
John Goerzen, Debian/GNU Linux developer,
transitions his kids from bash to xmonad: "I'd been debating how to introduce GUIs for a very long time. It has not escaped my attention that children that used Commodores or TRS-80s or DOS knew a lot more about how their computers worked, on average, than those of the same age that use Windows or MacOS. I didn't want our boys to skip an entire phase of learning how their technology works." I decided long ago that my kids - if I ever have them, I'm undecided and way too young - will learn computing the way I learned it: with a CLI. I never realised an xmonad setup would form a good transition phase into GUIs.
Member since:
2010-01-07
No.
No more than the enterprise and small business instantly migrated from MSDOS to Win 3.1 or from XP to Vista and Win 7.
Windows 95 made an explosive entry into the consumer market.
I can still vividly recall launching the "Good Times" video from the companion CD:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iqL1BLzn3qc
In October 1996 AOL went to flat-rate monthly billing and our phone service (like others) to an affordable flat-rate calling plan.
I had struggled with E-mail. FTP. Telnet. BBS. IRC chat. USENET.
AOL was a revelation. Layer upon layer of complexity simply stripped away.
Nothing would ever be the same again.