Glad someone wrote in to quote the headline on CNN.com: "President Bush announced today that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, architect of an unpopular war in Iraq, is stepping down. Bush said he is nominating former CIA chief Robert Gates, who headed that agency from 1991 until 1993, to become the next secretary of defense." I feel like I read something worthwhile.
This article is such bullshit that it's difficult to figure out how it even got published in the first place. Seriously.
Most of his arguments seemed to revolve around either one (1) test case or simply saying, "Well, this isn't true - because I say so."
I don't use Linux for a lot of reasons. I don't like Windows for a lot of reasons. Linux offers too many indistinct choices, unclear conventions, inconsistent & incompatible interfaces, bizarre naming conventions, spotty documentation, and more. Windows locks me into the Microsoft Way-Of-Thinking and doesn't allow me to fully do what I want to do.
Both operating systems get in the way of my productivity, but for different reasons. Windows assumes I'm an idiot, and Linux assumes I'm an expert. Neither works for me because my strength on different platforms is different.
My final comment is this: Can we change http://slashdot.org to http://shillforlinux.org? Please? It would be a lot less confusing sometimes.
This thing will be cool, briefly, and be the "cool" thing to have. Briefly.
Honestly, people are willing to pay for a $300 mp3 player because it plays mp3s REALLY well. It's also pretty slick and sports cool design.
I don't think enough people will want to pay for this device, which seems to want to do a lot. (DVD player, phone, game console, mp3 player, etc.) The price for including all those functions will be enormous, even if Sony's willing to take a loss on the unit itself (and make it back on licensing fees.)
Plus, what happens if you don't WANT this as your cell phone. Or you don't WANT to watch mini-movies in low-res? You'll end up paying for a lot of functionality you won't use.
Perhaps it just me, but aside from a cool-looking game console, I don't see anything exciting. (And they say it won't look as cool when it's done.)
Now I think this is great for the FBI. I firmly support the idea (as long as it falls under the fourth (?) amendment).
I believe that this is another step in the cryptologists vs. cryptanalysts war. Obviously this is a shortcoming somewhere along the line for those of us who wish to encrypt our stuff... but hey, adversity is a synonym for progress, right?
If we all get outraged, then our response is wrong! This is a boon, exposing a weakness, giving us a lamp on how to improve.
I was denied to use this interface unless I used their library.
I don't know exactly what he was denied to use, but it sounds to me like he tried to implement his OWN version of the interface rather than just using the available library, which Apple provides in thier development kit.
So he has to buy the SDK and use the actual Apple library so that Mac OS X (under development for YEARS) doesn't have a bunch of half-assed imitation interfaces lurking around. They've been doing this since the beginning: enforcing a UI standard.
Use the Apple library. It's there. It damn near ensures UI compatibility, and it's probably more flexible than anything you can easily concoct.
I'll back Apple on this one. Knowing how hard they've worked, they're going to make sure that anything you develop for for OS X (or to look like Aqua) is going to use Apple's libs.
What's the problem?
Re:Did just this thing for 3 years
on
Dorm Storm?
·
· Score: 1
At the University of Oregon. In a week and a half, we connected a few thousand students, with any configuration they had, to our network. For several years in a row, at no cost to the student (minus the ethernet card we sold them at-cost.)
We worked out a system:
Hire about 30-35 first tier techs, and train them. Divide into teams of about 8 per complex (we had 5 complexes) with 6 first tier techs, 1 second and 1 third tier tech. (The third tier is also the crew boss. My^H^H His word is God.)
Have everyone work 12 hour days.
After the first week and a half, let the first tier techs go to class and have the second and third tier techs work as many hours as possible for the next month fixing the problem computers.
Works like a charm. Don't forget to saw off half that card to get it to fit in the old, black Compaqs!
A few friends and I did the same thing. We were all Computer Science students, and, back in 1998, we created a program that would search the cards for a few specified points. I personally lost $250 bucks.:(
It was an interesting program and an interesting experiment, but we just weren't hitting the payoffs as much as we should have and we ran outta money. (College students.)
Re:Warning : Go to Titan..but forget about Europa
on
Space Blimps
·
· Score: 1
Buddy... that's
"All these worlds
are yours
Except Europa
Attempt no landings there.
Explore them together
Explore them in peace."
Once again, Ars Technica delivers the stuff that keeps it my favorite Tech site. A plain, relatively unbiased review that covers a lot of criticism that Apple should listen to. Kudos to John Siracusa for writing such an in-depth look at the up-and-coming Mac OS X.
I'm particularly impressed by the way that he has done the same thing for the past several DP installments. How I hope the Apple engineers look it over and see what's been missing from a user's point of view.
Jesus, before you start spouting off at the mouth, maybe you better check your facts, Jack. Oh wait, you're a typical Slashdot user. No facts required.
You want to know why messing with my video card causes my machine to lock up? Because the I bought one of the first FIC SD-11 motherboards and have a Creative Labs GeForce DDR. And the two do NOT coincide nicely when trying to run at AGP 2x. So I have to run at AGP 1x. Sometimes I forget, and enable it in different ways trying to get it to work. And my computer locks up, due to the HARDWARE, fool, not the software.
So maybe it's not FUCKING DRIVER RELATED, JACKASS! Don't you look like the idiot now!
University of Oregon Law School
on
Laptop Exams?
·
· Score: 1
We've been having open laptop, open internet exams for a few semesters now at the University of Oregon's Knight Law School. (Named after the illustrious Phil Knight.)
We have one of the most wired Law Schools in the world, with a 100 megabit backbone (to be upgraded to gigabit as soon as we can afford it and get around to it), with a fibre connection to the University's DS3. Each desk in most classrooms has two ethernet ports, one for each student. And every student is required to own a laptop.
Several professors have these open laptop, open internet exams, with the knowledge that some students might find a way to use internet sources while the proctor isn't looking. These exams, however, aren't e-mailed in. They are printed over the network at the end of the exams to one of our printers. (This is a lot of fun for we tech support folks.) So there is a time limit, and there is someone looking over the students' shouders.
Just thought I'd post this to let you know that it's happening all over the world.
Did you even ready my post? I was talking about what Slashdot said and the difference between that and the actual facts!
So, next time you want to yell the "Misrepresenting the Truth" banner, try doing some research and actually learn what the truth is first.
I yelled "Misrepresenting the Truth" because that's actually what was going on. Notice you didn't dispute the fact that Linux wasn't user-friendly. Thank you for that... I'm right, am I not?
I won't dispute the fact that parts of the WinXX GUI isn't "intuitive." But no where in my post did I say that it was, or that I was even a Windows user. You just assumed that was the case... I wonder why? Perhaps because you've been taught to hate Microsoft, and anyone who defends them is evil? Ya think?
So next time you want to ignorantly flame someone, try reading what they wrote...
Anthony Fuentes writes "Looks like Homer and company are getting into the free ISP business, click here for details. Offer applies to win32 users only." Probably because Homer uses Windows - and Internet Explorer, of course, because that's the only browser you can use with this service.
What the actual ISP page said:
You must have a copy of Microsoft Internet Explorer, version 4.0 or higher, to access the free Internet system, but you may surf the web with any browser. Click on the following link to download the latest version of Internet Explorer.
Wow... there's a difference. Slashdot reports that Internet Explorer is the only browser you can use with this service, where the actual page says that you can use any browser to surf the web, but you must have a copy of IE 4.0. Maybe because Microsoft bundled additional libraries with IE 4.0 in the form of a service pack? You think?
I object to this editorialization of "news". Why does the news on Slashdot have to be anti-Microsoft? "News for Nerds"? Or "News for Linux users"? Why don't we call it what it really is? I run Linux on a dedicated Linux box. It's really stable, hasn't crashed in 3 months. Linux is nice, I like it. But face it: it's a cheap Unix hack. That's all it was designed to be, that's all it will ever be, until they make it "user-friendly." "Intuitive". It's not, and no one can successfully argue with me.
So let's start being a little less biased in reporting "news", shall we?
Let's step back for a moment and consider the fact that not everyone endorses the Open Source movement. Many companies don't like to Open Source their products because of copyright standards and such like that. However, this makes porting their programs to different platforms more work, and not always feasible.
And then there's Java, a perfect solution. It suddenly makes life a ton easier on computer owners everywhere, because they can all run the same programs, using the same interfaces. Programs for the various flavors of Unix and Linux no longer have to ship the source code with the program, instead having to just ship the program itself, guaranteed to work.
Java is the solution that many companies are looking for. But, like any startup language, it's fighting for its independance right now (Microsoft J++) and it can't be burdened with a "standards committee".
I like Intel products. In the past year or so, they've been very fast, and very reliable. Nonetheless, I'm pleased to see a changing of the guard, so to speak.
AMD has released a superior product, no questions asked. As soon as the Athlon was released, thousands of testers went out and compared it to the existing Pentium III processors, and the Athlon kicked butt in every test, not only beating Intel in equivalent MHz rating, but often beating out superior MHz Pentium chips.
So Intel got scared. The Athlon was much, much more than they expected. Intel was used to being able to charge more than AMD did for their chips, because Intel chips were "the fastest". Not anymore. Now that AMD has AT LEAST equally fast chips on the market, Intel realized that people might buy faster chips for less money. There goes market share!
This is where Intel really looks silly. They pulled out all the stops, started there.18 micron manufacturing process, did the on-chip cache thing, and STILL the Intel chips, with significant speed improvements, were still ONLY AS FAST AS THE AMD CHIPS. When you stop to think about this, you realize that AMD has a.18 micron fabrication plant in the works, has engineers working on these solutions, and as soon as they release the Athlon-II, (or whatever they want to call it) Intel will again be up a creek, only this time they may not have a chip coming out on which to hedge their bets.
The sad part here is that Intel's reaction is to try to choke AMD out of business. For the first time consumers are wildly impressed with AMD's product, and AMD hasn't fumbled of their own accord. So Intel, having no recourse, hits the motherboard manufacturers. Unfortunately, AMD has few motherboard manufacturers in its camp. So the motherboard manufacturers are all holding their collective breaths, waiting to see if the Athlon catches on before they irk Intel by producing a board. (Note: Asus unofficially has the K7M motherboard produced, but you will find no mention of it on their website.)
This is a sad situation for we capitalists. I, for one, want to invest in an AMD K7 chip. They're fast, reliable, and kick-ass. But Intel has made my life difficult. Shame on them.
In response to "The Gartner Group has been whoring themselves to MS for as long as I can remember":
I'm not the world's most proficient Linux user. I have a linux box and a Win95 box sitting right next to each other on my desk. Guess which one gets used more often? The MS box.
"Why is this?" you might ask. "What a Microsoft whore!" you might comment. To that I would reply that I see many problems with Microsoft products. But I don't see viable solutions in any one OS out on the market today.
Microsoft Windows is a great operating system, but, LIKE EVERY OTHER OS OUT THERE, it has its flaws. You need to reboot too often. You can't network easily enough with TCP/IP. Security is a joke. And those complaints are absolutely correct. Nonetheless, I use it because it is the least of the evils.
Linux was not sent down to the people from Mount Sinai! Linux is a cheap hack of Unix, albiet one that is growing in popularity. But until they make Linux easy to use and hardware/software compatible, it will not be the answer.
Can you use a DVD drive with Linux? No. Can you play Half-Life under Linux? No. Can Joe User use his AOL account with Linux? No. Is Linux in any way user-friendly? Nope.
I would not put my father in front of my Linux machine if it meant saving the world. Where in Windows he can unzip a program using Winzip, in Linux he'd have to gzup -u file, then tar -xvf file. Oh, that's easy to do.
Any Linux autodetection sucks. My Linux box was given to me by a friend's parent, and I put Linux on it. It's an HP Pavilion 7420. No aftermarket add-ons except a 3com Network card. The sound doesn't work, (I haven't gotten around to running isapnptools in HOPES that it will get recognized then.) The s3 video card was NOT autodected the first time. I have to know the refresh rates of the old monitor I'm using, rather than picking from pretty comprehensive list. It's not a viable OS for the average home user.
Now I'm not saying that Windows help files are any good, or that their documentation is at all comprehensive, but at least it's there! Linux documentation is sketchy, at best. Man files are a joke; trying to understand them is like translating Russian to English, via Chinese. It's not an easy task. And the Linux Documentation Project, while a nobel undertaking, isn't nearly comprehensive enough nor is it always current.
But the Linux drones out there will just say I'm another Microsoft Whore, and I guess that's okay. 'Cause I'll stick with my MS until Linux programmers make Linux an easy to use operating system.
I'm a computer science major at the University of Oregon. A while ago, Windows crapped out on my and lost about 3 megs of my windows/system directory. Not a lot that I could do except re-install. I chose to try Linux. (I was borrowing a Win98 machine for the time being, so I had a backup PC.) I liked it... the install was fairly easy. But NOWHERE was there any sort of documentation as to what the hell was going on. None.
Linux, unlike Windows, didn't seem to want to detect my old ISA SoundBlaster 16. Couldn't figure it out. And there just don't seem to be any places on the web for people who grew up under Dos 3.3 and then moved on from there to find clearly written instructions.
And I couldn't use my DVD drive to play DVDs. It worked for CDs, but had my roomate (running Solaris 7 at the moment) not been able to suggest a thing or two, I'd never have been able to figure out what was going on. Configuration and customization of the X terminal was a pain in the ass. That's one of the nice things about Windows... (And I run Win95a)... I know where things are. I find it to be highly intuitive for me, and relatively problem free. Linux didn't crash, but I really didn't use it as much. I didn't install bizarre shareware and crazy programs.
Overall, I'm still going to throw Linux on a second box, but the lack of support and lack of standardized applications (WordPerfect, a Netscape that doesn't crash every 10 minutes, etc) make me shudder at trying to use it as a primary machine.
One last note. Windows 95 ran faster on my Pentium 233 w/ 48M of RAM than Linux w/ Gnome did. Really.
Slashdot Mirror
Glad someone wrote in to quote the headline on CNN.com: "President Bush announced today that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, architect of an unpopular war in Iraq, is stepping down. Bush said he is nominating former CIA chief Robert Gates, who headed that agency from 1991 until 1993, to become the next secretary of defense." I feel like I read something worthwhile.
This article is such bullshit that it's difficult to figure out how it even got published in the first place. Seriously.
Most of his arguments seemed to revolve around either one (1) test case or simply saying, "Well, this isn't true - because I say so."
I don't use Linux for a lot of reasons. I don't like Windows for a lot of reasons. Linux offers too many indistinct choices, unclear conventions, inconsistent & incompatible interfaces, bizarre naming conventions, spotty documentation, and more. Windows locks me into the Microsoft Way-Of-Thinking and doesn't allow me to fully do what I want to do.
Both operating systems get in the way of my productivity, but for different reasons. Windows assumes I'm an idiot, and Linux assumes I'm an expert. Neither works for me because my strength on different platforms is different.
My final comment is this: Can we change http://slashdot.org to http://shillforlinux.org? Please? It would be a lot less confusing sometimes.
This thing will be cool, briefly, and be the "cool" thing to have. Briefly.
Honestly, people are willing to pay for a $300 mp3 player because it plays mp3s REALLY well. It's also pretty slick and sports cool design.
I don't think enough people will want to pay for this device, which seems to want to do a lot. (DVD player, phone, game console, mp3 player, etc.) The price for including all those functions will be enormous, even if Sony's willing to take a loss on the unit itself (and make it back on licensing fees.)
Plus, what happens if you don't WANT this as your cell phone. Or you don't WANT to watch mini-movies in low-res? You'll end up paying for a lot of functionality you won't use.
Perhaps it just me, but aside from a cool-looking game console, I don't see anything exciting. (And they say it won't look as cool when it's done.)
Let me first say this: I read the article.
Now I think this is great for the FBI. I firmly support the idea (as long as it falls under the fourth (?) amendment).
I believe that this is another step in the cryptologists vs. cryptanalysts war. Obviously this is a shortcoming somewhere along the line for those of us who wish to encrypt our stuff... but hey, adversity is a synonym for progress, right?
If we all get outraged, then our response is wrong! This is a boon, exposing a weakness, giving us a lamp on how to improve.
Don't forget that.
I was denied to use this interface unless I used their library.
I don't know exactly what he was denied to use, but it sounds to me like he tried to implement his OWN version of the interface rather than just using the available library, which Apple provides in thier development kit.
So he has to buy the SDK and use the actual Apple library so that Mac OS X (under development for YEARS) doesn't have a bunch of half-assed imitation interfaces lurking around. They've been doing this since the beginning: enforcing a UI standard.
Use the Apple library. It's there. It damn near ensures UI compatibility, and it's probably more flexible than anything you can easily concoct.
I'll back Apple on this one. Knowing how hard they've worked, they're going to make sure that anything you develop for for OS X (or to look like Aqua) is going to use Apple's libs.
What's the problem?
I know. I did it with you. And your roommate.
At the University of Oregon. In a week and a half, we connected a few thousand students, with any configuration they had, to our network. For several years in a row, at no cost to the student (minus the ethernet card we sold them at-cost.)
We worked out a system:
Hire about 30-35 first tier techs, and train them. Divide into teams of about 8 per complex (we had 5 complexes) with 6 first tier techs, 1 second and 1 third tier tech. (The third tier is also the crew boss. My^H^H His word is God.)
Have everyone work 12 hour days.
After the first week and a half, let the first tier techs go to class and have the second and third tier techs work as many hours as possible for the next month fixing the problem computers.
Works like a charm. Don't forget to saw off half that card to get it to fit in the old, black Compaqs!
It says it'll be released in Japan... when will we see a version for us over here in the New World?
A few friends and I did the same thing. We were all Computer Science students, and, back in 1998, we created a program that would search the cards for a few specified points. I personally lost $250 bucks. :(
It was an interesting program and an interesting experiment, but we just weren't hitting the payoffs as much as we should have and we ran outta money. (College students.)
Buddy... that's
"All these worlds
are yours
Except Europa
Attempt no landings there.
Explore them together
Explore them in peace."
Once again, Ars Technica delivers the stuff that keeps it my favorite Tech site. A plain, relatively unbiased review that covers a lot of criticism that Apple should listen to. Kudos to John Siracusa for writing such an in-depth look at the up-and-coming Mac OS X.
I'm particularly impressed by the way that he has done the same thing for the past several DP installments. How I hope the Apple engineers look it over and see what's been missing from a user's point of view.
Keep up the good work, Ars!
Jesus, before you start spouting off at the mouth, maybe you better check your facts, Jack. Oh wait, you're a typical Slashdot user. No facts required.
You want to know why messing with my video card causes my machine to lock up? Because the I bought one of the first FIC SD-11 motherboards and have a Creative Labs GeForce DDR. And the two do NOT coincide nicely when trying to run at AGP 2x. So I have to run at AGP 1x. Sometimes I forget, and enable it in different ways trying to get it to work. And my computer locks up, due to the HARDWARE, fool, not the software.
So maybe it's not FUCKING DRIVER RELATED, JACKASS! Don't you look like the idiot now!
We've been having open laptop, open internet exams for a few semesters now at the University of Oregon's Knight Law School. (Named after the illustrious Phil Knight.)
We have one of the most wired Law Schools in the world, with a 100 megabit backbone (to be upgraded to gigabit as soon as we can afford it and get around to it), with a fibre connection to the University's DS3. Each desk in most classrooms has two ethernet ports, one for each student. And every student is required to own a laptop.
Several professors have these open laptop, open internet exams, with the knowledge that some students might find a way to use internet sources while the proctor isn't looking. These exams, however, aren't e-mailed in. They are printed over the network at the end of the exams to one of our printers. (This is a lot of fun for we tech support folks.) So there is a time limit, and there is someone looking over the students' shouders.
Just thought I'd post this to let you know that it's happening all over the world.
Did you even ready my post? I was talking about what Slashdot said and the difference between that and the actual facts!
So, next time you want to yell the "Misrepresenting the Truth" banner, try doing some research and actually learn what the truth is first.
I yelled "Misrepresenting the Truth" because that's actually what was going on. Notice you didn't dispute the fact that Linux wasn't user-friendly. Thank you for that... I'm right, am I not?
I won't dispute the fact that parts of the WinXX GUI isn't "intuitive." But no where in my post did I say that it was, or that I was even a Windows user. You just assumed that was the case... I wonder why? Perhaps because you've been taught to hate Microsoft, and anyone who defends them is evil? Ya think?
So next time you want to ignorantly flame someone, try reading what they wrote...
- Burton Simmons
mrwhite@d198-192.uoregon.edu
What Slashdot said:
Anthony Fuentes writes "Looks like Homer and company are getting into the free ISP business, click here for details. Offer applies to win32 users only." Probably because Homer uses Windows - and Internet Explorer, of course, because that's the only browser you can use with this service.
What the actual ISP page said:
You must have a copy of Microsoft Internet Explorer, version 4.0 or higher, to access the free Internet system, but you may surf the web with any browser. Click on the following link to download the latest version of Internet Explorer.
Wow... there's a difference. Slashdot reports that Internet Explorer is the only browser you can use with this service, where the actual page says that you can use any browser to surf the web, but you must have a copy of IE 4.0. Maybe because Microsoft bundled additional libraries with IE 4.0 in the form of a service pack? You think?
I object to this editorialization of "news". Why does the news on Slashdot have to be anti-Microsoft? "News for Nerds"? Or "News for Linux users"? Why don't we call it what it really is? I run Linux on a dedicated Linux box. It's really stable, hasn't crashed in 3 months. Linux is nice, I like it. But face it: it's a cheap Unix hack. That's all it was designed to be, that's all it will ever be, until they make it "user-friendly." "Intuitive". It's not, and no one can successfully argue with me.
So let's start being a little less biased in reporting "news", shall we?
- Burton Simmmons
mrwhite@d198-192.uoregon.edu (linux box)
Let's step back for a moment and consider the fact that not everyone endorses the Open Source movement. Many companies don't like to Open Source their products because of copyright standards and such like that. However, this makes porting their programs to different platforms more work, and not always feasible.
And then there's Java, a perfect solution. It suddenly makes life a ton easier on computer owners everywhere, because they can all run the same programs, using the same interfaces. Programs for the various flavors of Unix and Linux no longer have to ship the source code with the program, instead having to just ship the program itself, guaranteed to work.
Java is the solution that many companies are looking for. But, like any startup language, it's fighting for its independance right now (Microsoft J++) and it can't be burdened with a "standards committee".
But that's just my two bits...
I like Intel products. In the past year or so, they've been very fast, and very reliable. Nonetheless, I'm pleased to see a changing of the guard, so to speak.
.18 micron manufacturing process, did the on-chip cache thing, and STILL the Intel chips, with significant speed improvements, were still ONLY AS FAST AS THE AMD CHIPS. When you stop to think about this, you realize that AMD has a .18 micron fabrication plant in the works, has engineers working on these solutions, and as soon as they release the Athlon-II, (or whatever they want to call it) Intel will again be up a creek, only this time they may not have a chip coming out on which to hedge their bets.
AMD has released a superior product, no questions asked. As soon as the Athlon was released, thousands of testers went out and compared it to the existing Pentium III processors, and the Athlon kicked butt in every test, not only beating Intel in equivalent MHz rating, but often beating out superior MHz Pentium chips.
So Intel got scared. The Athlon was much, much more than they expected. Intel was used to being able to charge more than AMD did for their chips, because Intel chips were "the fastest". Not anymore. Now that AMD has AT LEAST equally fast chips on the market, Intel realized that people might buy faster chips for less money. There goes market share!
This is where Intel really looks silly. They pulled out all the stops, started there
The sad part here is that Intel's reaction is to try to choke AMD out of business. For the first time consumers are wildly impressed with AMD's product, and AMD hasn't fumbled of their own accord. So Intel, having no recourse, hits the motherboard manufacturers. Unfortunately, AMD has few motherboard manufacturers in its camp. So the motherboard manufacturers are all holding their collective breaths, waiting to see if the Athlon catches on before they irk Intel by producing a board. (Note: Asus unofficially has the K7M motherboard produced, but you will find no mention of it on their website.)
This is a sad situation for we capitalists. I, for one, want to invest in an AMD K7 chip. They're fast, reliable, and kick-ass. But Intel has made my life difficult. Shame on them.
A Critique
In response to "The Gartner Group has been whoring themselves to MS for as long as I can remember":
I'm not the world's most proficient Linux user. I have a linux box and a Win95 box sitting right next to each other on my desk. Guess which one gets used more often? The MS box.
"Why is this?" you might ask. "What a Microsoft whore!" you might comment. To that I would reply that I see many problems with Microsoft products. But I don't see viable solutions in any one OS out on the market today.
Microsoft Windows is a great operating system, but, LIKE EVERY OTHER OS OUT THERE, it has its flaws. You need to reboot too often. You can't network easily enough with TCP/IP. Security is a joke. And those complaints are absolutely correct. Nonetheless, I use it because it is the least of the evils.
Linux was not sent down to the people from Mount Sinai! Linux is a cheap hack of Unix, albiet one that is growing in popularity. But until they make Linux easy to use and hardware/software compatible, it will not be the answer.
Can you use a DVD drive with Linux? No. Can you play Half-Life under Linux? No. Can Joe User use his AOL account with Linux? No. Is Linux in any way user-friendly? Nope.
I would not put my father in front of my Linux machine if it meant saving the world. Where in Windows he can unzip a program using Winzip, in Linux he'd have to gzup -u file, then tar -xvf file. Oh, that's easy to do.
Any Linux autodetection sucks. My Linux box was given to me by a friend's parent, and I put Linux on it. It's an HP Pavilion 7420. No aftermarket add-ons except a 3com Network card. The sound doesn't work, (I haven't gotten around to running isapnptools in HOPES that it will get recognized then.) The s3 video card was NOT autodected the first time. I have to know the refresh rates of the old monitor I'm using, rather than picking from pretty comprehensive list. It's not a viable OS for the average home user.
Now I'm not saying that Windows help files are any good, or that their documentation is at all comprehensive, but at least it's there! Linux documentation is sketchy, at best. Man files are a joke; trying to understand them is like translating Russian to English, via Chinese. It's not an easy task. And the Linux Documentation Project, while a nobel undertaking, isn't nearly comprehensive enough nor is it always current.
But the Linux drones out there will just say I'm another Microsoft Whore, and I guess that's okay. 'Cause I'll stick with my MS until Linux programmers make Linux an easy to use operating system.
I'm a computer science major at the University of Oregon. A while ago, Windows crapped out on my and lost about 3 megs of my windows/system directory. Not a lot that I could do except re-install. I chose to try Linux. (I was borrowing a Win98 machine for the time being, so I had a backup PC.) I liked it... the install was fairly easy. But NOWHERE was there any sort of documentation as to what the hell was going on. None.
Linux, unlike Windows, didn't seem to want to detect my old ISA SoundBlaster 16. Couldn't figure it out. And there just don't seem to be any places on the web for people who grew up under Dos 3.3 and then moved on from there to find clearly written instructions.
And I couldn't use my DVD drive to play DVDs. It worked for CDs, but had my roomate (running Solaris 7 at the moment) not been able to suggest a thing or two, I'd never have been able to figure out what was going on. Configuration and customization of the X terminal was a pain in the ass. That's one of the nice things about Windows... (And I run Win95a)... I know where things are. I find it to be highly intuitive for me, and relatively problem free. Linux didn't crash, but I really didn't use it as much. I didn't install bizarre shareware and crazy programs.
Overall, I'm still going to throw Linux on a second box, but the lack of support and lack of standardized applications (WordPerfect, a Netscape that doesn't crash every 10 minutes, etc) make me shudder at trying to use it as a primary machine.
One last note. Windows 95 ran faster on my Pentium 233 w/ 48M of RAM than Linux w/ Gnome did. Really.