Yes, of course they poll a small segment (the sample) out of the entire member group (the population). It would be impossible to poll every Linux user in the world. My point is that the sample size is not big enough, and there are statistical methods to figure out how many is considered "big enough". I just feel that 2,401 machines out of millions are statistically not "big enough" to make this poll accurate.
And even if 2,401 machines is enough.. this group is *self-selecting*. This means this group chose to participate because they are interested in it. Again that is not representative of the entire Linux population, because not all in the Linux population are interested in running that machine-update script or this poll.
In a real survey, the researcher would first calculate the sample size that would be big enough to get accurate results. Next, figure out a proper sampling method. There are many ways to obtain your sample.. I'll just describe one here.. let's say, random sampling.
In the random sampling method, the researcher would go randomly to any Linux user, and ask them questions like what kernel they're running and so on. In this case, we reach a proper number of Linux users.. whether or not they're interested in the poll or aware about it. They would continue doing this until they obtain the required sample size. This is in contrast with the Linux Counter poll, where the entire sample consist of only those who are interested in the poll. Thus, it is inaccurate.
Random sampling is just one sampling method to make a fair survey with less errors.. there are other methods too but I won't go into their details unless you really want me to.
That's the major problem with all online polls. That's why Slashdot polls have that line that says that Slashdot polls are:
"wildly inaccurate. Rounding errors, ballot stuffers, dynamic IPs, firewalls. If you're using these numbers to do anything important, you're insane."
And that's also why the QuickVote polls at CNN.com says:
This QuickVote is not scientific and reflects the opinions of only those Internet users who have chosen to participate. The results cannot be assumed to represent the opinions of Internet users in general, nor the public as a whole.
I think the Linux Counter system statistics are not accurate because that's an unscientific "poll". The information there is gathered from only 2,401 machines, which is obviously not representative of the entire population of Linux machines (which probably number in the millions?). Statistically we would say that there is not enough "power" to detect a statistical significance, because of this low-number sample.
The other thing is that the people running that machine-update script are self-selecting. For any statistic to be accurate, it is important that the samples are chosen accurately (for example, a random sample or a stratified random sample). The Linux Counter sample selected themselves to participate, and that is of course not accurate.
So I don't think the statistics presented there are accurate at all.
Actually, it's the other way round. Sun takes the source code of OpenOffice.org, adds extra stuff (database, etc), packages it nicely, and you get StarOffice. Ok that's not totally detailed, but you get the idea.
I've been using Slackware since 3.5 back in 1997, and I continue using it today. In fact, I'm posting this from my Slackware 8-ish box. So why Slackware? It's all about simplicity. Let's get more specific...
The lack of "forced" package dependencies is a good thing. When I know exactly what I want, I don't need to care about "forced" package dependencies. I run a Debian laptop at home, and when package dependencies break (ok so I'm trying out the unstable branch), it can be a real pain to fix that back. And I don't even want to get started on RPM (yes I run a Red Hat box too). But if I know exactly what I want, I can fix everything myself in Slackware. I'm not forced to accept what a package/distro maintainer wants me to install. It's all about control.
Learning Linux/UNIX. Some of you have already mentioned this. If you really want to learn about Linux/UNIX administration/development, Slackware is a great distro for that purpose. Now, people who would just want to use Linux as a desktop (for non-programming purposes) should use another distro. Slack's not for you. However, people who really want to learn will love the DIY-ness of Slackware. When you have to compile stuff yourself, or figure out why a certain library isn't working, you'll learn a whole heap of skills and tricks that will be really useful to you later. For example...
Moving back and forth from/to BSD is a breeze. When I first had to admin an OpenBSD box, I felt right at home. The similar *.tgz-style packages were easy to admin, and so was editing/configuring the system via editing text files. I later had to do some research using FreeBSD boxes, and again, I'm on familiar ground.
There are a whole lot of other reasons too, but I can't spell it out right now due to my current semi-hangover mode...
The downside: Of course, the obvious downside to using Slackware is time. You need to have heaps of time to learn and use it. But once you're done with that phase, you'll find your investment in Slackware will be worth it all. Again, I stress that Slackware is not for everyone. I certainly don't expect some of my less-obsessed-with-UNIX friends to like it. But hey, if you're the adventurous type who loves to learn and tinker around with stuff, go try it out. I think you'll like it.
Yeah I used to get this in SO 6.0 beta, but mine seems to work now with OOo 1.0. Not sure why though. I use KDE. If I find the reason I'll let you know.
Ah, the eternal question about StarOffice/OpenOffice.org differences. According to OpenOffice.org's FAQ, the differences are as follows:
The source code available at OpenOffice.org does not consist of all of the StarOffice code. Usually, the reason for this is that Sun pays to license third party code to include in StarOffice that which it does not have permission to make available in OpenOffice.org. Those things which are or will be present in StarOffice but are not available on OpenOffice.org include:
Certain fonts (including, especially, Asian language fonts)
StarOffice 6.0 softwre is a commercial product aimed at organizations and consumers while OpenOffice.org 1.0 is aimed at users of free software, independent developers and the open source community. StarOffice includes licensed-in, third-party technology such as:
Spellchecker and thesaurus
Database component (Software AG Adabas D).
Select fonts including Windows metrically equivalent fonts and Asian language fonts
Select filters, including WordPerfect filters and Asian word processor filters
Integration of additional templates and extensive clipart gallery
In addition to product differences, StarOffice offers:
Updates/upgrades on CD
Sun installation and user documentation
24x7 Web based support for enterprises and consumers
Help desk support
Warranties and indemnification guarantee
Training
Professional services for migration and deployment
Ok, I feel that it's all right if RMS wants credit to be given to the GNU project. After all he started the whole thing in the first place.
But I have a problem with the "GNU" name. If we want Linux, oops, GNU/Linux to be adopted in the mainstream, I think corporate types and non-techies will have a hard time accepting that name. Like, imagine trying to explain what the GNU acronym is to your manager. Sure, recursive acronyms are "cool" to us techies (though I personally hate them), but busy managers won't have the time to ponder what it is. And what do you mean GNU's Not UNIX? And how do you pronounce it? And how do you get them to adopt it? I bet they're more comfortable saying Linux rather than GNU/Linux all the time.
So I think it would be better if GNU is called something else. Of course, that's not gonna happen. After all, the GNU term has been around forever. But that doesn't mean I agree that it's a nice name.
ZDNet: Why StarOffice and not OOo?
on
StarOffice 6.0
·
· Score: 2
I wonder if anyone still reads this thread. Anyway, here's a pretty insightful ZDNet article that talks about why somebody would want to pay $76 for StarOffice instead of downloading OpenOffice.org for free. One interesting part is where the author mentions that since the codebase for StarOffice and OOo are sync'ed daily, a company can actually just buy one copy of StarOffice for $76 (to get Sun's support) and deploy OOo company-wide.
I totally agree with you. I think the reason why we're seeing this behavior might be because most Slashdot readers are tech hobbyists who prefer their things cheap or free. This is not surprising. In Geoffrey Moore's book Crossing the Chasm, this group is what we call the "innovators" -- people who love technology, who're way ahead of everybody else but they want to get their things free or as cheap as possible. Hence the many posts saying "why not download Mozilla/OpenOffice.org/etc etc" instead.
Sun's market for StarOffice 6, OTOH, is likely for IT managers and other corporate types, who prefer to pay for stuff just to get that warm fuzzy feeling that their investment is being protected. Plus, it's easier to convince upper management to migrate to alternative products, if they're stated as being "less expensive" as opposed to "free". Upper management always says, "how can good products be free?" So I think Sun's strategy of making StarOffice at a quarter price of MS Office, instead of being "free", as a really good move. Plus they offer OpenOffice.org for the hobbyists too. So I don't see why anyone should complain.
Well I'm not necessarily that skilled to design nice templates nor do I necessarily have the time to do it. Same reason you don't expect secretaries to write word processors for themselves.
Differences between StarOffice and OpenOffice.org
on
StarOffice 6.0
·
· Score: 5, Informative
Re:Why not Open Office?
on
StarOffice 6.0
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
The one feature which I need in StarOffice which is not available in OpenOffice.org is the templates. As someone who frequently needs to do quick presentations, templates are a must. Now if there's some project out there that produces templates specifically for OpenOffice.org, that'll really be sweet. Any takers?:-) Perhaps there's a need for a new SourceForge project.
BTW if you're interested, the diffs between OpenOffice.org and StarOffice are available here. That may contain other reasons why people would prefer StarOffice instead of OOo.
"Next-gen" office from Microsoft, also XML-based
on
StarOffice 6.0
·
· Score: 5, Informative
Wow. Hot on the heels of Sun's press release, it looks like Microsoft is also planning their so called next-gen Office which is also supposedly based on XML. That zdnet article is pretty interesting.. it has some comments from Gartner about both Office.NET (ugh! I'm getting.NET-phobia) and StarOffice.
Ironically I couldn't do a "Copy link location" for that link on parent post and put it onto Mozilla 1.0rc2's URL bar. Hmm.. or maybe it's just my setup.
When I need to get into the zone, I need a semi-dark room, my laptop,... and streaming Internet radio! That is a must. And depending on what my mood is at that time, I can change radio stations when I wish. I've got a whole list of stations for different moods.. from groove and indie rock, to smooth jazz, to alternative. I can't stand a repetitive MP3 playlist.. I always need "new music", and Internet radio fits that bill just fine. Of course, that assumes you're bandwidth-endowed.:-)
And yes I agree with some of you that web browsers are the prime distraction! Ok gotta get back to work...:-)
Yes I agree. As a graduate student and an IEEE member researching in computer security, which also involves breaking security of certain products, I think I'll have to start thinking of publishing my papers elsewhere. This is such a shame. IEEE has some of the best conferences around. But making me sign that form is way too much.
Slashdot Mirror
Yes, of course they poll a small segment (the sample) out of the entire member group (the population). It would be impossible to poll every Linux user in the world. My point is that the sample size is not big enough, and there are statistical methods to figure out how many is considered "big enough". I just feel that 2,401 machines out of millions are statistically not "big enough" to make this poll accurate.
And even if 2,401 machines is enough.. this group is *self-selecting*. This means this group chose to participate because they are interested in it. Again that is not representative of the entire Linux population, because not all in the Linux population are interested in running that machine-update script or this poll.
In a real survey, the researcher would first calculate the sample size that would be big enough to get accurate results. Next, figure out a proper sampling method. There are many ways to obtain your sample.. I'll just describe one here.. let's say, random sampling.
In the random sampling method, the researcher would go randomly to any Linux user, and ask them questions like what kernel they're running and so on. In this case, we reach a proper number of Linux users.. whether or not they're interested in the poll or aware about it. They would continue doing this until they obtain the required sample size. This is in contrast with the Linux Counter poll, where the entire sample consist of only those who are interested in the poll. Thus, it is inaccurate.
Random sampling is just one sampling method to make a fair survey with less errors.. there are other methods too but I won't go into their details unless you really want me to.
That's the major problem with all online polls. That's why Slashdot polls have that line that says that Slashdot polls are:
"wildly inaccurate. Rounding errors, ballot stuffers, dynamic IPs, firewalls. If you're using these numbers to do anything important, you're insane."
And that's also why the QuickVote polls at CNN.com says:
This QuickVote is not scientific and reflects the opinions of only those Internet users who have chosen to participate. The results cannot be assumed to represent the opinions of Internet users in general, nor the public as a whole.
I hope this clarifies my points.
I think the Linux Counter system statistics are not accurate because that's an unscientific "poll". The information there is gathered from only 2,401 machines, which is obviously not representative of the entire population of Linux machines (which probably number in the millions?). Statistically we would say that there is not enough "power" to detect a statistical significance, because of this low-number sample.
The other thing is that the people running that machine-update script are self-selecting. For any statistic to be accurate, it is important that the samples are chosen accurately (for example, a random sample or a stratified random sample). The Linux Counter sample selected themselves to participate, and that is of course not accurate.
So I don't think the statistics presented there are accurate at all.
I'm not sure if we can all say the same thing about Mozilla. :-)
Actually, it's the other way round. Sun takes the source code of OpenOffice.org, adds extra stuff (database, etc), packages it nicely, and you get StarOffice. Ok that's not totally detailed, but you get the idea.
I've been using Slackware since 3.5 back in 1997, and I continue using it today. In fact, I'm posting this from my Slackware 8-ish box. So why Slackware? It's all about simplicity. Let's get more specific...
The lack of "forced" package dependencies is a good thing. When I know exactly what I want, I don't need to care about "forced" package dependencies. I run a Debian laptop at home, and when package dependencies break (ok so I'm trying out the unstable branch), it can be a real pain to fix that back. And I don't even want to get started on RPM (yes I run a Red Hat box too). But if I know exactly what I want, I can fix everything myself in Slackware. I'm not forced to accept what a package/distro maintainer wants me to install. It's all about control.
Learning Linux/UNIX. Some of you have already mentioned this. If you really want to learn about Linux/UNIX administration/development, Slackware is a great distro for that purpose. Now, people who would just want to use Linux as a desktop (for non-programming purposes) should use another distro. Slack's not for you. However, people who really want to learn will love the DIY-ness of Slackware. When you have to compile stuff yourself, or figure out why a certain library isn't working, you'll learn a whole heap of skills and tricks that will be really useful to you later. For example...
Moving back and forth from/to BSD is a breeze. When I first had to admin an OpenBSD box, I felt right at home. The similar *.tgz-style packages were easy to admin, and so was editing/configuring the system via editing text files. I later had to do some research using FreeBSD boxes, and again, I'm on familiar ground.
There are a whole lot of other reasons too, but I can't spell it out right now due to my current semi-hangover mode...
The downside: Of course, the obvious downside to using Slackware is time. You need to have heaps of time to learn and use it. But once you're done with that phase, you'll find your investment in Slackware will be worth it all. Again, I stress that Slackware is not for everyone. I certainly don't expect some of my less-obsessed-with-UNIX friends to like it. But hey, if you're the adventurous type who loves to learn and tinker around with stuff, go try it out. I think you'll like it.
Yeah I used to get this in SO 6.0 beta, but mine seems to work now with OOo 1.0. Not sure why though. I use KDE. If I find the reason I'll let you know.
The source code available at OpenOffice.org does not consist of all of the StarOffice code. Usually, the reason for this is that Sun pays to license third party code to include in StarOffice that which it does not have permission to make available in OpenOffice.org. Those things which are or will be present in StarOffice but are not available on OpenOffice.org include:
In addition, Sun also has a FAQ that says:
StarOffice 6.0 softwre is a commercial product aimed at organizations and consumers while OpenOffice.org 1.0 is aimed at users of free software, independent developers and the open source community. StarOffice includes licensed-in, third-party technology such as:
In addition to product differences, StarOffice offers:
Hope it helps!
Right on. I've some points about this in my earlier post.
Without GNU
Without GNU,
What is an OS called Linux,
But something that just sucks.
Without GNU,
What have you,
But an OS with a screen so blue.
With GNU,
Freedom is true,
Believe in GNU,
And you'll see the world brand GNU.
Haha! Sharp observation there! :-)
Ok, I feel that it's all right if RMS wants credit to be given to the GNU project. After all he started the whole thing in the first place.
But I have a problem with the "GNU" name. If we want Linux, oops, GNU/Linux to be adopted in the mainstream, I think corporate types and non-techies will have a hard time accepting that name. Like, imagine trying to explain what the GNU acronym is to your manager. Sure, recursive acronyms are "cool" to us techies (though I personally hate them), but busy managers won't have the time to ponder what it is. And what do you mean GNU's Not UNIX? And how do you pronounce it? And how do you get them to adopt it? I bet they're more comfortable saying Linux rather than GNU/Linux all the time.
So I think it would be better if GNU is called something else. Of course, that's not gonna happen. After all, the GNU term has been around forever. But that doesn't mean I agree that it's a nice name.
Doesn't that depend on the language being used?
I wonder if anyone still reads this thread. Anyway, here's a pretty insightful
ZDNet article that talks about why somebody would want to pay $76 for StarOffice instead of downloading OpenOffice.org for free. One interesting part is where the author mentions that since the codebase for StarOffice and OOo are sync'ed daily, a company can actually just buy one copy of StarOffice for $76 (to get Sun's support) and deploy OOo company-wide.
Having lived in Australia for more than two years, I'd say your walk would be worth it! :-)
I can't believe it says "MSN Hotmail - More Useful Everyday". Sure is "more useful!"
I totally agree with you. I think the reason why we're seeing this behavior might be because most Slashdot readers are tech hobbyists who prefer their things cheap or free. This is not surprising. In Geoffrey Moore's book Crossing the Chasm, this group is what we call the "innovators" -- people who love technology, who're way ahead of everybody else but they want to get their things free or as cheap as possible. Hence the many posts saying "why not download Mozilla/OpenOffice.org/etc etc" instead.
Sun's market for StarOffice 6, OTOH, is likely for IT managers and other corporate types, who prefer to pay for stuff just to get that warm fuzzy feeling that their investment is being protected. Plus, it's easier to convince upper management to migrate to alternative products, if they're stated as being "less expensive" as opposed to "free". Upper management always says, "how can good products be free?" So I think Sun's strategy of making StarOffice at a quarter price of MS Office, instead of being "free", as a really good move. Plus they offer OpenOffice.org for the hobbyists too. So I don't see why anyone should complain.
Well I'm not necessarily that skilled to design nice templates nor do I necessarily have the time to do it. Same reason you don't expect secretaries to write word processors for themselves.
Seems that there are a lot of "Why StarOffice, and not OpenOffice.org?" posts out there. To make things easier, here's where you can find the differences between StarOffice and OpenOffice.org.
The one feature which I need in StarOffice which is not available in OpenOffice.org is the templates. As someone who frequently needs to do quick presentations, templates are a must. Now if there's some project out there that produces templates specifically for OpenOffice.org, that'll really be sweet. Any takers? :-) Perhaps there's a need for a new SourceForge project.
BTW if you're interested, the diffs between OpenOffice.org and StarOffice are available here. That may contain other reasons why people would prefer StarOffice instead of OOo.
Wow. Hot on the heels of Sun's press release, it looks like Microsoft is also planning their so called next-gen Office which is also supposedly based on XML. That zdnet article is pretty interesting.. it has some comments from Gartner about both Office.NET (ugh! I'm getting .NET-phobia) and StarOffice.
Ironically I couldn't do a "Copy link location" for that link on parent post and put it onto Mozilla 1.0rc2's URL bar. Hmm.. or maybe it's just my setup.
Haven't you heard? 70% of statistics are made up on the spot! :-)
...if they can simulate my idiotic dorm roommate who puked on the sofa, didn't clean it, and didn't tell anyone about it...
When I need to get into the zone, I need a semi-dark room, my laptop,... and streaming Internet radio! That is a must. And depending on what my mood is at that time, I can change radio stations when I wish. I've got a whole list of stations for different moods.. from groove and indie rock, to smooth jazz, to alternative. I can't stand a repetitive MP3 playlist.. I always need "new music", and Internet radio fits that bill just fine. Of course, that assumes you're bandwidth-endowed. :-)
:-)
And yes I agree with some of you that web browsers are the prime distraction! Ok gotta get back to work...
Yes I agree. As a graduate student and an IEEE member researching in computer security, which also involves breaking security of certain products, I think I'll have to start thinking of publishing my papers elsewhere. This is such a shame. IEEE has some of the best conferences around. But making me sign that form is way too much.