Linked by Phil Hall on Thu 5th Dec 2002 00:35 UTC
I'm a long-time Windows user, but for years I've been searching for an intelligent alternative. Macs are actually a great choice, but have you priced them lately? I don't have two grand to spend for another system. I had been reading all the hoopla surrounding Xandros Desktop for a number of months and decided to take the plunge. I had been burned two times previously trying to install other Linux distributions. Their tech support was non-existent. I'm essentially working in a vacuum. When something has gone wrong in the past, I've found that I was on my own. 
Permalink for comment
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
Recent Original Stories
Recent Comments
Headlines
Random Comments
Random Stories
Random OS Link
My thoughts echo his in that it's not ready yet...
As I alluded to in a previous post, the question really isn't "is Linux ready for the desktop?" anymore, but rather "are you ready for Linux?".
...and didn't need much more software than the stock programs that come installed with the OS and the 'click and run' interface, then Linux might be right up your alley.
I haven't done a count of all the software available for Windows in the world and compared it to a count of all the software available for Linux, but I dare say that there is infinitely more software legally available to Linux users than there is available to Windows users. Why? Most Windows users don't have the money to spend on licenses for products like:
- Microsoft Office
- Macromedia Studio
- Photoshop
- Illustrator
- SQL Serverallude
- VisualStudio .NET
ad nauseam.
Therefore, for most people the choice is to a) run Windows with what whatever stock programs came with their machine (Minesweeper, yay!), b) engage in illegal piracy of software, or c) Run Linux; amongst some other sundary choices.
For people who want to pirate software to fiddle with it, copying may be fine (for them), but what if you want sell a program you wrote using a pirated copy of VisualStudio, or create a successfull retail website using your pirated copy of Dreamweaver with graphics and multimedia content created with pirated copies of Photoshop and Flash? You can't do it without risking legal action.
Having worked at several large software companies, a couple who create some of the above mentioned software packages, I can tell you that the files you create get watermarked with whatever license number and name you registered with. So if Microsoft, for example, wants to go and check out the watermark of the software package you are successfully selling all over the place, and they find it was created with a copy of VisualStudio that is registered to Snoopy using a pirated license, then you are incredibly screwed.
I am bringing this up because I have noticed in many Linux articles in the past that you bring up your misconcieved notion that there is little or no software available for Linux and that Windows offers a rich cornucopia of software delights for its users.
I'm just wondering if you understand that there is literally tons of software available for Linux, and also that the amount of software available for Windows is largely irrelevant if it is not legally available to the user.