[Gllug] [OT] while we're flaming anyway.. (was: Erratic Mouse Behaviour)

[Mike Brodbelt]

On Mon, 2001-12-10 at 08:41, James.Rocks at equant.com wrote:
> Hi Mike,
> 
> > That's a good way to start out. I'd be surprised if you can't use
> > it as your primary OS - what sort of tasks are you trying to
> > get it to perform?
> 
> Yes I feel that it has potential (lots of it) ... as a friend of mine says
> computing should be without boundaries and Linux (to my mind) gets closer
> to that ideal than MS. It isn't perfect though, game support (by vendors at
> any rate) is pretty poor but in other respects I am, so far, fairly
> impressed.

Loki don't do a bad job - the only real problem is there's not very much
choice. ID tend to make linux binaries available for download, so if you
buy the Windows version, you can d/l the executables and play in Linux.
Some other stuff works in Wine(Half Life/Counterstrike for example). On
the whole though, you're right - game support lags well behind Windows.
 
> The stuff I typically use my computers for are:
> 
> * Word processing & other office related tasks inc. contacts & e-mail
> (obviously).

Plenty of choice on that front:-
Open Office/Star Office/Abiword/KOffice/Gnumeric, etc, etc. Ximian
Evolution is great for Outlook refugees (and even non-outlook refugees
:-))

> * MP3 ripping & playing (I currently use Audiograbber to rip, WinAmp to
> play) ... also editing in terms of ripping from tape and sectioning WAV
> files and saving them as MP3, editing ID3 tags and such.

XMMS to play, LAME/Bladenc to encode, cdparanoia to rip, any one of a
number of GUI's to deal with rip/encode in a pretty way (I use grip or
RipperX).

> * Web browsing and web site design (I design and update an E-Zine that is
> updated monthly) ... that includes some graphics handling.

Browsing - all the obvious (Netscape/Mozilla/Opera). Site design - I
like Bluefish. There's not really a DreamWeaver equivalent - personally
I think that's a good thing for the sanity of the web, but YMMV. A new
version on Quanta has just been released, which looks fairly nice.

> * Games I suppose but I have a system with removeable hard drives so I
> still use Win2K and can use Win Me for games (I don't play games much but I
> do rather enjoy games like Wing Commander [G])

Older stuff will in all probability work under Wine or dosemu.

> * Data sharing ... sad to say I DO have a home computer network (based on a
> 2K domain server) and use it to provide proxy mail & browsing services to
> the other machines on my network as well as storage of data (documents,
> MP3's etc.) & its backup.

You can interoperate with this, though Linux/Windows file sharing works
better with Linux as the server. 
 
> I suppose voice dictation would be quite cool too ... I don't use it a lot
> but I guess it would be interesting to see if Linux has anything like that?

ViaVoice, as people have mentioned. Commercial, but you can't win 'em
all.
 
> I'm not sure I'd say monopolist as I think he and his company are just
> following unbridled business practices inasmuch as all companies want to
> dominate and make a shed load of money! Nor do I support any of the "look &
> feel" & he stole this from that OS or vice versa arguments

Hah hah - they *all* nicked it from Xeroc PARC. Apple really did have a
cheek, alleging that MS stole "their" interface.

> I agree with that to ... I wonder if its just the nature of the beast i.e.
> with H/W technology continually advancing and OS & others apps being such
> vast projects (not the efforts of one or two exceptionally bright people
> that they used to be) that to expect reliability in computing is some3what
> of a pipe dream?

I think that it is a pipe dream, but for economic reasons. I'm sure
people are quite capable of writing decent OS's, but the commercial
realities of the marketplace don't reward quality commensurately with
the effort required to produce it. In software, perhaps more than in any
other industry, hiding poor workmanship is easy. Most users just don't
have the experience to differentiate good code from bad, and all the
commercial companies ship binaries anyway, so even those with the
experience can't see what they're up to without enormous effort.

> I have to admit that the one really big thing I like about Linux isn't
> really Linux and GNU or rather the GPL i.e. you can use "our" patented code
> but by doing so your entire codes must be made completely open ... how cool
> is that?

The GPL is indeed a cool thing :-)

> I think this is something that could be debated at length (though not with
> me, I don't understand the Linux or UNIX kernel in sufficient depth) ... a
> friend of mine considers the UNIX and Linux to be incredibly poorly
> designed. He is, however, about to try out the Darwin variant of UNIX.

It gets beaten to death regularly. If you want to see haggling over
kernels, lots of BSD people will doubtless oblige :-). Personally, I've
seen lots of arguments, but the numbers tend to bear out the contention
that Linux improves steadily. It's not problem free (witness the recent
VM debacle), but it is pretty damn good. I've had uptimes in excess of
two years on servers - I can't say the same of Windows, Netware, or SCO
Unix (Solaris actually seems pretty solid), which is a pretty good
indication, I think. 
 
> > Don't be too hasty. It's not that bad here :-)
> 
> Perhaps ... if I get "attacked" I defend (I'm just not the kind of person
> to sit back & "take it" ... why should I?) so if I get many more of these
> "attacks" I will have to start looking elsewhere for my advice.
> 
> I think Williams suggestion of a Linux Newby forum is a good idea.

There are some linux newbie lists around - I'm not sure a GLLUG newbie
list would be a good idea. Too many of the more experienced people here
would quite possible not subscribe, and so it would probably be less
valuable than just subscribing directly to GLLUG.

Mike.


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