I've got to disagree with Explorer looking nice...it really doesn't. Sure, it's got a lot of eye candy...but the amount of such is enough sugar to make my eyes sick.
GNOME on the other hand is sleek, simple, and clean. KDE has a bit more eye candy, and is far more Windows-like, but frankly, I don't like Windows.
UI shouldn't be the only focus of software. At some point, you've got to actually do something with that computer, and I don't want to wait forever for all of that eye candy to load in order to type up a paper.
I'll take the two hours for a GNU/Linux install (got it down that quickly...I know my preferences fairly well) instead of the 24 hours needed to get a Windows computer running from scratch--especially if it's a reformat. Have you ever had to go and try to find that software key? My God, what a pain in the ass. And then there's the whole activation bit, which can't be done online because it's been activated before, so you've got to call them...and then you've got to do it again with Office. Then you've got to hunt down your drivers.
All this is already there when I get my GNU/Linux side done installing. Sure, I've got to get Flash, Java, XMMS (if the distro doesn't have it...not hard, I can select it in the upgrade process), and MPlayer...but that takes far less time.
Software freedom means never having to look for CD Keys or activating products...more time to be productive. I'll take that over slaveware any day.
Well, you can't really depend soley on the community of LiveJournal to be its own independent community. It doesn't stand up that well, really. You need to know people on it, preferably ones that you want to communicate with. Most of my online friends (most of whom I've never met in real life) were people I met during my message board days. From that seed of probably 25 people, I've amassed a friends list six times that size.
Have you tried the beta for OO.o 2.0? I'd say it's pretty damn close. And the help file is far easier to use than MS's. That said, I'm still waiting for a "OpenOffice.org for Dummies" book. That'll tell you that it's finally relevant to the market.
Why do you need spoofstick when Firefox itself gives you that information in the bottom right corner of the screen when you're on a secure site? And why are you putting up credit card numbers on non-secure sites?
Er...it's the GIMP because GNU made it, not because it uses the GTK+ toolkit (in fact, GTK+ is named for the GIMP, not the other way around) or Gnome (completely unrelated name, except again to show that GNU made it).
The GNU Image Manipulation Program doesn't tell you exactly what the program is for? Come on! PSP has nothing to do with painting, and Photoshop is a really broad name (especially for a program that can't make animated.gifs on its own).
The way you keep your competitive advantage is by being at the leading (not bleading, leading) edge. Besides, if they don't have the rights to access your binaries, they cannot see the source. That's one of the things about the idea of open source software. Sure, they'll eventually get a copy of the binary through legal means, but that can take a while if you charge a reasonable price for the binary.
The problem isn't that you've got to keep your software secret, it's that you've got to support it better than the other guy and be reasonable about your pricing scheme. Sure, if Quark was open-sourced, I could download it myself without paying, but your large contract companies want support, results, and reliability. If you deliver on those three things, and do so better than your competitor, you should dominate.
Of course, if you were really paranoid, you could write your own license that gives you exclusive rights to the source for a brief period of time after the software is released (say, one year), and then after that the license converts to a free license. This can help recoup the losses to R&D, get mindshare out there, and general respect for the product.
If your company cannot compete based on price, then the laws of economics dictate that your company should fail. It's okay to charge more if you're providing more, but if you provide an equivalent product, you shouldn't expect to be able to charge twice as much as your competitor.
Granted, it's not true freedom, but at the same time, it'd be a step to allow people to better appreciate the freedom given to them by free and open source software.
Well, there is one reason to use a POP3 account (managable easily through Gmail without paying extra): spell checking.
I know I'm not the only one that can't remember how to spell.
Unfortunately, AOL, Hotmail, and Yahoo don't do POP3 for free. Yahoo does do it, but it costs $20/year (but with that, you get 2 GB and 20 MB in attachment space for each message). Hotmail stopped the service, and I have no clue about AOL.
I must agree whole-heartedly. I mean, for the purposes of e-mail, paper-writing, and reading stories where random groupings of Hogwarts characters have sexual relations in 1337, any GNU/Linux distro is better than Windows, especially SuSE/FC/Mandrake/Ubuntu/distro de jure.
It's more natural to click on a "programs" menu or some KDE-theme-related icon to get to a program than it is to click "Start". Yes, Microsoft got some good names, but that's all they have. That, and no Unix desktop uses a "start" menu to shut down the machine. That is just plain stupid.
I prefer spreading FUD about MSIE itself.
However, I see both the humor and the validity of the grandparent's argument. MS Windows sucks. I have to use it for various purposes, so I keep a laptop with it on. There's too much eye candy, not enough substance, and getting to the commands I need is rather difficult. In GNU/Linux and BSD, I can just open a terminal. In OS X, I can either do that or actually use the graphical interface tools, which are set out sanely and are easy to get to. In Windows, I can't find half of the settings I'm looking for, and the console is worthless.
Give me a *ix any day.
Back to the topic at hand, I actually haven't had any problems with annoying crashes or stalls. Heck, on my Windows box, I don't even see the/. bug. I still can't sell my mom on Firefox, but all but one other person has taken quite well to it.
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Running a system using the Linux kernel on a laptop may be challenging, but it certainly is fun.
I've got to disagree with Explorer looking nice...it really doesn't. Sure, it's got a lot of eye candy...but the amount of such is enough sugar to make my eyes sick.
GNOME on the other hand is sleek, simple, and clean. KDE has a bit more eye candy, and is far more Windows-like, but frankly, I don't like Windows.
UI shouldn't be the only focus of software. At some point, you've got to actually do something with that computer, and I don't want to wait forever for all of that eye candy to load in order to type up a paper.
I'll take the two hours for a GNU/Linux install (got it down that quickly...I know my preferences fairly well) instead of the 24 hours needed to get a Windows computer running from scratch--especially if it's a reformat. Have you ever had to go and try to find that software key? My God, what a pain in the ass. And then there's the whole activation bit, which can't be done online because it's been activated before, so you've got to call them...and then you've got to do it again with Office. Then you've got to hunt down your drivers.
All this is already there when I get my GNU/Linux side done installing. Sure, I've got to get Flash, Java, XMMS (if the distro doesn't have it...not hard, I can select it in the upgrade process), and MPlayer...but that takes far less time.
Software freedom means never having to look for CD Keys or activating products...more time to be productive. I'll take that over slaveware any day.
Well, you can't really depend soley on the community of LiveJournal to be its own independent community. It doesn't stand up that well, really. You need to know people on it, preferably ones that you want to communicate with. Most of my online friends (most of whom I've never met in real life) were people I met during my message board days. From that seed of probably 25 people, I've amassed a friends list six times that size.
Obviously, I didn't know that existed.
Perhaps I should ammend my statement to read "when OpenOffice.org for Dummies is readily available on the shelves at my local Barnes and Noble".
It's ready for the public. Sadly, they're facing competition with far deeper pockets.
Have you tried the beta for OO.o 2.0? I'd say it's pretty damn close. And the help file is far easier to use than MS's. That said, I'm still waiting for a "OpenOffice.org for Dummies" book. That'll tell you that it's finally relevant to the market.
Why do you need spoofstick when Firefox itself gives you that information in the bottom right corner of the screen when you're on a secure site? And why are you putting up credit card numbers on non-secure sites?
Actually, for animated .gifs, they include ImageReady, which is bundled with PS for that purpose.
Er...it's the GIMP because GNU made it, not because it uses the GTK+ toolkit (in fact, GTK+ is named for the GIMP, not the other way around) or Gnome (completely unrelated name, except again to show that GNU made it).
The GNU Image Manipulation Program doesn't tell you exactly what the program is for? Come on! PSP has nothing to do with painting, and Photoshop is a really broad name (especially for a program that can't make animated .gifs on its own).
The name is good. Not to mention fun to say.
Or better yet:
http://www.bugmenot.com/
That works quite well.
Haven't you heard? MS is dead and Netcraft confirmed it!
Er...it'd be under the MPL, not the GPL, as it's just a port of a program under the MPL.
The way you keep your competitive advantage is by being at the leading (not bleading, leading) edge. Besides, if they don't have the rights to access your binaries, they cannot see the source. That's one of the things about the idea of open source software. Sure, they'll eventually get a copy of the binary through legal means, but that can take a while if you charge a reasonable price for the binary.
The problem isn't that you've got to keep your software secret, it's that you've got to support it better than the other guy and be reasonable about your pricing scheme. Sure, if Quark was open-sourced, I could download it myself without paying, but your large contract companies want support, results, and reliability. If you deliver on those three things, and do so better than your competitor, you should dominate.
Of course, if you were really paranoid, you could write your own license that gives you exclusive rights to the source for a brief period of time after the software is released (say, one year), and then after that the license converts to a free license. This can help recoup the losses to R&D, get mindshare out there, and general respect for the product.
If your company cannot compete based on price, then the laws of economics dictate that your company should fail. It's okay to charge more if you're providing more, but if you provide an equivalent product, you shouldn't expect to be able to charge twice as much as your competitor.
Granted, it's not true freedom, but at the same time, it'd be a step to allow people to better appreciate the freedom given to them by free and open source software.
Er...you don't have to pay for POP access with Gmail. You just activate it in your settings. No hacks needed.
Well, there is one reason to use a POP3 account (managable easily through Gmail without paying extra): spell checking.
I know I'm not the only one that can't remember how to spell.
Unfortunately, AOL, Hotmail, and Yahoo don't do POP3 for free. Yahoo does do it, but it costs $20/year (but with that, you get 2 GB and 20 MB in attachment space for each message). Hotmail stopped the service, and I have no clue about AOL.
How does it do with mailto: links from Firefox in Linux? That's the one question burning on my mind.
Do your "tax dollars" entitle you to peruse IBM's source code? And do IBM's tax dollars entitle them to peruse yours?
No, the GPL does.
I'd rank Debian-based distros higher than OS X. Simply put, # apt-get dist-upgrade is just too easy not to do.
I must agree whole-heartedly. I mean, for the purposes of e-mail, paper-writing, and reading stories where random groupings of Hogwarts characters have sexual relations in 1337, any GNU/Linux distro is better than Windows, especially SuSE/FC/Mandrake/Ubuntu/distro de jure.
It's more natural to click on a "programs" menu or some KDE-theme-related icon to get to a program than it is to click "Start". Yes, Microsoft got some good names, but that's all they have. That, and no Unix desktop uses a "start" menu to shut down the machine. That is just plain stupid.
I prefer spreading FUD about MSIE itself. However, I see both the humor and the validity of the grandparent's argument. MS Windows sucks. I have to use it for various purposes, so I keep a laptop with it on. There's too much eye candy, not enough substance, and getting to the commands I need is rather difficult. In GNU/Linux and BSD, I can just open a terminal. In OS X, I can either do that or actually use the graphical interface tools, which are set out sanely and are easy to get to. In Windows, I can't find half of the settings I'm looking for, and the console is worthless. Give me a *ix any day. Back to the topic at hand, I actually haven't had any problems with annoying crashes or stalls. Heck, on my Windows box, I don't even see the /. bug. I still can't sell my mom on Firefox, but all but one other person has taken quite well to it.
Never seen it in Windows or Linux. Ever.
Don't know what makes me different.
It'd be different if they didn't try to act like some singular sentient being, like every other corperation, and demand the same rights as such.
That's why there's Firesomething.
Say Ni. It'll save you! Ni! Ni! Ni!