[quote] Of course, if by "better managed", you mean used illegal anti-competitive methods, then I do agree with you. [/quote]
Not necessarily. I meant moreso, sustaining and creating a market that you can excel in. MS definitely sustained very well. Create new markets... not that I can really see, although one good thing that they did do was crush prices down alot. Prior to NT, server software was not a cheap thing. Now still, MS isn't as bad as some of the old school UNIX licesnses. I think that that can be attested to Linux/BSD and MS just always underpricing the competition. Sun followed suit thankfully, and AIX and HPUX are still tied to pricey hardware (not that pricey though, IMHO).
To the IBM piggyback, that is another good management technique that I was alluding to. Quiite honestly, that was a great manuever by them. I just wish that I could say more good here about them, but I am at a loss for words. They really IMNSHO went evil in the 90's and havent done any real good since. At least that I am privy too. I am only aware of the new imaging format that was geared to medical facilities and imaging (my field). Its not quite released yet, but should by the end of '07. But really, anyone could have done this with business savvy owners/management.
Yeah, that too. Good point. But as it seems to go around like clockwork, the visionaries that start the "Good Things" seem to get booted and unless they return, the company is as good as dead.
Good catch. Bushnell was another great visionary that put together something wonderful only to let some other guy quash it all with good ole stupidity.
Commodore died because of shit management. The book by Brian Bagnall "Rise and Fall of Commodore" (or something to that effect) told it quite well. Amiga was going well but not good enough to sustain, and then the idiot management effectively killed themselves with moronic models (A600 comes to mind...). Atari may have lived also, but they got murdered with stupidity, and with a backlash of Tramiel's tactics.
Apple was luck rnough to have a good entrenchment in schools, and kept just a large enough following outside of the major professional markets (such as video and audio) to live long enough for reason to return (Steve Jobs) and re-orientate the vision back to sanity. Jobs is a born leader, Gasse was not. Irving Gould was a mere investor and should have learnt his place. Medhi Ali was not a good leader, TJ Rattigan was.
Really, Apple's defeat was kicking Jobs out. Commodore's defeat was kicking Tramiel out. Atari's defeat was taking Tramiel on (Tramiel was notorious for undehanded tactics with suppliers and it hurt him when at Atari badly, Atari was better off with anyone else for a good chunk of time and it was just "Too Late" by the time he corrected things.)
Microsoft won for the longest time because nothing else had penetration. OS/2 was not a very penetrating OS. MS-DOS and Windows were. When almost every PC clone has MS-DOS, you know that marketing and tactics have won, not necessarily quality. OS/2 may be still on the ATM you visit, but is it a winner in the end?
Piracy helped MS alot, but it also could have killed them if any serious competitor were to have arisen prior to 1995. Linux and BSD just weren't there, Apple was kinda in a limbo (not good enough to entice the masses, but on the flipside, not that crappy to totally die off). Who was there to step up? Commodore was then d e d - dead. Atari? Pfft, they were even deader, rotting maggots dead. Sinclair? TI? Osbourne? Nope, all minor players by then, if even in the personal computing arena even.
Thats why MS won in the end. Now, most people associate a PC and Windows. MS was just better managed, held a reasonable amount of respect within the general populace, and was able to sustain life into near monopoly.
Personally I am after either Linux or Apple or both to get a metric tonne more users so that some real competition gets going. Both camps have a serious contender, but aren't currently getting the "Main Event" fight.
I agree. But where I would be complaining is when CNR for Ubuntu is relased and it isn't offered by default from Dell. CNR is aimed at the general computer user, and really does make linux shine. Those of us that can give numerous anecdoted on compiling 2.0.x kernels obviously don't feel a need to buy it since we can run a CLI based apt/yum/pkgadd command and get our software the original way.
But yes, I see it moronic to force codecs down our thoats since the first wave of owners of these new Dell Linux machines are going to be the nerds that can add them within the first 5 minutes anyway. But I can understand the counterpoint, I just think its not the best thing at this time. For all we know, that is something in the works (ala CNR) or a Fluendo license of some sort.
And yes, as a former user of Linpsire (will return possibly when 6 is released), CNR is currently the easiest and simplest way to acquire software. Although Ubuntu's software manager is damn nice, it's still not where CNR is today.
[quote] this is why i won't be going open source for a while -- when you're with clients, it's a problem if you say, "oh hold on, i have to recompile the kernel". macs, for production, are solid -- which is not surprise since it's one of their major demographics. [/quote]
I do linux work professionally all day, and run several Fedora, Ubuntu, and Linspire machines and a MacBook. I have not once rebuilt a kernel on any of these machines, nor for any of the umpteen clients I administer.
7 years ago, maybe. Basically here is what you and every other artist/hired-recorder needs to know: - Buy real supported Linux compliant hardware. Creative labs sucks, and thats coming from just a home user POV. mAudio has some slick stuff. There are others, just look at the ALSA project page for details. - Once the first one is taken care of, next is use a modern distro and revision. Linspire 5.1 is great, but on last years hardware. Hold on for Linspire 6 (due soon) or just use Ubuntu 7.04 or Fedora 6 (or 7 since its due soon also). This means a few things inc ase you were not aware. First, latest kernel thats been built by PROs at things like that. This damn near eliminates anyone's need to toy there. Second, ALSA is updated. That means any patches are there to make your hardware work better. - Dont use auto-updating. On production systems anything can break it, even Red Hat has let slip a bad RPM here and then (not common, but still sucks if you fall in the 2 hour window of a bad revision and its fix) - If you arent familiar with getting a system up and going, bribe a nerd to setup your system with a 12 pack of Guiness or a decent stogie. This will alleviate any issues that stopped you up on install. But if you truly adhere to my first point, this is a non-issue.
Linux has its holes, but if you have compliant hardware the holes diminish rapidly. Enterprise accounting software is the only gaping hole that I have run across. Thats what the Mac is for:D
Feel free to contact me if you have any further questions or need more customized assistance. This is something that I have setup a few times for my band buddies (I have about 15 friends between 3 bands) that wanted a recording studio in their basement. Its not that bad, especially for you since you know what you want and need and seem at least fairly competent on the computing side of things.
The article's whole purpose was to benchmark the performance. The easiest way is to take a game that is on windows and linux. WoW isnt on linux. FEAR isnt either. Doom and ET is.
Now, to accurately bench them, the settings need to be the same. Well... no DX on linux. Just OpenGL. Hence the GL tests...
Rather expensive. I was looking at a phone that was $1200 USD with a plan that was close to $300 a month for the bare minimum minutes I would expect to need. I ended up not going down that path (change in career), so I never actually ordered it. But as aforementioned by another poster, it is a rock solid service that cannot be touched by other cellphone carriers. Expensive - yes. Unique -- oh hell yeah! As aforementioned, it replaces alot of high end radio equipment into a rather managable formfactor (large canybar style phones generally).
I definitely will. I just don't have time to build my own anymore, much less ensure that each part is compliant. If it comes with the OS, it at least will work (perhaps not the best quality, but will work).
Yes I am getting lazy in some areas I used to have a much larger passion in. Have a kid, and start your own repair shop. Can you say "No f-ing time?"
If the price is fair its a done deal. System 76 matches the criteria too:D They do have some compteition already.
Really, Linux isn't that unknown. Especially when all the geeks/nerds/admins are running around with Linux orientated Con shirts and laptops with Ubuntu or Fedora on it. I have converted my share. All have been told I can reinstall windows for them for free if things don't work out. Zero requests to do so. Most have been followed up with too.
And thats just me.
More companies are using it. Schools are starting to switch. Some people do notice this, and spark interest. Just pretend now you are a tech noob, and hear about this Ubuntu thing. What do you get when you google that? One of the better Linux homepages IMHO. Enough to at least spark interest or curiousity. And most people have their resident geek to ask about. Thats how over half of the people I know are on Linux (mostly Linspire and Ubuntu) found out about it. Some blurb somewhere and drilled me.
However, that being said, some real advertising beyond IBM is needed. Especially with the context of the IBM ads. They are aimed at us and the PHB and the army of Sr Admins that control what toys get bought and when. When Ubuntu or Linspire get ads with a Dell or Gateway, then the real momentum will begin.
I made a living out of that on the side. My income nearly doubled (my normal job sans any OT is over 50K a year, USD that is). How, why, what the heck happened??
Easy. People want to pay to learn and will. Show them the costs involved from the big picture and what it will take to learn this and go forth with freedom. It works flawlessly. I have a method I will share that can make life great for all involved.
When you go out to fix a AV issue or a spyware issue, bring a Linspire/Freespire/Ubuntu/'Distro that is easy for noobs' and give it to them after doing the repair (for a fee, not for beer, for cash). Tell them that this would not be an issue if they used this Linux. And hand them a "Version" of it that my suit them well, and if they wish they can load off the CD and play with it. If interested for the same cost as the AV cleanse, you can set it up and give them a quick 30min primer, if more is wanted hire you. Literally, you will have made $300 for literally little labor. You made at least $150 (more if you have any decent marketing skills), another $100 at least to reload and the primer, and more to get taught how to use more efficiently the wealth of software they now dont have to pay for.
Now, before you let them play for too long (2 weeks is good), call them and ask how their machine is behaving and if they have any issues. If they dont bring it up, you do it. Ask about the Linspire disc or whatever it was that you dumped off. Talk to them. Even if they dont ask you back, you have solutions to new issues that will happen again. Next stop is better.
I have numerous conversions under my belt. Nearly a dozen thus far this year alone. About one a week average, and I was sick for 4 of them:D Life is getting better in our FLOSS realm. If you want something you need to learn to either earn it or take it from the careless owner (legally speaking of course). MS is the careless fool. Why sit back and let them win by default?
I have several widescreen laptops, and I have aided in getting linux on other's widescreen laptops. Here is the deal -- depending on the video controller, you may need the proprietary drivers for it to work. My WS's are Intel and ATI. ATI absolutely needs the fglrx driver for the proper 1280x800 to work correctly. The Intel driver works fine (since its an OSS driver now). I hae seen a few oddball nVIDIA controllers that did and didn't need it. Either way, you need to have the proper driver installed and properly setup. Just like on all OS's if the software can't talk to the hardware, problems will ensue.
That said, although I am a Red Hat schill/whore/slut/fanboy, I have found that for laptops Ubuntu is just easier to setup and since I love GNOME, their affiliation with the GNOME desktop just is icing on the cake. For me.
With regards to your triple-header setup, I prefer to run nVIDIA on my desktop and this is a very easy and possible setup. I **THINK** that ATI can easily handle this too. I am kinda a noob at the Intel GMA drivers so I can't do anything more than guess. But XFree and X.org both support alot of monitors. I am sure there's a software limit, but I am certain that your hardware limitations (free PCI slots for more cards) will hurt you first.
IF you need a hand, email me (andrew at schotty dot com) and I can start getting on troubleshooting your xorg.conf file for you. Ubuntu (or really any other professionally done distro) should be more than adequate for you with the simple requests that you seemed to state that you had problems with.
And yes you do have odd display needs. No its not out of the question, its quite the opposite. For very advanced setups, learning the xorg.conf is moreso a necessity still since ATI and nVIDIA don't see it fit to make a decent control center that does useful things. That said, once you know what you are doing, its a few seconds to a minute in order to add a new display by copy/paste in the xorg.conf.
But did you look at what hardware was being provided? It sucked -- bad. Nobody wants a $200 computer that is hideously outdated already. 128MB of Ram sucks. I am a happy customer and reseller of Linspire, and that has been their plague -- cheapo crap computers. Nobody wants that -- not the geeks, nor the regular schmoes. Really, 512MB of ram is an understood minimum when dealing with recent revisions of all the OSs out there -- MacOS, XP, Vista (hah, more like a gig here... but), any GNOME based Linux, any KDE based Linux. Sell garbage and dont be suprised that your sales figures are that. Middle of the road is what almost everyone I know (personally) wants -- not uber high end, nor riduculously low end either.
Currently the only Linux OEM that gets it is System76. And look at what they offer - decent systems for a very good price at the bottom end, up to what you feel like paying for. Thats what people want out of Dell, or Wal Mart, or Best Buy.
The apt and rpm solutions are both phenomenal and work great. When they stop working great is with poorly made packages. Having used both, RPM and DEB, I can say when a competent packager gets a package rolled out, no matter how complex, the package works fine. It's the complete puds that are either too green in making packages, or people who refuse to read the documentation on how to create a proper package for the target distro. I have also seen problems with applications that convert from one to another format not translate correctly for one reason or another. one major one is dependency package names. I have seen discrepencies personally with respect to one system using blah as the package name, and blah4 to refer to the same thing. Obviously there will be a problem here, since as far as the db can tell, that is two different programs.
In short, dont blame RPM or APT, its the packagers that need to step up. And with what I have seen recently -- they have. Dependency hell is an ancient thing for my customers, friends, and myself. It is only the occasional badly done package that I can repack into whatever target format that has been the problem for anyone I have dealt with for a few years now. Right around FC2 and the earlier releases of Ubuntu is when I saw a notable shift in quality of packages and the considerable lessening of dep-hell instances.
The only gripe I have had with RPMs was on Red Hat Linux 8 & 9 and the DB corruption days... I am very glad that issue got fixed... that was a bad time.../me has evil falshbacks
Kevin Carmony gets the whole thing of linux, and coming from a regular Joe's point of view (he is rather computer unsaavy),he realizes that OS's as a whole suck major balls, and things need to be fixed. Try doing anything like CNR for Windows or OS X. One word -- futility. Yet, it would be what alot of users would love to have.
Hardcore nerds won't take much interest in CNR or Linspire due to it being simplified so much, but thats why we have multiple distros like Slackware, Gentoo, Debian, and Fedora (and many many more). The noobs or peeps that just dont care about computers, but rather just want to get work done have their place too in the market. Windows. Now Linspire and Canonical are challenging that (well, have been for sometime now).
The OP never linked to anything except the company. The other links were wikipedia entries detail what a non-compete clause is and soforth. Pleas ego thru the links if you are going to talk about them.
Thats the first thing I thought -- countersuit. Sue the shit out of them. Make it a 20M countersuit. When asked why, reply "You wasted my time, and I find this fun."
Really, the cock n balls tactics that this employer is trying is just sour grapes and trying to instill fear into the OP. I would make this as expensive as humanly possible for the fool of an owner that thinks this will fly. Just for the fun. Why? Because its asses like this that clog the system, and the faster we stake their balls to the wall, the better off the world is.
BTW I know this works from experience. I only got 40K, but thats 40K I didnt have to start with.
I appreciate your comment, but unfortunately the link is stale. I think that taking BSD code is fine, since that is what the license allows for (assuming that is what is being referred to since I cant view the article). BUt until I can locate the article I cant really comment much further.
Look, I hate being put out of my way just as much as the next guy, but I cant fault MS on this one. They have had their OS stolen rampantly for years now, and I cannot fault them for wanting proof of payment or legality of the installation. Considering that the fella does have an odd situation (really, how many peeps out there really do swap their mobos out besides us nerds on/. ?).
What would be an unreasonable thing is being put on hold an hour to be told to piss off and not get a new validated key.
I believe you misread the post, he said "closest competitor". Linux may be MS's closest competitor in the desktop arena, but that doesnt take into consideration that %90+ of the market is on MS. Same applies here with the GPL vs. BSD adoptance.
If only I could get this fanatical of zealots for my company...
You are somewhat correct here. But I personally think that the feeling is more for the fact that !MS gets the money. Personally I like Macs, but Linux blows me away much more than OS X. 10.4 is nice and all, dont get me wrong, but Linux has caught up in the OS/Desktop arena, and is just lacking whole applications (Quicken, TurboTax, see the trend). Once more adoption hits (hopefully Linspire and Ubuntu start taking off much more soon), those apps will be there. The trend has begun already.
Slashdot Mirror
[quote]
... not that I can really see, although one good thing that they did do was crush prices down alot. Prior to NT, server software was not a cheap thing. Now still, MS isn't as bad as some of the old school UNIX licesnses. I think that that can be attested to Linux/BSD and MS just always underpricing the competition. Sun followed suit thankfully, and AIX and HPUX are still tied to pricey hardware (not that pricey though, IMHO).
Of course, if by "better managed", you mean used illegal anti-competitive methods, then I do agree with you.
[/quote]
Not necessarily. I meant moreso, sustaining and creating a market that you can excel in. MS definitely sustained very well. Create new markets
To the IBM piggyback, that is another good management technique that I was alluding to. Quiite honestly, that was a great manuever by them. I just wish that I could say more good here about them, but I am at a loss for words. They really IMNSHO went evil in the 90's and havent done any real good since. At least that I am privy too. I am only aware of the new imaging format that was geared to medical facilities and imaging (my field). Its not quite released yet, but should by the end of '07. But really, anyone could have done this with business savvy owners/management.
Yeah, that too. Good point. But as it seems to go around like clockwork, the visionaries that start the "Good Things" seem to get booted and unless they return, the company is as good as dead.
Good catch. Bushnell was another great visionary that put together something wonderful only to let some other guy quash it all with good ole stupidity.
Commodore died because of shit management. The book by Brian Bagnall "Rise and Fall of Commodore" (or something to that effect) told it quite well. Amiga was going well but not good enough to sustain, and then the idiot management effectively killed themselves with moronic models (A600 comes to mind...). Atari may have lived also, but they got murdered with stupidity, and with a backlash of Tramiel's tactics.
Apple was luck rnough to have a good entrenchment in schools, and kept just a large enough following outside of the major professional markets (such as video and audio) to live long enough for reason to return (Steve Jobs) and re-orientate the vision back to sanity. Jobs is a born leader, Gasse was not. Irving Gould was a mere investor and should have learnt his place. Medhi Ali was not a good leader, TJ Rattigan was.
Really, Apple's defeat was kicking Jobs out. Commodore's defeat was kicking Tramiel out. Atari's defeat was taking Tramiel on (Tramiel was notorious for undehanded tactics with suppliers and it hurt him when at Atari badly, Atari was better off with anyone else for a good chunk of time and it was just "Too Late" by the time he corrected things.)
Microsoft won for the longest time because nothing else had penetration. OS/2 was not a very penetrating OS. MS-DOS and Windows were. When almost every PC clone has MS-DOS, you know that marketing and tactics have won, not necessarily quality. OS/2 may be still on the ATM you visit, but is it a winner in the end?
Piracy helped MS alot, but it also could have killed them if any serious competitor were to have arisen prior to 1995. Linux and BSD just weren't there, Apple was kinda in a limbo (not good enough to entice the masses, but on the flipside, not that crappy to totally die off). Who was there to step up? Commodore was then d e d - dead. Atari? Pfft, they were even deader, rotting maggots dead. Sinclair? TI? Osbourne? Nope, all minor players by then, if even in the personal computing arena even.
Thats why MS won in the end. Now, most people associate a PC and Windows. MS was just better managed, held a reasonable amount of respect within the general populace, and was able to sustain life into near monopoly.
Personally I am after either Linux or Apple or both to get a metric tonne more users so that some real competition gets going. Both camps have a serious contender, but aren't currently getting the "Main Event" fight.
Doh, I should type slower.
I agree. But where I would be complaining is when CNR for Ubuntu is relased and it isn't offered by default from Dell. CNR is aimed at the general computer user, and really does make linux shine. Those of us that can give numerous anecdoted on compiling 2.0.x kernels obviously don't feel a need to buy it since we can run a CLI based apt/yum/pkgadd command and get our software the original way.
But yes, I see it moronic to force codecs down our thoats since the first wave of owners of these new Dell Linux machines are going to be the nerds that can add them within the first 5 minutes anyway. But I can understand the counterpoint, I just think its not the best thing at this time. For all we know, that is something in the works (ala CNR) or a Fluendo license of some sort.
Its Click N Run, not Click2Run.
And yes, as a former user of Linpsire (will return possibly when 6 is released), CNR is currently the easiest and simplest way to acquire software. Although Ubuntu's software manager is damn nice, it's still not where CNR is today.
[quote]
:D
this is why i won't be going open source for a while -- when you're with clients, it's a problem if you say, "oh hold on, i have to recompile the kernel". macs, for production, are solid -- which is not surprise since it's one of their major demographics.
[/quote]
I do linux work professionally all day, and run several Fedora, Ubuntu, and Linspire machines and a MacBook. I have not once rebuilt a kernel on any of these machines, nor for any of the umpteen clients I administer.
7 years ago, maybe. Basically here is what you and every other artist/hired-recorder needs to know:
- Buy real supported Linux compliant hardware. Creative labs sucks, and thats coming from just a home user POV. mAudio has some slick stuff. There are others, just look at the ALSA project page for details.
- Once the first one is taken care of, next is use a modern distro and revision. Linspire 5.1 is great, but on last years hardware. Hold on for Linspire 6 (due soon) or just use Ubuntu 7.04 or Fedora 6 (or 7 since its due soon also). This means a few things inc ase you were not aware. First, latest kernel thats been built by PROs at things like that. This damn near eliminates anyone's need to toy there. Second, ALSA is updated. That means any patches are there to make your hardware work better.
- Dont use auto-updating. On production systems anything can break it, even Red Hat has let slip a bad RPM here and then (not common, but still sucks if you fall in the 2 hour window of a bad revision and its fix)
- If you arent familiar with getting a system up and going, bribe a nerd to setup your system with a 12 pack of Guiness or a decent stogie. This will alleviate any issues that stopped you up on install. But if you truly adhere to my first point, this is a non-issue.
Linux has its holes, but if you have compliant hardware the holes diminish rapidly. Enterprise accounting software is the only gaping hole that I have run across. Thats what the Mac is for
Feel free to contact me if you have any further questions or need more customized assistance. This is something that I have setup a few times for my band buddies (I have about 15 friends between 3 bands) that wanted a recording studio in their basement. Its not that bad, especially for you since you know what you want and need and seem at least fairly competent on the computing side of things.
Talk about the pot calling the kettle black ...
Did you actually read this and not get it?
...
The article's whole purpose was to benchmark the performance. The easiest way is to take a game that is on windows and linux. WoW isnt on linux. FEAR isnt either. Doom and ET is.
Now, to accurately bench them, the settings need to be the same. Well... no DX on linux. Just OpenGL. Hence the GL tests
Rather expensive. I was looking at a phone that was $1200 USD with a plan that was close to $300 a month for the bare minimum minutes I would expect to need. I ended up not going down that path (change in career), so I never actually ordered it. But as aforementioned by another poster, it is a rock solid service that cannot be touched by other cellphone carriers. Expensive - yes. Unique -- oh hell yeah! As aforementioned, it replaces alot of high end radio equipment into a rather managable formfactor (large canybar style phones generally).
0 0/e s/globalstar.html
Phones (example, there are others) - http://www.globalcomsatphone.com/globalstar/gsp17
Plan rates - http://www.globalcomsatphone.com/satellite/servic
I definitely will. I just don't have time to build my own anymore, much less ensure that each part is compliant. If it comes with the OS, it at least will work (perhaps not the best quality, but will work).
:D They do have some compteition already.
Yes I am getting lazy in some areas I used to have a much larger passion in. Have a kid, and start your own repair shop. Can you say "No f-ing time?"
If the price is fair its a done deal. System 76 matches the criteria too
Word of mouth.
Really, Linux isn't that unknown. Especially when all the geeks/nerds/admins are running around with Linux orientated Con shirts and laptops with Ubuntu or Fedora on it. I have converted my share. All have been told I can reinstall windows for them for free if things don't work out. Zero requests to do so. Most have been followed up with too.
And thats just me.
More companies are using it. Schools are starting to switch. Some people do notice this, and spark interest. Just pretend now you are a tech noob, and hear about this Ubuntu thing. What do you get when you google that? One of the better Linux homepages IMHO. Enough to at least spark interest or curiousity. And most people have their resident geek to ask about. Thats how over half of the people I know are on Linux (mostly Linspire and Ubuntu) found out about it. Some blurb somewhere and drilled me.
However, that being said, some real advertising beyond IBM is needed. Especially with the context of the IBM ads. They are aimed at us and the PHB and the army of Sr Admins that control what toys get bought and when. When Ubuntu or Linspire get ads with a Dell or Gateway, then the real momentum will begin.
I made a living out of that on the side. My income nearly doubled (my normal job sans any OT is over 50K a year, USD that is). How, why, what the heck happened??
:D Life is getting better in our FLOSS realm. If you want something you need to learn to either earn it or take it from the careless owner (legally speaking of course). MS is the careless fool. Why sit back and let them win by default?
Easy. People want to pay to learn and will. Show them the costs involved from the big picture and what it will take to learn this and go forth with freedom. It works flawlessly. I have a method I will share that can make life great for all involved.
When you go out to fix a AV issue or a spyware issue, bring a Linspire/Freespire/Ubuntu/'Distro that is easy for noobs' and give it to them after doing the repair (for a fee, not for beer, for cash). Tell them that this would not be an issue if they used this Linux. And hand them a "Version" of it that my suit them well, and if they wish they can load off the CD and play with it. If interested for the same cost as the AV cleanse, you can set it up and give them a quick 30min primer, if more is wanted hire you. Literally, you will have made $300 for literally little labor. You made at least $150 (more if you have any decent marketing skills), another $100 at least to reload and the primer, and more to get taught how to use more efficiently the wealth of software they now dont have to pay for.
Now, before you let them play for too long (2 weeks is good), call them and ask how their machine is behaving and if they have any issues. If they dont bring it up, you do it. Ask about the Linspire disc or whatever it was that you dumped off. Talk to them. Even if they dont ask you back, you have solutions to new issues that will happen again. Next stop is better.
I have numerous conversions under my belt. Nearly a dozen thus far this year alone. About one a week average, and I was sick for 4 of them
I have several widescreen laptops, and I have aided in getting linux on other's widescreen laptops. Here is the deal -- depending on the video controller, you may need the proprietary drivers for it to work. My WS's are Intel and ATI. ATI absolutely needs the fglrx driver for the proper 1280x800 to work correctly. The Intel driver works fine (since its an OSS driver now). I hae seen a few oddball nVIDIA controllers that did and didn't need it. Either way, you need to have the proper driver installed and properly setup. Just like on all OS's if the software can't talk to the hardware, problems will ensue.
That said, although I am a Red Hat schill/whore/slut/fanboy, I have found that for laptops Ubuntu is just easier to setup and since I love GNOME, their affiliation with the GNOME desktop just is icing on the cake. For me.
With regards to your triple-header setup, I prefer to run nVIDIA on my desktop and this is a very easy and possible setup. I **THINK** that ATI can easily handle this too. I am kinda a noob at the Intel GMA drivers so I can't do anything more than guess. But XFree and X.org both support alot of monitors. I am sure there's a software limit, but I am certain that your hardware limitations (free PCI slots for more cards) will hurt you first.
IF you need a hand, email me (andrew at schotty dot com) and I can start getting on troubleshooting your xorg.conf file for you. Ubuntu (or really any other professionally done distro) should be more than adequate for you with the simple requests that you seemed to state that you had problems with.
And yes you do have odd display needs. No its not out of the question, its quite the opposite. For very advanced setups, learning the xorg.conf is moreso a necessity still since ATI and nVIDIA don't see it fit to make a decent control center that does useful things. That said, once you know what you are doing, its a few seconds to a minute in order to add a new display by copy/paste in the xorg.conf.
But did you look at what hardware was being provided? It sucked -- bad. Nobody wants a $200 computer that is hideously outdated already. 128MB of Ram sucks. I am a happy customer and reseller of Linspire, and that has been their plague -- cheapo crap computers. Nobody wants that -- not the geeks, nor the regular schmoes. Really, 512MB of ram is an understood minimum when dealing with recent revisions of all the OSs out there -- MacOS, XP, Vista (hah, more like a gig here ... but), any GNOME based Linux, any KDE based Linux. Sell garbage and dont be suprised that your sales figures are that. Middle of the road is what almost everyone I know (personally) wants -- not uber high end, nor riduculously low end either.
Currently the only Linux OEM that gets it is System76. And look at what they offer - decent systems for a very good price at the bottom end, up to what you feel like paying for. Thats what people want out of Dell, or Wal Mart, or Best Buy.
The apt and rpm solutions are both phenomenal and work great. When they stop working great is with poorly made packages. Having used both, RPM and DEB, I can say when a competent packager gets a package rolled out, no matter how complex, the package works fine. It's the complete puds that are either too green in making packages, or people who refuse to read the documentation on how to create a proper package for the target distro. I have also seen problems with applications that convert from one to another format not translate correctly for one reason or another. one major one is dependency package names. I have seen discrepencies personally with respect to one system using blah as the package name, and blah4 to refer to the same thing. Obviously there will be a problem here, since as far as the db can tell, that is two different programs.
... I am very glad that issue got fixed ... that was a bad time ... /me has evil falshbacks
In short, dont blame RPM or APT, its the packagers that need to step up. And with what I have seen recently -- they have. Dependency hell is an ancient thing for my customers, friends, and myself. It is only the occasional badly done package that I can repack into whatever target format that has been the problem for anyone I have dealt with for a few years now. Right around FC2 and the earlier releases of Ubuntu is when I saw a notable shift in quality of packages and the considerable lessening of dep-hell instances.
The only gripe I have had with RPMs was on Red Hat Linux 8 & 9 and the DB corruption days
Thst would be Sich Heil.
I am a real grammar Nazi. Freu Leben!
Kevin Carmony gets the whole thing of linux, and coming from a regular Joe's point of view (he is rather computer unsaavy),he realizes that OS's as a whole suck major balls, and things need to be fixed. Try doing anything like CNR for Windows or OS X. One word -- futility. Yet, it would be what alot of users would love to have.
Hardcore nerds won't take much interest in CNR or Linspire due to it being simplified so much, but thats why we have multiple distros like Slackware, Gentoo, Debian, and Fedora (and many many more). The noobs or peeps that just dont care about computers, but rather just want to get work done have their place too in the market. Windows. Now Linspire and Canonical are challenging that (well, have been for sometime now).
The OP never linked to anything except the company. The other links were wikipedia entries detail what a non-compete clause is and soforth. Pleas ego thru the links if you are going to talk about them.
Thats the first thing I thought -- countersuit. Sue the shit out of them. Make it a 20M countersuit. When asked why, reply "You wasted my time, and I find this fun."
Really, the cock n balls tactics that this employer is trying is just sour grapes and trying to instill fear into the OP. I would make this as expensive as humanly possible for the fool of an owner that thinks this will fly. Just for the fun. Why? Because its asses like this that clog the system, and the faster we stake their balls to the wall, the better off the world is.
BTW I know this works from experience. I only got 40K, but thats 40K I didnt have to start with.
I appreciate your comment, but unfortunately the link is stale. I think that taking BSD code is fine, since that is what the license allows for (assuming that is what is being referred to since I cant view the article). BUt until I can locate the article I cant really comment much further.
Look, I hate being put out of my way just as much as the next guy, but I cant fault MS on this one. They have had their OS stolen rampantly for years now, and I cannot fault them for wanting proof of payment or legality of the installation. Considering that the fella does have an odd situation (really, how many peeps out there really do swap their mobos out besides us nerds on /. ?).
What would be an unreasonable thing is being put on hold an hour to be told to piss off and not get a new validated key.
I believe you misread the post, he said "closest competitor". Linux may be MS's closest competitor in the desktop arena, but that doesnt take into consideration that %90+ of the market is on MS. Same applies here with the GPL vs. BSD adoptance.
Mmmmm.... Beer ....
If only I could get this fanatical of zealots for my company ...
You are somewhat correct here. But I personally think that the feeling is more for the fact that !MS gets the money. Personally I like Macs, but Linux blows me away much more than OS X. 10.4 is nice and all, dont get me wrong, but Linux has caught up in the OS/Desktop arena, and is just lacking whole applications (Quicken, TurboTax, see the trend). Once more adoption hits (hopefully Linspire and Ubuntu start taking off much more soon), those apps will be there. The trend has begun already.