A slimmed-down version of Microsoft’s Windows XP will be offered to novice computer users in Thailand beginning in September.
Thailand to get slimmed-down Windows
About The Author
Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
Follow me on Twitter @EugeniaLoli
As The Register (correctly imho) points out : in a country where they are losing ground to Linux and losing business because of piracy they offer a cut version of windows. But how exactly does this help novices ? They yank out extra stuff and it magically becomes easier to use, this just doesn’t seem plausible.
I couldn’t find a reference anywhere to what exactly they are cutting. Anyone have a clue ? Also, this could be a gestures towards the EU who arez demanding a cut down version of Windows, who knows.
I couldn’t find a reference anywhere to what exactly they are cutting. Anyone have a clue ? Also, this could be a gestures towards the EU who arez demanding a cut down version of Windows, who knows.
If they are cutting some of the fat, I wonder if I could get a copy of it
Why someone in Thailand will pay $ 36 to something he can get for US$ 3 (pirate copies).
People in Thailand need of free software, not this “Trojan Horse”…
As said in Brazil recently, M$ is like a drug dealer: first portions are free or cheap but the subsequents are expensive.
I think most people think of windows of being ‘free’. This is because you usually end up paying for it being bundled with the PC it came with. Everyone I know who has built their own PC or who is looking to upgrade their version of windows just pirates a copy. I don’t think this attitude is just limited to some of the far eastern countries.
I think most people think of windows of being ‘free’. This is because you usually end up paying for it being bundled with the PC it came with.
And how is this any different than PCs that come with commercial Linux distros?
Everyone I know who has built their own PC or who is looking to upgrade their version of windows just pirates a copy. I don’t think this attitude is just limited to some of the far eastern countries.
No, just to people who are dishonest.
From what I’ve seen before, in their first “slimmed-down” version (aka “Windows XP Home ICT version” — ICT = Ministry of ICT, Thailand) it’s pretty nice.
All the UI and help files of Windows and all its apps, inc. Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player has been translated to Thai.
And that’s great enough for many Thai people who has no English skill.
I agree that free software should be a more suitalbe/sustainable way for our country (I’m Thai).
But MS should get some credits from this. At least it helps many people find a more friendly (and more natively) way to start learning using computer.
Thai localization in free/open source software is one of the key things to make it successful/get wide adoption in Thailand. Considering that it just only few proportions of population that can understand English.
And as you know, localization is more than just translation .. and both require lots of efforts .. sadly, I don’t think there’s lot of developers who do Thai localization outthere.
—-
Funny enough, I think. While FOSS lacks of Thai localization developers, MS has plenty of them — and can use localization as their tool of the pricing strategy. They can dump down the price of Windows as low as they want to, to capture the market. And they don’t have to worry about someone will resale this Windows to other country .. as everything is already in Thai language (which hmm.. I don’t think there’s any country use it).
As far as localization goes I’ve used a pretty good Mandrake linux which had Thai localization. Are you saying
that the standard is not good enough? If so, what about the Thai distros like TLE and Burapha for example? How do they stack up?
Localization in apps like AbiWord, OpenOffice.org or KOffice is not good enough. Even some of them can display Thai text properly now. But none of them can handle Thai digits as a calcuatable amount (in Thailand, we use two digit systems — Arabic digits (like most part of the world) in private sector, and Thai digits in government agencies and militaries), Thai Buddhist calendar, numbering with Thai digits and characters (OO.o 1.1.x already supports this one, but still has bug), sorting in accordance to Thai dictionary/yellow pages, .. many things. So for a serious business user, it’s not good enough.
For academic/scientific community, Thai support in LaTeX is more or less kind of hack .. it works pretty well, but may required too much efforts (in user point of view).
There’re quite a good number of patches to enalble Thai functionality in many foss. But it seems that to get these patches accepted into the main development branch of each foss takes so long time. For example, Thai text line wrapping patch for Mozilla is still waiting for “ACCEPT” .. for almost two years I think.
Anyway, for Thai ‘home’ user (who has a little more skill than ‘novice’), Mandrake is very nice. Many internet cafe in Thailand use Mandrake, and they happy with it. But that’s also because of the nature of usage (web browsing, instant messenger, media player, or student’s small piece homework).
when you can get a full Mandrake localised version for free ???
And what would make it easier to noobies if they take a few things out of it ?
That really makes no sence to me.
So the thai’s get windows for $36 when i still have to pay $200? WTF! I mainly use Windows to Play games, Surf the net, and handle email seems to me that this would be an ideal version for me. I guess this is Windows XP Third world edition… <shakes head>
“So the thai’s get windows for $36 when i still have to pay $200? ”
its relative. for people in thailand $36 has more value than you can imagine.
in Silom area, one of business centers in Bangkok,
I used to spent 30 Baht for lunch, on average.
Say 1 USD = 41 THB, that’s less than $1
(new computer science graduate gets around $220 – $600)
its relative. for people in thailand $36 has more value than you can imagine.
Yeah i understand that Thailand is pretty poor..so what. This crap about how i or we should pay more becasue we have more money is just plain crap.
Just like to say thanks for your explanation bact.
cheers
Dave