Hi,
I rarely see a post I totally disagree with, down to almost every word.
Here is one:
I wrote:
>
> >How do we get folks to use it at home? How do we get the word out
> >and *show* people that we have something really special here in terms
they
> >can understand and accept?
>
> I see comments like these and I worry. Note that there is no question of
> whether folks at home should use it, this is simply a foregone conclusion.
> I've watched Linux advocates argue that Linux should be pushed into every
> conceivable niche of computing and that open source is the only way
> to write software and open source is the only software people should
> support.
Um... that is not what I am saying. What I am saying is that it *is* better
than Windows for many, many people, and if they were aware of what Linux
could do for them, they would make the change. I will back this up, at
least by anecdotal example, later in this post.
>
> Fanaticism, by my definition is when somebody holds views that do not
> take reality into account and does not question those views. Positions
like
> the 3 i've listed above are, in my opinion, fanatical.
Again, I disagree. Advocating something one believes in is not fanaticism.
I will prove that I *have* taken reality into account.
>
> Getting back to the quoted passage, we see the view expressed that
> people in general should install and use Linux at home. The premise for
> this seems to be that Linux is faster, more stable, and costs less than
> Windows. What this premise fails to take into account is that it is
> almost completely unusable for the computer illiterate and semi-literate.
>
I couldn't disagree more. Linux passed the Mom test, as in my
not-very-computer-literate Mom can and does use it, and likes it better than
Windows. My Mom is a woman in her 60s who teaches French at a state
university. She is educated, intelligent, but not at all technologically
savvy, to the point where she really has trouble programming a VCR. If
Linux is for her, IMHO, anyone can use it.
> First, Linux is not particularly easy to install properly and configure
> without considerable skills, and not everyone has someone else to do this
for them.
Really? Have you tried Red Hat 6.1? Caldera 2.3? These releases, IMHO,
are no harder to install than Windows, and actually much easier than NT.
Though I haven't tried them (at least not yet), I understand that SuSe 6.3,
Mandrake 6.5, and Corel Linux all have easy graphical installers with
excellent hardware auto-detection. Now, if someone cannot install an OS at
all, they still may not need help. When they next decide to upgrade and buy
a new system, they can buy it with Linux preloaded.
> This has been getting easier I'm told, but it is not even close to what is
> offered on end-user operating systems.
I beg to differ. Try the releases I listed above, and see if you still feel
that way. I could walk my Mom through an install.
> Further, the window managers in Linux, for
> all their good points, are still quite crude and cryptic when compared to
> the GUIs of end-user operating systems.
You are kidding, right? KDE 1.1.2 outdoes Windows. My Mom single clicks on
her WordPerfect icon and her favorite word processor (which happens to be
the standard in her department at the university) is there for her. Ditto
Netscape, which is exactly the same program she used for browsing, mail, and
news under Windows. Adjusting from Explorer to KFM took her perhaps five
minutes. Need I go on?
> The question is not whether
> a linux system could be set up for someone so they could manage to use it,
> the question is whether or not it really makes sense at this point.
IMHO, it does. It didn't a year ago, I'll grant you that. Since this past
spring, though, the world has really changed.
One thing that Michelle Leonard brought out in her presentation were that
her company's customers were comfortable with Red Hat 6.1, with
Gnome/Enlightenment as the GUI. She handles tech support for her company,
and is now fielding questions on installation of Star Office. She is
starting to see customers dumping Windows for Linux, and her company does
not sell Linux, just one piece of software that requires Linux. Her company
never advocated dropping Windows on the desktop, or trading in MS Office for
Star Office. The customers are doing this on their own after getting a
taste of Linux.
>
> The bottom line is that Linux is not now, and may never be, the kind of
> OS that your average person would be comfortable with. Given this, it
> is a mistake to try to push it into mainstream home use, it just does not
> fit very well.
That is not my experience at all. Having done a successful Installfest, and
having watched the pure look of joy on a newbie's face when she realized
that this wasn't hard after all, convinces me that your conclusions are
incorrect. To my Mom, Linux is just faster, more stable Windows. Her
system was slow, and she didn't want to replace it just yet. For her, Linux
was a wonderful solution that required minimal adjustment.
> You are simply re-arranging the types of problems the
> user has ease of use vs. performance/stability.
The three examples I have used so far would tend to illustrate otherwise.
> Issues of cost, performance,
> and stability are important and an effort needs to be made to solve them,
> moving away from Windows is a good idea, but the answer is not Linux.
Really? What, pray tell, is the answer?
> Linux is well suited to being a server operating system, it is also well
> suited to being a workstation operating system for power users, it solves
> more problems than it creates in these areas. For end users there are
> other options such as BeOS that will solve their problems without creating
> new ones.
No, BeOS creates a much bigger problem: a lack of suitable applications.
>
> Linux does not have to be all things to everyone to be a good thing, it
> just has to be the right thing in the right place.
Yep, and IMHO, the desktop is more the right place than the server room. In
the server room there is very little incentive to change OS. Cost is the
main motivator for business. If they are using, for example, Solaris 7 on a
SPARC, they already have a significant investment in Sun. The server is
almost certainly doing a good job for them, and there is no reason to change
platforms. Linux can only make incremental inroads in this environment as
additional servers are added for specific uses which are not tied to
software which in turn is tied to the Sun platform.
OTOH, on the desktop, I've seen a number of reports pegging the total cost
of migrating from a Windows NT or mixed NT/'9x environment to a Windows 2000
environment at $3,150 per workstation, give or take a small amount depending
on who is calculating the figure. This assumes, quite rightly, that most
companies will need to replace their existing equipment due to the much
higher minimum usable configuration of the OS. It also takes into account
the workstation license, client access license, and a proportional cost of
the server license and server hardware upgrade. That is a big number when
you multiply it by the number of workstations in a medium sized business.
500 workstations puts you up into the millions.
Linux on the desktop allows you to leverage the existing hardware investment
and lengthen the life of a company's workstations and servers, assuming an
NT server. Applications are much less expensive as well, if we compare,
say, Office 2000 vs. Star Office 5.1a. Even with retraining costs, which
are also needed with Windows 2000, BTW, the savings is enormous.
Now, let's translate that to consumers. A decent new PC is what? $800 or
so? Add the Office upgrade, which is another couple of hundred dollars, and
Linux can also make a positive impact in the home environment. My roommate
loves Quake. Quakers (as Quake enthusiasts are called) prefer Linux to
Windows. Why? Well, stability mostly, since they no longer get the
overflow errors that dump them out of a game in Windows. Speed helps too.
Come to think of it, I don't know anyone who doesn't like a more stable
system.
>
> I realize i've taken a fairly modest comment and gone quite a bit beyond
> its original scope, for this I apologize to the author. All I can say is
> that it provided me with an opportunity to bring an issue that is
probably my
> biggist criticism of the Linux community out in the open for discussion.
IMHO, there are overly zealous people in the Linux community, and I agree
that is a real issue worthy of criticism. Suggesting that Linux is now
ready for the desktop, IMHO, does not fit into that criteria.
Like your post, mine is not designed as a personal attack. It is designed,
however, to make clear that I feel my asking for suggestions on how to get
Linux into the mainstream is neither fanatical nor unjustified, but rather a
well reasoned request based on my experiences. FWIW, a year and a half ago
I was a Linux detractor. Why? It was nowhere near ready for the desktop,
nor did it scale well to large servers. The desktop issue has been well
addressed, and the scalability issue is well on the way to being addressed
as well.
Regards,
Caity
************
[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.linuxchix.org
