IMO it is in apps department where GNOME has forged a large and growing lead.
That should change after KDE 3 is released, since the API will remain stable (binary-compatible even!) for some time, allowing an application base to build up. I think it was the big change from KDE 1 to KDE 2 that made KDE fall behind in the apps department, and GNOME will likely experience a similar phenomenon with its next major release, probably occurring within KDE 3's lifetime.
Besides, I like Konqueror is better than Nautilus, and KOffice 1.1 is looking good (the 1.0 release was a total joke, but so much has changed since then, just try it!). Aethra is coming along well in the "Giant E-mail/PIM monstrosity" department. Also, I think aRts contains much of the functionality that is in GStreamer (but I could be mistaken). Even if GStreamer is better, it is hardly a GNOME-specific project and could be adopted as part of KDE's multimedia system.
More than 500
computer developers, including over 100 full-time, paid developers,
contribute their time and effort to the project.
What a cool statistic! Now I'm really interested to see this statistic for KDE. Somehow I get the impression that the number of paid KDE developers is smaller than 100.
How is it that KDE is keeping up with them then? (surpassing, even, IMHO) Greater support from non-paid developers? Perhaps I am wrong about the number of paid KDE developers.
I've only used OS X for 10 seconds at CompUSA once, so I'm afraid I can't provide much informed commentary. I can say this, though: OS X was meant to provide people with something interesting and different so they would take notice and help Apple gain market share. AtheOS is only meant to be a pet project for one guy, and despite its GUI-oriented nature, it does not go in for much eyecandy (yet?).
AtheOS isn't really mature enough to compare in any meaningful way to OS X. That's why I say it is 'an OS with promise.'
When you have people being paid to help support a peice of software I feel you get a superior product. Some guy coding a peice of software in his scarce spare time is not going to be able to get as much work done and the product will not be complete. So what if OSS people care about their products more, they code only for their own needs and the "customer" comes second.
</paraphrase>
Extreme arguments can be made both ways. The ideal situation is to pay coders who also care about their product. Perhaps some innovative solution needs to come along where people can support open-source programmers with tips or something. If SourceForge adopted an optional donation system, we could see how well something like that would work on a large scale. Imagine: people being paid to do what they like! What a concept!
All the apps (WordPerfect, etc) are kept on different servers and run with rsh. They use memory and hard disk space on a different machine. I imagine the/home directory is an NFS mount on a different machine with TONS of disk space. That server runs KDE, and only KDE, all the time, nothing else. It's not their file server.
How can a comment simultaneously have a -1 rating and a "Funny" designation, and it hasn't even been modded at all yet?
Re:Quick release
on
KDE 2.2 Tagged
·
· Score: 3, Informative
KDE is sticking to a short release philosophy even for 3.0. The transition to 3.0 will be nothing like the long transition from 1.1.2 to 2.0. Basically 3.0 will be almost a direct port of KDE 2 to QT3 (of course adding a few new features though).
The big reason for the major version number change is binary compatibility. KDE 3 will be using QT3 and GCC 3.0, which will both break binary compatibility with KDE 2. At the same time, the KDE guys will use the opportunity to fix any problems that have been uncovered with the 2.0 API (since the API can't be changed much without breaking compatibility). Therefore, KDE 3.0 should be a very stable desktop (since it's not a complete rewrite), based on the newest and best in Open-Source technology, with refined APIs for developers.
Once 3.0 is out, they plan to standardize on it for a long time to allow a large application base to build up. Of course in the meantime they will make lots of point releases with the great new functionality we've come to expect from KDE releases.
The future looks bright:-)
Re:I hope that sounds better in Japanese
on
WonderSwan Advance
·
· Score: 3, Funny
Oh, that's right. I forgot that Japanese people love the look and sound of English words, but many have no idea what they mean. I learned this from Dave Barry's book "Dave Barry Does Japan" (very funny book, I recommend it) which includes the following actual quotations from T-shirts worn by unsuspecting Japanese citizens:
I am Plump Mary.
We're Bone Nob. We're happy our original dance.
Nurse Mentality
We hope to always have an open
A souvenir goods make us happy anytime. Don't you Think So?
Boneractive Wear
If you head over to www.engrish.com you can see more examples of this hilarious stuff.
If you never had video games before and then Pong came along it was the best and most fun game.
Right. I'm not disputing that. But if, at that time, you had had other, more advanced games to play, you probably would have played those instead and had even more fun. Pong doesn't stack up in sheer fun to games that came after it. That doesn't mean that Pong was never fun. I have played Pong and had fun. However, I have also played MarioKart 64 against 4 other people and had *much more* fun than Pong could ever hope to be. If you had a choice between Pong and 4-player MarioKart, which would you choose?
I hope that sounds better in Japanese
on
WonderSwan Advance
·
· Score: 5, Funny
WonderSwan? WTH?
Do they have a companion home console system named SuperDuck or UberSquirrel?
I can just imagine the games they would make featuring "WonderSwan" and her sidekick "MegaGoose."
The situation without passport is even more insecure because:
- it relies on individual vendors to provide security for communication
- consumers trust these vendors to do so in most cases
- any vendor protocol is subject to the same security risks as passport
- most vendors are script kiddies rather than security experts (i.e. they are quite clueless about implementing proper security)
Yes, but since the current system isn't centralized, a hacker can only crack one transaction or vendor at a time. With a centralized passport system, a hacker could crack one username/password and gain access to incredible amounts of information and purchasing power. Plus when the Passport servers are cracked (I think it's inevitable that they will be at some time, somehow) the consequences will be catastrophic.
Dude, you guys yelling "Where's Pong?" need to get a clue! Pong is *not* one of the best games of all time! It gets kind of boring after a while. Pong was the first; it was influential, groundbreaking, innovative, visionary, and even fun in small doses. However, that doesn't make it the best game of all time. The best games are the ones that are the most fun!
I think compiling a list of games that are more fun than Pong wouldn't be too hard. Now, if the list was of the most important games of all time, I'm sure Pong would top the list.
Where, right now, let's say there are 10 text editors, each has a group of 3 people working on it. If we were to evaluate and eliminate the worthless projects (as an organization would do) we can better pool our resources together so we can have 2 maybe 3 text editors, each with 10 to 15 people working on them.
OK, you're making a big wrong assumption here, and it is that people will do what you tell them.
These people aren't doing their text editors to further some cause! They are doing it because it is fun, or to learn, or to fill a specific need, or to waste time, or a million other different reasons. They are NOT working on their text editors simply to make Open Source Software as a whole better. If they were, your scheme would work fine. However, if your "organizational unit" disbands the Text Editor XY team and "assigns" all its coders to Text Editor AB, what makes you think they will want to work on it? Anyway, how are you proposing to stop them from continuing to work on their old text editor? They can do whatever they darn well please.
The problem with your proposal is that open source people aren't working toward a common goal like the people in a business. No common committee can address their individual reasons and goals. Business management techniques are totally inapplicable to any traditional open-source project. I think the dept. line for this article said it best: cat-herders-needed-apply-within
Emulating SNES games on the iPAQ would be too slow. I've got a NES emulator on mine and it rocks, but it just barely keeps up (get too many sprites on-screen and it slows down below real-time speed). That doesn't stop me from playing it though:-) I'm finally going to beat Super Mario Bros. 3 (currently on World 7)
Debian on my iPAQ would be great! Thanks for the link! I see it requires an IBM 1GB Microdrive, though. Those things are expensive (as expensive as the iPAQ itself)!
The other problem with Linux on the iPAQ is that you can't install it without either getting a serial sync-cradle or modifying the hardware of your USB one. Then when you look at the install instructions they are covered with warnings like "If you see the message 'foo' while installing the bootloader, DO NOT continue. Leave your iPAQ on and slowly back away. Doing otherwise may cause your iPAQ to become unbootable or spontaneously explode." I think I'll wait until the install instructions are more foolproof before I risk my $500 investment.
I bet if you asked these same people about using technology to revive, say, John F. Kennedy from the grave to appear in a movie, they would have also been dubious. But that didn't stop Forrest Gump from being a success, mostly because of that technology.
Oh, so that's how they did it! Gosh, movie making technology is getting more advanced all the time!
I think that every Slashdotter, when they go to see this movie, should do what my friend William did when he saw it.
Near the end of the movie, the spaceman (Leo) kisses the human-rights-activist ape (Ari).
this drew lots of "EWWW!" comments from the audience in the theater. Ten seconds later, Leo goes over and kisses that human woman. Everyone in the theater was very quiet, except for my friend William, who immediately yelled out "EWWW!"
I was laughing for a minute and a half afterwards.
What about companies developing in-house apps for their own use? They have no problems with GPLing their programs - the GPL doesn't state that you have to broadcast your program out for free over the Internet, it just says that anyone who gets the binaries must have access to the source and the right to redistribute said binaries and source.
For in-house apps, this isn't a problem, because most in-house apps never even travel outside of the company where they are developed (hence the name). And even if they do, they aren't sold anyway, so the company loses nothing by GPLing their in-house program.
This was the reason why QT for Windows was never GPL'd - a very large chunk of TrollTech's income comes from people buying Windows licenses for QT for in-house applications. A GPL QT/Windows would ruin TrollTech.
Borland could lose money in the future because of this...
By this I would assume that you are talking about at least two computers?
No, actually just one. My dad just had to have a laptop because they're cool(even though he doesn't use computers). It was a bad choice.
I don't know anyone who has so little respect for their own family that they would invite them to spend $500 plus (at least two machines, right) on the newest version of windows so they can strangle their own freedoms while the second newest version would be more than enough for their needs.
Okay, okay, no need to troll! Calm down. I have plenty of respect for my family - that's why I must recommend the best option to them. WinXP has features that make it the best option for home use. Fast startup, fast user switching, massive hardware compatibility, games, runs software sold in normal stores, runs software we already have, works with AOL/Compuserve, works with winmodems, easy to use, easy to configure, stable. Linux has only a few of these, plus if I was away at college and something went wrong, my family would be helpless to fix it. Win2K doesn't have fast startup/user switching, ease of use/configuration, or remote troubleshooting, and it has compatibility issues with games. Although I haven't priced it, it would probably be around the same price as XP, therefore XP is the clear winner here.
Anyway, how will using XP instead of 2K "strangle our freedoms?" We won't even use MSN/passport, we use Compuserve. We won't use WMP, we use Winamp. If we want to copy XP, we'll use one of the myriad hacks for the registration that will undoubtedly appear in the weeks following XP's release. MS won't be strangling any of our freedoms. I fail to see how using XP strangles more freedoms than using 2K unless its the freedom to make unlicensed illegal copies.
Hey, its a new advertising campaign for Microsoft: Use Windows XP, because it doesn't strangle any more of your freedoms than Win2K does!
You surely mean "Gives you a login prompt in 30 seconds", right?
No, I mean "starts up in 30 seconds" and that's including the time it takes you to click your username and type your password and wait for the desktop to come up. 30 seconds from pushing the power button to a logged-in, fully functional desktop (no thrashing the disk). No kidding.
Wow, that's interesting. You mean Mandrake actually made their hardware config into a KDE control panel module? How... sensible of them! So Linux is finally making headway in the hardware support/config front. Great news!
Now, if Mandrake could just do something about those awful icons and pictures and menus that they replace the nice KDE ones with...
I hate getting into these kinds of discussions
Why? I found your comment informative and helpful.
That's true, but Win2K doesn't have a lot of ease-of-use features for home users, plus it doesn't have a lot of game compatibility. Also, WinXP starts up in 30 seconds (including login time) and has fast user switching, which are two other features I forgot to mention that my family will like a lot (they're always complaining about the startup time).
Given a choice between Win2K and WinXP, WinXP is the better choice for an easy-to-use home PC.
As far as innovation in WinXP vs. Win2K, take a look at my other post on that subject, here
I guess you're right, KDE2 is as easy to use as Windows (perhaps more) for specific tasks (checking email, surfing web) once you learn it. I love it myself, I'd be using it right now if it wasn't for the fact that I have a frickin' WinModem (Windows only modem).
However, KDE is not as consistently easy to use as Windows. Some of the apps have horrible UIs or were written by people who don't speak English as a first language (KPackage comes to mind...). The Control Center, while powerful, is intimidating to users (so many panels!), and can't handle many things that Windows's can (like hardware setup - almost always requires command-line jockeying).
So, I guess a Linux box can be used very effectively for specific tasks if it is set up by an expert (I'll bet your sister didn't install and configure Linux herself...) and the setup is not changed. But if your sister tried to start installing a program or tried to add a printer, look out!
XP is just Windows 2000 with themes and a few other insignificant changes, mostly cosmetic.
This is the attitude I hear from a lot of geeks. Unfortunately, what you are not realizing is this: Cosmetic changes in the OS are major revolutions to users! They see a "My Pictures" folder with thumbnails and stuff, and they think "Wow! I can keep digital pictures in here. Windows XP lets me manage pictures!" They don't know that they could manage pictures equally well with Win98 or any other OS. They see a button in the sidebar for "E-mail this file" and they think "Wow! I can e-mail a file to somebody! Windows XP lets me e-mail files!" Never mind that any e-mail client on the planet can send attatchments, the idea never occured to them before to send files. Soon they will be E-mailing their digital picture collections all over the Internet, saying "Look at all the neat stuff Windows XP lets me do!"
Windows XP doesn't add new capabilities - it just informs the user of the capabilities they have always had. Don't kid yourself though: to normal users, who never knew just what capabilities they had, its a revolution in technology.
. I have already told all my family and friends to carefully consider the consequences of upgrading to XP
The problem for me is, XP does include a couple of features that make it better for home use by my family than Win 98, the biggest one being stability. I'm tired of telling my mom that the computer crashed because "Windows is stupid" (which has become my default explanation for computer problems). Also, the user account features and much improved ease-of-use seem compelling for a family computer. MS really does know what people want (after spending $$$millions on usability testing), and they give it to them (with several features tacked onto the side to extend their monopoly). If I recommended that my family stick with Win98, I'd be kicking myself the next week when some program takes down the whole computer and my family is frustrated.
I like Linux as much as the next guy, but I'm not sure Linux is ready for my family to use. First of all, any software they've bought at the store in the past or will want to buy in the future won't work on it (this is a big issue that never seems to be brought up). Also, they use CompuServe (one of those locked-in for 4 yrs deals), which got swallowed up by AOL a while back and is now almost a direct clone w/ different graphics. It won't work on Linux. They'd have to sign up for and switch to a different e-mail and learn to use the new system (which still isn't as easy as Windows) and it would be a big hassle and expense (paying for 2 ISPs at once? ugh). Plus the laptop we use has a winmodem, so we'd have to go and buy some other external modem.
Those are the reasons why I (and I'm sure many others like me) am recommending a Windows XP upgrade for my family. MS may be bad, Linux may be great, but for my family, Windows is the only viable solution right now, and Windows XP is the best Windows there is.
Slashdot Mirror
IMO it is in apps department where GNOME has forged a large and growing lead.
That should change after KDE 3 is released, since the API will remain stable (binary-compatible even!) for some time, allowing an application base to build up. I think it was the big change from KDE 1 to KDE 2 that made KDE fall behind in the apps department, and GNOME will likely experience a similar phenomenon with its next major release, probably occurring within KDE 3's lifetime.
Besides, I like Konqueror is better than Nautilus, and KOffice 1.1 is looking good (the 1.0 release was a total joke, but so much has changed since then, just try it!). Aethra is coming along well in the "Giant E-mail/PIM monstrosity" department. Also, I think aRts contains much of the functionality that is in GStreamer (but I could be mistaken). Even if GStreamer is better, it is hardly a GNOME-specific project and could be adopted as part of KDE's multimedia system.
What a cool statistic! Now I'm really interested to see this statistic for KDE. Somehow I get the impression that the number of paid KDE developers is smaller than 100.
How is it that KDE is keeping up with them then? (surpassing, even, IMHO) Greater support from non-paid developers? Perhaps I am wrong about the number of paid KDE developers.
AtheOS isn't really mature enough to compare in any meaningful way to OS X. That's why I say it is 'an OS with promise.'
When you have people being paid to help support a peice of software I feel you get a superior product. Some guy coding a peice of software in his scarce spare time is not going to be able to get as much work done and the product will not be complete. So what if OSS people care about their products more, they code only for their own needs and the "customer" comes second.
</paraphrase>
Extreme arguments can be made both ways. The ideal situation is to pay coders who also care about their product. Perhaps some innovative solution needs to come along where people can support open-source programmers with tips or something. If SourceForge adopted an optional donation system, we could see how well something like that would work on a large scale. Imagine: people being paid to do what they like! What a concept!
All the apps (WordPerfect, etc) are kept on different servers and run with rsh. They use memory and hard disk space on a different machine. I imagine the /home directory is an NFS mount on a different machine with TONS of disk space. That server runs KDE, and only KDE, all the time, nothing else. It's not their file server.
by evil_spork
What?!? Someone explain this to me.
How can a comment simultaneously have a -1 rating and a "Funny" designation, and it hasn't even been modded at all yet?
The big reason for the major version number change is binary compatibility. KDE 3 will be using QT3 and GCC 3.0, which will both break binary compatibility with KDE 2. At the same time, the KDE guys will use the opportunity to fix any problems that have been uncovered with the 2.0 API (since the API can't be changed much without breaking compatibility). Therefore, KDE 3.0 should be a very stable desktop (since it's not a complete rewrite), based on the newest and best in Open-Source technology, with refined APIs for developers.
Once 3.0 is out, they plan to standardize on it for a long time to allow a large application base to build up. Of course in the meantime they will make lots of point releases with the great new functionality we've come to expect from KDE releases.
The future looks bright :-)
I am Plump Mary.
We're Bone Nob. We're happy our original dance.
Nurse Mentality
We hope to always have an open
A souvenir goods make us happy anytime. Don't you Think So?
Boneractive Wear
If you head over to www.engrish.com you can see more examples of this hilarious stuff.
Right. I'm not disputing that. But if, at that time, you had had other, more advanced games to play, you probably would have played those instead and had even more fun. Pong doesn't stack up in sheer fun to games that came after it. That doesn't mean that Pong was never fun. I have played Pong and had fun. However, I have also played MarioKart 64 against 4 other people and had *much more* fun than Pong could ever hope to be. If you had a choice between Pong and 4-player MarioKart, which would you choose?
Do they have a companion home console system named SuperDuck or UberSquirrel?
I can just imagine the games they would make featuring "WonderSwan" and her sidekick "MegaGoose."
Yes, but since the current system isn't centralized, a hacker can only crack one transaction or vendor at a time. With a centralized passport system, a hacker could crack one username/password and gain access to incredible amounts of information and purchasing power. Plus when the Passport servers are cracked (I think it's inevitable that they will be at some time, somehow) the consequences will be catastrophic.
I think compiling a list of games that are more fun than Pong wouldn't be too hard. Now, if the list was of the most important games of all time, I'm sure Pong would top the list.
OK, you're making a big wrong assumption here, and it is that people will do what you tell them.
These people aren't doing their text editors to further some cause! They are doing it because it is fun, or to learn, or to fill a specific need, or to waste time, or a million other different reasons. They are NOT working on their text editors simply to make Open Source Software as a whole better. If they were, your scheme would work fine. However, if your "organizational unit" disbands the Text Editor XY team and "assigns" all its coders to Text Editor AB, what makes you think they will want to work on it? Anyway, how are you proposing to stop them from continuing to work on their old text editor? They can do whatever they darn well please.
The problem with your proposal is that open source people aren't working toward a common goal like the people in a business. No common committee can address their individual reasons and goals. Business management techniques are totally inapplicable to any traditional open-source project. I think the dept. line for this article said it best: cat-herders-needed-apply-within
Debian on my iPAQ would be great! Thanks for the link! I see it requires an IBM 1GB Microdrive, though. Those things are expensive (as expensive as the iPAQ itself)!
The other problem with Linux on the iPAQ is that you can't install it without either getting a serial sync-cradle or modifying the hardware of your USB one. Then when you look at the install instructions they are covered with warnings like "If you see the message 'foo' while installing the bootloader, DO NOT continue. Leave your iPAQ on and slowly back away. Doing otherwise may cause your iPAQ to become unbootable or spontaneously explode." I think I'll wait until the install instructions are more foolproof before I risk my $500 investment.
Oh, so that's how they did it! Gosh, movie making technology is getting more advanced all the time!
Near the end of the movie, the spaceman (Leo) kisses the human-rights-activist ape (Ari). this drew lots of "EWWW!" comments from the audience in the theater. Ten seconds later, Leo goes over and kisses that human woman. Everyone in the theater was very quiet, except for my friend William, who immediately yelled out "EWWW!"
I was laughing for a minute and a half afterwards.
What about companies developing in-house apps for their own use? They have no problems with GPLing their programs - the GPL doesn't state that you have to broadcast your program out for free over the Internet, it just says that anyone who gets the binaries must have access to the source and the right to redistribute said binaries and source.
For in-house apps, this isn't a problem, because most in-house apps never even travel outside of the company where they are developed (hence the name). And even if they do, they aren't sold anyway, so the company loses nothing by GPLing their in-house program.
This was the reason why QT for Windows was never GPL'd - a very large chunk of TrollTech's income comes from people buying Windows licenses for QT for in-house applications. A GPL QT/Windows would ruin TrollTech.
Borland could lose money in the future because of this...
No, actually just one. My dad just had to have a laptop because they're cool(even though he doesn't use computers). It was a bad choice.
I don't know anyone who has so little respect for their own family that they would invite them to spend $500 plus (at least two machines, right) on the newest version of windows so they can strangle their own freedoms while the second newest version would be more than enough for their needs.
Okay, okay, no need to troll! Calm down. I have plenty of respect for my family - that's why I must recommend the best option to them. WinXP has features that make it the best option for home use. Fast startup, fast user switching, massive hardware compatibility, games, runs software sold in normal stores, runs software we already have, works with AOL/Compuserve, works with winmodems, easy to use, easy to configure, stable. Linux has only a few of these, plus if I was away at college and something went wrong, my family would be helpless to fix it. Win2K doesn't have fast startup/user switching, ease of use/configuration, or remote troubleshooting, and it has compatibility issues with games. Although I haven't priced it, it would probably be around the same price as XP, therefore XP is the clear winner here.
Anyway, how will using XP instead of 2K "strangle our freedoms?" We won't even use MSN/passport, we use Compuserve. We won't use WMP, we use Winamp. If we want to copy XP, we'll use one of the myriad hacks for the registration that will undoubtedly appear in the weeks following XP's release. MS won't be strangling any of our freedoms. I fail to see how using XP strangles more freedoms than using 2K unless its the freedom to make unlicensed illegal copies.
Hey, its a new advertising campaign for Microsoft: Use Windows XP, because it doesn't strangle any more of your freedoms than Win2K does!
No, I mean "starts up in 30 seconds" and that's including the time it takes you to click your username and type your password and wait for the desktop to come up. 30 seconds from pushing the power button to a logged-in, fully functional desktop (no thrashing the disk). No kidding.
Now, if Mandrake could just do something about those awful icons and pictures and menus that they replace the nice KDE ones with...
I hate getting into these kinds of discussions
Why? I found your comment informative and helpful.
Given a choice between Win2K and WinXP, WinXP is the better choice for an easy-to-use home PC.
As far as innovation in WinXP vs. Win2K, take a look at my other post on that subject, here
However, KDE is not as consistently easy to use as Windows. Some of the apps have horrible UIs or were written by people who don't speak English as a first language (KPackage comes to mind...). The Control Center, while powerful, is intimidating to users (so many panels!), and can't handle many things that Windows's can (like hardware setup - almost always requires command-line jockeying).
So, I guess a Linux box can be used very effectively for specific tasks if it is set up by an expert (I'll bet your sister didn't install and configure Linux herself...) and the setup is not changed. But if your sister tried to start installing a program or tried to add a printer, look out!
This is the attitude I hear from a lot of geeks. Unfortunately, what you are not realizing is this: Cosmetic changes in the OS are major revolutions to users! They see a "My Pictures" folder with thumbnails and stuff, and they think "Wow! I can keep digital pictures in here. Windows XP lets me manage pictures!" They don't know that they could manage pictures equally well with Win98 or any other OS. They see a button in the sidebar for "E-mail this file" and they think "Wow! I can e-mail a file to somebody! Windows XP lets me e-mail files!" Never mind that any e-mail client on the planet can send attatchments, the idea never occured to them before to send files. Soon they will be E-mailing their digital picture collections all over the Internet, saying "Look at all the neat stuff Windows XP lets me do!"
Windows XP doesn't add new capabilities - it just informs the user of the capabilities they have always had. Don't kid yourself though: to normal users, who never knew just what capabilities they had, its a revolution in technology.
The problem for me is, XP does include a couple of features that make it better for home use by my family than Win 98, the biggest one being stability. I'm tired of telling my mom that the computer crashed because "Windows is stupid" (which has become my default explanation for computer problems). Also, the user account features and much improved ease-of-use seem compelling for a family computer. MS really does know what people want (after spending $$$millions on usability testing), and they give it to them (with several features tacked onto the side to extend their monopoly). If I recommended that my family stick with Win98, I'd be kicking myself the next week when some program takes down the whole computer and my family is frustrated.
I like Linux as much as the next guy, but I'm not sure Linux is ready for my family to use. First of all, any software they've bought at the store in the past or will want to buy in the future won't work on it (this is a big issue that never seems to be brought up). Also, they use CompuServe (one of those locked-in for 4 yrs deals), which got swallowed up by AOL a while back and is now almost a direct clone w/ different graphics. It won't work on Linux. They'd have to sign up for and switch to a different e-mail and learn to use the new system (which still isn't as easy as Windows) and it would be a big hassle and expense (paying for 2 ISPs at once? ugh). Plus the laptop we use has a winmodem, so we'd have to go and buy some other external modem.
Those are the reasons why I (and I'm sure many others like me) am recommending a Windows XP upgrade for my family. MS may be bad, Linux may be great, but for my family, Windows is the only viable solution right now, and Windows XP is the best Windows there is.