[dundee] [jtsmoore@revolution-os.com: Re: Screening of Revolution OS]

[Tom Stott]

And breathe mark!! - deep breaths Mr Harrigan :)

Tom



On Sat, 2003-07-19 at 16:34, Mark Harrigan wrote:
> On Sat, Jul 19, 2003 at 01:32:57AM +0100, Andrew Clayton wrote:
> > 
> > Personally, I started using Linux, because I wanted to run UNIX on my
> > PC. It grew from there....
> > 
> I'd say that's my real reason too but that's kinda wanting to really
> understand how the computer works... or should work.
> 
> <snip>
> > > can't be bothered to learn a little?! People should stay in their own little
> > > controlled world without sharp edges and potholes in that case.
> > > 
> > 
> > Which is why it's good to have the likes of SuSE, Red Hat, Mandrake and
> > Connectiva around. They pay people to do the stuff that other hackers
> > don't want to do. e.g docs, nicey nicey stuff etc
> > 
> > Also having the likes of IBM/HP/Oracle/SAP/CA  and many others, on board
> > will only help this situation.
> > 
> Now this I find interesting, yes these fine companies do invest in
> Linux but I don't see any that really invest in the user
> experience. 
> 
> Redhat funds some Kernel work and developer side stuff for
> Gnome especially work on ORBit the CORBA base behind Gnome's
> architecture. Nothing directly user orientated.
> 
> SuSE works on server side stuff like the OS/390 port and Opteron
> support. Nope.
> 
> Mandrake have a list of stuff they develop down the side of their home
> page most of which is developer or high performance server
> orientated. Don't think so.
> 
> Connectiva is hard to find out about but I'd assume they would help
> Gnome in some way so they should be a good example. Maybe but I
> couldn't find anything, didn't look very hard mind.
> 
> IBM, HP, Oracle, SAP and CA... I have a strange feeling this is all
> very server side.
> 
> I agree that the application side is coming on very well but it's
> still not intended for "Mr Average" when installed they look and work
> in a way that will appeal to the average user but the install is
> pretty daunting. What the hell are partitions? I only have a hard
> disk? I've just bought a new graphics card/modem/cheap piece of
> generic Taiwanese junk how do I install it? Taking the case off freaks
> these people out enough, you then expect them to find out the chipset
> their particular card has, find out if it has a driver, recompile the
> kernel or modify XFree86? Not gonna happen. I want a piece of software
> to do whatever, do I need the source, rpm or deb? How do I use these
> files? Why isn't the latest version with magic feature A available for
> my pc? You mean there's different platforms? I thought it was
> all Linux? 
> 
> The only way to get around this is to change the architecture
> significantly as Apple have done. XFree86... out the door, kernel
> modification... gone, choice of desktop... nope, standard Unix
> filesystem, no no no. The minute a big distro comes out like that
> every Linux guru will be on Slashdot/Linuxnews calling it an
> abomination that is against everything they've ever fought for. I
> realise that gobolinux does the filesystem but that's a small
> component.
> 
> Note I say A Distro, there can't be more than one, companies won't
> sell identical distros because there's nothing to differentiate them
> from the crowd and users won't stand for differences, look at the Unix
> market of the 1980's to see why.
> 
> Unix was meant to be powerful, no-one ever said it should be easy, Linux
> was created as a replica of that. The only reason Linux has these nice
> looking apps is that nerds like shininess as much as power.
> 
> Mark
> 
> 
> 
> 
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