Man, fanboy is a word that's just getting WAAAAY over-used.
Yep. Anytime "somebody" disagrees with "anybody", "anybody" is 'obviously' a fanboy who follows 'the hive mind' or 'group think'. At least people aren't using "zealot" as much these days.
I paid as well. The time that I save has definitely earned me more than $40. I still have the ad banner up there to bring in revenue for them. It doesn't take up that much space.
Paying for quality software is always better than using bad free software. Congratulations for seeing the wisdom Opera.
That being said, I dropped Gnome years ago because I felt it was focused more on programmers doing what they wanted and giving other programmers cool programming stuff, and KDE was much more focused on an easy to use experience.
Around the 3.1.4 days of KDE, I began to read the documentation of both environments to get an idea of what I should use. Without a doubt, I can honestly say that I actually enjoyed reading about KDE and how to use it. I was being sold on it, and I appreciated being sold on it. I read as much as I could find on the KDE web site about the base install.
After that, I went to the GNOME web site, and honestly, the docs put me to sleep. They were harder to read than man pages. There was no direction. The documentation gave information that wasn't already obvious. For example, it would say something similar to this, "To open a file, click on the file menu, then select save. To save a file, click on the file menu, then select save.". Don't get me wrong. This information is important, but I don't think that that is the information that people are looking for when they read documentation. I think that GNOME gave a poor explanation of what each software package does, while KDE tells you what it is for and how to use it. GNOME gave a poor quality cheat sheet, while KDE gave a tutorial.
I guess GNOME is more task oriented, while KDE seems more goal oriented. GNOME says, "Hey! Let's build a file menu. After we're done, we can design some kind of app to use it, like a drawing program or something.", while KDE says, "Hey! Let's build a drawing program or something, and we can make it more user friendly by building something like a menu to deal with saving and opening files.".
I honestly couldn't force myself to read through the entire GNOME documentation. I just went with KDE and never regretted it.
As for GUIs, you're right about GUIs being better for many people. That's because it teaches you as you use it. Where as, command lines don't necessarily do that. The typical console apps require "-h" or something to show its choices, and even then it only gives enough information for those who are already familiar with the concept. I teach ESL and high school math to adults, so I believe that I have an idea of what it means to be user friendly for learning styles. I really appreciate you mentioning that you taught as well.
I should add, I just think it's turning into a "boy that called wolf" kind of situation.
It's funny that you should mention that. I was thinking of that just the other day and how it applies to Linux. It's getting tiresome to hear about how each year is the year of Linux. I'm having a difficult time believing it now.
Thanks for speaking about #4. I was wondering about that. If anybody said that it was in a future buggy version, then I would be actually quite pleased. I would be pleased that it's on its way out to the public, and that they are trying stamp out the bugs. At least, that's what I got from reading it casually.:^/
Seriously, everybody, when somebody is about to give you something for free, I really doubt that you should be complaining about it. I know that bashing open source and closed source on/. is popular, but come on. This just about being patient.
Many slashdotters are reminding me of management: "Hi. You're all probably wondering why I called you in for this meeting. There something that I'd like you to program for me, and I'd like it done yesterday!".
It's funny that you should say that. I wonder how many people have thought that up as well. My brother wanted to change things around a little, so he made dynamite [fist with thumb up like you are hitch-hiking] which, of course, beats everything.
I think that internet cafes and schools could make use of Linux as well, because their needs are very limited compared to home users who want to do several types of tasks. Internet cafes and schools also have a network administrator [or equivalent] on hand to deal with surprise errors.
Linux is expected to have changes in the future too. But they would simply go into future versions.
Well, Linux 2.4 & 2.6 is no longer stable-only, so I'm not sure that Linux is the best illustration on stability. Changes often go into previous versions. People backport often.
You make a good point about it being a programmer's heaven. Every so often, the community discusses how companies keep bringing the deadlines too close and how developers need more time to create quality code with less stressful deadlines. Well, it seems that even when a company does give the developers more time, the community doesn't recognize it. It seems that the guilty party here is the consumers.
Well, I'm using a Pentium Classic, which dates to around 1995. I power it off each night, unless I forget or I am compiling. In fact, I power off a few times a day, if I don't expect to come back in half an hour. I think of it as a tv or radio. I don't keep those devices on 24/7 to save hardware costs. I realize business environments are different, but I don't buy into this saving hardware idea.
Just so that you know, I boot up KDE and it doesn't take 5 minutes. Again, I realize that business environments are different, but still.
I don't recall a single hardware problem, or replacement. It's all subjective, but you have to admit that I'm doing something right.
I can verify that this is a good technique. Just use good code first, and then put the IE hacks at the bottom of your style sheet.
...insert good stuff here...
* html ul{blah blah balh} * html li{asdf asdf asdf} * html div{etc. et.c}
The moral of the story here is to put all of your hacks at the bottom of the page, and to start off each hack with "* html", without quotes obviously. If you want to put in some styles that can't be read by IE, you'd put "html>body " before each style. The idea is that IE can't handle ">".
It's all much easier that way. I don't feel so guilty about using styles inappropriately when I do it this way. If IE is no longer being used or is not relevant, then I can just delete the chunk at the bottom to make the file smaller.
I think that it's safe to say that MS also lives in the real world, yet they aren't supporting IE 5. They aren't telling IE 5 users to go to hell, yet they aren't supporting them either. Asking somebody to upgrade isn't even close to telling him to go to hell. There are alternative browsers out there.
Yes, I agree. I see this as an official approval that designers can drop support for IE 5. IE 5 is being used less than Firefox or Opera, if I recall correctly.
It's a good feeling to design clean pages without any CSS hacks.
What are you talking about? The fellow is trying to emphasize that they are listening and that giving constructive feedback is a good thing. Unless I'm saddly mistaken, he's being sarcastic about how giving feedback is too much to ask.
If I'm mistaken, then would somebody please correct me? Otherwise, maybe we should focus less on reading the article, and more on understanding it. Reading != comprehension!
Slashdot Mirror
Well, you could always put this at the top/bottom of your pages:
"This is best enjoyed with the Opera web browser."
Don't force them. Educate them.
I paid as well. The time that I save has definitely earned me more than $40. I still have the ad banner up there to bring in revenue for them. It doesn't take up that much space.
Paying for quality software is always better than using bad free software. Congratulations for seeing the wisdom Opera.
Well, some of the versions only focus on spelling mistakes on slashdot. So, count your blessings.
After that, I went to the GNOME web site, and honestly, the docs put me to sleep. They were harder to read than man pages. There was no direction. The documentation gave information that wasn't already obvious. For example, it would say something similar to this, "To open a file, click on the file menu, then select save. To save a file, click on the file menu, then select save.". Don't get me wrong. This information is important, but I don't think that that is the information that people are looking for when they read documentation. I think that GNOME gave a poor explanation of what each software package does, while KDE tells you what it is for and how to use it. GNOME gave a poor quality cheat sheet, while KDE gave a tutorial.
I guess GNOME is more task oriented, while KDE seems more goal oriented. GNOME says, "Hey! Let's build a file menu. After we're done, we can design some kind of app to use it, like a drawing program or something.", while KDE says, "Hey! Let's build a drawing program or something, and we can make it more user friendly by building something like a menu to deal with saving and opening files.".
I honestly couldn't force myself to read through the entire GNOME documentation. I just went with KDE and never regretted it.
As for GUIs, you're right about GUIs being better for many people. That's because it teaches you as you use it. Where as, command lines don't necessarily do that. The typical console apps require "-h" or something to show its choices, and even then it only gives enough information for those who are already familiar with the concept. I teach ESL and high school math to adults, so I believe that I have an idea of what it means to be user friendly for learning styles. I really appreciate you mentioning that you taught as well.
Thanks for speaking about #4. I was wondering about that. If anybody said that it was in a future buggy version, then I would be actually quite pleased. I would be pleased that it's on its way out to the public, and that they are trying stamp out the bugs. At least, that's what I got from reading it casually. :^/
/. is popular, but come on. This just about being patient.
Seriously, everybody, when somebody is about to give you something for free, I really doubt that you should be complaining about it. I know that bashing open source and closed source on
Many slashdotters are reminding me of management: "Hi. You're all probably wondering why I called you in for this meeting. There something that I'd like you to program for me, and I'd like it done yesterday!".
How's it going?I agree with you on this.
An extra benefit is that you will have more people to exchange files with, because they now have software that is compatible with those file formats.
I'll have to give that a try to see what happens. I doubt that I'll get very far, but it might get a laugh or 2.
It's funny that you should say that. I wonder how many people have thought that up as well. My brother wanted to change things around a little, so he made dynamite [fist with thumb up like you are hitch-hiking] which, of course, beats everything.
I really appreciate it.
/. where people are labelled spelling Nazis.
It's also quite surprising to see this on
I think that internet cafes and schools could make use of Linux as well, because their needs are very limited compared to home users who want to do several types of tasks. Internet cafes and schools also have a network administrator [or equivalent] on hand to deal with surprise errors.
You make a good point about it being a programmer's heaven. Every so often, the community discusses how companies keep bringing the deadlines too close and how developers need more time to create quality code with less stressful deadlines. Well, it seems that even when a company does give the developers more time, the community doesn't recognize it. It seems that the guilty party here is the consumers.
I agree that GMail isn't much to sneeze at. It's not bad, though.
I like Yahoo! the best. It's so well integrated throughout its system.
Thanks for the advice. As obvious as your idea is, I would have never thought of it.
Well, I'm using a Pentium Classic, which dates to around 1995. I power it off each night, unless I forget or I am compiling. In fact, I power off a few times a day, if I don't expect to come back in half an hour. I think of it as a tv or radio. I don't keep those devices on 24/7 to save hardware costs. I realize business environments are different, but I don't buy into this saving hardware idea.
Just so that you know, I boot up KDE and it doesn't take 5 minutes. Again, I realize that business environments are different, but still.
I don't recall a single hardware problem, or replacement. It's all subjective, but you have to admit that I'm doing something right.
...do we actually have to wear red shirts? Red isn't my colour, and besides, I'm a bit superstitious.
That's an awesome punchline. I really didn't expect it.
It's all much easier that way. I don't feel so guilty about using styles inappropriately when I do it this way. If IE is no longer being used or is not relevant, then I can just delete the chunk at the bottom to make the file smaller.
On the other hand, maybe I misunderstand you.
I think that it's safe to say that MS also lives in the real world, yet they aren't supporting IE 5. They aren't telling IE 5 users to go to hell, yet they aren't supporting them either. Asking somebody to upgrade isn't even close to telling him to go to hell. There are alternative browsers out there.
Yes, I agree. I see this as an official approval that designers can drop support for IE 5. IE 5 is being used less than Firefox or Opera, if I recall correctly.
It's a good feeling to design clean pages without any CSS hacks.
What are you talking about? The fellow is trying to emphasize that they are listening and that giving constructive feedback is a good thing. Unless I'm saddly mistaken, he's being sarcastic about how giving feedback is too much to ask.
If I'm mistaken, then would somebody please correct me? Otherwise, maybe we should focus less on reading the article, and more on understanding it. Reading != comprehension!