This is my reaction to Tsu Dho Nimh’s “Migrating to Linux not easy for Windows users” featured on Linuxworld.com recently. It’s not a response, I’m not challenging his opinions, which I feel are not only valid, but mostly right, it’s just a reaction.I want Linux to be ‘ready for the desktop’ as much as anyone. If you’ve ever read any of my past articles, you’d know I am a big proponent of user-friendly, desktop-centric Linux. I couldn’t wait to ditch Windows, but I was chained in. I’m a Windows power user, a domain administrator, an MCP, and I’m comfortable with the polish and stability of Windows 2000 and especially Windows XP. While I’d install a new Linux distribution with high hopes every month, the same results ensued: I’d be incredibly impressed with the modifications, find one or two things lacking, and always come back to Windows.
Since I installed Mandrake 9.1, it’s been two weeks, and I haven’t needed to boot back into Windows. In fact, my trusty NTFS partition hasn’t seen a bit of action in weeks, save pulling my WinAmp skins over to XMMS. However, having survived the first crucial week, I’m sold. I’ve made some observations and I’d like to share them with you, and with luck, Mr. Nimh as well.
Migration is not for the faint of heart. Commercial Linux distributions like Mandrake, Red Hat, and SuSE make it appear easy – but it simply is not. This is a fact — and I prove it each time I try to introduce non-tech-weenies to Linux. I know the truth, and it’s this simple: change requires you to change. I’m not trying to sound Confucian, I’m not trying to be profound; I’m trying to make an assertion we usually take for granted, or sometimes, simply forget. When you move to Linux, you won’t be using Windows, and that requires you to learn new skills and suffer for a while until you do. Anyone selling Linux and representing the painlessness of the transition is a used car salesman. Any transition will force you to learn new things and there will be an adjustment period. I don’t mean to sound condescending, but we need to understand this as we go.
First off, a distribution manufacturer probably wants to identify “target switchers.” Switchers aren’t people considering buying a Mac, they’re people who want to leave Windows or in some cases, a Microsoft platform. They usually have some skill, and I’d venture to say, know their way around Windows. I’d even go so far as to say that most of them aren’t running Windows 95. See, I believe something has to prompt you to leave a platform. Price and politics might play a role, but I believe the major prompt is limitation. People who are frustrated with the locks on you as a Windows user. Frustration with software that litters your filesystem with trash that can’t be uninstalled because the Control Panel uninstaller can’t find a certain config file. Folders three deep under the Program Files directory that you don’t recognize. Spyware. People who haven’t upgraded their OS in 8 years aren’t frustrated — on the contrary, I’d argue that they are content. They’ve obviously been happy enough to not feel a need to upgrade in nearly a decade.
When these distribution makers know their target audience, they can make the necessary adjustments in their software. Assuming that the standard Windows user is your target user is foolish, since generally, they’re not. In fact, these people don’t know what an ISO file is, how to burn one, or even how to use FTP to obtain one.
Linux does not have all the same features Windows does. Working with that, Linux hackers have to know that those who really know Windows will almost definitely be discouraged when they are lost in Linux. They’ve forgotten that they learned the commands at some point, and, understandably, it’s frustrating to feel lost when there’s another platform on which you’re comfortable and knowledgeable. Moreover, they will feel limited in what they can do in Linux without being equipped with the knowledge. They don’t know how to use the shell and DOS commands they’ve used for 10 or 12 years are suddenly useless anyway. They are confused by not being a “local administrator” and needing additional rights to accomplish certain semi-regular tasks. They are dumbfounded when ipconfig doesn’t work and they feel like…gasp….a “user.” The real work comes in teaching these people that they don’t need all the same features and that there are often better ways to accomplish similar tasks.
Linux has many features that Windows doesn’t. I don’t know why Windows Explorer doesn’t have the media preview “onMouseOver” that Konqueror does, I think it’s ingenious. But that’s just the simple stuff. In Windows, you can’t rename an mp3 (or ogg) while it’s in use in, say, Winamp. While a media file is in use in XMMS, or Kaboodle, or any of the other media players in Linux, you can rename it, change its location in the filesystem, or even delete it! The filesystem adapts to you, not vice versa. I know as a network administrator that one of our big problems was that MS Outlook, once it touches a .pst file, which is an e-mail archive, locks it for the entire period the machine is running, even after Outlook is closed. Most Linux filesystems don’t complain about files being in use. Permissions, while sometimes confusing and sometimes a repetitive pain on your desktop, are actually a feature, and some say, a real plus. Without the root password, a comprimised Linux account is, for the most part, contained. Damage is isolated. Learning how advanced features work for you specifically will increase your productivity.
The problem is, switching from one OS to another is a cultural change. If you use your computer for a sizeable portion of the day, it’s an enormous mental and procedural migration. Getting comfortable with a new desktop and layout is not easy and it requires a real commitment. Like going to the gym, you can’t expect immediate results. But consistent effort yields better payoffs.
While Tsu Dho Nimh acknowledges that the distributions he tried are now outdated, what he doesn’t realize is the evolution that’s transpired since. NTFS resizing is quickly becoming commonplace in Linux installers. Software installation is really coming along. CD burning, hardware detection, and driver support are getting better by the month. Recent distributions have combatted the transition hiccups by making Linux friendlier without resorting to the man pages. Little steps, like adding a short program description in the K and Gnome menus, have helped significantly. Though we have a ways to go, everyone is contributing to making Linux advance faster than anything else out there. In fact, I believe Linux has come further in the last two years than Windows has in any two year span.
If you’re feeling adventurous, be prepared to put up with random crashes now and again, learning to use the command line, and having trouble installing applications. Be prepared for temporary cluelessness, reading man pages, googling for advice, and relearning applications. Be prepared to ditch most of your games and favorite apps in favor of a world of choice. Also prepare for unlearning the limitations Windows has taught you are standards. You’ve accepted them long ago, so long ago you barely even realize they are limitations anymore.
Migration is not for the faint of heart. Most people acknowledge this. But give credit where credit is due – Linux is the future, and deservedly so. It might not be the final destination, but it has cemented its place on the trail. We might not be ready for you today, but check back in two years. I have a sneaking suspicion your article will read differently.
Tsu Dho Nimh…sound it out. Pseudonym? Anybody? Wow…am I the first to get that?
The worst thing that Windows has done to the computing world is automating everything. When a user can’t figure something out and there’s no “Wizard” to do it for you, well then the program is broken and the user goes no farther. However the beauty of Linux is that there is no “automated” abstaraction layer between the user and programs. Some may argue that various vendors are trying to add this layer of automation, however when it’s all said and done, on Linux you can open a config file and edit things to your liking.
You simply have no alternatives on a Windows platform. Linux forces each and every user to become a power user. Linux will mold computer users into becoming smarter computer users, who are not afraid to work on something from a command prompt. These users will realize that the only restraint on a Linux system is their knowledge of the OS. All doors are open with Linux. Amen.
-justin
Self motivated “target switchers”(TS), would seem to be a very small segment of the population.OTH word of mouth referals would seem to be a much greater possibility.
In addition there are a few, like me, that have believed the words on tthe boxes, and in the reviews, that “x” is easy to install. Having blown over $200 canadian during the past year or so on distros that I was unable to get working,
I now have a “love/hate” attitude to linux.I would love to get a distro that behaved as Adam specifies, but I am definitely _not_ going to lay out any more “hard earned” money.
Just by reading the many and various linux forums one can see that , so far, NONE of the distros work ( in the sense that Adam specifies)
The worst thing that Windows has done to the computing world is automating everything. When a user can’t figure something out and there’s no “Wizard” to do it for you, well then the program is broken and the user goes no farther.
Bullsh*t. Do you rewire your VCR everytime you want to record something off the TV and not just playback? Do you open your fridge’s back port to change its temperature? Do you sacrifice a goat to change a channel on your TV?
Computers are today a commodity.
Therefore, they need to be automated as much as it is possible. If Windows does that better than XYZ, then good for them. If Linux doesn’t, then do not except it to have the kind of migration and switching from Windows users that it _could_ have if Linux could compete in that area. Linux _will_ continue to live as a technical/geek OS, but DO NOT except it to be widely adopted until this and other such shortcomings are fixed.
Another thing:
Your comment really showed “el33tism”… You don’t win the crowds with elitism my friend.
Also, IF a wizard SOLVES the problem and does what you need to do, then a wizard is as good as a command line tool. The HOW does not matter, as long the job is DONE as it is supposed to, in a hassle-free way for the user.
Simple… economics.
For me, I don’t feel that Linux (the kernel and the desktop enviroment(s)) is really lacking anything that would prevent me from crossing over. However, as many of you already know, I am into music making and a few other ‘specialized’ tasks and so I think it will be awhile yet before I can switch, because many of the apps I need are simply not up to par in Linux or missing altogether. However, after trying Knoppix 3.2, Redhat 9, Slackware 9, with Mandrake 9.1 & Suse 8.2 on deck, I know what kind of power is there and it’s something I want. However, at the end of the day, it all comes down to the apps.
As for your ‘normal’ average every day computer-illiterate Windows user, I don’t think the incentive is there for them to even try Linux. I’m not saying that there is not a benefit, but simply that they don’t see it. I mean, you might think that DRM, product activation, spyware, etc are all good reasons to switch, but most Joe Users don’t even know what those things are. And when they get nailed with a virus, they usually figure it’s their own fault for not updating (or even running) their virus scanner. Not saying that this logic is RIGHT, just the way things are.
And a lot of people say that users need to change to adopt to Linux. Well, uhhh … I’m sorry to break the news to you, but that’s not going to happen. Some users will indeed ‘adapt’ (as some have), but most won’t. The sooner you realize that, the sooner you can stop with this fantasy of a Debian or Slackware-like Linux distro ruling the roost. Some guy earlier in the thread was praising Linux because you could edit config files et al. Most people that just want the machine to work would ask them what they were smoking.
If you say “Well, some people used DOS or even CP/M back in the days ….” to that I say that people also used to solder their computers together and program from punch cards. The difference is that now, they don’t have to. I also know that some of you think that since computers are such powerful machines, then they should be needless complicated and out of the reach of most people who would never take the time to learn a complicated machine, which is something I have personally never understood because simplicity doesn’t always mean a lack of power. I mean, imagine being able to just tell your computer that you wanted to upgrade to the newest version of Mozilla, and it does it. That certainly seems a lot easier and a lot more powerful than ‘apt-get’ or ‘rpm -ivh whatever …’
It is interesting to me how you are constantly being bombarded by reviews of people trying to install one Linux distro or another and making each instance sound bad. In a nutshell, Windows XP is Windows XP and any Linux distro is its own entity. THEY ARE DIFFERENT, GET OVER IT.
Thinking back…. when you first migrated, say, from DOS to Windows, or Windows 95 to Windows 2000, you had a learning curve where you bitched about this or that not being the same or how you know do this or that when I used to do it in this “really simple way”. Well, why should it be any different when going from Windows XYZ to Linux or Mac OSX?? If you don’t want to migrate and go through the learning curve, don’t migrate. Simple as that.
Now, getting to why most people, IMHO, haven’t migrated away from Windows is….. why do they really need to? Most people buy a computer and the darn thing is preloaded; therefore they use what they have. In addition, the computer probably has some preloaded software that they use. They have, in essence, been stuck into the Windows world and its applications.
The Windows platform has the majority of the WELL KNOWN applications that people use; any other platform doesn’t. So as long as this continues to be the case, most people have absolutely no incentive for using anything else and hence, trying another platform such as Linux. Microsoft is truly wise in realizing that the business world governs a lot of the home market. Office has become a defacto standard in the workplace and has as a result, filtered into the home world where people need to read, use, etc. their work files.
Although Linux distros are maturing at a very fine rate, even when they have matured to the point (and hopefully past the point) of any Windows platform, they will still have to fight the true battle, the application world. Until then, only geeks like us will continue to play with new distros, find one or two to use, and be content. Let’s face it, the common user basically surfs the web, uses some flavor of Office or Works, and plays games. The operating system is simply a host; nothing else. Get those same quality of apps on Linux or Fred’s platform, or whatever, and you finally begin to have a true reason why to try another option.
I’ll be darn curious to someday read an article on ones of these sites that one day compares a well-known, must have Linux-based application suite versus an equivalent Windows-based application suite, that are both very prominent in the market place (back like in the days when Lotus SamrtSuite, Wordperfect OfficeSuite, and Windows Office Suite were actually competitors).
You simply have no alternatives on a Windows platform. Linux forces each and every user to become a power user. Linux will mold computer users into becoming smarter computer users, who are not afraid to work on something from a command prompt. These users will realize that the only restraint on a Linux system is their knowledge of the OS. All doors are open with Linux.
Indeed. And all drivers should be mechanics. All homeowners should be builders, electricians and plumbers. Etc.
Do you fit these criteria ? Can you rewire your house, repair your washing machine, build a room extension ? Can you rebuild your car’s motor, install new suspension and give it a professional paint job ?
Thank u Adam you opened my eyes and help me see the true aspect to Linux
While the original article by “Tsu Dho Nimh” may have raised some valid points about the usability of Linux distros, I also have to point out that there was nothing “new” in that article. Not only that, but she also went ahead insulting the people who develop the software which the Linux distributions consist of. If I was a deceloper of said software, I am not sure I’d care a whole lot about “winning over” users such as “Tsu Dho Nimh”.
When I first started using Linux in May, 1998, I was only looking for a cheap way to learn UNIX to help me with my job. I purchased and installed Red Hat 5.1, and for the first time in well over a decade, was totally lost. I had been using MS-DOS since 1984, and CM/M and other things before that. I was very familiar with MS-DOS and Windows (3.0 – Windows NT 4.0). I was a power-user and had been a sys admin in another life. Now, I just stared at the console screen and wondered what to do next. Finally, I did what we all hate to do, I opened the book that came with Red Hat and started looking it over. In a very short amount of time, I had learned enough commands to be able to get around in the console. I even took notes, so I wouldn’t have to look them up again 😉
As time went by, I learned more and more. I now run two Debian boxes, a Mandrake 9.0 box and two FreeBSD machines (4.8 and 5.0). I did have to adjust. I bought more Linux and FreeBSD books than I had ever bought for MS-DOS/Windows. It’s a different world, but not so different that you can’t learn it.
To all the people that feel threatened or intimidated by the thought of using Linux, I would suggest (if you can afford to) buying a used computer that you wouldn’t feel too bad about if it got wiped-out. I pick them up all the time for under $50. This will give you a machine you can experiment on. I run Linux/FreeBSD on some old hardware with no problems. Pick one of the easy to install distributions (Mandrake 9.1, Lindows, Xandros, etc…), install it and just play around with it. Buy a book if you have to.
I learned that Linux/FreeBSD are NOT Windows. The entire mind-set is different. I also found I much prefer that mind-set. I have become a dedicated Linux/FreeBSD fan, and only keep one Windows machine in my house, my notebook, which has Windows 2000 loaded on it. The only reason it still has Windows loaded is because I am a consultant, and do need to work with Windows because of my clients.
unless you play it as a hobby, then that is a challenge …
what’s wrong with every thing automatic ? In Windows, a lot of things can be tweaked by hand – best choices of both world
it only appears to be a “problem” when there isn’t the automatic option available
If people want better support for hardware for Linux it needs to be more widely adopted. Most users NEED wizards and the like to guide them through certain processes, most users NEED automation. If there is a distro that can offer this ease of use for installing printers, digital cameras, scanners and most other common hardware, ease of use for installing and removing software, ease of use for installing fonts, configuring the display, getting on to the internet, reading e-mail. Drives need to be able to be automounted/unmounted. The desktop interface needs to be simple and consistent, software needs to be just what is needed for the target audience and no more.
If all these can be in place and with an install as simple as the BeOS install (that was the most fantasticly easy install program ever and no Linux distro comes close) then the average user may be convinced enough to move to Linux and as it takes off, the hardware and software developers may become convinced to start moving to Linux.
I belive that some distros are on their way to achieving this goal, though I’ve not been able to try them as they don’t play nice with my hardware – very few distros like my soundcard and hang when they try to use it.
For those who don’t want this, use another distro and shut up with your elitist bull, not everyone can or wants to be a Linux guru – most just want a system that works and can get a job done. Treat every Linux user with respect, even the ones who don’t have a clue, and the Linux ‘community’ will grow. At the moment it is becoming entrenched in various camps that can only be described as ‘denominations’ – you only have to look at the Christian church to see how people with essentially the same belief can’t get along with each other! Let’s keep Linux together and give our blessing to Linux becoming more accessible.
. I mean, imagine being able to just tell your computer that you wanted to upgrade to the newest version of Mozilla, and it does it. That certainly seems a lot easier and a lot more powerful than ‘apt-get’ or ‘rpm -ivh whatever …’
Actually that’s precisely what apt-get does “apt-get mozilla” upgrades you to the newest version of mozilla. More importantly “latest version” can be defined to your taste:
a) nightly build from CVS
b) latest source files to be built on your system
c) latest build in a binary repository
d) latest testing build in a binary repository
e) latest version your company, distribution.. supports
etc..
Now you’ve been corrected and the normal reaction here is to just ignore it. I’d like you to stop and think for a second about the broader issue that caused you to make this mistake:
Command lines are more powerful than guis. GUIs force you to play 20 questions. At even given time the GUI gives you a small number of choices you select from those choices and are then presented with more choices. Over time the computer is able to determine what action out of all possible computer actions you want it to perform. With a command line you simply tell it what action you want it to perform.
What you are asking for is the exact opposite of “simplicity” (i.e. a very shallow learning curve) but rather “complexity” (power and features).
A good (but brief) take on this is at http://www.philscorner.org. Check it out.
“Bullsh*t. Do you rewire your VCR everytime you want to record something off the TV and not just playback? Do you open your fridge’s back port to change its temperature? Do you sacrifice a goat to change a channel on your TV?”
Actually I think both approachs are valid. The problem I see all too often in Windows is that the “fallback” approach of being able to go into easy to edit config files is not there and instead has been sent to the purgatory of “regedit” and its impossible to understand alien langauge.
I think for a long time Linux was the other extreme, too much reliance on hand edited config files while Windows has moved to nothing to configure and too much reliance on sometimes inflexible point and click wizards. Linux lately has been moving toward a nice middle ground where both are available.
I much prefer “wizards” first but if they can’t succeed then having the config files accesible is a lifesaver.
Linux is not that hard to use. I came from Windows to Linux and the transition was no harder than when I started with Windows. In fact I would say that my experience with Dos and Windows helped a great deal in understanding Linux and its commands. Many were not all that different. For a brand new user to computers the newer Linux distributions are no harder to start with than any version of Windows. I can see that people who had a hard time learning Windows in the first place might have a hard time but those with the knack for understanding operating systems shouldn’t have it too hard.
Could it get better? Of course! But then Windows has a LONG way to go before its perfectly user friendly as well. Everything improves with time.
Both Gentoo and Debian-based system have the ability to do exactly what you described. I use Gentoo and haven’t manually downloaded a piece of software since I started.
apt-get mozilla, mozilla and its dependencies are installed.
emerge mozilla, mozilla’s source and its dependencies are installed and compiled.
What in the Windows world can match this?
Nice to see the term “user” instead of “loser” or whatever used. But anyway – another problem would-be converts that have only ever used Win9x series or NT, is that they have no clue as to the development cycle of a distro.
Buying and successfully installing a distro may well be seen as not worth the hassle if the system will be perceived at being out of date in just 6 months or so time.
– – –
As to the article, I feel Adam has hit the nail on the head here, sure it’s not applicable to everything/one, nothing particularly fresh but does sum up the mature comments made about the article it is in response to.
I’m sick of hearing comments about Regedit. It’s a doddle to use. Why do you even need to touch the registry anyway and why are Linux’s text files easier? If you don’t know what you are doing you shouldn’t touch either. If you have a problem you first research that problem, only then do you follow the instructions to make the appropriate changes to the registry. The registry is not for messing around in – it is a fallback. I’m sure that if you sit someone who has never used regedit and tell them what key to change they can have a pretty good stab at it. Give that same user VI and tell them which file to edit and they’ll be stuck just trying to figure out how to use the text editor.
Tsu’s original article was excellent. IF you want Linux to be viable for average users so they can save money and are free from DRM and “exploitation”, Linux must grow up. So what to do? It’s all up to RedHat. (if you don’t care about average users, skip the rest.)
They are the leader of Linux. Period. Mandrake is bankrupt, Suse is limited to Europe and nearly broke. They must set the Standard – they must be the people who finally make DECISIONS.
No more multiple desktops. CHOOSE ONE, Redhat, and we all know it is Gnome. Personally, i prefer KDE, but 99% of the world’s population doesn’t give a rat’s ass. Say, Gnome is it, we know it’s mediocre at best, but all our resources are going into it. Preferably, all Gnome apps will be written with MONO, which should have decent VERSIONING and easy INSTALLATION, like Installshield. Period. We guarantee every app written from today will run on RedHat for 5 YEARS.
Browser: Mozilla. Office Suite: Open Office, and make it work well with Gnome. These 2 paragraphs of DECISIONS will get Linux 80% of the way to desktop rule.
People will bitch and moan – where’s AbiWord, where’s Kongqueror? – but eventually, they will start coding to these Standard API’s and making a mass movement.
The LSB is a joke. Until RedHat starts making the HARD decisions and taking heat, Linux will be stagnant on the desktop. They should not strive to be like Windows. The ideal is the ease of use, simplistic installation (just copying a folder), and pure fun of Mac OS X. Nothing else should be acceptable.
Then Microsoft’s software model is valid – toss out your existing hardware, and get something new that runs the latest and greatest. After all, you wouldn’t try to rebuild your toaster to add two more slots, not when you can buy a new one with four slots already.
My experience with users (from users up to senior level execs) has been most people want the commodity reliability and lack of operating knowledge that goes with an appliance in a general purpose device. No wonder software continues to bloat, as every conceivable possibility is addressed by a ‘wizard’ or someting similar!
Despite millions of dollars spent in misinformation and marketing lies, computers are still general purpose devices, not commodity appliances. And I don’t think people really want that, anyway. I don’t see web TV or email appliances flying off the shelves, while those hard-to-use computers collect cobwebs. People want the flexibility of a general purpose device, but they’ve been conditioned (through marketing, misinformation, etc.) to expect that they won’t need to learn anything at all about the way their computer works. This is the issue that needs to be addressed, not how feature-restricted (the real purpose of an appliance, after all) Linux or *BSD or Windows can be made.
It’s just not possible to retain the flexibility of a general purpose device and simultaneously restrict the operation to that of a commodity appliance. Take your pick – Flexibility, or no-brain operation.
With Linux text files, you’re not restricted to using Vi. Any text editor will do – and, in the Unix world, there are dozens.
Quite frankly, the Windows regedit or regedt32 could use some enhancements – how about a consistency checker, for starters or an undo feature ( besides exporting every key you intend to change beforehand)?
From the original article “Migrating to Linux not easy” by Tso Do Nimh :
Distro : Mandrake 9.0
GUI : Yes
Printer : Worked well
Modem : Worked well
CD burning: Worked well
Notes : Modem setup doesn’t properly identify Net connection when connected
———————————————————————- ——–
Mandrake 9.0 apparently worked almost flawlessly on your system, by your criteria, so, what made this distro inadequate? Did you find that the “Modem setup doesn’t identify Net connection when connected” error (which seems rather minor IMHO) was a show-stopper for you, or did something else happen to make you give up on Mandrake 9.0?
I’m curious, because Windows seems filled with numerous errors at least as bad as this one. For instance, the fact that you *stop* your computer using the “Start” button.
-Nemo
“Why do you even need to touch the registry anyway and why are Linux’s text files easier? ”
Why are text files easier to read compared to a mishmash of text, hex, and undocumented flags? Are you being funny?
Also,
1 programmers or users cannot put comments in the registry to explain what a setting does.
2 You cannot comment out sections of the registry to make them inactive while still keeping them available if you want to re-enable them at a later date.
3 All the configuration of an app is in a single file, not scattered around the registry. It’s more obvious for example if I want to change the configuration of syslog to edit syslog.conf than to try and find out where all it’s compenents might be in the registry.
Just like slashdot!
Two posts ago!
The original article made reference to poor Linux support for supposedly widely available video hardware. Well, neither Windows ME nor XP had built-in support for my Toshiba Satellite Pro 4270 XDVD’s Savage IX-MX chip. I was forced to struggle with standard VGA until I could download
drivers from s3graphics.com.
> Why are text files easier to read compared to a mishmash of text, hex, and undocumented flags? Are you being funny?
Yes, like Linux config files are not the slightest bit cryptic and everything in the registry is pure hex.
This is exactly the kind of bullsh*t I’m talking about.
> programmers or users cannot put comments in the registry to explain what a setting does.
True, but text files, like registry should be last resort.
> You cannot comment out sections of the registry to make them inactive while still keeping them available if you want to re-enable them at a later date.
But you can rename keys, same effect.
> All the configuration of an app is in a single file, not scattered around the registry. It’s more obvious for example if I want to change the configuration of syslog to edit syslog.conf than to try and find out where all it’s compenents might be in the registry.
I’ve not found one app where it’s settings are scattered around the registry. Whereas the unix way is /usr/share/app/appconf or possibly /usr/local/share/appconf or maybe /opt/share/app/appconf
jstn said:
“All doors are open with Linux. Amen.”
…
But the users find themselves at the wrong address, in a strange neigbourhood, with no key.
Switching to Linux: a Mac user shares her views.
Flooded with junk email from the various Linux distributor vendors, an innocent newbie is tempted into the unthinkable.
April 6, 2003
Summary
I have always thought using a computer was as easy as turning on a TV, and my old Mac SE never disappointed me in this respect (except Apple placed the power button at the back of the case). So I was led to think that installing Linux would be a matter of minutes on my computer which I bought at a garage sale for $20 two years ago. But I was wrong. (11 pages, because more pages means more ads and Eugenia asked me to write no less than 8000 words, so here goes) Copyright Ana O´Neemus
By Ana O´Neemus <[email protected]>
Page 1 of 11
(Garfield Group) – My Mac SE has proved tenaciously useful for my work, but recently I felt I was falling behind compared to the state-of-the-art in computing technology. I still have many friends using their Sinclair ZX-81 at work or running their businesses on VIC-20 machines, but as a technical writer I thought I owed to my readers to try something new. I recently attended one of these Linux conferences and I was lucky enough to bump into an attractive bearded man who only identified himself as Alan C. He really looked like on of these UNIX gurus and he talked like one, too. I was so impressed that I asked him to show me what Linux could do; he politely declined, but instead I ended up with a pile of CDs, and he even gave me a motherboard. Alan´s only comment was: ¨Don´t call me in England¨.
After sorting the CDs and throwing out all the AOL ones, I was left with a few Linux distributions to try. It then took me two years (that´s 24 months, by the way) to write this comparison of these various Linux distributions.
Before we go on, I should tell you a few things about myself. I am a woman. I am not objective. I don´t read manuals. And if you don´t like my review, logic says you must be a Linux jerk. A **male** Linux jerk. Oh, and don´t expect me to include any snapshots from the various Linux distributions I have tried.
What I need from Linux
I learned to use a computer with a single-button mouse and I expect Linux to provide the same simplicity and ease of use. I am not interested in the rationale behind having two buttons. After all, when they sell you a Japanese car, do they teach you Japanese too?
1) It must have a mouse. If I have to actually read what´s on the screen and type something, then, sorry, but it´s not efficient.
2) It must be be usable on my PC. I mean, at least some light has to come on when I press the power button.
3) MacWrite, MacPaint and SuperCard must all be usable, or I should have the equivalent applications included for free.
Page 2 of 11
My goodness, look at my fingernails! Folks, I really have to go out buy some groceries, so please skip to page 3, OK? (that was a **hint**).
Well you naughty geeks, still here?
Page 3 of 11
My PC
I can´t tell you anything about the brand, but suffice it to say that the company went out of business a few years ago. After unsoldering all the leaking electrolytic capacitors on the motherboard that Alan had given me, and soldering some tantalum ones in their place, I thought it was ready to go.
I have divided my hardware in two broad classes: there is the internal stuff that is **inside** the computer, and then the external stuff that is **outside** the computer. Isn´t the logic clear, here?
Inside stuff
Well, what would you expect?
Outside stuff
I confess I was so fond of my SCSI 2x external CD-ROM drive that I used with my Mac SE, that I have kept it until now. I also kept my ImageWriter dot-matrix printer, but I was told Linux didn´t have a driver for it. I can confirm this sad fact, as I didn´t manage to get it to work with any of the Linux distributions I tried.
I am very sorry to say that I have lost track of the internal components, except that I remember the system behaved differently at different times during those two years of testing:
This worked for sure
The keyboard was very reliable. I am still using one of the original NorthStar keyboards that I bought so many years ago. All Linux distributions recognized and correctly identified this hardware.
This I am almost sure didn´t work
I think the ImageWriter wouldn´t have worked with any of the Linux distributions I tried, but I can´t be sure, because the ribbon was so worn out and dry it wouldn´t have printed anything anyways.
The disappointing part
The SCSI CD-ROM drive worked fine with all my previous CDs, but it seemed to reject all the CD-Rs that Alan gave me. This was a huge disappointment, and since it worked previously with my Mac SE, I can say with absolute certainty that Linux was at fault here. Alan, if you read these lines, I hope you feel guilty.
Linux is nowadays the ONLY viable alternative for poor countries. While americans can buy Apple machines, pay for expensive softwares, etc, third-world countries can’t have this luxury.
Even if english is not our native language, we are trying to adopt use linux at large scale as desktop operating system (the linux advantages for servers is obvius). Windows XP can be more user-friendly but your price is abusive for us. A single copy of Windows XP is 3 times the minimum salay in Brazil and a copy of M$ Office is 5 or 6x the minimum salary, perceived by 40% of population.
Don’t think that users are completely stupid. They can adapt to linux rapidly if trained. Windows is not in human DNA and these users need to be trained also for Windows operation. People used DOS in 198x until 1995, even for writing documents, spreadsheets, etc.
I don’t understand why I see more resistance to linux in USA than in my country (Brazil) and other countries. The most of software is written in english, the most of information is diponible in english, you have more scholarity, etc.
Linux is spreading here like a fire, while BSA promote an inquisition agains piracy. Linux also can recicle old computers if we use it like graphical terminals of a more powerfull computer.
Both Gentoo and Debian-based system have the ability to do exactly what you described. I use Gentoo and haven’t manually downloaded a piece of software since I started.
apt-get mozilla, mozilla and its dependencies are installed.
emerge mozilla, mozilla’s source and its dependencies are installed and compiled.
Well, apt-get is not quite as intuitive as you make it sound. On Debian stable, if you do ‘apt-get mozilla’, unless you make some changes to the sources.list file or use the unstable version, you’re probably not going to get version 1.3. And I’m not even going to get into the amount of effort it takes for a first-timer to get Debian up to the point where you can even start throwing apt-get commands at it in the first place.
Even in some Debian-based distros like Xandros, if you try to throw the ‘apt-get mozilla’ command at it (I’ve actually done this), it’s going to tell you that you have the latest version installed, even though the version installed is like 1.01.
What in the Windows world can match this?
Eh, pop in the CD/double click on Setup, Next, Next, Finish. Not as quick as apt-get mozilla, but considering that you don’t have to put up with Debian and sources.list, and packages that break and/or misbehave because you didn’t get it/couldn’t find it in the ‘official’ repository, I’d say it’s worth the effort.
And even so, in the future, when computers are all-powerful and you can actually speak to them, you could say:
“Ok, download and install for me the latest nightly build of Mozilla (or latest stable version, or version 1.3, or latest beta version, or whatever). Since I don’t know what kind of bugs the nightly build has, please don’t overwrite my original installation. Oh, and I forgot to install Flash when I originally installed Mozilla, so please download and install Flash for me and make sure it works for both versions of Mozilla”
And then the computer would process the request, ask you any questions if it doesn’t understand, and then go do it. I’d love to see you try and do that with apt-get
Oh come on Ken ! You are defending a sinking ship here. Everyone knows that for a average user, text files are easier to deal with in the long run. Also when was the last time a application writer took the time to rename a key and write in what it suppossed to do and what values it effects and how it effects it ? Now as for your example you provided below anyone that has learned the file structure of *Nix can easliy know where those files would be found and why. It’s just like knowing where to put a program like md5sum in Win2000 ( C:WINNTSYSTEM32 ) inorder to get it to work in the command line. It’s just plain easier to deal with text files then it is to deal with the reg. Not to mention that the registery in windows is like putting all you eggs in one basket. One screw up and your system is hosed if you haven’t backed it up and most users I know don’t even know how to back it up to begin with.
“Yes, like Linux config files are not the slightest bit cryptic and everything in the registry is pure hex. ”
I did not say that. However, there is some truth in it.
Linux config files in /etc/ are designed to be human readable. The Windows registry is not. That is why there are comments in text files, and no comments in the registry. Simple, isn’t it?
The registry contains a hell of a lot of =hex: entries. I can’t find any files in /etc that contain any hex. Perhaps Windows admins are expected to convert hex>dec in their heads?
Of course, the contents of a configuration file will appear cryptic if you do not know what it refers to.
“I’ve not found one app where it’s settings are scattered around the registry. ”
Not looked very hard then. Try Internet Explorer.
Hint: you probrably have not known how many entries are related to IE’s operation because there is no indication in the registry to that effect.
There are problems with the Linux/Unix method of text files as well, but you will have to use a *nix to find them.
When the s**t hits the fan though, and you have to get down and edit the configuration of your server by hand, I find the *nix method wins every time.
Learning curve my A$$, why should someone have to mess to xfree’s config file just to change a driver, what the hell is the “profound enlightenment” that you get by knowing the inner workings the “/etc/X11R6/XFree86Config-4”?, or having to use the command line to build the freakin driver? That’s not learning, that moving a step backwards down in evolution.
Spending half an hour just to install a driver or an app that could have otherwise been installed by a couple of mouse clicks is just lame. The whole point of using a destop enviroment is ->NOT<- having to use a command line, that’s the reason they where invented in the first place.
…neither Windows ME nor XP had built-in support for my Toshiba Satellite Pro 4270 XDVD’s Savage IX-MX chip.
I still do not have my Toshiba Tecra 750DVD MPEG decoder working under Windows, and my HP Deskjet 970C insists on printing a “garbage” page every 20 minutes when my wife is using Windows ME. I have not yet figured out either of these problems.
Oddly enough, when these sorts of hardware problems (Missing, broken or poor drivers) manifest themselves with Windows, the manufacturer always gets the blame. Yet when these hardware problems show up under Linux, it is always the fault of “those damn Linux hackers”.
Why is the general expectation for Linux to support all of your hardware out of the box and work flawlessly, while the first thing anyone does when they install Windows is to download, update and install a whole bunch of drivers from the manufacters?
I agree. I found it surprising that the new NVidia driver I downloaded did so much configuration automatically, but did not make the simple change on an ‘nv’ to an ‘nvidia’ in my XF86Config.
There should be a gui tool for this, I think it can be assumed that someone who has downloaded drivers for a Gforce 4 is probably running a gui, or at least provide support for native X11 if they want to keep it window manager agnostic.
While editing configuration files should be made as easy as possible, by keeping them in human readable text, a newbie should not be expected to do this.
I think, by far, the most critical thing Adam mentioned was the concept of a target market. Linux, as it stands, should not be aimed at the masses of people. There’s no point. They wouldn’t switch anyway. Identifying exactly who you can sell to is the critical first step in being successful. You don’t need a 99% Microsoft monopoly to be successful in the OS market. Getting a strong foothold in a few key niches is enough to ensure that you’ll be around long enough to keep hacking away at other markets. Right now, Linux is ready for a few key markets:
1) The corporate desktop.
2) Public workstations (universities, schools, libraries).
3) Artists workstations (ILM has already switched most machines over).
4) Power users (the people who used to futz around with IRQs in Win 3.1)
At this point in time, getting a solid base in the above markets is going to be far more useful than trying to cater to the home user. And guess what: that’s what the major distros are doing right now!
@Eugenia. You’re comments about the VCRs and goats imply something very different from reality. The truth is, that once you learn Linux, you do your work far more efficiently than you can futzing around with wizards or “task oriented” menus. By the time someone finds a folder in explorer, opens the target folder, highlights everything, and drag-and-drops them over, I’ve done”cp -R <src> <dst>” and moved on with my life. Sure, I don’t expect a clueless user to be able to know how to use the CLI. I disagree with you, in that I believe that pretty much every use can be *taught* how to use his/her computer efficiently, and the time and expense of training is greatly outweighed by increased productivity. What you’re missing is that it’s not like rewiring your VCR every time you want to record. It’s like building it from scratch and never having problems with it ever again. A lot of people don’t get enough use out of their VCR to justify building it from scratch. I certainly don’t. But computers aren’t commodity items for everyone. And for those people, the hassle of setting things up, and learning things beforehand is worth it.
PS> Programming a VCR is still a gaint hassle today. *I* have trouble figuring out our DirecTV receiver. It’s not intuitive, at all. Almost no TV programming is (think: magic key combos on remotes to program the brand of TV). Yet, the world still manages to go around without too many people that have “12:00” blinking on their VCRs.
Someone here already said it, but let’s turn it a bit differently :
“Bullsh*t. Do you rewire your VCR everytime you want to record something off the TV and not just playback? Do you open your fridge’s back port to change its temperature? Do you sacrifice a goat to change a channel on your TV?”
BullSh*t. Do you expect your car to feature drive Wizards ?
Do you let your camera make the framing of your next photo for you ?
A computer is a fairly complex system, that deserves a minimum of _intelligence_ to operate. Wizards never deal with complicated operations, only installation or configuration procedures, which avoid the user to deal with learning configuration parameters. At some point, when you want to use software, you have to know how to use it, what it is made of, and leave automated wizards behind.
That said, we mostly speak about migration these days, but not much about discovering the system. What about people who _learn_ computer use through Linux OS ? How do they react to it ? Is it a good system to learn computer use with ?
Darius : Can you say to a Windows system : “please install the latest Mozilla CVS” just like you described ?
apt-get can’t do that, but on the feature side, it’s at least as useable as an installshield package, except that almost all packages are located at the same place. And if you take a look at the existing GUI wrapping apt-get (synaptic, or the fancy red-carpet), they are quite user friendly to me.
The whole point of using a destop enviroment is ->NOT<- having to use a command line, that’s the reason they where invented in the first place.
Actually no. The reason desktops were invented in the first place were to allow for multiple full screen / command lines at the same time. The idea of escapint the command line came from the unified application frameworks: Lotus, Wordperfect, etc…
The idea of a desktop that didn’t require command line configuration didn’t exist until the Lisa / Macintosh.
apt or urpmi are great tools that let us have access to tons of software, but the problem is that your system will be broken and unstable before you get a chance to setup your desktop the way you want it. Every distro revision brings a better desktop, but Linux is far from ready to be a win replacement for the average user.
The wizards keep breaking the system, hardware support is lagging (I know it’s the fault of hardware manufacturers…). It always turns to lenghty sessions of HOWTO reading and vi editing to just get the damn thing fixed.
Tried Man9.1 on 3 different computers, different packages installed, different problems, none works flawlessly.
You compare two different things here. Inserting the CD and running the installer means that you already have the newest version on CD.
If you have a Debian stable CD set, you won’t have the new version on it, as it is newer than your CDs. Yes, you have to tell apt to use a “testing” mirror. But this is the same as acquiring a new CD.
And “the amount of effort it takes for a first-timer to get Debian up to the point where you can even start throwing apt-get commands at it in the first place” should be nothing, because you have already set up apt during the installation.
Oh, and BTW, the command is “apt-get install mozilla”.
This article is probably the most accurate article on the subject that I have read. The problem is described exactly as it really is. Most of the people who would consider switching already know Windows. This is because it would only occur to a computer nerd to switch and a computer nerd already knows their OS pretty well.
The problem is that when they attempt to switch to Linux things are different for them. They say, “I am good with computers, and I can’t get it to work!” Of course the reality is that they are good with Windows. Linux seems hard to them not because it’s hard, but because it is different. This is like taking an excellent football player, dropping them on a rugby field, and expecting perfect performances right from the get go. It won’t happen. Linux is a different “sport” from Windows. The rules are different, and the way you interact is different. If you want to use Linux you just have to learn those rules.
Think of it as a second language. It is harder to learn than the first, but the sooner you start, the easier it is.
Adam- great article. a gem. There is no excuse for
reviewing old distros. Maybe each Distro should come up with a cheatsheet/tutorial for the most common
hurdles for the new user. And I mean real spoon fed, hand
holding help files not something lifted from a man page.
Arbor- re: Redhat set standard.
Actually the problem with the LSB is Red Hat through
pride, nih, desire for control wanting LSB standards to
be Redhat standards.
So yes,Rhat should make the hard decisions and ditch rpm for deb,apt-get. What was the point in not
doing this, since everyone is grafting apt onto their
package managment anyway? Had been done, many people could have been spared much of the more common frustrations in installing Linux software. But Pride,NIH, or whatever precluded that.
Also, if the Debian packaging system was the standard think of how much better it would be with evryone help
improve it rather than just the Debian Developers.
Darius – you probably saw this, but just in case
http://developers.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=03/04/04/1340204&mode…
…, setup programs for msdos used to make changes to the autoexec.bat and config.sys files with few problems.
And as for the apt-get program, I’ve found that very few of the rpm sites tell me what lines I should put into my sources.list file. Nowhere on the freshrpms site, for example, do they give a sample.
I’ve mentioned this before, that in windows the responsibility for the setup is on the installing programs side and thus requires no special knowledge on the part of the user.
In linux, you have to know how to use apt-get, and rpm ( and in Suse 8.1 the rpm is outdated, so even if you download apt, you can’t install it, and downloading a newer rpm.rpm runs into broken dependencies), and then you have to know which repositories have programs for your distribution, and THEN you have to know what to put into your sources.list ( because every rpm site has a different directory structure, and even if I know the directory structure, I’m still not sure even after reading the f*ing manual how to translate that into a source.list line, and besides, the urls I read in the browser do not necesarily corelate with the actual location, or maybe I’m just putting a backslash in the wrong place).
To make it short, apt is not perfect. It’s nice when it’s working, but getting there can be a struggle.
> Oh come on Ken ! You are defending a sinking ship here. Everyone knows that for a average user, text files are easier to deal with in the long run.
Back that up or STFU.
>Linux config files in /etc/ are designed to be human readable. The Windows registry is not. That is why there are comments in text files, and no comments in the registry. Simple, isn’t it?
>The registry contains a hell of a lot of =hex: entries. I can’t find any files in /etc that contain any hex. Perhaps Windows admins are expected to convert hex>dec in their heads?
The point I made is that you shouldn’t touch the registry unless you know what you are doing. Configuration of Windows is done through control panels etc. If you mess around in the registry without knowing what you are doing and screw up your machine then you deserve the results.
Text files may have advantages but my point was that command line editors are more cryptic than regedit. Also my point was that if you have a problem, look it up on the net and then make the recommended changes. If you don’t have a problem, don’t touch the registry. Simple. Windows way works. Linux doesn’t have a unified configuration because each distro is slightly different – RedHat, Mandrake, SuSE, Debian all use different styles and have files in slightly different places – at least once you’ve learnt to configure Windows it’s the same on each system.
” Linux doesn’t have a unified configuration because each distro is *slightly* (emphasis mine) different -”
slightly most people believe it or not can handle.
” RedHat, Mandrake, SuSE, Debian all use different styles and have files in slightly different places – at least once you’ve learnt to configure Windows it’s the same on each system.”
I seem to remember that they were *slightly* different
in W95,w95b,w98,w98se,wme,w2k,wxp.
If windows is as easy as some think it is how come the
Video Professor (windows tutorial) has been raking in the bucks for so many years ?
years.
It’s still a lame article. 8000 wasted words. It loses even more credibility when the author takes potshots from behind a pseudonym. I think Eugenia’s full of baloney a lot of the time, but she posts her name and photo publicly, and has the courage to go public with her views.
Forget you, Tso Dho Nimh, you’re a waste of time. I’m wondering if the whole thing isn’t a hoax.
Hello Alice,
Tsu and I used to be good friends many years ago, so I can tell you she is for real. She bought an 16MHz 286 IBM AT clone and I bought a Mac 128 more or less at the same time, then our ways parted forever. She now writes those lame reviews…
> slightly most people believe it or not can handle.
I love these generalised ‘MOST PEOPLE’ comments. Do you know ‘MOST PEOPLE’? No you don’t. Have you done any research? No you haven’t.
The truth is you can use Windows. Yes, that is the truth. Many people use it every day. Sure there are things that are frustrating at times – same goes for Linux. But with Windows you can use it WITHOUT ever having to touch regedit. With Linux, depending on your hardware, you may be able to do the same – but my system doesn’t play nice with any of the more automated Linux distros, so I’ve had to delve into text files and figure out their syntax etc. This has been my experience on more than just my own system. And sure, comments in the text files helped – but not every config file is well commented, and what if I don’t speak the language that the comments are written in? I speak English, but believe it or not, not everyone does.
> W95,w95b,w98,w98se,wme,w2k,wxp
Yes, things evolve – over time. Not ‘sideways’ as in Linux. This is what makes Linux a problem for commercial developers to develop for ‘Linux’ as it is a ‘Fuzzy’ target. Most commercial developers only seem to support RedHat or maybe another mainstream distro. True, the product may work without problem on other distros – but they don’t guarantee it.
> If windows is as easy as some think it is how come the
Video Professor (windows tutorial) has been raking in the bucks for so many years ?
I have never said Windows is easy, but it is quick to learn the basics that you need to use it as a tool. Linux has a steeper learning curve, so why should someone leave Windows for Linux? At the moment I see no reason on the desktop of the average home user. As for all those Windows tutorials… well someone on this forum said Windows etc is not in our DNA, people need to learn somehow.
Ana,
Are you saying that is her real, honest-to-gosh-borned name?? Excuse my skepticism, but that’s like saying Nom De Plume is a real person. My apologies to Tsu if I’m wrong, but really now! That would be quite a linguistic coincidence.
“The point I made is that you shouldn’t touch the registry unless you know what you are doing. Configuration of Windows is done through control panels etc. If you mess around in the registry without knowing what you are doing and screw up your machine then you deserve the results.”
The original point that I made that sent you off on your uninformed multipost tirade was not that the average person should be messing around in the registry. My point was that Linux is evolving into a nice middle ground where a user CAN use “wizards” but should those wizards fail to do the job the user can fallback to using text config files or command line tools. That ability is fast disappearing in Windows. Without that ability the user may be forced to attempt the registry fix or worse yet have to reload the entire system for what would be simple fixes in Linux/Unix based operating systems.
Your posts have shown an obvious bias towards Windows and your ignorance is plainly visible to any who tried to respond reasonably to you.
Oh, and as you so politely said to another poster…STFU.
“please install the latest Mozilla CVS”
>>>>>>>>
How about “emerge phoenix-cvs”
Ken , lighten up a touch. I don’t ever telling a stranger to shut the f*ck up, it isn’t going to win any arguements.
1 ) We are seeing an evolution to something better than the registry or text files – XML specifications for configuration. Force users to use a validating parser in their editor and you get a lot fewer mistakes. Couple this with some tools to validate the imputs & compare your config with a database of know errors & you will have a great system.
2) If you ever hose your regisitry, you are basically dead. Time to blow a day reinstalling the OS and getting all the apps etc reinstalled. Any you will reboot about a dozen times before you get the updates (The MS update site is on my ‘Favorites List’). I assume the need to reboot after installs will continue to improve with time – after all MS can approriate more than TCP stacks from the BSD’s.
2a) I will agree that screwing up config files in *nix can also leave you with a dead box, but its relativelyeasy to copy in new text files. (You can go to the command line & reload some keys in the registry, but that is more involved that copying files.)
2b) Why on earth should application configuration be in the same ‘thing’ (the registry file) as system configuration? Sure they are under different keys, but you can’t ‘accidentally’ damage rc.conf when you are editing httpd.conf
3) You can bet that the configuration of a fairly complex app is spread all over the registry. Each COM compenent & COM interface has a key in there somewhere. Searching the registry is (for some reason I really don’t understand) much slower than ‘exploratory grepping’.
4) You noted that the config files don’t always end up in the same place. This is mostly an issue of figuring out how your flavor of Unix works. For me, this is why I am really starting to like the BSD’s. All of the ports/packages are installed under /usr. Still, it is surprising when files end up in strange directories.
5) IMO, Microsoft moved away from ini files becuase they were an admin’s nightmare. Users can (and did) edit them & occasionally, they screwed up an app. With newer Windows (and of course any *nix), you can lock down files as well as the registry. Text files were almost TOO easy to use. If you get *nix-heads that can use Unix text proccessing tools, it is very clear that text fliles are much more flexible.
6) GUIs (and CLI applications) are good for configuration. I agree that you should not have to open config files in you favorite text editor (which I assume is not vi). But, its just as easy to have the GUI (Wizard or otherwise) modify a text file or the registry. KDE has a bunch of Windows-like interfaces to handle many common configuration tasks.
One of the great insights of Unix is that everything can be treated as a file. (/dev and /proc don’t really contail ‘files’, but you can treat them like the contents ‘just like’ files & directories on a drive.) All text files can be manipulated with common tools. I don’t think the *nix comminities would ever want a registry-like configuration.
Do cars have wizards? What do you think an automatic transmission is. It is something designed to make driving simpler because people are lazy. They become content, they don’t want to change. Why do you think the supercar makers of Europe have finally caved and started making automatic versions of their vehicles. I never thought I would see the day where a big rig came with an automatic transmission but guess what.
Linux is great, I started with Slackware 3.0 and the 1.2.13 kernel. I was younger then and I didn’t mind the command line as DOS wasn’t officially dead yet and it just made sense. Years later, I have seen progress in Linux but I have seen more in Windows. I am not happy with Windows, the OS I would like to try is not yet ready and I refuse to buy a Mac. I have too much invested in this ‘crappy’ CISC technology. But my question is…is not OS X a fancy wrapper for *BSD? OS X does everything in a consistent and straightforward manner. It just works. I wish I could say the same for linux. I don’t know the exact cause but installing Mandrake 9.1 was painfully slow and I even lost my mouse halfway through the process. I have an Intellimouse Explorer, I choose Intellimouse Explorer and several screens later…nothing. Red Hat 9.0 installed with no problems. Everything looked fine until I tried to access the network. Setting were correct. I set them up using the wizard-like app and then the command line. Installing Gentoo did wonders for forcing me to learn the command line but still no go. I unplug the caple, plug it back in and I can ping local machines on the network but Mozilla, Galeon, anything other than ping refuse to work. Even when only trying to access my router. How is this helping me to get work done? It isn’t. My solution, fix the hal.dll not found error with windows and try again.
Windows has its problems, linux has more IMO. No matter how willing you are to hang in there. Is there an easy solution, probably not but at times it is easier to go with the more traveled path. Especially when the least traveled one forks off into 3000 sub-paths. And another thing I still can’t figure out. Years ago I had a fully functional linux system in less that 640 megs. XP, with a moderate selection of software sans pagefile can be had in less than a gig. Why does every linux distro insist on installing two gigs plus? Even with gutting options. And where are all these apps? That is another thing that has always annoyed me. I like keeping tabs of what is on my system and with linux, I always feel like I am getting ‘crap’ that I will never use and no matter how hard I try, I have to install it all because installing that app has 20 dependicies with 20 other dependicies and so on and so on. That, I think, will be the major obstacle stopping widespread linux adoption in the US. Like it or not, americans(like my self) are lazy and take too many things for granted because it is what we have come to expect.
If someone where to take a stance and trim some of the options and just tell the user what they are going to get, it might be better in the long run. Everyone else tells us what we are going to get. Gnome, KDE? Who cares, pic one and I will cope. Make it look as good and responsive as other desktop OSes and no one will complain…much. Besides, if they want KDE or Enlightenment or whatever, they can always apt-get or emerge it…right?
Configuration of Linux is, at least on a ‘newbie’ distro like Mandrake is though gui tools like ‘Mandrake Control Center’ as well. Other more powerful gui tools like Linuxconf or Webmin can also be used.
Unfortunately, people still have to get their hands dirty with config files on occasion. The NVidia drivers is one example. This is unnacceptable, but very hard to avoid unless NVidia are prepared to open source their drivers, provide detailed specs, or can be persuaded to write a better installer.
I do not think that the Linux gui system administration tools are as well integrated into the OS as the configuration control panels in Windows. There is much room for improvement here.
However, editing a text config file is a much less dangerous and difficult task compared to making changes in the registry. Linux is quite modular and robust, it’s harder to break and the low level configuration is better commented and documented compared to Windows.
As the configuration files are parsed text, the parsers are expected to deal with syntax errors before passing them to the app. An error will normally leave you with a log file error report entry rather than an broken system. With Windows, the registry is expected to be sound, and an error is much more critical, and less likely to be logged anywhere.
This is because for a long time, the *only* way to really configure a Linux system was through it’s config files, so the apps that rely on them had to deal with errors in a more forgiving way.
“Text files may have advantages but my point was that command line editors are more cryptic than regedit.”
You don’t have to use command line tools to edit config files, you could even use OpenOffice if you liked. They are just text files.
“Linux doesn’t have a unified configuration because each distro is slightly different – RedHat, Mandrake, SuSE, Debian all use different styles and have files in slightly different places – at least once you’ve learnt to configure Windows it’s the same on each system. ”
I don’t find these slight differences to be a problem, but can see how a newbie could. There is a deeper problem of the division between the low level tools in Linux and the high level gui and desktop.
For example, in the KDE control center I can *see* the configuration of my network and SCSI cards, but not change them without opening a different gui app.
I can however, configure file sharing, samba, proxy, power saving, and even configure the kernel from the same control center.
This is due in part to the user/system administrator seperation philosophy of *nix based OSs, and the desire of KDE to keep their desktop OS agnostic, but the division is less and less clear.
cheezwog: The NVidia drivers is one example. This is unnacceptable, but very hard to avoid unless NVidia are prepared to open source their drivers, provide detailed specs, or can be persuaded to write a better installer.
Why should they provide open source drivers? why shouldnt linux provide a standart way to use binary drivers, instead of making it intentionally difficult because of political reasons (proprietary is bad and all that blah blah blah), if it works with windows and osx why can’t it work on linux.
Well, don’t know what this is all about, cause the case is pretty clear:
If you want your OS to look like Windows and behave like Windows, just go ahead and use Windows!!! (Or BeOS, or MacOS, or whatever)
But do yourself and all of us a favor and stop bitching around, spreading FUD based on outdated arguments and telling all of us ‘My OS is the be all, end all!’ – I think I’m not the only one who couldn’t care less…!
I am a long time MS Windows user. My first version was MS Windows 3.11 for Work Groups. Win98 was the version I used the most. I learned all kinds of tweaks and hacks that made Win98 run well. But I also knew how to crash the system daily. Then I heard about Linux, so I tried several different distros, mostly different version of SuSE, Mandrake, RedHat, and Slackware. I was in a tweaker’s dreamland. My main machine has only RedHat Linux right now. It has been that way since July of last year.
Recently, I have had the opportunity to install Windows 2000 Pro and explore Windows XP. Below are just a couple of my observations.
The install process of Win2000 is a trivial thing to do. What is not so trivial is to install application software. Some how the permission structure in Win2000 gets in the way. It seems the application programmers haven’t caught on to the fact that Win2000 has permissions. You are suppose to install an application as Root then run the application as a regular user. Of course, Win2000 only has limited permision attributes anyway.
Windows XP has the permission structure even more buried. You are either a Limited user or a Root user. With both types of users, passwords are optional. Most of the time WinXP goes into a busy state. The computer is a Gateway so thew hardware isn’t too off the mark. I am learning what all the processes that are running so that I can shut some of them off. Right now, all I know is that some process with the word ‘idle’ in its name is taking 98 percent of the CPU’s time. Gaming wise, WinXP can play most of my old Win98 games. Trying to install games on Win2000 can be a hair pulling event. Yes, Win2000 wasn’t designed for games but some games were made to run on Win2000. The problem with games that were made to run in Win2000 is that they need to be played as a Root user.
My general impression is that Microsoft is definitely trying to hide all the complexity but hasn’t found the right way to do it yet. It is not that hard to make Win2000 and WinXP to act like Win98. That really is not a complement. At the same time Microsoft is taking away or burying the tools that might help solve some problems if you know what you are doing.
I will stick with Linux for now. I do have my eyes on FreeBSD 5.0. Trying something different does give you a new perspective.
Open source drivers were just one of the three options I gave.
NVidia *does* provide drivers in a single standard binary package, that will work on any distro. The problem is that it lacks a complete gui installer, and no-one else but them can write and redistibute one. (Although it may be possible to cludge some kind of wrapper….)
When there are open source drivers available, hardware installation is normally totally automatic. For example, on my machine if I run Win2K, the sound card and web cam need drivers to be downloaded and installed. With Mandrake 9.1 they all just work.
Right now, all I know is that some process with the word ‘idle’ in its name is taking 98 percent of the CPU’s time
You should kill that one, it must be virus
LOL …
No seriously don’t, that the XP kernel system idle procress.
>Why should they provide open source drivers? why shouldnt >linux provide a standart way to use binary drivers,
There are standard ways of dealing with drivers. It’s called providing RPMS for people to use for there distro. It’s up to the OEM to provide those drivers but in most cases they would rather you do the hard work. This is true with Nvidia. At first their drivers were open source and later on they pulled the rug and closed them. When they were open source you got many more driver updates and bug fixes. Now it takes longer for newer drivers to come out and usually there is some bug that has go un-noticed by the Nvidia boys.
>instead of making it intentionally difficult because of >political reasons (proprietary is bad and all that blah blah >blah),
Well maybe it’s because people don’t like getting sued or having their work stolen from underneath them.
>if it works with windows and osx why can’t it work on linux.
Go call up the OEM’s and ask them why.
Well, I’ve been a MS user for most of my life. I’ve seen nothing more stable than Windows Xp. I can’t think of the last CRASH I had that was not due to a bad driver. I used to turn off automatic updating…now its on and wonderful. I used to hate the registry and prayed for the return of ini files, but I’ve gotten used to the registry, and it hasn’t been corrupted in ages. Web browser being IE…well its there, but I use Phoenix for all my work except for certain sites which aren’t nice to it.
Now, as to Linux. I’ve installed and uninstalled a few linux distros. I tried Corel linux way back, red hat, and right now I have Mandrake 9.0 installed. The biggest problems I have with Mandrake and I suspect most other distros are:
1. Too much bundled and duplicate software. I mean, after making my choices, I ended up with with at least 7 text editors. Why on Earth are these all bundled with the OS? And people complain about microsoft bundling IE. At least they don’t bundle MsOffice. Not to mention the browser issues. I had to choose between Konqueror, Mozilla and a some other options. Again, why are there so many choices? Needless to say, I just downloaded Phoenix and was on my way. The same goes for the choices of terminals. Anyone can configure their own linux…the reason I bought a distro was to have a pre-configured package ready to use.
2. Install/Uninstall software. This is just of those things where users throw up their hands. I saw a few software managers and tried to use them. It’s not too bad, but I still had countless dependency problems. Perhaps they coult take a key from MS software installers and have the install package include the most common set of libs. Installers don’t often install things onto the start menu…
3. Nothing is polished. It’s a pretty broad statement I know, but valid I think. Settings are not saved in many cases. Options are hidden in obscure places. Take even the use of QT. Qtdesigner, Kdevelop are both installed and can be used, but the qmake does not work as its DIRS…are not setup. Why not? Most software programs also appear unfisihed. Just compare say Gaim to say Trillian. I don’t think that’s even a contest.
That’s not to say there’s ‘nothing’ good about mandrake. I had NO install problems. It all worked easily with the exception of some confusion around HDA, HDB, HDC…All my hardware was detected easily and everything worked. Only my mouse doesn’t seem to work well. I can’t get the scroll wheel to work. dah well. System crashes are virtually non-existent, but then again my XP install is also crash free.
Overall, Linux distros are catching up to Windows, but what incentive is there to switch. Stablity is about par I think. Those people who manage to f**k up windows install will manage to f**k up their linux systems. You will never get rid of people who think like “How to I import my Kazaa mp3s into Winamp” or people who open attachments without concern. I don’t know, but the number of security patches available for redhat and mandrake appear to be the same, if not more, than that available for windows xp. What does a linux distro offer the average or even advanced user about Windows? Price…is about the only thing I can think of, but most of them have no problem pirating software. Do they care? If they really want the unixy command line programs like grep…they can get those installed in windows as well.
The question on migration should be: “What does linux offer the average or even advanced user that windows cannot” It should not be “how close is linux to imitating Microsoft” Otherwise, people will just go for the real deal (MS).
The lack of support for binary drivers isn’t a political decision (Linus himself is rather apolitical), it’s a technical one.
Take a look at the Windows APIs. There are *tons* of crufty, deprecated APIs in there. Why not get rid of some of them? Because they can’t break binary compatibility. In the Linux kernel, the API changes *very* fast. There have been two major changes just over the course of the development of kernel 2.5. Making the driver API stable enough for binary drivers would lead to tremendous cruft buildup. This is one of those places where you just have to accept the “Linux is not Windows” idea. The kernel isn’t developed by a single corporation that can go through huge amounts of planning before commiting to some code. It’s developed in fits and spurts of inspiration by a distributed group of coders. The result is that the quality of various systems improves *very* quickly. Just look at all the improvements between 2.4 and 2.5. They’re equivilent to the changes over versions iterations of WinNT. On the flip side, it means that code is very fluid, it gets changed, chopped up, and often just thrown away. Forcing the kernel to stick to a single driver API, for the benifet of a few binary drivers, would greatly stagnate kernel development.
Linux supports a whole bunch of hardware. Most vendors have come to the realization that disclosing their device specs to kernel developers has no real disadvantage on their part. Knowing the register interfaces to a network card doesn’t really give you anything you don’t already know. NIVIDA is a rather unique situation. The need the full support and quick releasese that only an in-house driver can provide, since NVIDIA on Linux is getting big in the pro-3D market. On the flip side, they don’t want to help out ATI and others who are having trouble with their own 3D drivers. Since an OpenGL driver is *very* high-level, there is lots of stuff in there competitors could use. Thus, they’re only option is to release a binary driver with an open-source compatibility layer. This is a good compromise. They get to protect their IP, independent hackers can adapt the compatibility layer to different kernels, and (with their newest installer) end-users get an easy-to-install driver set that doesn’t care about theirkernel version.
Too much bundled and duplicate software. I mean, after making my choices, I ended up with with at least 7 text editors. Why on Earth are these all bundled with the OS?
Because choice is important, and one of the major virtues of free software is the ability to give people almost infinite choice. I use about 7 editors on windows
1) GVIM — I like the vi syntax and this is my primary editor
2) VEdit — when I need good EBCDIC support
3) Wordpad — I use this to edit documents that started off as word files I’ll move to text or text documents I want to move to .rtf. Also useful because it supports CL invocation
4) Notepad — very short edits, generally under 1 minute
5) XEmacs — when I need to run an Emacs script over a file
6) Frontpage HTML editor — I happen to like the features of this app and when I’m in the environment…
7) edlin.exe — short edits from the when in command line in cmd.com. Not as good as vi but vi isn’t available on most windows boxes and this is
8) TSE — when I have to read hundreds of pages from the screen.
9) I’ve used edit.exe but now use vi from the command line. 10) I’ve used textpad
11) I’ve sometimes had to use word in the same way I mentioned wordpad where the document format was something weird
I could probably get up to 15 before I ran out of editors I’ve used in the last year at least once on my windows box. If we say the last 10 years for all of windows I’d easily break 50 and might break 100.
Some people want choice.
First of all, let me say that I am definitely a Linux advocate. I have been trying to make the migration at work away from Windows to using Linux full time.
I think that there are two common threads of thinking among Linux advocates that, while both being reasonable statements, cannot be expected to be true at the same time:
1. Linux advocates look forward to Linux being used more widely — even to the point that they assert that Linux will unseat Windows one day.
2. Linux advocates expect that Linux will require “temporary cluelessness, reading man pages, googling for advice, and relearning applications,” as Adam Scheinberg states.
Mr. Scheinberg caveats his article by stating that the target audience for Linux is not the person looking to switch completely away from Windows — that is, your typical end user. I certainly don’t consider myself a typical end user among my colleagues at work. Out of the hundreds of physicians that work at my hospital, I probably am the only one willing to pound away at a command line to get a Linux install to work.
The fact remains, though, that the VAST majority of the computer using population are typical Windows users that don’t want to learn a command line, or configure an XFree86 config file just to get their computer to work. Of my colleagues at work, I cannot think of a single one that has the time to “learn new skills and suffer for a while,” as Mr. Scheinberg puts it. Yes, there are lots of horror stories about Windows installs all the way from 3.1 to XP, but overall it is easier to install or upgrade a Windows system than a Linux system.
As bad as Windows is from a security standpoint, the bottom line is that for most users the usability of a computer boils down to: [1] does the OS recognize my hardware, and [2] does it run the software I need? They do not ask “How secure is this OS?” or “Will I get increased stability?”
As much as I hate this, I have to admit that at this point in time, Windows has the lead, fairly or unfairly, in recognizing hardware connected to the computer, and in the breadth of software available to it. Here are a few examples:
Hardware: getting a Palm device to sync with Windows is far easier than getting it to sync in Linux.
Software: there is no tax preparation software package that I know of for Linux, nor is there a full featured MP3 tag editor for Linux comparable to Tag&Rename for Windows. The variety of P2P software is also wider on Windows.
Believe me, I do know all of the advantages that Linux has over Windows — that’s why I made the switch. I consider myself as proficient with a computer as one can be without actually being in the IT field. But until the installation process becomes much easier, and hardware recognition is improved, Linux will still be in the minority of systems. And I don’t see this changing as long as thought process #2 above still exists.
Some readers are just too thick to grasp anything beyond blindingly obvious.
Are you saying that is her real, honest-to-gosh-borned name?? Excuse my skepticism, but that’s like saying Nom De Plume is a real person
Ana O’Neemus. (Anonymous)
Well, both articles touche on the point of switching to Linux from Windows, I guess people gotten used to the Windows mindset quite a lot….
But I have to ask, easy or not, does it or does it not worth it to learn new stuff to migrate/use to Linux? If it does, then why people always compare Linux to Windows in the Windows way? While people asked for more and more usability, was it so difficult to adjust to Linux way of doing things? If, however, you are complaining about the lack of _apps_ you need, then raise the app issue specifically.
There’s also a myth I think it’s being too much pushed – and Adam raised this point exactly: the migration to new stuff always need some motivation; those people who keep trying and looking for answers in forum, newsgroup and HOW-TO manage to get what they want to work on Linux. On the contrary, did everything always work out of the box for Windows? Did Windows users call technical support when they didn’t get what they want to work? If so, they both will have to look for answers, although in different way and perhaps different level of technical competence. But after all, the motivation to learn is what matters – and does the cost effectiveness, high level of customization and stability worth it?
I am not against usability improvement. The way KDE and Gnome progress has been very encouraging and promising. KDE crashed less often with the release of 3.x and it made it very easy for Windows users to ‘use Linux’ on this desktop environment. The K3b CD burning program is maturing, along with more and more desktop apps on Linux. But does it mean users can or should learn less to know what’s going on underlying the system simply because of improving usability?
I remain skeptical. The commerical app paradigm where these apps will hide operating (system) specifics from users has proven to work in the Windows and Mac world. So what lacks on Linux, however, is commercial app where their customers got used to the way it works. To make Linux and many other open source apps easy is not a bad thing, but to make it too easy can be counter-productive – because to the Linux crowd they know and _will_ tweak a lot – you can take this customization capability away from Windows users because they don’t really have it in the past; but not so to the Linux users. Therefore, it will be extra work to fit both crowds – it’s essentially a culture and community nature and issue. In certain way, the open source developers are also adapting, but it’s highly unlikely a top priority because of the ‘fun factor’ for incorporating new features vs the ‘discipline/expertise’ required to make it easier to use. Either you join the open source developer community to initiate a bit of persuasion to them to do the extra work, or hope the commercial developers will make it available for the platform as you pay them.
BTW, Linux kernel 2.6 will have ALSA and low latency pre-emptive patch where audio apps will really benefit from, and I expect some commercial audio developers will think seriously developing on Linux later on.
Did you dare call Alice thick?
You must be a male Linux jerk.
I am going to write to Eugenia and ask her to exclude you from OSnews once and for all (yes, we have your IP address, and your name). BTW, I hope you and everybody else noticed how unprofessional Tsu was in her review. I mean, really, a 1GB Linux swap partition?
Ana
“Do you sacrifice a goat to change a channel on your TV? ” ROFL Eugenia!!
Great article Adam! Yes, the thing is, even with the corporate desktop, there must be some familiarity the user can relate to. By and large, it is the Windows interface. So, I think it is good that Linux DE’s have the Start button, panel/taskbar, etc. It’s my personal opinion that Red Hat has it right with the BlueCurve theme – nice artwork without glitz. Anyway, people, even corporate cubicle people, won’t get it if those familiar things aren’t there.
Ana, I want a Sinclair!!! I’ve got one of those SE’s with the two floppy drives I’d trade:-)
I moved partitions from one drive to the other. One contained a windows vfat partition the other was a Linux ext3 partition.
Linux had no problems with that. Windows had many.
Applications had to have registry entries edited to change the drive letter. There is no way to automate this. Also they had to have the links in the start menu altered.
Worst of all after the moveing I found I was lacking a bit of disk space. I went into the control panel and tried to uninstall an application but there was no entry. So I went into the startmenu and found the uninstall program and executed it. It brought up an error about the drive letter being wrong. Then the installer died. There was nothing I could do.
Obviously by this standard windows is not ready for the desktop.
While losing backwards compatibility in favor of a clean system is a good thing some of the time. Too much of anything is bad. There would be no problems with Linux and binary drivers if Linus only changed ABI’s every major kernel update. For instance, if the whole 2.4.x series had binary driver compatability this would make distributing binary only drivers entirely reasonable.
Linus may be fairly apolitical, but he’s also not trying to make it easy for non open source software. Personally, I would like to see an open, standard, desktop computing plateform. An operating system that gives a fair playing field to any method of software development and distribution. In a funny way, Windows is more open then Linux. Proprietary (binary only) developers and open source developers are on a level playing field. There are too many areas in the current open source software which really makes it difficult for proprietary and companies in general to compete. Since I’ll no doubt be flamed for this opinion, I’ll just end now.
Linus is not apolitical when it comes to open source of GPL for that matter. He is strict than RMS, and is more active in the open source movement more than free software movement. OTOH the idea of treating closed source binary only software with anything more than tolerance in anthema. Time and time again he has shown an unwillingness to sacrfice the performance of open source software on linux in exchange for giving the stability neccesary for Linux to become a truly viable platform for closed source development.
There is no question that Windows is a vastly more friendly platform for people selling closed source binary only applications than Linux. From the sounds of it you’d probably be much happier with the philosophy of the open group than FSF/GPL/GNU/OpenSource/Linux, take a look at http://www.opengroup.org.
BTW if you take a steop back and look at the movement over the last 20 years the hostility towards closed source is growing. Lets not forget the migration of licenses regarding critical libraries from public domain to MIT/BSD to LGPL to GPL.
I have ran both windows and linux. I am now on a computer that only has Mandrake 9.1. It has a cd-burner and a dvd-rom. AMD XP 2000+, 512 DDR ram, WD 60G HD and Maxtor 20G HD, floppy drive, optical mouse, and a basic keyboard. The video card is an onboard Nvidia nForce 220D, onboard sound cmpci 8738, a onboard lan and six usb 1.1 ports. Now, Mandrake 9.1 saw everything during the install. I did have to tweak the sound driver so it would load all the time. The only thing I do not have working yet is the onboard lan. The mobo is an ASUS A7N266-VM Total cost to build my box US$755
man_linux
I am a Linux user at home, dual booting with Ecks Pee. I am not your gung ho power user. I use Kinux to do the usual B.S. stuff (net surfing, e-mail, etc..etc…) The main things is, some people that I know that are Windoze users, refuse to even try Linux because it doesn’t handle certain porograms they use. Are there any CAD programs, video editors? I’d gladly get rid of my Ecks Pee partition if there was a program close to a Cool Edit Pro (I do commercial audio production at home sometimes.)
Don’t get me wrong, I’m greatful for what the Community has done for us so far, but ntil the Cummunity can bring programs that people NEED to use at home, the day of Linux unseating Micro$oft won’t happen.
To anonymous:
Why don’t you STFU ’til you’ve got something worthwhile to say.
To cheesewog:
> You don’t have to use command line tools to edit config files, you could even use OpenOffice if you liked. They are just text files.
Unless you can’t get X to work straight away.
I’m just sick of all you Linux zealots and your views. You’ve got your ‘religion’ and you want everyone else to join it by bashing the other ‘religions’. You can’t admit that Microsoft has a good product (regardless of what you think of the company). You can’t admit that you want Linux to be more like it. You’re worse than those smug Mac users – at least they have a reason to be smug. Linux is just too much of a mess underneath all the fancy stuff at the moment to be a Windows killer. BeOS was the closest thing to replacing Windows, shame Be screwed up. Make Linux better for the Newbie, understand the Newbie if you want to bring the Newbie along into your world. Make a Linux more like OSX, Windows, BeOS – it can be done. Unfortunately it seems to me that a lot of ‘geeks’ just don’t relate to people, they’re just elitist gits.
If people don’t have a reason to move to Linux then they won’t move. They certainly don’t want to take a backwards step.
I’m not saying Windows is perfect, I’m not anti-Linux/pro-Microsoft – just that at the moment Windows is more perfect for the desktop and saying ‘you can edit text files in Linux’ is not going to win people over.
Hi Jay,
I am not sure my friend with the Sinclair will part from it, after all he runs all the accounting (and payroll) for his construction company on it. And they recently just received notice of a contract in Iraq…
OTOH I may be willing to buy your SE. (Eugenia, sorry to use your website for commercial purposes, BTW) Please make me an offer I can´t (and won´t) refuse.
Ana
Brandon,
I’m personally not very knowledgable about requirements of professional audio producers but you may find this site useful.
“Planet CCRMA at Home is a collection of software packages that you can add to a computer running RedHat 7.2, 7.3 or 8.0 to transform it into an audio/video oriented workstation.”
http://ccrma-www.stanford.edu/planetccrma/software/
“Unless you can’t get X to work straight away. ”
I’d say that would be very unusual with modern distros and hardware. If the worst should happen, Mandrake has a framebuffer mode that while slow, will work on any vesa video card. Windows also has this, they call it ‘safe mode’.
At least you can as a last resort fall back on the command line in Linux. Try running regedit without a gui.
“I’m just sick of all you Linux zealots and your views. ”
Sigh. When the technical arguments run out….
“You can’t admit that Microsoft has a good product ”
If you read my post, there were a couple of places where I gave kudos to Windows, and pointed out problems with Linux. Neither is perfect, but you have to ask, why are so many people trying to switch?
“saying ‘you can edit text files in Linux’ is not going to win people over.”
Neither will saying ‘you can use regedit in Windows’.
Please, if you want to continue a coherent argument, be more specific than ‘too much of a mess underneath all the fancy stuff’, and provide examples.
Stunami:
1) Thanks for that research, I’ll try it…..
2) When I blow out MDK & install RH (which I never thought I’d ever do. 🙂
Thanks for the reaserch!
I’ll give it a try after I check the HCL on RH’s page.
Eugenia, you completely over reacted to my comments. And if I’m correct you also represent this website in one fashion or another? And your first remark to my post on the article was “Bullsh*t”? That’s about as unprofessional as it gets.
We obviously so not see eye to eye but who are you to put my opinions down? Are yours any better?
And your remarks about me having ‘el33tism’? Was that not completely an inconclusive and rather assumptious remark? How do you know what my Linux skills are?
I never said Wizards were bad or unhelpful. I agree that automation is indeed a good thing. However when things do go bad, most Windows users know no alternatives then to deem things ‘broken’. I know this as I work for an IT team at a large software company. The things they call us for are ridiculous. I simply meant that with the advent of ‘Wizards’ computer users are becoming zombies to their monitors and mouses. *double-click* *double-click* *double-click*
In my programming class we use Visual Studio and almost everything we do is done via a ‘Wizard’ (adding classes, member functions and variables, etc.). What does that do? It “dumbifies” me. It helps me to forget the essential code I should know to get such tasks done. I’ll say it is helpful, but I find it to be a detriment to my programming.
> Computers are today a commodity.
A computer is indeed a commodity, that speaks in 0’s and 1’s. It doesn’t know what you’re thinking or what your next keystroke will be. It requires some knowledge from the user, knowledge that is not being instilled into the user because wizards are making people retarded.
> Bullsh*t. Do you rewire your VCR everytime you want to
> record something off the TV and not just playback? Do you > open your fridge’s back port to change its temperature? Do > you sacrifice a goat to change a channel on your TV?
I’m not trying to say that every computer user should be able to remove their case and solder new circuits into their machine. Again, you over reacted to my opinions. But in the larger picture, (look at the computing industry as a whole) if we can make things like editing config files and the such seem to be less daunting, then the computing industry as a whole will become smarter. You’re looking at this issue (rather assumptiously) as “Uber Linux User -vs- Newbie Linux User”.
I’m not putting down your opinions in any way, I’m just trying to fit in my opinion that ‘Wizards’ can help to make computer users less knowledgeable about their enviroment.
Over the weekend, I tried installing Red Hat 9 (which I even bought a Red Hat Network subscription just to try it – yes, I’m odd), Yoper 1 (which I bought as well), and LindowsOS 3. I managed to get Red Hat 9 to start installing, but as soon as it hit the GUI part of the installation, my monitor went blank, and it said the video signal was out of range. Apparently Red Hat and either my video card (MSI nVidia GeForce4 Ti 4200), or my Sony LCD monitor, or both, didn’t agree with each other, and since I couldn’t see bleep, there was nothing I can do. So I took out the Red Hat CD I burned, rebooted my computer, and put in the Yoper CD. It installed correctly, but soon as X started, boom, everything went dead again, no video at all. I got the same error message … the video signal was out of range. Grr. At this point, I was ready to call it quits, but I had one last distro to try.
I started installing LindowsOS, and about halfway through, I got a “fatal error,” and it said the machine had to be rebooted. On one last shot, I decided to try installing LindowsOS again, and this time it worked, and I was actually able to see X on my monitor when it started! Not only that, but I also heard sound! So, out of Red Hat, Yoper, and LindowsOS, Lindows was the only one that could get my video card and/or monitor, not to mention my sound card, to work. That was just a test run though. I reformatted the hard drive it was on, and I’ll re-install it next weekend and play around with it.
My system is not abnormal … it’s an AMD XP 2000+, with 1 gigabyte of Samsung DDR-333 RAM, two 80 gig Western Digital IDE hard drives, MSI GeForce4 Ti 4200 video card with 64 megs of video RAM, SoundBlaster Audigy Platinum sound card, and a Sony 18″ LCD monitor digitally connected to my video card.
I find it kinda ironic that the only Linux I could use with any video and sound was the one that the Linux community loves to hate second only to Microsoft … Lindows.
your last comment,
> I find it kinda ironic that the only Linux I could use with
> any video and sound was the one that the Linux community
> loves to hate second only to Microsoft … Lindows.
will start a flame war. Allow me to begin and feed the fire, if I may.
Lindows, although I havn’t used it myself, I’ve heard it to be a very friendly Linux. (Based on reviews I’ve read here and in Linux Mag) I personally don’t use it (Eugenia, FYI I’m 1337, and use Slackware) however Lindows has my full support. There is no dedicated Linux distro out there whose goal is to dismantle Microsoft’s monopoly. People could argue Xandros, but Xandros seems to be better suited for /integrating/ Linux and Windows systems, not competing. I’m not “anti-Microsoft” because I enjoy to use Linux over Windows but I feel that Linux needs more elbow room in the OS world. People need to realize there are more options.
Lindows is definetly pushing some weight around and showing Microsoft that there are indeed serious, serious competitors out there who are willing to butt heads. With guys like Michael Robertson heading the Lindows project, and capable vendors like Wal-Mart, you will see more Linux in the OS world.
– jstn
This article felt like what I would have written. It’s the first article like this that I felt was somewhat complete, fair and where effort was put out to write properly. The author pointed to all the important things and some of the things that most people just conveniently ignore (such as GUI stupidity). There are endless “Linux good enough for everyone?” articles and most of them are written by people who have no concept of what’s acceptable to regular people and what’s not acceptable because they are technical geeks and have been for years. I applaud the author for the effort that was put out and for the objectivity and manner in which the whole process was carried out. He wasn’t needlessly abusive (as a Linux hater would be), nor was he unrealistically forgiving (as Linux geeks are).
I just had to comment about the little argument between Eugenia and jstn.
I’m with Eugenia here. The only reason a tech person believes it is bad for general users to know nothing about how computers work is because computers are too damn complicated to work constantly unless you DO know something about how they work. This isn’t a “blame the user for not knowing” scenario and it is not a “blame MS for making wizards and abstraction layers” scenario. The blame lies on the overall state of computer hardware and software. They are too complicated and require too much low level knowledge (or at least access to someone who has the knowledge) for normal people to use them on a long term basis, reliably. As a technician of nearly two decades, I know this from being right there with the users. Taking away the NEED to know the details is the solution. Don’t pick on people because they don’t want to know what mounting, shared libraries, command line arguments and IRQs are. Stop redirecting the blame to the users. Stop assuming that computers are SUPPOSED to be technical. Computers should be no more difficult than a Palm handheld. They ought be less difficult than that, really.
Well I can’t do anything realy because I can’t program, but this dog is all bark & no bite.
“. . . it would only occur to a computer nerd to switch and a computer nerd already knows their OS pretty well.”
Uh. . . no. I am not a computer nerd, but I did decide to switch, and it is due to a couple of things. First, I do not like the business practices of Microsoft, nor do I like the pricing. second, I am not in a position to buy a new computer to run the latest versions of Microsoft software.
I switched from Windows 98SE to Mandrake 8.0 and then tried Libranet 2.0, ELX BizDesktop 1.0 and am now trying Libranet 2.7. I have not learned the nuts and bolts of any of them. I have learned some basic tasks, such as configuring my PPP connection, installing my printer, and trying to install my external Zip drive (only ever worked perfectly under Mandrake).
I think there are more of us than people admit who are politically or economically motivated to switch to Linux, even though we are not well-versed in the inner workings of our machine or of an OS. For the sole reason of having a choice, I believe there ought to be a place for us at the Linux table. At least a few distributions seem to agree, at least in principal if not in practice.
I am not an uber-geek and not likely to become one, but I am committed to the ideas of choice and competition. Because of that, I expect to continue to try Linux and one day, perhaps, use it even more effectively and efficiently.
There seems to be a problem with MSI GeForce4 Ti cards (I have a 4400) and the framebuffer mode (used during graphical installs). I’m still trying to figure out if it’s something in the kernel fb module, but this is some pretty advanced stuff. The key, if you have such a video card, is to use text mode for install.
Oh, and a message for Ken: as an average user, I’d prefer text files over a registry any day. Gnome has introduced a registry-like way of handling configuration and I absolutely HATE it. Different strokes for different folks, I guess.
Anyway, this doesn’t matter: the home desktop is not the goal, the corporate one is. Once people begin to use Linux at work, they’ll be more likely to migrate to it at home.
There are endless “Linux good enough for everyone?” articles
List them then
A minor point, but it’s worth noting–the idea that desktops were invented to hold multiple terminal windows seems to be something of a myth, stemming chiefly from the fact that X Windows predates GUIs on Unix systems. There was no “X Window GUI” because it wasn’t what MIT was interested in; their explicit design goal was to be able to run applications remotely across heterogenous Unix networks as teaching aids. The entire concept of a “desktop” in the Macintosh sense was beside the point to them–but the concept was already well-established when they were working.
Look at the timeline: X came out of MIT’s Project Athena, which started in 1984. By that time the Apple Lisa had already been on the market for a year. X didn’t make it out of MIT until 1986, by which point the Mac had been on the market for nearly two years. And of couse, the Mac and Lisa desktop concept had come out of Xerox and the Alto project–whose commercial implementation, the Xerox Star, had been on the market in 1981.
> However the beauty of Linux is that there is no
> “automated” abstaraction layer between the user and
> programs.
This will probably come as a shock to you, but… neither in Windows. Developers willingly write software like that (nothing intrinsic to Windows forces them to), because that’s what users ask for and want
> Actually that’s precisely what apt-get does “apt-get
> mozilla” upgrades you to the newest version of mozilla
Clearly another case of RTFA – Read The Fine Article. The reviewer tried exactly that, to get Gnome or KDE, but neither “gnome” or “kde” worked. She had to install some kind of calculator that happened to depend from KDE
> Command lines are more powerful than guis
would you please stop that? you are making the world exceed its quota of stereotypical Linux weenies
> I don’t understand why I see more resistance to linux in
> USA than in my country (Brazil) and other countries.
See, Marcelo, in rich countries people just love to bitch and whine about anything. Almost everyone that doesn’t use Linux, even if they could, doesn’t use it because the Linux community has alienated them
Look at me, for example: I use *exclusively* Windows at home, and have for the last five years (save for a short BeOS parenthesis). I have VMware Workstation, and I use it to run yet more instances of Windows. Hell, I even work on an open source Windows kernel. Still, I’m a walking C language and Unix reference and daily reverse x86 binaries and study Windows internals at the kernel level. Do you think I don’t use Linux because it’s too hard for me? no, I don’t use it for two reasons:
– it doesn’t want to be used. Linux support has its blind spots too – things that nobody seems to know, or be able to fix. One day you get tired of this routine, you ask yourself “why did I want to try Linux, in the first place?”, reply “dunno” and free up 3 GBs of disk space. Windows, instead, is usable right out of the box. You don’t have to struggle for water and oxygen. You feel solid ground beneath your feet
– even the lowest grunt thinks he’s special and superior just because he uses Linux. I can’t stand this. People that in their whole life only used Amiga, Windows and Linux, suddenly becoming experts and blabbering about what Unix is supposed to be about and how it’s much better than Windows, completely oblivious to the amazing results you can achieve on Windows with a fraction of the effort it takes to just get the GUI working on Linux. Linux lit a candle in these people’s empty souls – you wonder if it was Windows their problem, in the first place. To get help from these people, you have to be all smiles and cheers, throw in a “I’m tired of Windows!” here, a “I want to try something different” there – this makes them happy. Otherwise, they could doubt that they made the right choice, and they don’t like that
> Of course, Win2000 only has limited permision attributes
> anyway
baloney. Linux, access control-wise, still hasn’t caught up with Windows NT 3.1 (build 807, released in 1993, exactly ten years ago). Please don’t compare something of which you have a mediocre knowledge with something you don’t even understand – you just add up to the background noise
> Right now, all I know is that some process with the word
> ‘idle’ in its name is taking 98 percent of the CPU’s time
please! that process, sir, takes 98% of the CPU time to shut the damn CPU off when it’s not being used by other processes
> The problem with games that were made to run in Win2000 is
> that they need to be played as a Root user.
false. They’re just badly designed and want to write to their installation directory
The linux desktop will not take off until it is viable for normal corporate use. Currently it is not. Surprisingly the requirements are simple:
– an office suite as good or better than MS’s
– a browser
– easy database access
– easy admin
– excellent security
– easy deployment
Linux wins on the last 5 but not the first. I’d bet pounds to peanuts that if MS had been broken in two by the DOJ then an MS Office for Linux would have appeared the same week (although not as freeware!!).