letters and spread sheads any faster in terms of real use then the old dos programs of the 80s gave us.
What let Billy and thirdparty people the room to give us "feature bloat" was due to gamers pushing the envelope. Now with ID shipping quake shrink wraped for linux, games will be the "killer app" (pun noted).
Some say that without a single entity behind it, linux will flownder under it's own hype - but looks at IBM and os/2 - we don't have one company to crap it up - only capable of holding still long enough to shoot themselvs in the foot - and the community in the head.
--
James Michael Keller
"Linux is not our destination, it is simply the open road to tommorow"
I'd tend to disagree with the hypothesis that this article was written as flamebait in order to hike up the hit count. While there may be an element of truth, atrocious articles like these are not doing the credibility of Chicago Tribune any favours in the long term.
;-)
While a pro-Microsoft stance may be a feasible journalistic position, phrases like "Harumph!" and "Sure da yoot are frustrated" and blind MS praise do the author's and paper's credibility no favours. Neither does the suggestion that Linux "rebels" take up a more conformist position wash very well. But what really puts the icing on the cake is the insinuation that RedHat and co are evil because they are trying make money, this flat bang in the middle of a pro-MS article. You'd think that MS is a large charitable benevolent institution or a public service.
As a 21 year old I find the whole conformist attitude extremely patronising as well as fundamentally flawed (you don't make footprints in the sands of time by sitting down). In fact I believe that even educated Windows users, (yes, they do exist) who acknowledge that MS software isn't perfect, would agree that this article is badly written and that the supression of new ideas is no sound long term strategy. Honestly, this article ought to be taken out and shot
Personally this is the only article out of the Chicago Tribune I've ever seen (there may be more but I've forgotten a few) and it's not really a good advertisement for the newspaper in general. Reading this does not entice me to spend any more time trawling through the rest of the newspaper in search of better reading material. Unless the average Chicago Tribune reader is a moron (a distinct possibility) the Tribune ought to, for their own sake, get a better writer.
nb: It's probably best to refrain from writing to the author unless you feel like taking the time to compose polite, polished, well written and factual response. Otherwise he'll be writing about those power-freaked linux "youths" bent on world domination and making money (shock horror!) and flaming anyone who is pro-MS (as opposed to just him).
This article utilizes one of the most blatantly false means of argumentation commonly found in the press today, which I call "argumentation by personification," since I don't know if there's an accepted term for it.
This type of argument involves putting up a person as a representative of a concept you dislike, and then ridiculing this person to convince people to share your view. Here's an example:
What does this have to say about the Linux operating system? Nothing at all, really. It's just a subjective way to say that Linus was strongly criticising Microsoft.
A more insidious way (frequently used by MS) to use this argument tactic is to not openly ridicule your subject, but paint a reasonable picture of them that is however, somehow flawed:
So here we go. Linux Torvalds (whoops... I mean _Linus_) is an arrogant, youthfully ignorant and violent little guy. Therefore, you should not use the Linux operating system, but "root" for an operating system conceded to be inferior and backed by a corporate "dragon."
You find the same nefarious arguments in scandal sheets like Newsweek, which recently published on their cover a spectral, corpse-like photo of the Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic, next to the words "The face of evil." NATO's bombing of Yugoslavia is often referred to as "bombing Milosevic." As far as I have heard, however, Milosevic's house has not been the target of any bombs.
It's obviously in the interest of the US government and the large corporations to distract people from the fact that most of the people dying as a result the bombing campaign in the Balkans are not war criminals, but ordinary civilians. If the press focused on this fact, there might be a lot more outrage about what is happening there and has happened in places like Iraq (Saddam Hussein), Panama (Manuel Noriega), Japan (Hito) and Germany (Hitler), to name just a few places that were bombed by the US this century and personified by the press in an effort to garner support for the bombings. [1]
Coates should not be believed when he states that
because he insinuates that professional organizations like Red Hat "Inc." and Caldera Systems "Inc." are quaint, unprofessional "software houses" that are simultaniously scheming, wheedling corporate entities trying to get rich by using Torvalds. The imagry is unsupported and uninformative.I don't wish to condemn Coates's article entirely: he does state the true (but obvious) point that Linux lacks the huge number of software titles that have made Windows so successful. That's a really powerful argument, and I for one will not urge anyone to switch to Linux until it has AOL, Seinfeld screensavers and talking paperclips. [2]
[1] I make no judgements here whether any of these bombings were justifiable. The relevant fact is, that in each case, the US press personified the countries as identical to their leaders.
[2] Which, of course, is an example of the same tactic I'm criticizing Coates for.
True dat.
... he seems to get his advice from mailing lists and asking individuals who may be as or more clueless than he.
Coates occasionally says sensible things, but any geek should stay away from his answer column, where he weekly tells people to reinstall this or that Winwhateverware. He's a Mac user who started out doing computer reporting by bragging about how neat it was to keep AOL running all the time on one's desktop -- conveniently forgetting that he was a Tribune reporter who got a free account, while at that time, most AOL users would have paid about $500/month for the same privilege.
The guy also suggesting stopping spam by politely writing to the spammer and asking him to desist. (He also gave a clueless definition of the origin of the term "spam".) I enlightened him with the URLs of several spam-fighting pages, asking why he hadn't done a simple web search on spam-fighting technique, and he brushed me off. The man simply doesn't care that people have already solved some of these questions
lake effect weblog
{Network engineer in Chicago--looking for work!}
He has the quote: "The Internet was working swell on traditional Unix, Macintosh and Windows NT before Linux was much more than a glimmer in Linus' eye". But he fails to realize that the internet was running on Unix before NT was a glimmer in Bill Gate's eye. And it's using the same software that Linux is using. He doesn't realize that a lot of the GNU software is older than Linux itself, and older than NT.
Also, how are we supposed to be "making nice with da dragon" if the dragon doesn't let us? What are supposed to channel our efforts into, poking at Word with a dissassembler? We're not allowed to make Windows any less abominable. It's not wasted effort. It's effort that would otherwise not have bene made towards much of anything.
I get the feeling he wrote it to get Slashdotted, as he realizes that everyone will hate him and sent him nasty emails. I'm not going to satisfy him. All he wants is for a few hundred of us to send threatening emails so he can confirm his belief that we're all ultra-liberal hippies.
For some reason everytime I read somehting by this guy it annoys me. Just last monday he was praising linux.
Though this time atleast he knows he's going to annoy me.
What I'm wondering did the fact ther MS does not make the source code for its software available to us slip his mind?
Perhaps if we COULD spend our time improving microsoft products, some of us would. Perhaps if this possibility was open to us those products would be more stable. Perhaps if MS's code was available we wouldn't have to "reinvent the wheel."
speaking of venting. I'll stop now. But I do have a few questions.
He quotes linux runs on "Maybe 7 Million" machines. Is close to accurate? I don't even know.
He also quotes that Linux is at most 2.5 million lines of code. How many lines of code is windows? And if we are going to compare on lines of code between windows and Linux shouldn't we also include the number of lines of code in X, KDE, and Gnome?
And if we went through all that trouble. What value would it be?
NT 3.1 was released in 1991. Development was rumoured to effectively have begun in 1987. Linus didn't start development until 1991, and didn't "release" anything to anyone until 1993.
Perhaps you may find thi interesting. This is from the Microsoft Museum Timeline
Microsoft Launches Windows NT at Windows World
05/24/93 Microsoft formally launches Microsoft Windows NT at Windows World in Atlanta. Windows NT delivers a powerful, reliable and open platform for client-server solutions - business applications ranging from inventory management to sales automation to financial analysis. It can also scale to meet the user's increasing processing needs because it has no internal system constraints on resources and provides consistent support for Intel, RISC and multiprocessor systems. It is scheduled to be released in 60 days.
and this, from linux.org
Linus had an interest in Minix, a small UNIX system, and decided to develop a system that exceeded the Minix standards. He began his work in 1991 when he released version 0.02 and worked steadily until 1994 when version 1.0 of the Linux Kernel was released.
Having used NT 3.1 extensively, I can assure you that it was rushed and felt very beta. However, Linux .02 was released in 1991 and hit 1.0 in 1994. It spent a lot of time in development in between, but it was mostly stable from the get-go.
BTW, it took me longer to type this than to find these sources. Poke around first next time.
Mike
--
Mike
--
"Wi nøt trei a høliday in Sweden this yër?"
"Linux currently offers mighty slim pickings for ordinary computer users."
??--What do ordinary computer users use that Linux does not have? Linux has image editing software (GIMP), web browsing and email software (NETSCAPE), Office-type software (K OFFICE, APPLIXWARE, STAR OFFICE). Have I missed anything that an ordinary computer user would want to use on any ordinary day?
"Meanwhile, billions of human hours have been spent writing the amazing applications that run on the Windows and Macintosh platforms."
This is true. However, most useful applications for Windows are third-party. Eventually, these companies will be writing their software for Linux too. (i.e. Wordperfect)
"to CD-ROM shoot'em-up games like Doom and Quake"
--oh gee, wow, wish i could play Doom or Quake in Linux....oh wait...I CAN!
"
The Internet was working swell on traditional Unix, Macintosh and Windows NT before Linux was much more than a glimmer in Linus' eye"
So...now it's working better than before--and for free...
"Meanwhile, they would have us reinvent the wheel by wasting billions more hours creating applications to take advantage of Linux"
What the hell?!? Reinvent the wheel?? What is this guy smoking??
Why do people not do more research before they write garbage like this. This guy has probably never even seen Linux in operation. Never seen all the cool apps that run perfectly on it--that were coded for (oh my!) free...
And, I agree with someone's comment before mine -- What the hell is wrong with a little competition?!? It makes everyone's product better in the end...
Now before the flaming contest begins, it is important to note that the author was correct about a few things. And then he was wrong about quite a few things. And then there are some ugly truths...
The Good:
* The truth is that Linux suffers from a dearth of real usable applications. This is changing rapidly, but at the moment, the lack of apps is the truth for most purposes.
* Microsoft gets lots of mindless bashing from Linux (and *BSD and MacOS) users. Unfortunately people just call Microsoft bad and don't understand the reasons why.
The Bad:
* The author claims that his years of experience make him better able to analyze the operating system market. Unfortunately the computer world doesn't work that way, let alone the world in general. Usually it's the young kids in a garage throwing together a product that cause revolutions, particularly in this industry.
* The author implies that if everyone ran the same operating system there would be an overall benefit. This isn't true at all. Choice and competition causes the operating systems to improve. A capitalist society without competition is a Bad Thing (see also "Railroad/Steel/Oil Barons").
The Ugly:
* The ugly truth for the Linux community is that some users' rage toward Microsoft outweighs their ability to justify their anger. If you believe that all software should be free, then you might have some room for anger. However, programmers are not charity cases generally, and you can't feed your family or yourself by giving your work away. There is room for both free and commercial software to coexist happily.
* The ugly truth about Microsoft is that people are hating them for all the wrong reasons. Once all the anti-competitive practices become the object of the public's rage, rather than just their shoddy software, then all the anti-trust laws will be strengthened. Microsofts crime isn't that it sells lots of software, it's that it leverages the software to screw the little guys by not releasing standards, API calling conventions, etc. Stallman wrote a nice piece recently touching on the fact that it is the leveraging that is the real crime with MS.
* The last ugly truth is that dearth of applications I mentioned. The tools to do certain tasks in Linux simply aren't there. If I'm doing programming then it's all a little bit better because many programming tools started in Unix (not Linux), and were quickly converted. At the same time though consumer and small business applications on Linux (or *BSD) are either not as well-featured as the Windows equivilant, or they don't exist.
There is a steep learning curve coming too. If you have a superior operating system in some aspect, and the applications, then users will come, right? Wrong. Look at Apple folks. MacOS although not superior in it's low-levels, has a vastly superior user interface to anything else out there. (I'm sure I'll get flamed for saying it, but it is simply a fact.) MacOS has plenty of applications for any task that are parallel or more featured than Win32 equivilants, but they don't have the user base, because they don't have the users and purchasers out of the WinEverywhere mindset yet.
To get users out of this mindset, and to convince this columnist that your operating system is better you need a killer app, that no other platform has. And Linux, just like *BSD, just like MacOS, just like BeOS, doesn't have that killer app yet to break the Windows mindset in consumers.
Pardon the novel... this is probably my 10 cents worth.
--Cysgod
I really hate to see articles like this. Although there are a few valid points in the article, it is overshadowed with dripping sarcasm.
The author would rather see us all get hired by m$ and write windows 2000 instead of working on "the dinky feature-weak, application-starved flavor of home-brewed Unix known as Linux".
WTF?
I think what Mr. Coates fails to realize is that there are a LOT of programmers in the world.
What's more, taste is subjective. Asking everyone to adopt a single standard solely for the sake of conformity is ludicrous. America was founded on the ideals of freedom of choice. To say that all of us (which he generalizes as young, idealistic, anti-establishment hackers) are "wasting billions more hours creating applications to take advantage of Linux and make Torvalds' colleagues at Linux software houses like Red Hat Inc. and Caldera Systems Inc. rich" is insane.
I don't think he gets it. I'd suggest everyone send him email, but I can't seem to find his email address anywhere.
He mentions the large amount of hours needed to develop Linux applications. He does not mention the larger number of hours being lost every week as millions of Microsoft systems crash and waste the time of users, maintenance, and administrative staff.
I do wonder whether it's even worth putting such links on Slashdot. It sends their hits sky-high, so the advertisers love it, the editor loves it, and enough Slashdot readers send unpleasant responses for the columnist to base their next column on the phenomenon. I don't see why we should give them more grist for their mill.
How do killer apps happen? To use Geoffry Moore's
analogy, they are the result of the Tornado --
technology and users needs coming together at
just the right point in time, so that a lazy
product segment becomes an unstoppable force.
And in the end, one company ("the gorilla")
dominates the segment. Looking back in history,
relational databases were a tornado, Oracle
became the gorilla. Internet infrastructure was
a tornado, Cisco became the gorilla. Desktop
publishing was a tornado, and the Macintosh and
Adobe shared joint gorilla status until recently.
On the free software server front, Apache and
Samba were the real gorillas, and Linux came
along as infrastructure for them. If we're
looking for desktop "killer apps", we need to
look to the future, predict the most probable
Tornados, and be ready -- not look in the rear
view mirror at Office, Microsoft got there first.
Especially since most of us don't even use an
app like Office to get our own work done -- we
use TeX+emacs.
but we are doing it so no-one else will have to again. That is where he completely misses the point. The current system of software development forces us to reinvent the wheel. Work done can only be reused and fixed to the extent that the original author allows. If we were allowed to fix and improve current software then linux would indeed be waste of time. But we can't and
in the long run linux and open software will greatly reduce the amount of wasted time and effort that the author is so worried about.
Linux is the solution, not the problem!
It IS kind of annoying to think that anyone would feel satisfaction for putting out this kind of garbage. However, there is an ideological objective to be gained by proactively fighting FUD, error, and just plain stupidity. I'm just as tempted to passivity as the next guy due to the time and effort that proactivity entails, however I think that is a weak tactic.
:) Seems to me that anyone who has been given a public mouth has the potential to do damage, especially if their platform is built on pillars of non-logic and non-fact, etc. The way I see it, we have a moral obligation to straighten these guys out. And who better qualified for this job than slashdot readers? :)
Sometimes you have to start small fires to put out big ones. Sometimes you have to keep fighting the little skirmishes while you're perfecting the big weapon.
"Know thy ignorance."
One of the most sensible statements made in this thread.
This "journalist" is trolling for flameage which will most likely be used in a follow-up article which shows the world (of Chicago) geeks being rude and intolerant -- the implied comparison is with the nice folks at Microsoft, of course. Haven't we seen enough of this type of crap recently? Playing into it doesn't serve us well. I can understand wanting to counter FUD, but this isn't FUD -- it's base, intentionally antagonistic and meant to irritate and elicit specific reactions.
I agree with Telsa -- time to stop feeding this type of troll.
Everything in the Universe sucks: It's the law!
Let's take a closer look into what he was saying. Hmm, Bill isn't a monster . . . ok, I can agree with that. He's simply a shrewd and lucky businessman, whose increasing market share has led him and his company to lose sight of little things like fair play and morals, etc. Here again this is simply human nature, not out of the ordinary. People with an unfair advantage over others *will* use the advantage. Didn't some "Wise Old Dead Dude" say that "power corrupts?" I agree.
Now he goes on a rant on how we should stop wasting our time supporting competition and choice and just accept Windows as our personal savior. Huh? Has he ever taken a single economics class at that Cracker-Jack college he went to? When has a lack of choice *ever* resulted in a better situation for the consumer? Hmm, I don't know. Ask your cable company, *if* you can get them to answer the phone!
Also, I should just mention that Linux (really open source in general) is not ever going away. This is exactly the type of collaboration that the internet makes possible and encourages. You are witnessing the power of the contributions of the *entire* world sharing and collaborating, and building on the work of others. Just as the power of compound interest makes for a much better investment return you will see much better and varied software now and later. Do you really think the third world (where the real growth is) is gonna fork over $300 for each computer to the richest (maybe?) man in the world? The only M$ products they use now are pirated.
If linux seems unfinished, well that's because it *is*! And yet it grows exponentially every year. Perhaps you are making your judgements on the linux of a year ago, I assure you this is not your father's linux. Windows will simply never be able to catch up after W2k version, because the version after that won't be out until 2003, while linux will be significantly improved every 3-6 months. It is already technically superior, it just needs to fleshed out with user apps, and that is happening quickly.
Finally, if anyone is wasting their time they're wasting it on Windows. They are supporting the very company that limits their choice, rewards them with dll conflicts and frequent reboots and crashes, as well as not supporting a system that benefits us all.
#6495ED - cornflower blue
It's true. Windows is an easier operating system to use. Don't get me wrong here, I'm not into Windows or Microsoft advocacy here. But neither am I into Linux advocacy either. I use whichever platoform and whichever set of applications make MY life easier and get MY job done. As economists would say: it's all a matter of utility. Does the cost of purchasing Windows and the frequent crashes and reboots of my windows applications outweigh the ease of use of the system? I don't know. Currently I am running a partitioned hard drive with both Windows and Linux. I have learned much about Linux and the ways of UNIX this past year and right now I will still say that even for the high tech of us, even for those of us who like to be in super control, Windows can do everything Linux can do and is much easier to make things happen. But I'm a programmer at heart and I certainly support the Open Source movement which seems to unlike anything else in society. I mean, where else do you have hundreds (sometimes thousands) of strangers uniting in a common goal with common objectives. I think if you take a step back and think about it, that is the amazing thing about Linux. Whereas Windows has hundreds of people working on the source code because they're getting paid, Linux has hundreds of people working on the source code because THEY WANT TO. And that is why I will continue to support Linux over Windows despite the fact that Windows is easier RIGHT NOW. But knowing the pace at which Linux has been developing, I have no doubt that Linux has the potential to outpace Windows in terms of ease of use and any other standard by which one may measure an operating system against another.
In the end I believe that choice is good because of the competition it promotes, and I will choose to support Linux and the ideology behind its growth and development.
If NT is the wave of the future, what doesn't he go down to the server room and see that they are running solaris???
Hey lookie here, it's not NT!
I live in Chicago and read the Tribune occasionally. I have yet to read one of his columns that I wasn't mentally correcting. He makes huge errors on a regular basis - this was one of his least clue-free ones. Wait till you see one of his real doozies.
"How perfectly Goddamn delightful it all is, to be sure" Charles Crumb