Switching to Linux doesn't need to lead to frustration. While it may sometimes seem that everyone plays games that require Windows, really it's a small percentage of the "family member" population. My slightly-technical younger brother and my very non-technical girlfriend both asked me to switch them over to Linux and are very happy with their Linux-defaulting dual-boot systems. Most of the (usually non-technical) installees at the installfests I've been a part are also happy with their Linux systems.
The "Linux is hostile to new users" argument is no longer as true as it once was. It's a bit different from Windows, but no harder to use.
Which is something that pretty well every Linux distro *forces* users to do without inconveniencing them at all. Why should security be something that is optional and that requires advanced technical knowledge and understanding to enable in an operating system? It just doesn't make sense to me.
Except it won't be BitTorrent, it'll be Avalanche. And the "no stealing" clause won't be in the EULA, it'll be hardcoded. And no one will end up using it.
Believe it or not, some users may actually (*gasp*) like using Linux better.
I am a full-fledged philosophical GNU/Linux zealot now, but when I started using Linux as my desktop OS sevenish years ago, I had no idea about the philosophy behind the software (I was only 12 years old after all). What I did know was that my Linux system never crashed, let me choose everything about how it looked and acted, ran fairly smoothly on my Pentium Pro 133 with 16MB of RAM, didn't have an annoying little Office Assistant offering to write letters for me, let me kill programs simply by right-clicking on their icons in the taskbar (and actually killed them when I told it to), didn't need an antivirus, managed to read files created on the Windows computers at school and my parents' Macs with equal ease and accuracy, had a million choices for every application that were all free so I wasn't stuck using software I didn't like and that Windows (and Mac OS) had none of these features. Of course, Windows has improved greatly since those days (Windows XP is almost usable in comparison to Windows 98 and NT4), but Linux has improved even more and when I leave my Linux machine at home or at work or at school to use a Windows computer for something, the Windows interface feels clumsy and irritating, never letting me do things how I want to do them.
The users in Vienna will choose the system they like better, and hopefully many of those users will have a similar experience to mine.
I fail to see a difference. If you go to a library solely use their internet, it's no different from if you go to get a book and happen to check your email while you're there. If you go and sit in your own car outside someone else's house and listen to the radio, it's the same as listening to it at home (well, it's a bit weirder to sit in your car, but equally legal). Fact is, the guy was on public property, accessing public, unencrypted radio signals. There's nothing illegal about that as far as I know. If the connection was encrypted it would be a different story - cracking the encryption on a wireless connection is illegal in many districts - however, that was simply not the case here.
While SMB is a non-essential port for many of us (those of us without Windows machines), it is essential for your average switching-from-Windows Linux noob. If someone who is thinking about switching goes and installs FC4, goes to get his files from his Windows machine and discovers that it doesn't work, he isn't going to read the release notes and figure out how to get it working. He's going to give up and go back to XP, where it works out of the box.
FC isn't aimed at server users who care about security above all else. That's Debian or OpenBSD's terrain. FC is supposed to be a desktop distro, and desktop distros should work out of the box for your average Windows user. That's the only way people will switch.
Re:Unlicensed copies of proprietary software?
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· Score: 2, Insightful
I agree that the willingness of the labs to use unlicensed non-free software is probably not a good fact upon which to base decisions about software. However, it is important to remember that no one - not even Microsoft - is going to go after a community computer lab in developing Africa for using pirated software. It would be a public relations nightmare, and not worth their time and money since they can't afford to pay for the software anyway. For these labs, pirated software is a perfectly viable option, so it needs to be taken into account in policy decisions.
And damn do I ever wish they would regulate internet service too. Then maybe Telus would actually have to stop sucking so much. Luckily, I'm in a good mood right now; otherwise there would be a lot of profanity aimed at Telus in this post.
At work a couple of years ago I was assigned to update an MS Access/VBA (ugh) application that had been written by a different programmer a few years previous. Upon delving into the code I discovered two things:
1) There were no comments. 2) The mostly descriptively-named variables were all spelled wrong. I found out later that the programmer didn't speak much English.
It took me forever to figure out what the code was supposed to do, and I ended up just rewriting the application from scratch because it was so bad.
Yes, it would seem that what they've essentially done is implement features that free software that does the same thing implemented - hm - five or ten years ago.
Yes, when I was in high school the school board did this too. Their policies state that all new computers purchased for use in schools must have certain specifications, one of those specs being that they run Windows. They're even restrictive of OSX - when our school got a dual G4 for doing digital video editing, the tech wouldn't allow them to connect it to the network because it was a "security risk." Really, the only security risk on our network was the tech - he didn't know how to do a damn thing. Oh, and possibly the 10 or so up-to-school-board-spec Windows 98 labs.
And they wonder why so few students are going through the AP comp sci stream these days.
In our comp sci department, many of the labs are now Dells running Slackware. Sun machines are getting old and being replaced by Dells or not being replaced at all.
Now if only we could convince the university to convert the Windows labs they operate (which are separate from the comp sci deparment) to Linux. We're working on them.
I have an nVidia card myself, but I've always found the drivers for it that are included with X to be far superior to those provided by nVidia. Perhaps instead of complaining about ATI not providing a decent driver, people should use, contribute to and support open-source drivers for their video cards and other such products.
Linux users should be supporting open-source projects anyway, this is one way to do it and get some benefit on the side.
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Switching to Linux doesn't need to lead to frustration. While it may sometimes seem that everyone plays games that require Windows, really it's a small percentage of the "family member" population. My slightly-technical younger brother and my very non-technical girlfriend both asked me to switch them over to Linux and are very happy with their Linux-defaulting dual-boot systems. Most of the (usually non-technical) installees at the installfests I've been a part are also happy with their Linux systems.
The "Linux is hostile to new users" argument is no longer as true as it once was. It's a bit different from Windows, but no harder to use.
Which is something that pretty well every Linux distro *forces* users to do without inconveniencing them at all. Why should security be something that is optional and that requires advanced technical knowledge and understanding to enable in an operating system? It just doesn't make sense to me.
Except it won't be BitTorrent, it'll be Avalanche. And the "no stealing" clause won't be in the EULA, it'll be hardcoded. And no one will end up using it.
Believe it or not, some users may actually (*gasp*) like using Linux better.
I am a full-fledged philosophical GNU/Linux zealot now, but when I started using Linux as my desktop OS sevenish years ago, I had no idea about the philosophy behind the software (I was only 12 years old after all). What I did know was that my Linux system never crashed, let me choose everything about how it looked and acted, ran fairly smoothly on my Pentium Pro 133 with 16MB of RAM, didn't have an annoying little Office Assistant offering to write letters for me, let me kill programs simply by right-clicking on their icons in the taskbar (and actually killed them when I told it to), didn't need an antivirus, managed to read files created on the Windows computers at school and my parents' Macs with equal ease and accuracy, had a million choices for every application that were all free so I wasn't stuck using software I didn't like and that Windows (and Mac OS) had none of these features. Of course, Windows has improved greatly since those days (Windows XP is almost usable in comparison to Windows 98 and NT4), but Linux has improved even more and when I leave my Linux machine at home or at work or at school to use a Windows computer for something, the Windows interface feels clumsy and irritating, never letting me do things how I want to do them.
The users in Vienna will choose the system they like better, and hopefully many of those users will have a similar experience to mine.
I fail to see a difference. If you go to a library solely use their internet, it's no different from if you go to get a book and happen to check your email while you're there. If you go and sit in your own car outside someone else's house and listen to the radio, it's the same as listening to it at home (well, it's a bit weirder to sit in your car, but equally legal). Fact is, the guy was on public property, accessing public, unencrypted radio signals. There's nothing illegal about that as far as I know. If the connection was encrypted it would be a different story - cracking the encryption on a wireless connection is illegal in many districts - however, that was simply not the case here.
5. XFCE = Ferrari (with a few scratches in the paint)
[adam@adam ~]$ whois leostoller.com
Domain Name: LEOSTOLLER.COM
Registrar: REGISTER.COM, INC.
Whois Server: whois.register.com
Referral URL: http://www.register.com/
Name Server: NS1.ONR.COM
Name Server: NS2.ONR.COM
Status: ACTIVE
Updated Date: 16-feb-2005
Creation Date: 04-jul-2003
Expiration Date: 04-jul-2006
Organization:
Tom McKay
Tom McKay
PO Box 201990
Austin, TX 78720
US
Phone: 512-784-9051
Fax..: 512-219-7724
Email: ibmfo@yahoo.com
Registrar Name....: Register.com
Registrar Whois...: whois.register.com
Registrar Homepage: http://www.register.com/
Domain Name: LEOSTOLLER.COM
Created on..............: Fri, Jul 04, 2003
Expires on..............: Tue, Jul 04, 2006
Record last updated on..: Wed, Feb 16, 2005
While SMB is a non-essential port for many of us (those of us without Windows machines), it is essential for your average switching-from-Windows Linux noob. If someone who is thinking about switching goes and installs FC4, goes to get his files from his Windows machine and discovers that it doesn't work, he isn't going to read the release notes and figure out how to get it working. He's going to give up and go back to XP, where it works out of the box.
FC isn't aimed at server users who care about security above all else. That's Debian or OpenBSD's terrain. FC is supposed to be a desktop distro, and desktop distros should work out of the box for your average Windows user. That's the only way people will switch.
I agree that the willingness of the labs to use unlicensed non-free software is probably not a good fact upon which to base decisions about software. However, it is important to remember that no one - not even Microsoft - is going to go after a community computer lab in developing Africa for using pirated software. It would be a public relations nightmare, and not worth their time and money since they can't afford to pay for the software anyway. For these labs, pirated software is a perfectly viable option, so it needs to be taken into account in policy decisions.
And damn do I ever wish they would regulate internet service too. Then maybe Telus would actually have to stop sucking so much. Luckily, I'm in a good mood right now; otherwise there would be a lot of profanity aimed at Telus in this post.
At work a couple of years ago I was assigned to update an MS Access/VBA (ugh) application that had been written by a different programmer a few years previous. Upon delving into the code I discovered two things:
1) There were no comments.
2) The mostly descriptively-named variables were all spelled wrong. I found out later that the programmer didn't speak much English.
It took me forever to figure out what the code was supposed to do, and I ended up just rewriting the application from scratch because it was so bad.
Yes, it would seem that what they've essentially done is implement features that free software that does the same thing implemented - hm - five or ten years ago.
Funny how that works.
Yes, when I was in high school the school board did this too. Their policies state that all new computers purchased for use in schools must have certain specifications, one of those specs being that they run Windows. They're even restrictive of OSX - when our school got a dual G4 for doing digital video editing, the tech wouldn't allow them to connect it to the network because it was a "security risk." Really, the only security risk on our network was the tech - he didn't know how to do a damn thing. Oh, and possibly the 10 or so up-to-school-board-spec Windows 98 labs.
And they wonder why so few students are going through the AP comp sci stream these days.
In our comp sci department, many of the labs are now Dells running Slackware. Sun machines are getting old and being replaced by Dells or not being replaced at all.
Now if only we could convince the university to convert the Windows labs they operate (which are separate from the comp sci deparment) to Linux. We're working on them.
I have an nVidia card myself, but I've always found the drivers for it that are included with X to be far superior to those provided by nVidia. Perhaps instead of complaining about ATI not providing a decent driver, people should use, contribute to and support open-source drivers for their video cards and other such products.
Linux users should be supporting open-source projects anyway, this is one way to do it and get some benefit on the side.