Come on! There are Linux distributions which are exactly aimed at that goal!
But: hardware vendors do not like to open-source their drivers, so we'd need to bundle user-friendly distributions to specific hardware like Apple does! Invent the Linux PC and market it. That will do it. (But that would require open-sourced 3D hardware. Hey, IBM, wanna do something for Linux? Sell open-sourced 3D cards instead of open-sourcing databases almost noone really needs and wants!)
At least almost: you still won't be able to attract the gamers. But there are already ongoing efforts for open-source games of high quality, eg. Nexuiz, Planeshift, Worldforge,... and as time goes by, these games will grow and get addons over and over. It seems like what has happened to the OS, then to Office suites and apps, is now also happening to the game genre.
Linux has ONE big advantage: we do not need to reinvent the wheel over and over and over. And we have a lot of time to invent one type of wheel after the other.
By the way: what is a good measure for the success of Linux? IMHO it is not the installed userbase. It is the number of Linux enthusiasts actively contributing to it.
Is he really one of us? I don't think so. He argues like a Windoze luser: he just complains instead of helping the community. I do not recommand ANYONE using Linux for personal use -- I'm glad all those non-contributing people stay out of our business and do not start to complain about every little unimportance.
The state of sound support in Linux is quite good, nowadays -- although not perfect. THE ONLY PROBLEM we have, are outdated apps which don't support recent sound servers like ARTS and ESD. But, hell, Linux is backwards-compatible as it is probably no other OS. How about backwards-compatibility on Windoze machines?? This guy could even fix that issue himself by updating the sound part of his OSS apps. Otherwise he just wouldn't have simultaneous playback, but, hey, the KDE ARTS sound server shuts himself down after a specific time of inacivity -- and then every OSS app works just fine!
That's easy: they couldn't afford providing support for all hardware...
Btw, that's the reason why Macs just work: Mac OS X does not need to recognize and work on every hardware component there is on the market.
So what most people are missing in a comparison between Mac OS X and Linux is: Linux supports A LOT OF DIFFERENT hardware and lets the user choose at least to SOME extent what hardware he wants to run.
We have SELinux. But we don't use it where it is of most use: securing web browsers and, in general, all network clients (ICQ, IRC,...). Look at firewalls available on Windows PCs: they let the user choose if he wants an application to be allowed to connect to specific sites. Why don't we use SELinux to do that under Linux?
And when it comes to browser security: why don't we integrate Firefox with SELinux? Each time Firefox connects to a site, its security domain gets switched! Browser bugs could not do any harm any more...
... for these components, Linux support is in general not THAT problematic. But what about power managment features, things that one needs most on a notebook? I guess they are still not doing enough. At least this short selection of support items shows that they are not aware of the problems one usually has with notebooks... (and what about the internal modem???)
... is a good notebook with a silent drive from Fujitsu, eg. the MHT2080AT with 80 gigs. Not cheap, but portable, fast and reliable. And, to be honest: real good silencer kits cost more than the difference between a PC and a good notebook.
Isn't there an automated network disk backup tool for paranoids like me?
Well, I'm not really paranoid, but I had some cases where faulty file system drivers or bad RAM modules changed the content of some of my files and where I have then overwritten my backup with these bad files.
Isn't there any automatic backup solution that avoids such a thing? What I have in mind: there should be several autonomous instances of backup servers (which may actually reside on desktop PCs linked via LAN) that control each other on a regular basis. They should also keep back old versions of files as far as disk space allows.
Then, there should be a KDE tray applet showing me the state of the backup server network. It would indicate if servers haven't been cross-checked for some time or if CRC errors or general malfunction problems have occurred.
Wouldn't that be nice? Never ever care again for your backups. It's all done in the background and in a total paranoid manner.
Someone who thinks that it matters how long your passwords on a Windows box are, is not paranoid, he just looks like a fool. Second, IT security guys talk of him being paranoid? Gosh, these guys must have been educated by Bill Gates personally.
I guess he uses IE -- because out of a VMware box that can make no harm -- except spying out all of your network and web passwords.
Well, writing plugins for Firefox is not too hard. You just need to set up a central server where the plugin can post your current browsing location... it will then make a lookup and display all people being online. A click should then pop up a message window from your external IM client.
Site-related chat rooms could, of course, be implemented server-side and independent from an IM client.
How does it count all the countless downloads from unofficial mirrors? And shippings with Linux distros? Downloads through the Gentoo Linux distfiles repository?
Intel Pro Wireless adapters are pretty good supported. But they require proprietary firmware to installed into the OS. That's a little problem.
Second, most IBM ThinkPads suffer from Linux support in respest to their ACPI support. When using ACPI, the OS must switch off many components of the system on its own. That's a problem when using suspend to RAM. Most thinkpads consume ten times the power as they should.
Third, there should be user configuration tools to configure the functionality of ACPI buttons. For example: should the system hibernate when pressing the power off button or call a shutdown command?
Maybe, we just should develop our own open-sourced Linux hardware. *g*
They should better start to give better support for Linux on their PCs. Especially the X series notebooks are VERY problematic when it comes to BIOS/Controller flash upgrades -- because these updates only work under DOS!
Shame on them. I WONT buy a USB floppy disk drive just for that. (would that even work??)
... looking for some investors helping to produce a graphics card 'owned' by the community?:-))
The open source community could develop the hardware design themselves in a public forum. Of course, we'd need Linus or RMS or some other great guy from the Linux world to lead/represent such a project. Maybe IBM could support that???
Maybe it is finally time to make a progression from software desgin to software AND hardware design, isn't it? Linux hardware would be the last link to ultimate Linux superiority. *g*
I would definitely buy a Linux notebook whose hardware has been developed by the open source/Linux community.
Slashdot Mirror
Come on! There are Linux distributions which are exactly aimed at that goal!
... and as time goes by, these games will grow and get addons over and over. It seems like what has happened to the OS, then to Office suites and apps, is now also happening to the game genre.
But: hardware vendors do not like to open-source their drivers, so we'd need to bundle user-friendly distributions to specific hardware like Apple does! Invent the Linux PC and market it. That will do it. (But that would require open-sourced 3D hardware. Hey, IBM, wanna do something for Linux? Sell open-sourced 3D cards instead of open-sourcing databases almost noone really needs and wants!)
At least almost: you still won't be able to attract the gamers. But there are already ongoing efforts for open-source games of high quality, eg. Nexuiz, Planeshift, Worldforge,
Linux has ONE big advantage: we do not need to reinvent the wheel over and over and over. And we have a lot of time to invent one type of wheel after the other.
By the way: what is a good measure for the success of Linux? IMHO it is not the installed userbase. It is the number of Linux enthusiasts actively contributing to it.
Is he really one of us? I don't think so. He argues like a Windoze luser: he just complains instead of helping the community. I do not recommand ANYONE using Linux for personal use -- I'm glad all those non-contributing people stay out of our business and do not start to complain about every little unimportance.
The state of sound support in Linux is quite good, nowadays -- although not perfect. THE ONLY PROBLEM we have, are outdated apps which don't support recent sound servers like ARTS and ESD. But, hell, Linux is backwards-compatible as it is probably no other OS. How about backwards-compatibility on Windoze machines?? This guy could even fix that issue himself by updating the sound part of his OSS apps. Otherwise he just wouldn't have simultaneous playback, but, hey, the KDE ARTS sound server shuts himself down after a specific time of inacivity -- and then every OSS app works just fine!
Additionaly, Mac und Linux users are usually totally different types of guys...
That's easy: they couldn't afford providing support for all hardware...
Btw, that's the reason why Macs just work: Mac OS X does not need to recognize and work on every hardware component there is on the market.
So what most people are missing in a comparison between Mac OS X and Linux is: Linux supports A LOT OF DIFFERENT hardware and lets the user choose at least to SOME extent what hardware he wants to run.
... to discuss such trivial things on /.?
/.
Maybe it is time to find a replacement for
Is there anyß
... really want bloody lamers complaining about all and everything they are too dumb to do under Linux?
The rule of thumb for Linux users is:
if it is not there: just do it yourself. Mac users ain't quite that sort of people.
...to fix a few extremely tricky bugs in Firefox and other products...
We have SELinux. But we don't use it where it is of most use: securing web browsers and, in general, all network clients (ICQ, IRC, ...). Look at firewalls available on Windows PCs: they let the user choose if he wants an application to be allowed to connect to specific sites. Why don't we use SELinux to do that under Linux?
And when it comes to browser security: why don't we integrate Firefox with SELinux? Each time Firefox connects to a site, its security domain gets switched! Browser bugs could not do any harm any more...
... for these components, Linux support is in general not THAT problematic. But what about power managment features, things that one needs most on a notebook? I guess they are still not doing enough. At least this short selection of support items shows that they are not aware of the problems one usually has with notebooks... (and what about the internal modem???)
Many open sourcers want to be free and independent of non-free code. The use of Java contradicts that.
First try to understand others -- then argue with them, and not the other way round.
It all depends...
... is a good notebook with a silent drive from Fujitsu, eg. the MHT2080AT with 80 gigs. Not cheap, but portable, fast and reliable. And, to be honest: real good silencer kits cost more than the difference between a PC and a good notebook.
for Gmail??? It is better to have high speed internet for GMX, Hotmail and others, but Gmail is pretty speedy even on thinbands :-)).
Well, I'll rather expect some more evidence.
Isn't there an automated network disk backup tool for paranoids like me?
Well, I'm not really paranoid, but I had some cases where faulty file system drivers or bad RAM modules changed the content of some of my files and where I have then overwritten my backup with these bad files.
Isn't there any automatic backup solution that avoids such a thing? What I have in mind: there should be several autonomous instances of backup servers (which may actually reside on desktop PCs linked via LAN) that control each other on a regular basis. They should also keep back old versions of files as far as disk space allows.
Then, there should be a KDE tray applet showing me the state of the backup server network. It would indicate if servers haven't been cross-checked for some time or if CRC errors or general malfunction problems have occurred.
Wouldn't that be nice? Never ever care again for your backups. It's all done in the background and in a total paranoid manner.
Who's gonna enjoy preview pics of Longhorn?
;-)
Slashdot is getting stranger and stranger
Someone who thinks that it matters how long your passwords on a Windows box are, is not paranoid, he just looks like a fool. Second, IT security guys talk of him being paranoid? Gosh, these guys must have been educated by Bill Gates personally.
I guess he uses IE -- because out of a VMware box that can make no harm -- except spying out all of your network and web passwords.
Gimme a proof.
I only allow connections to my ssh daemon -- and I only accept public key authentication...
:-))
So what?
Well, writing plugins for Firefox is not too hard. You just need to set up a central server where the plugin can post your current browsing location... it will then make a lookup and display all people being online. A click should then pop up a message window from your external IM client.
Site-related chat rooms could, of course, be implemented server-side and independent from an IM client.
That should be pretty easy to do.
How does it count all the countless downloads from unofficial mirrors? And shippings with Linux distros? Downloads through the Gentoo Linux distfiles repository?
Hehe. Just open the cups TCP port! Amazingly, FC3 is too stupid to do that on its own... so it recognizes printers via UDP but cannot transfer data!!
Intel Pro Wireless adapters are pretty good supported. But they require proprietary firmware to installed into the OS. That's a little problem.
Second, most IBM ThinkPads suffer from Linux support in respest to their ACPI support. When using ACPI, the OS must switch off many components of the system on its own. That's a problem when using suspend to RAM. Most thinkpads consume ten times the power as they should.
Third, there should be user configuration tools to configure the functionality of ACPI buttons. For example: should the system hibernate when pressing the power off button or call a shutdown command?
Maybe, we just should develop our own open-sourced Linux hardware. *g*
They should better start to give better support for Linux on their PCs. Especially the X series notebooks are VERY problematic when it comes to BIOS/Controller flash upgrades -- because these updates only work under DOS!
Shame on them. I WONT buy a USB floppy disk drive just for that. (would that even work??)
... looking for some investors helping to produce a graphics card 'owned' by the community? :-))
The open source community could develop the hardware design themselves in a public forum. Of course, we'd need Linus or RMS or some other great guy from the Linux world to lead/represent such a project. Maybe IBM could support that???
Maybe it is finally time to make a progression from software desgin to software AND hardware design, isn't it? Linux hardware would be the last link to ultimate Linux superiority. *g*
I would definitely buy a Linux notebook whose hardware has been developed by the open source/Linux community.