if everybody bought their grandma an iMac, there would be a lot more exploits on them then there are now. As many as wintel boxes? Probably not. But more than there are now.
I doubt it. Before OSX there were Mac viruses appearing that everyone had to watch out for. But ever since OSX, none.
The popularity of a platform doesn't have as much to do with it as you seem think.
Re:KDE, Gnome, or: Why Linux is going down the dra
on
Why KDE Rules
·
· Score: 1
You are talking about the 'Devices' pane in Konqueror. Its job is to list all your filesystem devices.
If you are making a quick manual backup, or sending data to someone using a removable HD, then it doesn't make much sense to browse a traditional Unix tree to find the destination device. And its less Windows-like than it is Mac-like, basically just listing the contents of mtab.
If anything, traditional Unix is unnecessarily Windows-like in the way it handles disk volumes. Instead of one letter, you get four letters/numbers and the volume label assigned by the user is typically ignored. Under OS X, when I label a disk volume, the system must refer to it by that name (instead of drawing almost random device names in some kind of lottery, and see if THAT can't result in the wrong devices ending up at the wrong mountpoints).
Anyway if you prefer, just switch to the Root or Home panes. KDE keeps the Unix tree paradigm.
As for KDE apps used for system functions, I do share your concern. I recall that on the Amiga, most of the GUI utilities doubled as CLI tools (if you ran them from CLI, you had to use an extra option switch to get them to display the GUI).
Thanks for the clue... A white-balance seems to be had IF the white/black dropper tools under "All Channels" are used. Otherwise, hues are unaffected. Even so, I'm not yet sure if this is doing a proper job as I suspect my inability to find a shade of middle-grey in photos may be leaving a range of intensities relatively unaffected. (Knowing how levels operates on Value/luma, I think my suspicion is probably right.)
Checking the GIMP guide on color-correcting photographs: http://docs.gimp.org/en/ch05s04s03.html...I see they would have the user try every complex contortion except the one above, just to do white balance (a term they apparently do not know, and struggle awkwardly to describe the concept as color cast, exposure, anything except the term that photographers and videographers will look for: WHITE BALANCE).
In fact, that help page horrified me to the extent of shuddering! I wouldn't wish those instructions on my worst enemy. To quote:
Color Enhance
Help me, what exactly does this do? Obviously it makes some things more saturated.
Not only is the writer unacquainted with digital photography (and its common use-cases and terminology), but they don't quite have a handle on GIMP's own knobs and sliders either. The coders also seem guilty: They actually added to the main program that useless-as-bulltits "Auto White Balance" function, which no pro or true enthusiast would touch with a 10-ft bra.
GIMP isn't Photoshop. It isn't PhotoPaint or PaintShopPro either. It isn't just "different". The only color adjustments I can confidently make with it are along R-G-B axes, which means its useful rarely if ever. It's not even on the level of Black Belt System's ImageMaster on the Amiga, a 15-year old program (with, I might add, an excellent ARexx API)... I would say that GIMP is ape-ing ImageMaster and doing a Bolshevik's job of it.
No wait.... There is "Auto White Balance", which might as well read "No White Balance" because the [i]whole point[/i] of a white-balance tool is to point-out what part of the image is to be considered "white". (Either that, or to indicate the color temp of the light source.)
This, and the fact they must ask for splashscreen art to be submitted to them, makes me wonder if the GIMP project isn't driven by artless hacks. If they had more professional contact with end-users (in formal product testing, for instance) they would have suitable artwork practically thrown onto their lap.
I generally agree about X11, although on the specific point of switching resolutions I believe Xorg supports that. It's setting up the master configuration that sucks.
You can setup encryption for any homefolder in Xandros right from the user admin section of Control Ceenter. It uses keyfiles and supports the algorithms you listed plus about six others.
Re:The cost of doing the right thing
on
Peter Quinn Resigns
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· Score: 3, Interesting
Or, in this case, it shows us what's wrong with commercial newsrooms.
like when firefox in the windows version has an exploit, and it's no where in the article, just "firefox". I've seen that more than once here. I think all these exploits should always be classified as a windows problem first in the title, if that is what it is. Add the sub problem in second place, "new windows vulnerability hits instant messaging systems" would be a more accurate title for the article.
I don't see what's wrong with putting the xorg.conf file through an XML parser. With a set schema, individial settings can be changed without trepidation.
At worst, it makes the config a little harder to read for anyone using an XML-unaware editor.
Saying we just need a "better" GUI settings tool doesn't address the problem. The GUI writer is still stuck trying to anticipate all the valid permutations (and possible missteps) in an odd and subtle format. Plus there are only small amounts of effort going into many different tools, and they all do a poor job.
I say let Xorg supply the smarts for actually managing its own xorg.conf file. This could take different forms: 1) Setting an XML schema; 2) supplying a library with functions for changing individual settings (and checking their validity before saving back to disk).
You believe that because you are a moron that don't even know its facts. Messenger (or whatever the name of the MS IM client)...
How funny. Misplaced your facts?...is not the Windows windowing system.
Yet the Windows OS anticipates this use-case and makes possible many applications from Citrix clients to WebEx and NetMeeting (shipped with Windows). X11 supporting more than one user viewing the same instance of the same application? Show me the application...
Also Netmeeting can work in P2P fashion, so costly servers are not absolutely required.
No, but its doc tells you how to do just that (hint : startx).
Brilliant. Man pages are so appropriate for desktop users changing a basic setting.
I think it even display how to test once it's finished configuring
Nope. However there are the usual questions asking for scanning frequency in kilohertz, device paths, etc. No wonder both NeXT and Apple ever touched X11 with a 20-foot pole.
I agree for end-user, that was not the goal of X11 implementations though. Sysadmins (good ones at least) handle just fine thanks. Tell me you are a (very) bad sysadmin, I will be more eager to believe you.
If your assumption holds (that X11's audience is limited to sysadmins and engineers), then its the Linux distros that are practicing badness. At least I can recognize when there is a disconnect between end-user needs and what is being offered to them. Too bad you instead took it as an opportunity for namecalling.
I think XFree86 was upto about THREE tacked-on shell-based configuration utilities. None of them really did the job.
With Xorg, now we have one config utility and it doesn't even display a testpattern with a timeout!
The community really should dump X11 for good. It has no sysadmin focus because server rooms shun it, and it has no end-user focus either. What do we get for using it? That great Unix "superiority" that allows you to run applications remotely *IF* you can use ssh; Meanwhile Windows users can share a window among multiple remote users and even "whiteboard" over the display, along with chat and videoconferencing. BUT!!! X11 is "superior".
If this worm only affects users of Windows software, and they chose to open and execute the file, then they become the victim. So yes, it does deliver unwanted software to a victim's computer. If the user is running another OS, then they are not victims. Is it that hard to understand?
Somewhat hard, yes. The slashdot summary does not mention Windows, so the rest of us have to dig for this vital detail. That makes the incident hard to understand as reported by slashdot because the editor didn't check story background.
From the posting, how are we supposed to know about "only affects users of Windows software"?? Telepathy?
The article is reporting what is actually a WINDOWS VIRUS without actually mentioning this vital background detail. According to the posting, its an "IM" problem. Heh.
The drawback is that us Mac/Lunix users have to click on the link anyway to check that it doesn't affect our platform -- just in case. Another drawback is that Microsoft gets away with not having their product explicitly associated with the virus.
Having this kind of gloss-over slip through has become typical at Slashdot.
I've said this all before and been modded-down for it. No doubt, I'll be cravenly modded-down again...
Dear god, mod parent up. I couldn't agree more!!!!!
Changing your refresh rate, resolution or anything else is a fscking nightmare. The X.org guys rely on DDC information, but for those us who are hooked via BNC or any other method that doesn't provide DDC information, it's hacking the file manually.
I posted suggestions on the X mailing list in 1999 and those problems are still here today. It's 2005, in a few days it'll be 2006, can we please have a decent tool for editing / changing options? *PLEASE?!*
Thanks. And part of the problem is also in that DDC is somehow mishandled in a minority of cases. The distros know this, and so many of us end up with configs forced to a "SVGA 1600x1200 @ 85Hz" with modelines explicitly listed, making the config file even more nightmarish.
A little more user focus would enable Xorg to anticipate common scenarios where end-users change specific defaults with a GUI-based tool. Currently, they do not enable distro and desktop projects to build good config tools.
Xorg is also a bear to configure, either by hand or automaticaly. You are only supplied with a CLI tool (with no options) that does a terrible job most of the time. In order to change the default resolution, depth or refresh rate most users must rely on distro-specific tools which are unable to handle the xorg.conf file with confidence.
For instance, my distro did not initially setup DPMS (power-saving) feature, so I added the option to xorg.conf myself with a text editor. Now I cannot change the default settings using the disstro-supplied GUI tool-- Thee only way it will let me is to first restore the original backup configuration (the version it knows how to handle).
Linux is plagued by perhaps a dozen half-assed Dsiplay setting tools.
Why does Xorg leave it to the dsitros and the end-user?? THEY are the experts on the conf file format, so they should provide a way to change individual settings without disturbing the others. It reads the bloody xorg.conf file every time it starts, so why can't it handle writing it back to disk?? Is it too hard to add one more API funtion saveConf() so that a user-facing configuration tool can make changes without screwing up?
Alternately, why not swicth to using an XML conf file? That would result in 3rd-party tools being able to change the configuration much for sure-footedly.
Anyone remember him? He supposedly invented some way to turn the magnetic field around powerlines into a MASER. No RFI issues at all. I even recall some news about him testing this stuff with TXU back in 2000.
It absolutely was. We used to have monopoly protection. When one company buys all the rest, competition goes WAY down. In an oligopoly, even, there is almost tacit agreement between corporations. As long as they all fuck everyone at the same time, they all reap the benefits.
I believe you are referring to the tendencies to not only monopolize, but to form conglomerates and cartels.
I hear you. I've used Linux regularly since 1998 and I still do. I wish OS X weren't proprietary, but I bought my first Mac anyway this February.
I don't own computers so they can automate ME. A system that trains people to jump through ridiculous hoops for simple tasks just because that's the way it is has become an end in itself.
Meanwhile, the Gnomebots are still trying to resurrect the glory of the Mac OS...circa 1992. Bizarro.
I think most of us that have gone to Linux have ended up with Mac OS X.
Why Linux? It had so much promise 7 years ago as a "better desktop": It had a GUI environment where you could drop to a Unix-like shell, and great multitasking.
But 7 years of being unable to refer to your permanent/removable media by volume-name, and spending half that time unable to write control-scripts for arbitrary GUI apps, and all the needless thrashing in/etc have really soured many of us. System configs used to be on-screen objects (seperate files of a system-recognized type) that we could grab and edit with a mouse, and most every GUI-fied system utility responded to standardized command-line arguments with equal efficacy.
Most Control Panel GUI tools on Linux still cannot configure a display or network-share half as well as Windows or OS X. API functions to change just the resolution or the refresh and then save to disk? Forget it-- You have to grok every nuance of their homebrew config format, both reading and writing, with your own distro-specific code. None of this stuff ever modernizes.
Want advanced technology? Well you get server-room Advanced Technology and just be happy with that. So the desktop environment remains primitive in striking ways.
The filesystem is even more an alarming ratsnest than 7 years ago, and there are gigantic and contorted "package managers" that chop applications into tiny pieces and spew them into a dozen or more disjointed paths. And then there's autofs.:-\
OTOH, I can access all my disk volumes under '/Volumes' in OS X. BY NAME. Ahhhhhh.....
I can have multiple audio outputs at once (no fiddling!). Ahhhhhh....
Applications install/uninstall with a copy/delete of a single folder. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!
BUT of course, the Linux priests say this isn't possible... OS tools tailored to the end-user break security and cause havoc (or something)! By their logic, OS X shouldn't exist.
Yours truly, Imaginary user on imaginary Unix system:-)
You want to know why Ubuntu succeeded. It's been said before, but I will say it again: ease of use.
It was also the first major distro effort to come along since large numbers of people started to sour on RedHat/Fedora. Ever wonder what happened to the Fedora rah-rah-sis-boombah crowd? They went to Ubuntu.
I don't use either distro; I'm pleased as punch with Xandros which had robust hardware support (incl the first autofig for USB devices), usable PDC access, and common-sense printer support all in the GUI before Ubuntu existed or Fedora had been spun-off from RedHat. In no case is Xandros pure FOSS like these other two, but I really don't care. There are already enough purist distros and I don't have time for enless wrangling with media players, browser plugins, using special tools or the CLI just to access SMB shares and VPNs, and all the extra time spent in/etc.
Fedora and Ubuntu are good starting points for talented admins who want to mold the installation to special applications or very controlled work environments. But as general consumer desktops??
Both desktops are rather approachable, with KDE erring on the side of defaulting to more visible buttons than necessary, and Gnome making some unfortunate choices about removing functionality. But where an OS and suite of programs are provided as a "set piece", they are both eminently usable.
Its when users want to break out of that "Unix-geek-set-it-up-for-granmda" mould that FOSS usability falls down. None of the intermediate "power users" can figure out how to install a Wifi card, or even an application/game they downloaded from a vendor site... so they don't want *nix around their desktop at work and they don't speak enthusiatically about it to friends and family. They feel savy adopting Firefox and wowing people with that; But Linux? Fuggetaboudit. These people outnumber hardcore *nix admins and basement enthusiasts by orders of magnitude.
So a typical Linux distro is very usable already-- as a thin/thick client in a controlled setting.
To go beyond this, people need more technical help from the layers underneath the desktop:
1. An identifiable brand for an umbrella Linux desktop standard. Maybe LSB4 can be marketed by the various distros as LMPC "Linux Media PC" Inside.
2. LMPC will need a standard binary interface for hardware drivers. That doesn't mean more performance-critical drivers can't be handled the way they are now, it just means the ABI is available for vendors wanting to supply drivers to the customer.
3. An exhaustive and well-maintained Hardware Compatability List to help people with their hardware purchasing decisions. I am astounded that nothing better than the HCL at linuxquestions.org seems to exist. Freeform Googling for compatible hardware is not good enough.
4. LMPC will also need a standard ABI for applications, with a clear demarcation of where the OS ends and where applications begin. Withoiut this, users have to filter their whole application-shopping experience through repositories and their dependency-checking databases; Mac users don't need this tarbaby and neither do we.
5. The upshot of LSB4 and item #4 above is that we (hopefully) get a robust and stable API. Desktop Linux then finally looks like a real platform that can win the confidence of more creative types.
6. Improve documentation and context-sensitive help. This should be a natural offshoot of good programming practices: Document and collect your use-cases and make sure the team reviews them often (esp. when making decisions since they'll throw mistaken assumptions into sharp relief). Near the end of your release cycle, you already have a document that shows just how your user documentation should flow (and how to test your product).
I'll add that all levels of development need to maintain focus on their audience through documented use-cases. Even you Linus.
7. More services/daemons ought to be made responsible for persisting their own configuration data to disk. That means Xorg provides an API to alter and serialize video settings, instead of leaving it up to a vast array of outsider hacks like Yet Another Config Tool By Bucky and Stewart, all of which poorly comprehend the conf file they're dealing with.
Gnome and KDE cannot help much more than they are with mainstream adoption. Probably the best they can do now is to take advantage of #7 by providing standard config widgets as services become capable of writing their own config files. Perhaps applying some pressure to those lower layers would help. Setting up a netowrk share or adding a new peripheral should not be a CLI-bound black art, nor should it be a sometimes-candy-coated experience that shifts drastically between distros.
A repeat of S. Korea's (or even the UK's) success with broadband is the last thing ATT-like behemoths want. It's too egalitarian. They want their own corporate media/data/services apparatus artificially elevated above the fray, to prevent competition from upstarts and outsiders. It makes their existence (and stock price) much more serene and less uncertain.
Corporatists are trying mightily to merge the interests of common carriers with content providers and information services, to the point where they must leave the Internet neglected and apart from their "respectable" network.
I wonder if they'll use the switchover to IPv6 as an excuse to acutally implement this.
What about those of us who may eat fast food (yeah, I admit it:-) but never actually go inside?
Then you get the kid to cry and scream when they get home, until mom and dad let them "Install the special program" to download the rest of the movie from the PC.
Slashdot Mirror
if everybody bought their grandma an iMac, there would be a lot more exploits on them then there are now. As many as wintel boxes? Probably not. But more than there are now.
I doubt it. Before OSX there were Mac viruses appearing that everyone had to watch out for. But ever since OSX, none.
The popularity of a platform doesn't have as much to do with it as you seem think.
You are talking about the 'Devices' pane in Konqueror. Its job is to list all your filesystem devices.
If you are making a quick manual backup, or sending data to someone using a removable HD, then it doesn't make much sense to browse a traditional Unix tree to find the destination device. And its less Windows-like than it is Mac-like, basically just listing the contents of mtab.
If anything, traditional Unix is unnecessarily Windows-like in the way it handles disk volumes. Instead of one letter, you get four letters/numbers and the volume label assigned by the user is typically ignored. Under OS X, when I label a disk volume, the system must refer to it by that name (instead of drawing almost random device names in some kind of lottery, and see if THAT can't result in the wrong devices ending up at the wrong mountpoints).
Anyway if you prefer, just switch to the Root or Home panes. KDE keeps the Unix tree paradigm.
As for KDE apps used for system functions, I do share your concern. I recall that on the Amiga, most of the GUI utilities doubled as CLI tools (if you ran them from CLI, you had to use an extra option switch to get them to display the GUI).
Checking the GIMP guide on color-correcting photographs:
http://docs.gimp.org/en/ch05s04s03.html
In fact, that help page horrified me to the extent of shuddering! I wouldn't wish those instructions on my worst enemy. To quote:
Not only is the writer unacquainted with digital photography (and its common use-cases and terminology), but they don't quite have a handle on GIMP's own knobs and sliders either. The coders also seem guilty: They actually added to the main program that useless-as-bulltits "Auto White Balance" function, which no pro or true enthusiast would touch with a 10-ft bra.
GIMP isn't Photoshop. It isn't PhotoPaint or PaintShopPro either. It isn't just "different". The only color adjustments I can confidently make with it are along R-G-B axes, which means its useful rarely if ever. It's not even on the level of Black Belt System's ImageMaster on the Amiga, a 15-year old program (with, I might add, an excellent ARexx API)... I would say that GIMP is ape-ing ImageMaster and doing a Bolshevik's job of it.
Who are they kidding?
No wait.... There is "Auto White Balance", which might as well read "No White Balance" because the [i]whole point[/i] of a white-balance tool is to point-out what part of the image is to be considered "white". (Either that, or to indicate the color temp of the light source.)
This, and the fact they must ask for splashscreen art to be submitted to them, makes me wonder if the GIMP project isn't driven by artless hacks. If they had more professional contact with end-users (in formal product testing, for instance) they would have suitable artwork practically thrown onto their lap.
Sorry, I tried but I just can't use this thing.
I generally agree about X11, although on the specific point of switching resolutions I believe Xorg supports that. It's setting up the master configuration that sucks.
3 13930
You might be interested in a prior thread about this: http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=171888&cid=14
You can setup encryption for any homefolder in Xandros right from the user admin section of Control Ceenter. It uses keyfiles and supports the algorithms you listed plus about six others.
Or, in this case, it shows us what's wrong with commercial newsrooms.
like when firefox in the windows version has an exploit, and it's no where in the article, just "firefox". I've seen that more than once here. I think all these exploits should always be classified as a windows problem first in the title, if that is what it is. Add the sub problem in second place, "new windows vulnerability hits instant messaging systems" would be a more accurate title for the article.
I agree!
I don't see what's wrong with putting the xorg.conf file through an XML parser. With a set schema, individial settings can be changed without trepidation.
At worst, it makes the config a little harder to read for anyone using an XML-unaware editor.
Saying we just need a "better" GUI settings tool doesn't address the problem. The GUI writer is still stuck trying to anticipate all the valid permutations (and possible missteps) in an odd and subtle format. Plus there are only small amounts of effort going into many different tools, and they all do a poor job.
I say let Xorg supply the smarts for actually managing its own xorg.conf file. This could take different forms: 1) Setting an XML schema; 2) supplying a library with functions for changing individual settings (and checking their validity before saving back to disk).
You believe that because you are a moron that don't even know its facts.
...is not the Windows windowing system.
Messenger (or whatever the name of the MS IM client)...
How funny. Misplaced your facts?
Yet the Windows OS anticipates this use-case and makes possible many applications from Citrix clients to WebEx and NetMeeting (shipped with Windows). X11 supporting more than one user viewing the same instance of the same application? Show me the application...
Also Netmeeting can work in P2P fashion, so costly servers are not absolutely required.
No, but its doc tells you how to do just that (hint : startx).
Brilliant. Man pages are so appropriate for desktop users changing a basic setting.
I think it even display how to test once it's finished configuring
Nope.
However there are the usual questions asking for scanning frequency in kilohertz, device paths, etc. No wonder both NeXT and Apple ever touched X11 with a 20-foot pole.
I agree for end-user, that was not the goal of X11 implementations though. Sysadmins (good ones at least) handle just fine thanks.
Tell me you are a (very) bad sysadmin, I will be more eager to believe you.
If your assumption holds (that X11's audience is limited to sysadmins and engineers), then its the Linux distros that are practicing badness. At least I can recognize when there is a disconnect between end-user needs and what is being offered to them. Too bad you instead took it as an opportunity for namecalling.
I think XFree86 was upto about THREE tacked-on shell-based configuration utilities. None of them really did the job.
With Xorg, now we have one config utility and it doesn't even display a testpattern with a timeout!
The community really should dump X11 for good. It has no sysadmin focus because server rooms shun it, and it has no end-user focus either. What do we get for using it? That great Unix "superiority" that allows you to run applications remotely *IF* you can use ssh; Meanwhile Windows users can share a window among multiple remote users and even "whiteboard" over the display, along with chat and videoconferencing. BUT!!! X11 is "superior".
Remember that. Try real hard.
If this worm only affects users of Windows software, and they chose to open and execute the file, then they become the victim. So yes, it does deliver unwanted software to a victim's computer. If the user is running another OS, then they are not victims. Is it that hard to understand?
Somewhat hard, yes. The slashdot summary does not mention Windows, so the rest of us have to dig for this vital detail. That makes the incident hard to understand as reported by slashdot because the editor didn't check story background.
From the posting, how are we supposed to know about "only affects users of Windows software"?? Telepathy?
I wouldn't say we're quite so lucky.
The article is reporting what is actually a WINDOWS VIRUS without actually mentioning this vital background detail. According to the posting, its an "IM" problem. Heh.
The drawback is that us Mac/Lunix users have to click on the link anyway to check that it doesn't affect our platform -- just in case. Another drawback is that Microsoft gets away with not having their product explicitly associated with the virus.
Having this kind of gloss-over slip through has become typical at Slashdot.
I've said this all before and been modded-down for it. No doubt, I'll be cravenly modded-down again...
Thanks. And part of the problem is also in that DDC is somehow mishandled in a minority of cases. The distros know this, and so many of us end up with configs forced to a "SVGA 1600x1200 @ 85Hz" with modelines explicitly listed, making the config file even more nightmarish.
A little more user focus would enable Xorg to anticipate common scenarios where end-users change specific defaults with a GUI-based tool. Currently, they do not enable distro and desktop projects to build good config tools.
Xorg is also a bear to configure, either by hand or automaticaly. You are only supplied with a CLI tool (with no options) that does a terrible job most of the time. In order to change the default resolution, depth or refresh rate most users must rely on distro-specific tools which are unable to handle the xorg.conf file with confidence.
For instance, my distro did not initially setup DPMS (power-saving) feature, so I added the option to xorg.conf myself with a text editor. Now I cannot change the default settings using the disstro-supplied GUI tool-- Thee only way it will let me is to first restore the original backup configuration (the version it knows how to handle).
Linux is plagued by perhaps a dozen half-assed Dsiplay setting tools.
Why does Xorg leave it to the dsitros and the end-user?? THEY are the experts on the conf file format, so they should provide a way to change individual settings without disturbing the others. It reads the bloody xorg.conf file every time it starts, so why can't it handle writing it back to disk?? Is it too hard to add one more API funtion saveConf() so that a user-facing configuration tool can make changes without screwing up?
Alternately, why not swicth to using an XML conf file? That would result in 3rd-party tools being able to change the configuration much for sure-footedly.
I think that blocking ads could encourage businesses to prefer shifting the Internet to a Cable-TV-like subscription model.
Anyone remember him? He supposedly invented some way to turn the magnetic field around powerlines into a MASER. No RFI issues at all. I even recall some news about him testing this stuff with TXU back in 2000.
http://www.hyperwires.com/Pages/hw-pr01.htm
It absolutely was. We used to have monopoly protection. When one company buys all the rest, competition goes WAY down. In an oligopoly, even, there is almost tacit agreement between corporations. As long as they all fuck everyone at the same time, they all reap the benefits.
I believe you are referring to the tendencies to not only monopolize, but to form conglomerates and cartels.
MS seems to be borrowing items like the OS X 'busy' icon, and rounded-corners on windows (with metal/candy effects).
Such flattery.
I hear you. I've used Linux regularly since 1998 and I still do. I wish OS X weren't proprietary, but I bought my first Mac anyway this February.
...circa 1992. Bizarro.
I don't own computers so they can automate ME. A system that trains people to jump through ridiculous hoops for simple tasks just because that's the way it is has become an end in itself.
Meanwhile, the Gnomebots are still trying to resurrect the glory of the Mac OS
I think most of us that have gone to Linux have ended up with Mac OS X.
/etc have really soured many of us. System configs used to be on-screen objects (seperate files of a system-recognized type) that we could grab and edit with a mouse, and most every GUI-fied system utility responded to standardized command-line arguments with equal efficacy.
:-\
:-)
Why Linux? It had so much promise 7 years ago as a "better desktop": It had a GUI environment where you could drop to a Unix-like shell, and great multitasking.
But 7 years of being unable to refer to your permanent/removable media by volume-name, and spending half that time unable to write control-scripts for arbitrary GUI apps, and all the needless thrashing in
Most Control Panel GUI tools on Linux still cannot configure a display or network-share half as well as Windows or OS X. API functions to change just the resolution or the refresh and then save to disk? Forget it-- You have to grok every nuance of their homebrew config format, both reading and writing, with your own distro-specific code. None of this stuff ever modernizes.
Want advanced technology? Well you get server-room Advanced Technology and just be happy with that. So the desktop environment remains primitive in striking ways.
The filesystem is even more an alarming ratsnest than 7 years ago, and there are gigantic and contorted "package managers" that chop applications into tiny pieces and spew them into a dozen or more disjointed paths. And then there's autofs.
OTOH, I can access all my disk volumes under '/Volumes' in OS X. BY NAME. Ahhhhhh.....
I can have multiple audio outputs at once (no fiddling!). Ahhhhhh....
Applications install/uninstall with a copy/delete of a single folder. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!
BUT of course, the Linux priests say this isn't possible... OS tools tailored to the end-user break security and cause havoc (or something)! By their logic, OS X shouldn't exist.
Yours truly,
Imaginary user on imaginary Unix system
You want to know why Ubuntu succeeded. It's been said before, but I will say it again: ease of use.
/etc.
It was also the first major distro effort to come along since large numbers of people started to sour on RedHat/Fedora. Ever wonder what happened to the Fedora rah-rah-sis-boombah crowd? They went to Ubuntu.
I don't use either distro; I'm pleased as punch with Xandros which had robust hardware support (incl the first autofig for USB devices), usable PDC access, and common-sense printer support all in the GUI before Ubuntu existed or Fedora had been spun-off from RedHat. In no case is Xandros pure FOSS like these other two, but I really don't care. There are already enough purist distros and I don't have time for enless wrangling with media players, browser plugins, using special tools or the CLI just to access SMB shares and VPNs, and all the extra time spent in
Fedora and Ubuntu are good starting points for talented admins who want to mold the installation to special applications or very controlled work environments. But as general consumer desktops??
Both desktops are rather approachable, with KDE erring on the side of defaulting to more visible buttons than necessary, and Gnome making some unfortunate choices about removing functionality. But where an OS and suite of programs are provided as a "set piece", they are both eminently usable.
Its when users want to break out of that "Unix-geek-set-it-up-for-granmda" mould that FOSS usability falls down. None of the intermediate "power users" can figure out how to install a Wifi card, or even an application/game they downloaded from a vendor site... so they don't want *nix around their desktop at work and they don't speak enthusiatically about it to friends and family. They feel savy adopting Firefox and wowing people with that; But Linux? Fuggetaboudit. These people outnumber hardcore *nix admins and basement enthusiasts by orders of magnitude.
So a typical Linux distro is very usable already-- as a thin/thick client in a controlled setting.
To go beyond this, people need more technical help from the layers underneath the desktop:
1. An identifiable brand for an umbrella Linux desktop standard. Maybe LSB4 can be marketed by the various distros as LMPC "Linux Media PC" Inside.
2. LMPC will need a standard binary interface for hardware drivers. That doesn't mean more performance-critical drivers can't be handled the way they are now, it just means the ABI is available for vendors wanting to supply drivers to the customer.
3. An exhaustive and well-maintained Hardware Compatability List to help people with their hardware purchasing decisions. I am astounded that nothing better than the HCL at linuxquestions.org seems to exist. Freeform Googling for compatible hardware is not good enough.
4. LMPC will also need a standard ABI for applications, with a clear demarcation of where the OS ends and where applications begin. Withoiut this, users have to filter their whole application-shopping experience through repositories and their dependency-checking databases; Mac users don't need this tarbaby and neither do we.
5. The upshot of LSB4 and item #4 above is that we (hopefully) get a robust and stable API. Desktop Linux then finally looks like a real platform that can win the confidence of more creative types.
6. Improve documentation and context-sensitive help. This should be a natural offshoot of good programming practices: Document and collect your use-cases and make sure the team reviews them often (esp. when making decisions since they'll throw mistaken assumptions into sharp relief). Near the end of your release cycle, you already have a document that shows just how your user documentation should flow (and how to test your product).
I'll add that all levels of development need to maintain focus on their audience through documented use-cases. Even you Linus.
7. More services/daemons ought to be made responsible for persisting their own configuration data to disk. That means Xorg provides an API to alter and serialize video settings, instead of leaving it up to a vast array of outsider hacks like Yet Another Config Tool By Bucky and Stewart, all of which poorly comprehend the conf file they're dealing with.
Gnome and KDE cannot help much more than they are with mainstream adoption. Probably the best they can do now is to take advantage of #7 by providing standard config widgets as services become capable of writing their own config files. Perhaps applying some pressure to those lower layers would help. Setting up a netowrk share or adding a new peripheral should not be a CLI-bound black art, nor should it be a sometimes-candy-coated experience that shifts drastically between distros.
A repeat of S. Korea's (or even the UK's) success with broadband is the last thing ATT-like behemoths want. It's too egalitarian. They want their own corporate media/data/services apparatus artificially elevated above the fray, to prevent competition from upstarts and outsiders. It makes their existence (and stock price) much more serene and less uncertain.
Corporatists are trying mightily to merge the interests of common carriers with content providers and information services, to the point where they must leave the Internet neglected and apart from their "respectable" network.
I wonder if they'll use the switchover to IPv6 as an excuse to acutally implement this.
What about those of us who may eat fast food (yeah, I admit it :-) but never actually go inside?
Then you get the kid to cry and scream when they get home, until mom and dad let them "Install the special program" to download the rest of the movie from the PC.