Hi,
Except for people who try to understand
the workings of computers, most computer users
treat them as a tool. They learn how to use their applications,
maybe to only 1/10th of capability, but enough for
what they want to do.
How many car drivers will do a full overhaul
on the engine, or replace brake linings, or even a
do a grease and oil change ?
When the support technician walks through
the door, they know all their computer problems will
be over. A tweek here, hammer there, install a thingy,
a careful explanation of how to avoid the problem in
the future. Pay the technician heaps of money and
everybodies happy.
People want to walk into a shop, see a lovely
Linux box, buy it, take it home and use it. With a unix box
they can't break the operating system, they just install
and use their applications, great. They don't care how
the propellers go round, just that they don't crash.
If they want to fiddle, fine, there's enough complexity
in there to keep a geek happy for ages.
Have a technician come and install a new
peripheral device, costs an extra $50, but its going
to work. An annual service to update the kernel,
utilities or applications, costs $100. Good investment.
On Wed, 23 Jun 1999, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>Hi C.D.
>On the other hand; I think you're (at least in part) right. The future for
>Linux must be somewhere between getting a lot more userfriendly, so that
>people like your girlfriend (and mine too...) will be able to install and
>use it, and still facilitating all the tweaking that's going on (just look
>at this list!). This is why: to enable it to spread and become popular among
>every-day-users, Linux will _need_ more userfriendliness, (idiot-safe-ness,
>we call it in Denmark), and to develop and grow and become better, faster,
>easier, it needs the tweaking and all the nerds and programmers and that
>sort of folks, who are making things work.
--
Cheers,
Colin Tree
