[Wolves] Why does Ubuntu want the CD to install portmap?

[Steve Parkes]

Deusiah wrote:

>Is there anything wrong with Linux getting easy enough for less tech
>savvy people? Linux can either stay as popular as it is and work the
>way it currently does or it can make things easier and become more
>popular that's how I see it.
>
Ther's no problem with Linux Desktop systems becoming easier to use most 
of the problem comes with administration.  Just like in the Windows world.

People want a system that is also easy to administer and that is a whole 
different ball game.  One of the reasons the windows world is so full of 
Malware and general crap is that MS decided to make windows easy to 
administer to get it into small business' and the home.  The extent of 
Malware on windows proves that they failed.

Windows is still hard to administer properly which is why there are so 
many MSCE's around.  Because linux is developed from a Unixish point of 
view it's easy to administer for people from a unixish point of view.  
Now people are coming from windows to desktop linux they expect the sort 
of adminstration they had on windows, the problem is they never had it 
on windows it just looks that way on the surface and has given a false 
sense of security.

Developments in the kernel world have made drivers a none issue.  If 
your hardware vendor is open enough to document thier products drivers 
are quickly available and in many cases distro's automatically install 
them for you.  Where this isn't the case good how-to's exist and if 
someone can't follow simple instructions they can never hope to 
administer thier own machine.  I am sure almost everyone can come up 
with bits of hardware that just don't work and in almost everycase this 
is due to secretive hardware manufacturers and not linux.

Most day to day administration is automatic and tidies up after itself a 
good example of this are the log files.

The thing people moan about is editing files in /etc/ when they thing 
they should have a dialog with a bunch of checkboxes and radio buttons.  
Quite apart from the fact frontends to many of these files would be 
almost impossible to create without ignoring several rules of 
accessibility, the barrier to entry this format creates allows an 
important cut off point for where you can tread with ignorance and where 
you need to do some background reading.

So while desktop ease of use is very important and vital to getting more 
users on linux based systems administration simplicity is a losing 
battle.  Every time you make it easier to alter the core parts of the 
system you are making it easier for someone who hasn't the required 
background to really fsck things up. 

As it is under unixish systems when you want to do hairy admin you read 
the manpages and google, you get all the warnings about what you are 
doing and can decide if it's really something you want to do.  This is 
`a good thing`(tm) a google for regedit proves my theory that a little 
knowledge is a dangerous thing.  Look at the amount of forum posts 
telling people how to fsck up their windows boxes ;-)

sparkes