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Posted on 06/24/2005 9:56:01 AM PDT by N3WBI3
In preparation for this column, I have strapped on the White Beard of Infallible Punditry.
I remind you all that when I am wearing the WBoIP, all of my pronouncements are absolutely flawless from all conceivable logical angles, and are not to be questioned.
Pronouncement the First: As a user-level operating system, Linux is a cruel and tawdry lie. Bigfoot will fly to your house and personally deliver a $30,000 tax refund before there's a Linux that can challenge Windows or MacOS in terms of usability. If anyone tells you otherwise, your only rebuttal should be to administer that thing that Moe used to do to Larry -- you know, where he'd grab Larry's nose with one hand and smack it down with the other.
Pronouncement the Second: None of that matters. Linux is still one of the best and most important OS's on the landscape.
It's just that anyone who tries to install (or God forbid) promote it as an alternative to a mainstream user OS just plain doesn't get it, and it's doubtful that the above-mentioned corrective action will do any good. It's still fun, of course.
I've been using various Linux distributions for four or five years now, and each and every one has underscored a basic point about this operating system. Linux isn't a Toyota, designed to carry groceries and kids in comfort and convenience. It's a street rod geared toward performance over convenience.
The classic Linux user isn't attracted to heated seats, an automatic transmission, three cupholders within easy reach and zero daily maintenance.
To the contrary: the fact that Linux requires its users to get their fingernails dirty from time to time is considered a strength, not a drawback.
Linux is the ultimate OS for people who know what they're doing.
And here you see the problem.
If you think "people who know what they're doing" describes the typical PC user, well, you've never seen somebody try to connect to the Internet by cramming a phone cord into the USB connector on their keyboard. It's easy to take the conveniences of MacOS and Windows for granted.
When you buy a hard drive or a printer or another sort of peripheral, you plug it into any available port, and it just plain works. There might be a bit of setup required, but the OS will walk you through it, and it'll be up and running before that sweet New Technology Smell has dissipated.
On Linux, you plug in a DVD burner, and -- nothing happens.
You go online, download what you think are the right drivers, and -- more nothing. If you ever get it up and running, it'll only be after conducting the sort of research and extended investigation that brought down Enron.
There have been lots of attempts to create a Linux for the masses. The most visible VolksLinux is Linspire (www.linspire. com), a $59 package available from electronics stores and Walmart.
But it's a poor cross-breed, offering few of the advantages of either Windows or a "real" Linux. Ubuntu (www.ubuntulinux.org; free free free) is much closer to the mark. It's a snap to install and useful straight from the box; all in all, it's the perfect choice for the Linux-curious.
It builds upon the Debian flavor of Linux (www.debian.org; it's what I run on my own Linux boxes), and combines credible ease-of-use with the satisfying crunch of fresh, wholesome Linux.
And so, I take down a little index card from my Wall of Future Column Topics. "Linux for Humans" has been on my wish list for years now. I've just been waiting for a Linux that really was a low-compromise alternative for ordinary users.
I had faith that it'd surface, but it turns out that I was center-stage in a fairly nerdy production of "Waiting for Godot."
I was silly to have even considered it. Linux isn't a challenge to MacOS or Windows. It's a challenge to Apple and Microsoft's server operating systems.
Folks who run corporate networks do indeed fall under the banner of people who know what they're doing (ideally, anyway) and the attraction of an OS that's fast, rock-solid, customizable, secure, and free is unbeatable.
As for you users, well, you'll still use Linux regularly. You just won't know that you're doing it.
Recall that Sonos home music system I wrote about recently? Its super-slick color handheld remote runs Linux. And Linux is at the heart of every TiVo digital video recorder. My Windows Media Center PVR freezes or otherwise drops the ball at least once a month. In four years of constant use, my TiVo hasn't screwed up even once. And iPod owners who Google the words "iPod Linux" are in for a pleasant surprise.
Without sounding like you're just being sarcastic, it's hard to say, "Linux is a fantastic operating system, so long as the user never, ever, ever has to install any new software or hardware on it."
But in fact, that's a spot-on description of how Linux will thrive in the world of the Humans.
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Well Ill give him this, if you buy bleeding edge stuff chances are it wont work in most Linux distros without knowing what you are doing. This is not a technical limitation of Linux in any way the vendors just don't bother to write Linux drivers, and wont release their specs to opensource programmers who would write them..
LOL
N3WBI3 beware...the linux fanatics are about to come out of the woodwork!
Hey many around here (including our dearly departed GE) think I am one of those fanatics..
Is he gone for good?
The latest version of SUSE (9.3) is vastly improved. Module for easy installation of downloaded files, very integrated feel, interface similar to windows and (seemingly) tight security. Networking seemed easier to set up and more intuitive than Windows XP. For home/office use I could set this up with openoffice and anyone familiar with Windows could make the transition in a snap.
I don't know what it would be like in a networked office environment because I am not familiar with linux server software. In any event, I don't think I could ever give up working in an exchange server environment anyway without a reasonably identical alternitive. In the final analysis, for home use linux makes a great desktop client if you are even moderately computer savy and don't expect to do any hard core gaming on the machine.
Dont know, but its been awhile..
?
Did I miss something?
And your system does not contain bleeding edge components.. Vanilla systems are fine..
GE's gone? Now who's going to save us from the communists violating our purity of essence by selling Linux?
Your post about Linux is true, up to a point, as far as it goes but it completely masks where Linux is currently out-competing and growing faster than Microsoft, and that is in the network, application, Email and web server environments.
It is clunky and inadequate to most desktop users because the market has not yet created a great GUI interface to sit on top of it for the average individual PC user, and because as another poster noted most software publishers of desktop apps are not yet delivering their own APIs for Linux for their offerings.
I would not predict where MS and Linux will land, in the desktop market, in the next decade, but I do believe that Linux will eventually dominate in the server market.
The technies that know server operations also know how to tweak them and Linux is infinitely more tweakable after installation and dynamically than is the MS server OS. The MS server concept is to try to "be more" (pre-coded and internally designed) while the installation of a Linux server allows you to "make it more" with great variety and with a much more efficient base internal footprint/resource demand.
Actually, my system has pretty bleeding edge componants. I built my box about 8 months ago to be a hard core gaming and media rig. I went top of the line on virtually everything, except I stuck with intel pentium 4 EE rather than trying out an AMD 64 bit system. (I stay away from first gen anything). The only issue I had when installing linux was getting the 3D renderer to work on the ATI Radion 9800XT video card.
I am currently experimenting with some Linux distros, and to date have been sorely disappointed. How about some more specs on the hardware you found to be so compatable with that particular one? I may try it if it is flexible enough to work with My admittedly older system.
The best one so far has been Xandros, but I wasn't even able to get Firefox to work after downloading it. Xandros found all the right drivers and loaded them, and even had a generic driver for a winmodem that worked. It setup everything flawlessly, but then, I didn't have a clue how to even add a new program. Mandrake 10 and Suse 9.1 both messed up the installation and I was never able to boot to the GUI, just the cmd line. Does anybody truly want to NOT get to their desktop? Why doesn't it just load some generic driver to start the desktop if it doesn't know what video card I have?
I'm certain Linux is good and powerful and all that stuff, but the geeks need to start thinking like a newbie or it will never be accepted as "main stream".
Hmmm. Not so general-purpose a system you have, mate. That leaves Me to doubt that the distro you are so happy with is any more functional than the ones I have already tried out. Good luck to you, though.
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