Dangers of Typecasting OSes

bjb writes "An interesting article has appeared on Byte's site on the dangers of typecasting operating systems. The article talks about specialization and purposes of Linux and BeOS. " Worth the reading, from the POV of dangers of stereotyping ideas/objects, in thsi case, putting BeOS throughly into the A/V corner, and Linux into the serve corner.

Comments

Typecasting Users

[craigly]

The following is an excerpt from a mail I sent to the author after reading his article:

Something that I think that this typecasting touches on, is the conception of the "user". What we may have is not the typecasting of OSs, but the typecasting of "users" in a way which does even more damage. If OSs are marginalized, maybe a company or two goes under, but if people are marginalized, then voices go unheard and people are no longer able to excercise power thru computers, wether it is making web pages, sending love letters, or writing Free Software. I find the alienation of people a much bigger threat, and something which not only the marketers, but the pundits for each OS or "user" propogate.

In a Windows only world, the "user" is a consumer, passive and accepting of choices presented to them by the market. They are not supposed to create, contribute or otherwise influence the development of the computer, and their use of it, other than thru the very hollow power of the dollar. In the Linux only world, the technocrat wields alot of power, the user is expected to share the mania of computers that the developers have. This is just as disempowering for many, because instead of being confronted with opaque surfaces, they are inundated with complexities.

The same thing happens in a BeOS only world, as it also has a very specific conception of "user". Something very similiar to Apple or Windows with a more sophisticated technical edge. We should be careful not to typecast BeOS as the third part of a Hegelian dialectic of the "user", the synthesis of two opposing concepts. We should not do that with ANY OS for that matter, because that action STILL will produce a single conception of the user which will alienate and isolate many people.

As Linus and others have pointed out, Linux world domination should not be about being the only OS, but about making the OS a choice, by allowing all different types of people choose the computing platform they want, and which suits their needs. These platforms should then be able to interoperate with one another, so that no one "user" ever becomes dominant. Obivously, this is not what the present personal computing market looks like, but I think it's something that we can all achieve.

Give Be a chance

[ShadeTC]

First, I have lurked around for a while, and I have been fairly impressed with linux, the users, and what can be done in the OSS model.

I think, though, that a lot of linux users are missing the point. Linux is a GREAT server OS. If I ever had to run a high traffic server I would run linux. But Linux is NOT a GREAT desktop OS. It can be a good one, but can anyone really say its great? (I shall define great as being able to be used by most users immediately after install). I have tried linux. I don't have the time to invest into setting it up or tweaking it so that it works. I have also tried Be. I was able to use it, go online, and start d/l software immediately without the help of a friend directing me. (btw I consider myself pretty technically literate, I am an MIS major with a CS minor). Be doesn't as yet have many apps for the general user, but that's because it is set up for being a Audio/Visual niche operating system. (Be is being smart. Remember they are a company that has to make money to put out a good product. Going head to head with the Redmond giant is suicide. Linux could do it because they don't need to come in on budget or have to make money) Look at linux 1-2 years ago. Where was StarOffice then?

A lot of people have stated that Be has no apps or they can't use the apps they have on linux. Just because Be is closed-source doesn't mean that you can't create apps for it or port apps to it. Be comes with a fully integrated BASH command line interface. It comes with a variety of GNU tools, most notably gcc. If you do some research you may notice that it is nearly fully POSIX compliant (they are not fully POSIX yet because they want to put their time into getting more hardware supported).

Have any of you checked out the specs on Be? Be uses a 64-bit Journaling File System. It has pervasive multi-threading, pre-emptive multi-tasking, and excellent use of SMP. It already has a security/multi-user architecture set-up waiting for a time when it will be usefull.
Many have said that they could not use X. Well if you go to the BeWine page you will see that they have ported X-Windows over and are working on a port of Wine as well.

I will finish with this last thought. Please remember that the OSS dev model transends all OS's. Just because an OS isn't open source does not mean you can't design a good app for it. The only reason there aren't a lot of OS apps on Be is because THEY HAVEN'T BEEN WRITTEN YET (and/or ported). Before you start thinking of how to flame me, remember that linux too was once really young with no apps, and that it took time before mainstream users started to notice it.

Let the moderation begin.

TC

Typecasting of OSes? Try User Typecasting...

[CJ Hooknose]

There's a common myth that "Users are Stupid." This article perpetuates that myth--shame on the journalist. I work with Real Users almost every day at the job, and many of them would be willing to trade some additional time investment for something that didn't crash all the time. Remember that it takes several hours for a new user to learn to use even a "bonehead computing environment" like the standard Windows/Mac GUI.

How many Linux users take advantage of access to source code?

The OS source is like a "home defense" handgun--not essential but Really Nice To Have in certain situations. I find that having gcc around is the best thing about Linux. How many other OSes have free compilers practically built in?

BeOS, on the other hand, is immediately satisfying.

Immediate gratification may be the American Way, but generally, the more powerful things are, the longer they take to learn. Tricycles are easy to ride; bicycles are not. Guess which goes faster. Everyone here knows where Linux stands in this setting...

Valid Points

[Anonymous Coward]

He makes some very valid points on the downsides of Linux. We've got a lot of baggage in there that is just bad from a mass market perspective.

We all hear things like "My pet rat who doesn't know the first thing about computers hates Windoze but loves the linux installation I gave it", but realistically, we're nowhere near the ease of use and fun for the average user provided by Be, or (gasp!) Windows.

Gnome is cool, KDE is nice, but maybe pushing linux into that space is the wrong way to go. Linux is wonderfully configurable, but it's still a unix at heart, and unix has way too much baggage for the novice to slog through.

There's a lot of baggage on the developer who wants to develop cool apps for the linux desktop, too. Even with GTK or QT, you're still writing to a wrapper to a library to a library to a driver, just to get a reasonably usable API. The sound system(s) are OK, but they certainly could be better. Contrast this with programming for BE, and it becomes pretty obvious that we don't hold up well.

What we in the open source community need is really a fresh start on the desktop. Linux is evolving wonderfully as a server and workstation OS for the power user, but if open source is going to win the average user, I really do believe we're going to need something very different from UNIX.

For now, though, I'm sticking with Linux since, though I think BE is a cool company, corporate control of an OS has repeatedly proved disastrous in terms of benefits for the end user.