The value of Twitter depends on who you follow. Saying Twitter is valueless because some people post valueless junk all the time, is rather like saying blogs are valueless because of the existence of blogs dominated by "hat my cat did" type posts, or that newspapers are valueless because of the existence of The National Enquirer, The Sun, etc.
You also need to skim past the stuf that does not interest you. That is why the 140 character limit matters.
That seems to be where Enlightenment is going. The current release of E17 has both desktop and small screen flavours. It is very good and I have switched my family to it (the light version of PCLinuxOS E17 to be exact).
That said, KDE does a lot more than just provide an application launcher. I still use KDE apps with a lightweight desktop because I cannot find anything else that supports remote file browsing and editing anything like as well as Konqueror and Kate. Those work well because of the seamless support for SFTP and other protocols provided by KDE.
Less importantly, I also cannot find a Linux RSS reader as good as Akgregator that does not have at least as heavy dependencies as its on KDE. Again, it uses common KDE components such as KHTML.
I though you could build a fully open source Android? The Cyanogen wiki says it is GPL and Apache licensed (which I assume means that some bits are GPL and others are Apache).
We are moving away from free market capitalism to monopoly capitalism. We could take take radical measures to fix this, but at the moment the trend is towards mercantilism and, and away from Adam Smith style free markets and even Washington consensus neo-liberalism.
You keep repeating variants of the same FUD. NASA's contributions to a GPL licensed work can be public domain, while the work as a whole and the contributions made by others can be GPL. No problem, its in the FSF FAQs I linked to earlier, so if you disagree its your opinion vs that of the FSF's lawyers.
I understand that your code has to be public domain, but you can mix public domain code with GPL. The FEF's lawyers seem to think you should have no problem:
The GPL is not controlled by a third party, and it certainty goes not give a third party control over a project. This is pure FUD.
The GPL was written by a third party, just as most software licences are written by lawyers rather than the developer, but this does not mean that the lawyers control the project.
Why is using the GPL "discriminating against commercial organisations"? The GPL gives all taxpayers continued access on equal terms, whereas the BSD license risks someone taking over the market with a single closed source version, stifling competition and effectively getting corporate welfare from the government.
It comes down to politics: GPL if you are pro competitive free markets, BSD if you want corporate welfare and central planning.
That task might be browsing the web, editing a document, writing code, watching a video, debugging, etc.
I do all of those on Linux with no problems. I did have one video that was playing out of sync, but it played out of sync of Windows as well.
Let go through your complaints:
operating system,
What is wrong with it?
development tool chain
This does not affect the average desktop user. It is also a matter of opinion as lots of developers like developing for Linux.
pc games
Yes, you cannot play Windows gamers on LInux, LInux has a limited choice of games available. Linux is not the best OS for gamers. Most people are not gamers The average users idea of a computer game is Farmville or a card game.
the amazingly badly designed FIOS TV interface
I do not even know what this is,.
I also find that the desktops are experimenting with increasingly weird crap
Most of which the average user does not notice. All they user the desktop for is to start programs, switch between them, and lock the screen.
but for the forseeable future, Linux just isn't there.
I feel exactly the same when I use Windows one someone else's PC. I usually think "how can people put up with all this crap".
There needs to be a way to use the software on my machine that doesn't require me to open a MAN page and edit a config file.
If you mean that the OSS software that requires config files to be edited needs to be easier to use, I disagree. It is mostly server software or parts of the system you should not change unless you know what you are doing. The last config files I edited on my Linux desktop were Apache, PostgreSQL and php.ini, If you are not comfortable editing a config file you should not be messing about with any of this stuff anyway.
If you are under the impression that the average user needs to edit config files to get things done, you are just plain wrong.
I just installed PCLinuxOS E17 light. This is not a geek distro like Arch, but it is definitely something on which you expect to find rough edges (it uses a desktop that is still in beta, and a light variant means that a lot of stuff is omitted, meaning more set up to do afterwards. Total problems to date:
1) I had to change an out of date sources list. This is the only config file I had to change, and I did not edit it, just downloaded the new one and overwrote the old. 2) The printer set-up was missing from the control centre. I had start up the GUI software installer, synaptic , Eelect two printer related items (following instructions from the website) and click "apply". 3) I cannot get E17 to lock with xscreensaver rather than its own screenlocker. It is a beta.
MY previous Liinux install was Mandriva KDE for my father. I did an entirely GUI install, which took ten minutes. Added some software (again, purely GUI), and set up some users (again, in a GUI). No config files. That was about six months ago and I have not had any requests for help from him since, which is a lot better than when he used Windows.
You do need sometimes to edit config files when things go wrong. That is probably easier than editing the Windows registry when things go wrong. The average user cannot do either.
Not just that he actually said that terrorism is OK as long as they do not attack the US:
"I understand why people who are misinformed might see a parallel. The fact is, the I.R.A. never attacked the United States. And my loyalty is to the United States."
He is far from being the only person who is hypocritical about terrorism but going to this extent and being this blatant is disgusting.
I have steered some people with no interest in computers to Linux. Most distros have a very Windows like default desktop, and it works on their existing hardware, so its a much easier jump. The main thing they need to learn is how to install software, and that is not exactly complicated on Linux (assuming a GUI package installer like Synaptic).
You do land yourself with a Linux install, but that is one-off.
It sounds to me as though the the GP finds it difficult to find loopholes in the GPL. That is what takes time.
The only legitimate problems I have come across are grey areas around proprietary plugins and mixing GPL code with proprietary libraries or GPL with open source libraries with GPL incompatible restrictions (e.g. an advertising clause). There is plenty of documentation provided by the FSF (and FAQ and a list of compatible licences) and I doubt there are many legitimate questions to which you cannot get an answer in five minutes.
ON the other hand proprietary licences are not necessarily that straightforward either. What about the cost of tracking licences: QT is per developer, others require a royalty per unit, others per product, so depend on licences for other products in ambiguous ways (e.g. MS.Net Framework license).
The argument is about what the effect is. What about the dimming effect of smoke articles? What about uncertainties in the data? What about discrepancies between satellite and land based sea level measurements?
Actually I have recently (within the last few weeks) become sceptical about global warning, because I started looking at the numbers, and reading the criticisms made of them, and I cannot see that there is any firm evidence.
Abortion is pretty much a clear-cut case: the vast majority of abortions take place while the foetus is several millimeters long. They are not human beings, don't even have a brain let alone pain centers, and don't even remotely look like a child.
Citation needed. By the time a pregnancy is discovered, an abortion is decided on, scheduled and carried out, you are well into the pregnancy.
I do not know about the US, but in the UK the limit is 24 weeks: you are talking about a fully formed baby that can live outside the womb.
If abortion was limited to very early pregnancy, at the "don't have a brain" stage I would be quite happy to says its a private decision. As it is, that is not the law, not by a long way.
Absolute rubbish. Doubt and the reasons for belief are one of the most common topics of Christian discussion.
I have never come across a Christian, even a complete fundamentalist, who is unwilling to discuss any of those topics.
You need to look at the positive role Christians have played in science. Mendel is the classic example, but far from the only one.
I personally learnt the importance of rationality by reading books about Christianity as a teenager. CS Lewis, in particular, kept stressing the importance of following an argument to its logical conclusion,
I do not like your choice to kill someone, and choose to stop you doing it is perfectly reasonable.
It is ludicrous to say that to kill a premature baby after birth is murder, but to kill the same baby, with the same level of brain function, a few hours earlier is fine - but that is what the law permitting abortion says.
There are a lot of stability (e.g. multiple processes for crash isolation), UI, and extension differences between browsers and advances in all those areas.
I see performance problems with FF when scrolling very large pages, and when switching tabs with many tabs open. Will the improvements in FF4 help that.
I use Linux so IE9 is not an alternative anyway. Chromium will be once it has an extension to match Tree Style Tabs.
1) Linuxconf: OK, I never used it, so I do not know what makes it special compared to other admin tools? It seems a bit more complete than, for example, Mandriva Control Centre, but does that really mater? 2) The challenge: use Arch or similar 3) Wordperfect: lots of good tools out there. There are a number of text editors for writers, there are several office suites, and there is Lyx. 4) Install fests: organise one 5) Linus’ sound byte: really matters? 6) Window managers: you have the choice. There are a number of lightweight distros. Something based on Openbox will suite you nicely. I am switching to PCLinuxOS E17 which is more fancy but a bit less solid, but still very fast. 7) Linus Torvalds: relegated to obscurity? I had not noticed. 8) Loki Games: that is something that never happened. Gamers do not use Linux because of the lack of games, so selling games for Linux is difficult. There are far more games for Linux than there were back then. This not "old school Linux" its "never happened Linux" 9) Vi/emacs wars. People are still passionate. Not about Vi and Emacs but about distros, desktop environments, Gtk vs Qt, languages, etc. 10) Thousands of distributions.... which no-one used, most of which would now be called re-spins. There are still plenty around and more out everyday - the Distrowatch news page always has plenty of new announcements. The problem is that most of us are too busy to keep trying new ones, when we have something that works.
I certainly want thousands of text files for config. Its simple, its reliable, its easy to tweak. I would much rather edit a text config file than the Windows registry.
What is the problem with incompatible formats? Does Digikam need to read my Sylpheed config all of a sudden? Do Windows app work better together by having a common registry?
Slashdot Mirror
The value of Twitter depends on who you follow. Saying Twitter is valueless because some people post valueless junk all the time, is rather like saying blogs are valueless because of the existence of blogs dominated by "hat my cat did" type posts, or that newspapers are valueless because of the existence of The National Enquirer, The Sun, etc.
You also need to skim past the stuf that does not interest you. That is why the 140 character limit matters.
That seems to be where Enlightenment is going. The current release of E17 has both desktop and small screen flavours. It is very good and I have switched my family to it (the light version of PCLinuxOS E17 to be exact).
That said, KDE does a lot more than just provide an application launcher. I still use KDE apps with a lightweight desktop because I cannot find anything else that supports remote file browsing and editing anything like as well as Konqueror and Kate. Those work well because of the seamless support for SFTP and other protocols provided by KDE.
Less importantly, I also cannot find a Linux RSS reader as good as Akgregator that does not have at least as heavy dependencies as its on KDE. Again, it uses common KDE components such as KHTML.
I though you could build a fully open source Android? The Cyanogen wiki says it is GPL and Apache licensed (which I assume means that some bits are GPL and others are Apache).
We are moving away from free market capitalism to monopoly capitalism. We could take take radical measures to fix this, but at the moment the trend is towards mercantilism and, and away from Adam Smith style free markets and even Washington consensus neo-liberalism.
You keep repeating variants of the same FUD. NASA's contributions to a GPL licensed work can be public domain, while the work as a whole and the contributions made by others can be GPL. No problem, its in the FSF FAQs I linked to earlier, so if you disagree its your opinion vs that of the FSF's lawyers.
I understand that your code has to be public domain, but you can mix public domain code with GPL. The FEF's lawyers seem to think you should have no problem:
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#GPLUSGovAdd
The GPL is not controlled by a third party, and it certainty goes not give a third party control over a project. This is pure FUD.
The GPL was written by a third party, just as most software licences are written by lawyers rather than the developer, but this does not mean that the lawyers control the project.
Why is using the GPL "discriminating against commercial organisations"? The GPL gives all taxpayers continued access on equal terms, whereas the BSD license risks someone taking over the market with a single closed source version, stifling competition and effectively getting corporate welfare from the government.
It comes down to politics: GPL if you are pro competitive free markets, BSD if you want corporate welfare and central planning.
That task might be browsing the web, editing a document, writing code, watching a video, debugging, etc.
I do all of those on Linux with no problems. I did have one video that was playing out of sync, but it played out of sync of Windows as well.
Let go through your complaints:
operating system,
What is wrong with it?
development tool chain
This does not affect the average desktop user. It is also a matter of opinion as lots of developers like developing for Linux.
pc games
Yes, you cannot play Windows gamers on LInux, LInux has a limited choice of games available. Linux is not the best OS for gamers. Most people are not gamers The average users idea of a computer game is Farmville or a card game.
the amazingly badly designed FIOS TV interface
I do not even know what this is,.
I also find that the desktops are experimenting with increasingly weird crap
Most of which the average user does not notice. All they user the desktop for is to start programs, switch between them, and lock the screen.
but for the forseeable future, Linux just isn't there.
I feel exactly the same when I use Windows one someone else's PC. I usually think "how can people put up with all this crap".
There needs to be a way to use the software on my machine that doesn't require me to open a MAN page and edit a config file.
If you mean that the OSS software that requires config files to be edited needs to be easier to use, I disagree. It is mostly server software or parts of the system you should not change unless you know what you are doing. The last config files I edited on my Linux desktop were Apache, PostgreSQL and php.ini, If you are not comfortable editing a config file you should not be messing about with any of this stuff anyway.
If you are under the impression that the average user needs to edit config files to get things done, you are just plain wrong.
I just installed PCLinuxOS E17 light. This is not a geek distro like Arch, but it is definitely something on which you expect to find rough edges (it uses a desktop that is still in beta, and a light variant means that a lot of stuff is omitted, meaning more set up to do afterwards. Total problems to date:
1) I had to change an out of date sources list. This is the only config file I had to change, and I did not edit it, just downloaded the new one and overwrote the old.
2) The printer set-up was missing from the control centre. I had start up the GUI software installer, synaptic , Eelect two printer related items (following instructions from the website) and click "apply".
3) I cannot get E17 to lock with xscreensaver rather than its own screenlocker. It is a beta.
MY previous Liinux install was Mandriva KDE for my father. I did an entirely GUI install, which took ten minutes. Added some software (again, purely GUI), and set up some users (again, in a GUI). No config files. That was about six months ago and I have not had any requests for help from him since, which is a lot better than when he used Windows.
You do need sometimes to edit config files when things go wrong. That is probably easier than editing the Windows registry when things go wrong. The average user cannot do either.
Not just that he actually said that terrorism is OK as long as they do not attack the US:
"I understand why people who are misinformed might see a parallel. The fact is, the I.R.A. never attacked the United States. And my loyalty is to the United States."
He is far from being the only person who is hypocritical about terrorism but going to this extent and being this blatant is disgusting.
We're also busy getting laid and whatnot, too
So how come you have time for ham radio and to post on Slashdot?
You have no idea what Christians believe or why, do you?
I have steered some people with no interest in computers to Linux. Most distros have a very Windows like default desktop, and it works on their existing hardware, so its a much easier jump. The main thing they need to learn is how to install software, and that is not exactly complicated on Linux (assuming a GUI package installer like Synaptic).
You do land yourself with a Linux install, but that is one-off.
It sounds to me as though the the GP finds it difficult to find loopholes in the GPL. That is what takes time.
The only legitimate problems I have come across are grey areas around proprietary plugins and mixing GPL code with proprietary libraries or GPL with open source libraries with GPL incompatible restrictions (e.g. an advertising clause). There is plenty of documentation provided by the FSF (and FAQ and a list of compatible licences) and I doubt there are many legitimate questions to which you cannot get an answer in five minutes.
ON the other hand proprietary licences are not necessarily that straightforward either. What about the cost of tracking licences: QT is per developer, others require a royalty per unit, others per product, so depend on licences for other products in ambiguous ways (e.g. MS .Net Framework license).
Comparing vulnerabilities is tricky. Have you taken severity, and the level of disclosure by the developers into account?
Chrome has low resource usage, and has quite a lot of extensions now - although it cannot match FF. Chrome also has a great UI.
The argument is about what the effect is. What about the dimming effect of smoke articles? What about uncertainties in the data? What about discrepancies between satellite and land based sea level measurements?
Actually I have recently (within the last few weeks) become sceptical about global warning, because I started looking at the numbers, and reading the criticisms made of them, and I cannot see that there is any firm evidence.
If you can point me to any, I would be grateful.
Abortion is pretty much a clear-cut case: the vast majority of abortions take place while the foetus is several millimeters long. They are not human beings, don't even have a brain let alone pain centers, and don't even remotely look like a child.
Citation needed. By the time a pregnancy is discovered, an abortion is decided on, scheduled and carried out, you are well into the pregnancy.
I do not know about the US, but in the UK the limit is 24 weeks: you are talking about a fully formed baby that can live outside the womb.
If abortion was limited to very early pregnancy, at the "don't have a brain" stage I would be quite happy to says its a private decision. As it is, that is not the law, not by a long way.
Absolute rubbish. Doubt and the reasons for belief are one of the most common topics of Christian discussion.
I have never come across a Christian, even a complete fundamentalist, who is unwilling to discuss any of those topics.
You need to look at the positive role Christians have played in science. Mendel is the classic example, but far from the only one.
I personally learnt the importance of rationality by reading books about Christianity as a teenager. CS Lewis, in particular, kept stressing the importance of following an argument to its logical conclusion,
I do not like your choice to kill someone, and choose to stop you doing it is perfectly reasonable.
It is ludicrous to say that to kill a premature baby after birth is murder, but to kill the same baby, with the same level of brain function, a few hours earlier is fine - but that is what the law permitting abortion says.
There are a lot of stability (e.g. multiple processes for crash isolation), UI, and extension differences between browsers and advances in all those areas.
I see performance problems with FF when scrolling very large pages, and when switching tabs with many tabs open. Will the improvements in FF4 help that.
I use Linux so IE9 is not an alternative anyway. Chromium will be once it has an extension to match Tree Style Tabs.
So they decided that having failed in the mobile market, they would tie up with MS who also failed, and the combination would be a winner!
All the more so if you look through his points:
1) Linuxconf: OK, I never used it, so I do not know what makes it special compared to other admin tools? It seems a bit more complete than, for example, Mandriva Control Centre, but does that really mater? .... which no-one used, most of which would now be called re-spins. There are still plenty around and more out everyday - the Distrowatch news page always has plenty of new announcements. The problem is that most of us are too busy to keep trying new ones, when we have something that works.
2) The challenge: use Arch or similar
3) Wordperfect: lots of good tools out there. There are a number of text editors for writers, there are several office suites, and there is Lyx.
4) Install fests: organise one
5) Linus’ sound byte: really matters?
6) Window managers: you have the choice. There are a number of lightweight distros. Something based on Openbox will suite you nicely. I am switching to PCLinuxOS E17 which is more fancy but a bit less solid, but still very fast.
7) Linus Torvalds: relegated to obscurity? I had not noticed.
8) Loki Games: that is something that never happened. Gamers do not use Linux because of the lack of games, so selling games for Linux is difficult. There are far more games for Linux than there were back then. This not "old school Linux" its "never happened Linux"
9) Vi/emacs wars. People are still passionate. Not about Vi and Emacs but about distros, desktop environments, Gtk vs Qt, languages, etc.
10) Thousands of distributions
I certainly want thousands of text files for config. Its simple, its reliable, its easy to tweak. I would much rather edit a text config file than the Windows registry.
What is the problem with incompatible formats? Does Digikam need to read my Sylpheed config all of a sudden? Do Windows app work better together by having a common registry?