Desktop Linux: When and how to add proprietary software
Linked by David Adams on Tue 27th Jul 2010 07:35 UTC, submitted by sjvn
Linux Some people hate the idea of adding proprietary software to their desktop Linux. For these people, there are Linux distributions such as gNewSense that use only free software. For the rest of us, who use distributions such as Fedora, openSUSE and Ubuntu, there are times we either want to, or feel forced to, add proprietary programs such as Adobe Flash or Skype or the ability to play proprietary audio and video formats such as MP3 or commercial DVDs to your Linux desktop. Here's how to do it.
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lemur2
Member since:
2007-02-17

Besides not reading your own links, you don't bother to read the posts either. We are talking about Desktop OS, to which Linux is an incredible failure, and will remain so for years and years to come until some finally realize what a complete waste of their lives they spent.


As a desktop OS, my Kubuntu 10.04 Linux installation stomps all over the Windows installation I am required to use at work. Absolutely slaughters it in every way imaginable. The desktop itself is better (desktop cube, multiple desktops, clipboard history, activities, etc, etc), the underlying OS features (performance especially on modest hardware, lack of bloat, security, resistance to malware, updates from on source rather than multiple updaters, inter-operability with other platforms) are light-years ahead.

FYI, just because an alternative exists, does not mean it is comparable.


Indeed, many of them are better. Some of them are much better. As an example, the default out-of-the-box PDF reader is far, far better and more capable than Adobe Acrobat.
http://okular.kde.org/formats.php
Adobe Acrobat can't do most of that, it can only display PDF files. Oh, and as for Windows 7, it doesn't even come with a PDF reader, on any PDF capability at all.

You spend so much time obsessing about Linux you have no clue to the world outside. The day most of us decide to recommend some of these idiotic toy apps you always seem to think are equitable is the day we lose our jobs.


Clearly you haven't used contemporary Linux desktop applications (particularly KDE/Qt ones). This is how you design and build cross-platform protable applications BTW, you write them in C++ to use Qt and simply compile them (on Linux) using GCC for each platform target ... this kind of thing is totally no-can-do for Windows. I use both Windows applications and KDE desktop Applications every day, and the constant-use set of free KDE4 desktop applications I use every day absolutely stomps all over the equivalent, expensive-to-acquire-and-maintain ones I must use for Windows. No contest.

Fools like you actually believe that something such as that wretched piece of shit called Open Office is actually anywhere comparable to Office. Hell, I would not even compare today's OpenOffice with Office 2003, and we are several iterations beyond that now. And this here is why the delusion will always cause failure. Thinking something is equatable is a hell of a lot different than actually knowing, and more importantly UNDERSTANDING why they are not equatable. Don't even get me started on those CAD programs, what a joke.


Fortunately, blinkers, outrageous rudeness and vehement bias such as yours is not universal, or even common.

BTW: OpenOffice penetration is currently measured at between 10% to 20% of the installed base, depending on geographic locality.
http://www.quantenblog.net/free-software/openoffice-market-share
http://www.webmasterpro.de/portal/news/2010/02/05/international-ope...
(they measured it by looking at the fonts installed).

Ten to twenty percent of the installed base of Office suites represents an absolutely huge (hundreds of millions, and rapidly growing) number of people who do not agree with your assesment.

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