There really are no absolutes. Who's respnsible for the lack of adequate stability for the linux desktop will forever be the "chicken or the egg" argument. At some point those promoting it must take responsibility (ownership for the problems). The lunux pundits are failing to do this at this time. No one is taking responsibility and everyone is passing the buck.
Business was, at one time, the main focus for computer sales. At some point home sales either met or exceeded the business sales market. Right now, if you think in terms of innovation and leading technology, it is those technologies that are kin to the home user that is driving innovation in the industry. Yeah, I'm talking about video and sound technologies. If your video support is poor and your sound is unheard then you will ultimately loose.
Manufacturers are not required to pump out drivers for every OS that crops it's head up and professes superiority. And most certainly manufacturers are not going to take kindly to having their feet held to the fire. There must be a motivating factor for them that goes beyond idle speculation about product superiority.
No business wants to have to hire support personnel with skills specific to a freebee OS when they know the market is filled with another OS of which there's an endless supply of local talent capable of supporting the products. Linux just isn't there and the motivation to get there for these companies is not going to come from a bunch of hacks that are trying to bootstrap their OS to provide them a means to make a fortune.
I, as a small business owner, would never even remotely desire to pay someone to write me a program to suit my needs for an OS such as Linux, especially when I can go to my locak computer store (or buy on the internet--or download from the internet) one of a thousand applications that would satisfy me. Not only that, years from now when that product is again broken by the next distro release, why would I want to feel obligated to seek someone out again and pay them yet again for a potentially temporary fix? A fix until the next distro release breaks the program again.
As a small business owner my goal is not to have to program this myself. It is not to mess with drivers or tweak the OS or compile a program to make it work for me. My time should be involved in whatever my business is--be it fixing cars, selling books, doing medical exams, etc.
Granted, the one example of a sound card that didn't work for this guy is really an indicator that "if this is just a single sound card that doesn't work then Linux should be pretty good". It does imply that there are potentially other problems with the OS, at least, a reasonable person would conclude that if the developers of the OS and the manufacturers of the cards can't work together then there must be something wrong and I as a small business owner would not want to be embroiled in that.
The linux community has worked hard to ensure that there is alot of compatability in their products. Kudos to them. Suffice it to say though, Linux has some gaping holes that need to be resolved and a few people here or there that are zealots should not be setting the tone for the direction or even the target audience of that product. Biggest marketing mistake of all time. The customer determines what they want and how much they will put up with.
The biggest problem with Linux acceptance on the desktop is the zealots and pundits not facing up to these very basic facts--users drive the needs and we fill those needs (or our product dies) and that the user has no time to waste on time-consuming procedures that should have been programmed better. Attacking me, as a small business owner, while I'm making business decisions will only yield dissatisfaction and seperation from me and you (and hence, your product--linux, etc).
Even if you think you have a superior product and you think that you have done all you should you should then moveover to let those that are willing to provide me, the customer, with what I want. Bottom line it all boils down to "serve the customer" and you don't get to choose who your customer is for the inevitable will occur and you will find yourself without customers sooner than later.
Not meaning to be rude, but it isn't the installation of the OS that is the issue with linux. It was a couple years ago, but now it is not.
It is after the OS is installed when ppl go looking for software to run on it. The base install is not enough.
When someone has to seek out support in 5 or more different places and get no where, when the recommendation is to "compile" the source, when you have to return to microsoft to get an installer for the application you wrote/modified then linux will drivel away into no where.
I can go every day all day, being someone in the computer industry, for about 20 years now, and never hear a word about linux. I can go for weeks, months, and years and never have linux brought up in the environment.
This basically means that linux is not necessary. The other operating systems are more then capable at virtually all things.
Linux has no innovations. Linux is alot like win 3.1 when it comes to availability of programs for end-users. It is still alot like DoS when it comes to the installs and even then DoS had it better because installation packages were always included.
Don't try to say that it is the multiple distro type thing that gets in the way of a consistent linux application installer, because that is not the case. Don't put that burden on me, the end-user.
Linux, well, sucks unless you get some decent end-user apps and the installers that go with it that don't require me to go to the distro itself for a way to get it installed. In that regard, linux is broken.
No RPMs,.DEB, nor apt-get are anyway near the solution.
I'm sorry but linux is more then device detection, which btw, is wrong, Debian failes on the device detection thing.
Linux is more then browsing and e-mail and cd-burning. I think everyone that develops for any distro should take a good long long look at what people actually use their computer for.
I would never accept Debian. It has alot but alot is not always better and since it can't create a graphical install I know it can't satisify 90% of the potential users. Come one, linux has been out for 10 years now and no graphical install? No cross-distro software installation routine either. This is just pathetically sad.
Debian actually sucks. I've looked at it. The damn thing create all sorts of problems just on the install. RH installed just fine with no problems whatsoever, period. Debian on the other had was confusing to install, several times ending in a loop. One time ended in a loop appologizing and it turned out it was an insufficient disk space issue yet debian didn't even look to see if enough was free before attempting the intall.
To top that off the install is character based and is very confusing to know what's going on. The menu system seems convoluted and didn't even have scroll bars to tell me there were more options further down in the list.
On top of that it wouldn't configure a nic manually or automatically even though RH had no problem with it. In fact, RH has only had a problem with one card and I knew it had the problem. I simply swapped it out for one it did know about.
The guy that is fluffing up debian is reacting to the attempt by RH to monopolize the Linux enterprise distro. He is fearful that once RH is so squarely entrenched any other distro will have great difficulty in getting onto the enterprise desktop. The same is what is driving the Novell purchase of SuSE.
The problem with gnome 2.4 is the installation. The developers themselves won't make distro installs. They are leaving it up to the distros themselves.
This is wrong. You made the software, now make it so I can install it. You decided it was the final version, now make it so I can install it. Make it so I can install it with your installation package and make it so I don't have to concern myself about which distro I have. You look at my installed linux and make the decision. Why should I have to go back to Microsoft just to get a program written by a 3rd party to install on their OS? I think you can see the absurdity of it.
If you don't want to go back to the distro to get an installer for your distro (lucky you if they have one and NONE of them have instructions on how to do it) then you can feel blessed in that you can install it by recompling it. Woopee. Not what I nor any end-user EVER should have to do. NO end users should ever have to compile it.
See, all linux developers have this really messed up mentality that I should have a compiler on my computer. Waste of space on my HDD if you ask me.
If you want me to run your software, that is why you made it and why you released it, then make it so I can run it by installing it with a couple clicks of a mouse button and without my regard to which Linux distro I have.
Hundreds of distro's creates fractionalization and marginalization of certain ones.
One distro won't help. Multiple distro's seem to create a situation where the user, wanting one good desktop have to pay to try multiples just to see which one is the right one.
Linux doesn't need one distro, it needs a single cross-distro installation package for after-OS-install applications (end user software).
Linux lives like the guy that constantly tweaks his car but never takes it out of the garage. It is also similar to the guy who thinks the car is all in the engine and nothing else matter. Why build doors on the car when you can get in through the windows, and who cares if the 3 year old daughter doesn't like it that way.
A cross-distro installation package for all end-user software that is graphical and can accomplish an install within a few clicks of the mouse is the only thing that will solve the problems linux has. Otherwise Linux will hit its zenith and take a noze-dive.
Very big difference between computer hardware nerds and an os nerd when the competing OS (windows) beats the pants off linux in virtually every category except initial cost.
It wasn't a few years ago, btw, it was 2 decades ago.
The difference between what you are saying and what the other person is saying is that it is the nerds giving linux a bad name because it is fractionalize, messy, uncoordinated, there's no standardized install for ALL apps across ALL distros.
If these pathetic nerds could come up with just one thing to change all of this it would be the last part of the last sentence in the prior paragraph.
Dump the source distribution retarded mentality. Put the source code into shared repositories where it can be checked out and modifications checked in and leave it there. DO NOT ask any customer, any potential user, to compile anything. If you can't make an installer for your app that works across all platforms that work within a couple clicks of the mouse and operate exactly like every other application installer does from everyone else.
Do that, and linux is the winner hands down.
Stop trying to just port the friggen apps from other OSes and make some of your own from scratch.
If anyone told you that you should recompile it they are friggen nuts. I've heard it before in the linux community and the person that decided that was a valid response should be shot, seriously. Give me the gun!
Listen, linux is dead if it doesn't change, period. If the developers think this is an OS for them well, they have another thing coming and it will be a shocking reality check.
I'm using Linux on the desktop and if I meet anyone in real life that tells me to compile an app or that any user should have to I'll probably take a swing at them and I'm a very passive person.
These people need to get their heads on straight. Microsoft isn't worried about linux as long as that sort of response is considered appropriate. They are laughing all the way to the bank.
It isn't even consistently across all apps and development. What will cure 90% of the acceptance woes is to have a cross-distro installation app that will accomplish an install within a few clicks of a mouse.
If there is one thing that helped windows, it was the consistent installation packaging. Once the installs went without a hitch then the software could be run and that made it easier for software penetration.
Far too much attention is being given to drivers in various linux acceptance discussions. If Linus T. comes down and says that all distro's will support this or that installation routine then Linux will boom ahead onto the desktop.
One might ask what right Linus has to dictate an installer package. As much as they decide what goes into the kernel or how the directory structure should be maintained, etc is the same as ensuring that consistency across distro's for app installation.
Back when the internet was first starting I used to help out in the county library. We had character based apps for everything because windows hadn't quite adopted graphical apps for the internet at that time.
Guess what? Pine was fine.
Nowadays, though, even though pine was fine then it is an abhorrently messy program better left at the bottom of the bit bucket set to go out with the trash.
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There really are no absolutes. Who's respnsible for the lack of adequate stability for the linux desktop will forever be the "chicken or the egg" argument. At some point those promoting it must take responsibility (ownership for the problems). The lunux pundits are failing to do this at this time. No one is taking responsibility and everyone is passing the buck.
Business was, at one time, the main focus for computer sales. At some point home sales either met or exceeded the business sales market. Right now, if you think in terms of innovation and leading technology, it is those technologies that are kin to the home user that is driving innovation in the industry. Yeah, I'm talking about video and sound technologies. If your video support is poor and your sound is unheard then you will ultimately loose.
Manufacturers are not required to pump out drivers for every OS that crops it's head up and professes superiority. And most certainly manufacturers are not going to take kindly to having their feet held to the fire. There must be a motivating factor for them that goes beyond idle speculation about product superiority.
No business wants to have to hire support personnel with skills specific to a freebee OS when they know the market is filled with another OS of which there's an endless supply of local talent capable of supporting the products. Linux just isn't there and the motivation to get there for these companies is not going to come from a bunch of hacks that are trying to bootstrap their OS to provide them a means to make a fortune.
I, as a small business owner, would never even remotely desire to pay someone to write me a program to suit my needs for an OS such as Linux, especially when I can go to my locak computer store (or buy on the internet--or download from the internet) one of a thousand applications that would satisfy me. Not only that, years from now when that product is again broken by the next distro release, why would I want to feel obligated to seek someone out again and pay them yet again for a potentially temporary fix? A fix until the next distro release breaks the program again.
As a small business owner my goal is not to have to program this myself. It is not to mess with drivers or tweak the OS or compile a program to make it work for me. My time should be involved in whatever my business is--be it fixing cars, selling books, doing medical exams, etc.
Granted, the one example of a sound card that didn't work for this guy is really an indicator that "if this is just a single sound card that doesn't work then Linux should be pretty good". It does imply that there are potentially other problems with the OS, at least, a reasonable person would conclude that if the developers of the OS and the manufacturers of the cards can't work together then there must be something wrong and I as a small business owner would not want to be embroiled in that.
The linux community has worked hard to ensure that there is alot of compatability in their products. Kudos to them. Suffice it to say though, Linux has some gaping holes that need to be resolved and a few people here or there that are zealots should not be setting the tone for the direction or even the target audience of that product. Biggest marketing mistake of all time. The customer determines what they want and how much they will put up with.
The biggest problem with Linux acceptance on the desktop is the zealots and pundits not facing up to these very basic facts--users drive the needs and we fill those needs (or our product dies) and that the user has no time to waste on time-consuming procedures that should have been programmed better. Attacking me, as a small business owner, while I'm making business decisions will only yield dissatisfaction and seperation from me and you (and hence, your product--linux, etc).
Even if you think you have a superior product and you think that you have done all you should you should then moveover to let those that are willing to provide me, the customer, with what I want. Bottom line it all boils down to "serve the customer" and you don't get to choose who your customer is for the inevitable will occur and you will find yourself without customers sooner than later.
Because it isn't necessary. When it becomes necessary everyone will switch to debian.
Sorry, but Wrong! :)
.DEB, nor apt-get are anyway near the solution.
Not meaning to be rude, but it isn't the installation of the OS that is the issue with linux. It was a couple years ago, but now it is not.
It is after the OS is installed when ppl go looking for software to run on it. The base install is not enough.
When someone has to seek out support in 5 or more different places and get no where, when the recommendation is to "compile" the source, when you have to return to microsoft to get an installer for the application you wrote/modified then linux will drivel away into no where.
I can go every day all day, being someone in the computer industry, for about 20 years now, and never hear a word about linux. I can go for weeks, months, and years and never have linux brought up in the environment.
This basically means that linux is not necessary. The other operating systems are more then capable at virtually all things.
Linux has no innovations. Linux is alot like win 3.1 when it comes to availability of programs for end-users. It is still alot like DoS when it comes to the installs and even then DoS had it better because installation packages were always included.
Don't try to say that it is the multiple distro type thing that gets in the way of a consistent linux application installer, because that is not the case. Don't put that burden on me, the end-user.
Linux, well, sucks unless you get some decent end-user apps and the installers that go with it that don't require me to go to the distro itself for a way to get it installed. In that regard, linux is broken.
No RPMs,
I'm sorry but linux is more then device detection, which btw, is wrong, Debian failes on the device detection thing.
Linux is more then browsing and e-mail and cd-burning. I think everyone that develops for any distro should take a good long long look at what people actually use their computer for.
I would never accept Debian. It has alot but alot is not always better and since it can't create a graphical install I know it can't satisify 90% of the potential users. Come one, linux has been out for 10 years now and no graphical install? No cross-distro software installation routine either. This is just pathetically sad.
Debian actually sucks. I've looked at it. The damn thing create all sorts of problems just on the install. RH installed just fine with no problems whatsoever, period. Debian on the other had was confusing to install, several times ending in a loop. One time ended in a loop appologizing and it turned out it was an insufficient disk space issue yet debian didn't even look to see if enough was free before attempting the intall.
To top that off the install is character based and is very confusing to know what's going on. The menu system seems convoluted and didn't even have scroll bars to tell me there were more options further down in the list.
On top of that it wouldn't configure a nic manually or automatically even though RH had no problem with it. In fact, RH has only had a problem with one card and I knew it had the problem. I simply swapped it out for one it did know about.
The guy that is fluffing up debian is reacting to the attempt by RH to monopolize the Linux enterprise distro. He is fearful that once RH is so squarely entrenched any other distro will have great difficulty in getting onto the enterprise desktop. The same is what is driving the Novell purchase of SuSE.
The problem with gnome 2.4 is the installation. The developers themselves won't make distro installs. They are leaving it up to the distros themselves.
This is wrong. You made the software, now make it so I can install it. You decided it was the final version, now make it so I can install it. Make it so I can install it with your installation package and make it so I don't have to concern myself about which distro I have. You look at my installed linux and make the decision. Why should I have to go back to Microsoft just to get a program written by a 3rd party to install on their OS? I think you can see the absurdity of it.
If you don't want to go back to the distro to get an installer for your distro (lucky you if they have one and NONE of them have instructions on how to do it) then you can feel blessed in that you can install it by recompling it. Woopee. Not what I nor any end-user EVER should have to do. NO end users should ever have to compile it.
See, all linux developers have this really messed up mentality that I should have a compiler on my computer. Waste of space on my HDD if you ask me.
If you want me to run your software, that is why you made it and why you released it, then make it so I can run it by installing it with a couple clicks of a mouse button and without my regard to which Linux distro I have.
Hundreds of distro's creates fractionalization and marginalization of certain ones. One distro won't help. Multiple distro's seem to create a situation where the user, wanting one good desktop have to pay to try multiples just to see which one is the right one. Linux doesn't need one distro, it needs a single cross-distro installation package for after-OS-install applications (end user software). Linux lives like the guy that constantly tweaks his car but never takes it out of the garage. It is also similar to the guy who thinks the car is all in the engine and nothing else matter. Why build doors on the car when you can get in through the windows, and who cares if the 3 year old daughter doesn't like it that way. A cross-distro installation package for all end-user software that is graphical and can accomplish an install within a few clicks of the mouse is the only thing that will solve the problems linux has. Otherwise Linux will hit its zenith and take a noze-dive.
Very big difference between computer hardware nerds and an os nerd when the competing OS (windows) beats the pants off linux in virtually every category except initial cost. It wasn't a few years ago, btw, it was 2 decades ago. The difference between what you are saying and what the other person is saying is that it is the nerds giving linux a bad name because it is fractionalize, messy, uncoordinated, there's no standardized install for ALL apps across ALL distros. If these pathetic nerds could come up with just one thing to change all of this it would be the last part of the last sentence in the prior paragraph. Dump the source distribution retarded mentality. Put the source code into shared repositories where it can be checked out and modifications checked in and leave it there. DO NOT ask any customer, any potential user, to compile anything. If you can't make an installer for your app that works across all platforms that work within a couple clicks of the mouse and operate exactly like every other application installer does from everyone else. Do that, and linux is the winner hands down. Stop trying to just port the friggen apps from other OSes and make some of your own from scratch.
If anyone told you that you should recompile it they are friggen nuts. I've heard it before in the linux community and the person that decided that was a valid response should be shot, seriously. Give me the gun!
Listen, linux is dead if it doesn't change, period. If the developers think this is an OS for them well, they have another thing coming and it will be a shocking reality check.
I'm using Linux on the desktop and if I meet anyone in real life that tells me to compile an app or that any user should have to I'll probably take a swing at them and I'm a very passive person.
These people need to get their heads on straight. Microsoft isn't worried about linux as long as that sort of response is considered appropriate. They are laughing all the way to the bank.
It isn't even consistently across all apps and development. What will cure 90% of the acceptance woes is to have a cross-distro installation app that will accomplish an install within a few clicks of a mouse. If there is one thing that helped windows, it was the consistent installation packaging. Once the installs went without a hitch then the software could be run and that made it easier for software penetration. Far too much attention is being given to drivers in various linux acceptance discussions. If Linus T. comes down and says that all distro's will support this or that installation routine then Linux will boom ahead onto the desktop. One might ask what right Linus has to dictate an installer package. As much as they decide what goes into the kernel or how the directory structure should be maintained, etc is the same as ensuring that consistency across distro's for app installation.
Back when the internet was first starting I used to help out in the county library. We had character based apps for everything because windows hadn't quite adopted graphical apps for the internet at that time. Guess what? Pine was fine. Nowadays, though, even though pine was fine then it is an abhorrently messy program better left at the bottom of the bit bucket set to go out with the trash.
Considering IBM gave us display writer I'd say they are not prime candidates to promote desktop computing.