Open discussion of Linux Limitations 222
dave writes "There is a thin line between publishing groundless falsehoods about Linux (FUD) and writing about serious limitations that need to be addressed by the Linux community. Nathan Cochrane opens his first in a series of editorials on Linux Today about this very subject. "
Anti-FUD (Score:1)
not spread Anti-FUD. There are other, legitimate channels for that
Installation issue... (Score:1)
I was hanging out on IRC, when a few people I know came in. Amazingly enough, each one had gotten hold of a new "virgin" machine to play with, and nuked the hard drive clean.
As a point of reference, both were medium-skill Windows users. Both had Windows install disks/CDs and Linux install disks/CDs at the ready.
Well, both came in looking for help installing Linux. Wanna know where the problem was? Setting up the partitions and mount points. Both of them were able to install Windows on these machines flawlessly (one with 95, one with 98) and get them up and running. Then, when they cleaned 'em again to setup 'em up to run Linux, they got completely stumped setting up partitions and mount points.
Once I got them past that part, things got better for them (mostly
IMHO (which probably doesn't mean much) Linux installation *is* harder than Windows 95/98 is. And don't tell me it is irrelevant, because it's not. People using Windows who want to try Linux need to be able to install it easily and take it for a test drive. If they cannot do that, then they most likely will not switch, even if they go to buy a new computer where they can get it pre-installed. Why? Because they want to try it out first of course.
Now, making Linux easier to install than Windows, and then saying, "Well, they are both hard!" is not good either. Linux should be made *simple* to install, with the option of doing custom installs. Kinda like lots of programs have a "typical" or "custom" installation in the Windows world, the same would be nice for Linux, which a "typical" would do the setup of things for you, using whatever spare HD space is available, etc.
But, the installation issue is not irrelevant. In fact, it's extremely relevant to the issue at hand, and that is gaining mindshare and new users. If it's too hard to take for a test drive easily, most wont even bother trying.
No Drivers "FUD", or reality? (Score:1)
For example: most 3D cards. Take an i740 chip, a Riva TNT, PowerVR, and lots of other cards marketed and sold as 3D PC video boards. How many drivers exist to really take advantage of the HW on them? [And Mesa in SW rendering doesn't count for jack s***.] Just about none. Same with Aureal and Soundblaster Live cards-- not too well supported.
This deficiency in drivers is a real problem, and needs addressing. Trying to deny there's a problem is just plain stupid. [And such discussions almost invariably degenerate into GPL vs binary-only driver debates, when such energy could be better focused into getting ANY support.]
FUDing Windows... (Score:1)
He says "The first stems from a belief that all Unix religions rely heavily on the command line. They do, as does Windows with DOS. Try doing anything really useful in a Microsoft operating system and you will find yourself dropping into DOS frequently. Worse, the System Registry, which was supposed to kill the confusion over autoexec.bat and config.sys files, has instead made these earlier configuration trials seem trivial."
I used to think the same thing about windows WHEN I STARTED USEING IT... but I almost never use the DOS prompt anymore. Nathan has confused useful with time wasteing OS maintanence. Useful is what I do in Visual Studio, Photoshop or Wordpad.
The registry is poorly used and is itself a poor implamentation, but the same can be said about a lot of Linux things. I think it's main point was to get rid of .ini files spammed all over the place and NOT autoexec/config files as he said. Haveing shared libraries and whatnot writing to .ini and .conf files is a BAD THING. Writing to the registry is better.
After some more shoveling of crap he says: "The other great myth is Linux is hard to install. This probably comes from the fact that most PCs ship with an operating system, usually Microsoft's. In order to access another OS, you have to make room for it and this usually entails a dual-boot scenario."
I've installed Redhat, Win3.1, Win95, Win98, WinNT. Redhat loses by a wide margin. Not just that but to actually DO anything with it, you often have to wade through really poorly maintained man and info pages. That being said, it's truely frustrating with Win9X when something goes wrong because it's quit difficult to figure out the problem. Overall though, it takes far less time to do setup and (re)-config with Windows, especially for non-gurus. Now, a lot of (re)-config stuff is close or is there for Redhat, but it needs to be more intuitive. You wouldn't think it would be hard to beat M$'s ease of use with the shutdown option being in the start button... but somehow Redhat has a ways to go.
He blathers on some more about this "For that matter, how many can access Windows95 files from their NT installation like they can with Linux?" He confuses me with that one as I have NO idea what he's talking about. This machine I'm on now I've installed Win95, WinNT and Redhat 5.1. My other machine has Win98 and WinNT... Redhat 5.2 as well but X won't work.
Then he says "Technically, I would rank myself as a notch above dolt when it comes to Linux" Oh... now he tells us. We're supposed to listen to someone who obviously has no clue what he's talking about and then finally admits it. :)
Doesn't address user frustrations (Score:1)
The *real* issues have nothing to to with so-called lack of desktop apps or games or use of command line. They are:
1. PC's today are no longer clones of IBM pc's. They are designed specifically for Windows in the same way that Macs are designed to run MacOS and Amigas were designed to run AmigaOS. How does this affect the typical home user seeking to install Linux on a new or relatively new PC, with or without the hassle of non-destructive repartitioning in case he wants to keep his Win installation intact? Let's assume he doesn't and wants a 100% Linux box with minimal partitioning.
a. The likelihood is that his modem is a WinModem, or if it is not the modem is almost certainly PnP. Forget it. Only a technical person can user isapnptools, in fact. In theory anyone who reads the instructions closely enough can, but in fact such "non-nerds" become nerds in the process, regardlesss of what they do for a living.
b. Ditto Sound card. Almost certainly PnP.
c. Odds are very high, but not certain, that the newest AGP graphics cards won't be supported or won't be fully supported, even with the latest 3.3.1 xfree86. However, if he is even one version back, even more are not supported. Please note that major distros like Debian and Slackware are not using the latest stable version of Xfree 86 and therefore are retrograde and to be avoided - unless you are installing on an old 486.
That's just for starters. We aren't even mentioning the latest DVD drivers, TV drivers, Scanner support, etc. All that is iffy.
No modem, no internet, no sound, no video (except text mode console). So, Joe User takes the box back to the dealer and has them reinstall Windows.
2. Linux documentation *SUCKS*. Man pages are just for reference. They have zero examples. Even one or two examples makes all the difference.
Info is a disaster, without a special info browser. Just something else GNU to be different.
Then there's Tex, postscript, SGML, HTML. That covers most of it. There are just too many formats for documentation and there is no way to get at it to find information needed for a particular topic, without building a special database constructed with complex searches using grep, find, etc., or perl, all of which are beyond the grasp of the new user. He needs documentation on how to use grep, find and perl first, remember?
There sould only be two kinds of docs for every application in addition to man. These are plain text and HTML, which can be read with Lynx in text mode or a grahpical browers in X. That's it. Anything else is extra. SGML is a development tool. Yet, typically Linux apps furnish documentation in SGML. Doh!
That should be enough to make the point that the article was incredibly dishonest about the real weak points of Linux. There are others, but if the hardware that most people now have will not support Linux without a *lot* of configuration and scripting (or not at all) and if the average literate user cannot easly find held *with examples* on imporatant topics then he can't use Linux without spending months doing what the distribution packagers should have done:
1. Honestly, and up front, list specific hardware supported and not supported BEFORE users download, order CD's or puchased boxed sets for $50.
2. Install a central documentation database with links to topic on all commands and common utilities in PLAIN TEXT and HTML *only* and with EXAMPLES. Remove all the useless postscrip, sgml Info and Tex documentation from
3. Get your distributions up to date Debian and Slackware - especially your drivers (latest kernel and modules and X) - or get the hell out of the way of those that do. Shame on you!
Joe Luser
Dialup/PPP (Score:1)
umsdos (Score:1)
It allows a "demo" install of Linux on a DOS or VFAT filesystem, or a cohabitating Linux installation without requiring a repartition of your harddrive. It allows me to say my mom has Linux on her computer (does she use it, well, that's another story...).
...and swap... (Score:1)
# dd if=/dev/zero of=/swapfile bs=1024 count=16384 /swapfile /swapfile
# sync
# mkswap
# swapon
You'll probably want to add the last to your /etc/rc.d/rc.system file to automatically turn on swap at boot.
...yes, performance suffers mildly, but on today's quick li'l boxen, the casual user won't know any better or notice, and converting to full-on Linux might provide an added benefit or two....
Corrections, Additions and Deletions (Score:2)
The Registry was created to provide a place for Windows configuration settings. In a typical Windows installation you have 10-15k registry keys, reparsing an ini file over and over containing 10k keys to check if an application changed a setting would be silly, keeping it in memory is even sillier.
Remember databases are not evil. For all intents and purposes, your filesystem is a database, so saying text config files are more stable is a contradiction.
Autoexec.bat and config.sys still exist on windows 9x systems, they are DOS init scripts.
Just because windows has a bad implementation of a registry database doesn't mean it's a bad idea. AIX, MacOS, MacOS X Server, and a few other majors all have configuration databases which are extremely stable and robust.
Plus, you aren't meant to edit the registry directly. That's what that 500 meg GUI is for.
Modern X-based systems are amazingly user-friendly and often superior in design to commercial variants because they put stuff in there that we as users have demanded and created.
Superior is a strong word. Windows9x and Windows NT are extremely developer friendly. If you can get past the bloat of MFC (which Windows developers seem to have no problem doing), it is an extremely complete GUI API.
Consistancy is also an important part of the GUI experience. Microsoft has tried to maintain control over the consistancy of it's desktop for a very good reason. A user should be able to use any windows machine without having to relearn the interface.
I've never been a big Microsoft advocate. Their software is buggy and bloated, their development staff is directed by marketing, their spindoctors could make the catholic pope look like the antichrist if they wanted to, and their fearless leader has so much money that he simply doesn't care any more.
But, being a developer I understand that Windows does provide a lot that Linux doesn't... right now at least.
I'm ready to be flamed...
--
Speaking of FUD? (Score:1)
That would be, "Sorry, but GNU/Linux can't scale to 128 processor [snip] systems yet."
I'm not trying to be cute here (well, okay, yes I am). SGI has been rumbling about getting Linux up and running on a large-scale Origin system. When you think about it, it's in their interest to get behind any type of promising OS (be it Linux or NT), since there's still a lot of money to be made in large-scale systems like the Origins. After all, IRIX hasn't exactly proved to be a market slayer...
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Installing - just a bit more patience ... (Score:1)
"... computer-literate user would
I probably am less computer literate than you, however, I do not give up easily.
Installation issue... (Score:1)
When I recently installed win95 on a desktop, it auto-detected everything need to run properly, including everything needed for the GUI. My monitor was auto-detected (it even knew the name and model number), my video card was auto-detected, same with my serial mouse. In Linux, none of this happened. In order to get Linux running with a GUI, I had to mess around with XF86Setup, which attempted to autodetect some stuff, but resulted in a lot more mucking around with video modes and a lot more reboots due to not being able to get out of a video mode that I found out (too late) my monitor and/or video card didn't support. It'd be nice if Linux would auto-detect and auto-setup those sorts of things, letting you change them later if you so desire.
Installation issue... (Score:1)
Oops, I meant "the problem..."
My Win98 didn't auto-detect all that stuff (Score:1)
Well, it said that my Matrox G200 was an OAK SVGA and refused to configure it at any resolution higher than 640x480 in 256 colors. It refused to recognize my Symbios 53c8xx-based SCSI card AT ALL, and nothing I tried would get it to recognize it no matter how much I wiped off the hard drive and reinstalled with the Symbios driver on a disk and etc. It didn't detect my old NE-2000 clone network card at all (non-PnP, but still...).
Red Hat 5.2 detected my video card fine, detected my SCSI card fine (and let me boot off of it!), in fact, the only way I could get Win98 to install on my machine (since it wouldn't detect my SCSI card, and my CD-ROM is hooked to the SCSI card) was to boot into Linux and copy everything to the FAT32 partition that I made with the Windows boot floppy.
Point: Auto-detection depends on what hardware you have in your system. Red Hat's installer is very good at auto-detecting PCI devices, not so good at detecting ISA devices, and doesn't do parallel device autodetection at all. For PCI devices, Red Hat actually auto-detects a larger percentage than Win98 does, in my experience. But if you still have a bunch of old PnP ISA devices, well, Win98 will detect them, Red Hat won't. Time to upgrade, eh?
-- Eric
Easy to install if you buy a real computer (Score:1)
For example, Linux installs on one of our computers in less than 15 minutes flat.
The DELL situation will be remedied whenever DELL gives a damn. Until then, don't buy DELL. Simple, see?
Why on Earth buy a machine labeled "Designed for Windows 98" to run Linux?!
-- E
Installation issue... (Score:1)
Instead, RedHat assumes (correctly) that you may
want to have other OSes installed. Yes it causes some trouble, and that's why RedHat offers customer support and install manuals to help. I have yet to see a manual on how to actually install Win95.
Speaking of Journaled EXT2 (Score:1)
"I expect to have publicly testable code for journaling over ext2fs in about 4 weeks or so."
Should be interesting eh?
Ahh... The Unix Way. (Score:1)
The idea is basically that file locations are no longer tied to devices. If you want "/usr/local" (think "Program Files") to be on your new hard drive, but you don't want to have to change your applications' configuration files, some similar means is neccesary.
This way, you can also define a system that is "handy" to you. You're not tied to having your filesystems off the root. You CAN have hda1 be "/c" if you want to, but it's optional. One of the ideas central to The Unix Way is: Flexibility Is Good.
ANd you'll find that just 'bout all linux/unix folks think this same way. They have built-in assumptions about what you MUST know and what IS better. All I can offer is that once you understand where these folks are coming from, you'll agree with them (and so, you'll be one). Scary, no?
Re video support... (Score:1)
As for the difficulties you encourtered w/ the installation, those aren't neccesary. Using a dedicated HD when dual-booting (as I reccomend that my clients do) or some commercial software like PartitionMagic helps solve the repartitioning stuff; Installing off a $7 CheapBytes CD (or a network image if at work, or a Mandrake CD I just burned...) eliminates the mounting-Win98-partition deal...
In short, most of the difficulties you encountered have workarounds available. You were man enough to do it the hard way; More power to 'ya. That doesn't meen Average Joe Newbie has to go through the same difficulties, or even that he should. But the flexability to allow one to do things the hard way is there... and I think that's a Good Thing.
This column is good (Score:1)
Linux needs a good ombudsman -- somebody who can give constructive criticism without laying on the FUD. I hope those involved in developing and promoting Linux give this guy some attention, without flaming him to a lifeless cinder or spamming him back to the stone ages.
So much for honest discussion (Score:1)
I see that you have the same problem i did when i installed RedHat (after using win x.xx for years).
I asked my friend (is-a-linux-guru): Why the cd-rom drive and floppy drives are hidden to some
The answer was: "..You MUST know that
That was neither fair discussion about pros & cons of Linux. It's rarely that. sad.
FUDing Windows... (Score:1)
> WinNT. Redhat loses by a wide margin.
You're weird. For nonstandard hardware, NT is much more painful to install.
I wouldn't know about Win95 or Win98 because it's been so long since I used an OS without preemptive multitasking that my memories would be inaccurate.
Speaking of FUD? (Score:1)
Beautiful. Didn't Microsoft perfect the vaporware technique years ago? Linux runs good on systems that developers have access too, however, the overwhelming majority of Linux developers don't have access to the many processor machinery needed to fully port and extend Linux on. And it will still take quite a while to get the QoS that companies like IBM and Amdahl can promise.
That being said, there's a much better chance of getting Linux (or the *BSDs) up and running on an Origin-class server than NT, considering the OS architecture.
So much for honest discussion (Score:1)
for three years solid without any filesystem
corruption, then when disks are reformatted
to run Linux, after a few months of light
usage and proper shutdowns, the
start gathering "Bad SuperBlock" and "Error
in directory" messages??? Could be flaky
RAM or bad disk controllers. Fine, but bear
in the same machines ran Windows without my
files being trashed.
Yes, ext2 is far superior to FAT16 or FAT32.
Yes, shame on me for using old hardware.
Yes, I run 6 newer Linux boxen without a single
filesystem hiccup yet. I hope they remain so...
So as usual the
fine. Windows sucks."
Very nice.
Installing Red Hat is easy, if... (Score:2)
- If your modem has a real UART (many don't)
- If your LAN adapter is on the compatibility list
- If you know the gritty technical specs of your video card and monitor
- If your video card is in the XFree86 compatibility list
If your hardware does not meet these conditions, then it could hold any newbie back for weeks before they are able to solve the issue. It's easy for an experienced Linux user, but I've been stuck back there in newbieville will incompatible mystery hardware and it's frustrating, but also a great learning experience.As far as an honest discussion of Linux drawbacks, lets talk about the instability of the ext2 filesystem for starters. I'm sorry but I've hard three disks go south on my in three different Linux boxes which before these same three systems ran three different flavors of Windows for years without any corruptions in the filesystem. True maybe my RAM was flaky, bad disk controller, whatever, but I wish ext2 was less prone to such errors, like power failures. (Thank God for UPS supplies)
What Linux needs is games (Score:1)
I've run DOOM more in the last few days than I have the last few months. I just love debugging
(Linus Torvalds)
I'm a 'real user', and not much of a consumer, but I still like games. That's why we already have xboing and xkobo, and there are people writing FreeCiv and DUMB. There are many open-source games out there, and until companies port their games, we're going to be cloning them.
Ho-hum, another ain't Linux great article (Score:1)
I never worried about if something was 'on the list', but I believe that 'Joe User' would have the same problem with installing NT. (However, NT4SP1 installed fine on my old P133, it's just slower than Linux was, and SP3 is much slower.
Yep, Linux ain't Windoze. I like OSes, and my Linux computer is something I use productively. I don't have to turn it on because... well, it just doesn't have to shut down that often.
Corrections, Additions and Deletions (Score:1)
I do the printing module for a commercial tax application, and it is a MESS of IfNT() crap, not to mention inconsistancies in 95 and 98 that make me do a lot of redundant work-- just to be safe. Check out the documentation for
I would rather have a consistant API that may be a little sketchy in parts and make me do a little more work than forcing me to code around all the different configurations and hoping to god that they don't change behavior underneath me forcing me to ship disks again for MS changes. (I know DLLs are supposed to be backwards compatible, but in the ComCtrl case, I've noticed the details get fudged. The list control comes to mind.)
As an aside, I should mention that I find MFC pretty thin in most cases (Doc-View printing comes to mind as an exception)... The only reason I dislike it is that it immediately ties me to the "One MS Solution". I mean, we spent 10 years on a C++ standard... wouldn't it be nice to take advantage of it now that it is here?
Ah well \
The point? Maybe. (Score:1)
HOWEVER, I still feel that many of the windows API are just a simple case of bad design. They are CERTAINLY inconsistantly designed. I furthermore think that the MS solution is almost always inferior. Rate them yourself... CORBA-COM? D3D-GL? Win32(GUI portion)-Xtk?
I like my work a whole lot more when I don't have to fight the API (or the compiler).
I am also looking at this from a programming point of view instead of a user interface point of view. Consistancy of UI is important- blah blah blah. We've heard it before. I believe you. That said, I personally don't care too much about GUIs. I think they cloud the process unless done right, and I don't think MS does them right very often. Please, go out, write the best GUIs out there. I will appreciate it, others will appreciate it.
All that said. I write WinXX software because I get paid for it. I go home at night and write *nix software because I love it. Someday I'll get paid to write *nix software, and there will be dancing in the streets, and good old biblical celebration.
->You are right: it is complete.
->Complete or not, I would rather work with consistant, well designed API.
If I sound cross, my apologies.
Linux hits reality (Score:1)
The same is somewhat true of sendmail. For the most part it's preconfigured. There is very little to configure for the small network or single user. The canned defaults are pretty much useful as is.
And nobody wants that (Score:1)
Installation issue... (Score:1)
Another point you missed... (Score:1)
Hardware Accelerated 3D? Use GL.
Either are vendor support issues not API issues. The abstractions are there, they just need vendor support underneath (printers, vidcards).
So don't run Linux! (Score:1)
Linux installation Easy (Score:1)
This is pretty much a nobrainer and is even documented in several places where there are a maze of dependencies to deal with (E for one).
Linux needs more critics. (Score:1)
While many criticisms lack any real value for lack of detail.
Any useful criticism basically needs to be a specification for that thing which Linux lacks. Far too few criticisms of Linux get anywhere near such a thing.
Doesn't address user frustrations (Score:1)
Real-World FUD Exposed (Score:1)
RH5.2 does just that (Score:2)
Speaking of FUD... (Score:1)
Chris DiBona
--
Grant Chair, Linux Int.
VP, SVLUG
Linux installation Easy (Score:1)
Daniel
Corrections, Additions and Deletions (Score:1)
I have to take issue with this one. Microsoft certainly tries to maintain control, but not consistency. I have MSIE4 and MS Office 97 installed on top of NT 4 here, and each of those has subtle differences in their widgets, layout, and behavior. They're not as different as Motif vs. OpenLook, and people seem to have little problem coping, but it's probably no more different than Qt, Motif, and GTK+ (using the default theme).
And for that matter, people moving from Win 3.1 to 95 had to relearn basically all of the interface. People did it, probably because the new interface was so much better.
Not to knock consistency, but I think that sometimes it's emphasized at the expense of quality.
Ho-hum, another ain't Linux great article (Score:1)
These examples don't have so much to do with Linux as with the hardware vendors. Linux is not intrinsically harder than Windows to install on any hardware. It certainly has nothing to do with Linux giving you greater control. It's just that hardware vendors tend to help Microsoft make it easy to install Windows, and get in the way of making it easy to install Linux.
Which is not to trivialize the issue. There's certainly effort that can be taken by Linux developers to increase hardware support. But this effort is a) hard (and more so than for people like Microsoft who get the specs and/or drivers from the manufacturers), and b) relatively expensive. I think for the time being, it's much better to be able to auto-detect hardware and have the installer say "I know what that is, let me configure it for you" or "I don't know what that is, but if it's one of the following, you can configure it yourself..." or especially "I know what that is, but Linux doesn't support it."
On the other hand, we're obviously likely to see more and more hardware vendors offer explicit Linux support as the market demands it.
The real reason Linux is so hard to learn... (Score:1)
Just typing the command name should work (like in DOS) unless "/usr/games" isn't in your PATH environment variable (also like in DOS). Unlike in DOS, the path entries are separated by colons, and the current directory is generally not included (for security reasons). I suspect that this latter part is what tripped you up, since it seems counter-intuitive, but it's really a good idea.
Corrections, Additions and Deletions (Score:1)
I as a computer user don't care if my desktop is consistent with others desktops. They can do what they like. I do care if mine moves around on me. Consistency is not the same as homogeneity.
But I don't care about consistency nearly as much as I do usability. I'm willing to learn a new thing if it offers an obvious, significant advantage (e.g., Windows 95 compared to 3.1). Most people would agree.
Which is not to say that Linux is superior in either regard.
Ho-hum, another ain't Linux great article (Score:1)
There are plenty of users with atypical needs who aren't willing to spend a lot of time mucking around with their computers to get stuff working (especially when it works quite easily in Windows). Musicians and artists are a good example. You simply can't do serious music work on Linux, not because of any intrinsic flaws, but because there's a lot of work to be done.
CIV3 (Score:1)
--
Statistics based on a sample of one (Score:1)
Some of the conclusions drawn in the article are not valid because they are based on statistics based on a sample of one. For instance, the author says that he didnt have any trouble hooking up a dialup connection, therefore, installation ease in Linux is good.
False! One only has to look at comp.os.linux.setup or the linux-newbie list. A huge number of help requests are from newbies having trouble with (a) PPP or (b) configuring X for their video adapters.
Of course, this installation ease also seems to be distribution specific. For instance, the Debian PPP install (pppconfig) is so painless, that I rarely see any Debian users cry out for PPP configuration help.
So how is one to make an assessment of whether the installation procedure is good, bad, or ugly? A fair assessment could only come from a large number of samples. For Linux, this is pretty easy to gather as all / most cries for help are in the public domain. This is not true for other operating systems. So I dont think that it is possible to get a meaningful comparison of ease of install between operating systems. An objective assessment for Linux only, should however be possible.
Installation issue... (Score:1)
Whatever... (Score:1)
Okay, how much credibility does a Windows--recently-turned-Linux user have when talking about the fundamental drawbacks of an OS? This article was about as useful as the wonderful IRC answer "Well, it works for me... you must be doing something wrong."
"Modern Unices including Linux no more rely on them than any other desktop operating system. "
MacOS excluded, of course.
"And the world's most popular operating system -- Microsoft's command line only Disk-based OS (DOS) -- is still the most popular. If difficulty was a barrier to adoption, then how did Microsoft succeed?"
Different era, different users. PCs are now being targeted at EVERYONE. In the 80s, they were targeted at over educated, over paid yuppies. (Look at the ads from back then in Compute or Byte - you had the white male in a suit, housewife, 2.5 kids and a dog, clustered around thier floor model wood cabinet TeeVee, with an IBM PC Jr. plugged into it.)
Oh, yeah, there was the office workers, who don't exactly have a choice in the matter, and whose bosses were seduced by the cheaper price of IBMs.
This column is not good (Score:1)
I agree with you.
However, this coloum starts out on the right foot, but descends into Anti-FUD. As I said elswhere, it's about as useful as the Linux user on IRC that says "Well, it works for me... I don't know what's wrong on your end."
Having someone that can address drawbacks impartially would be... I don't know. It would just be.
egoless? (Score:1)
What Linux needs is games (Score:1)
... only on 3dfx hardware, and we all know how wonderful that is (yay... 16 bit colour... pretty.... NOT.)
Now we have FUD from linux (Score:1)
Doesn't address user frustrations (Score:1)
1. The information is there if people want to get it - it's not concealed by anyone. I wouldn't even buy hardware for my Windows box without first checking that it was supported, let alone under Linux. Windows NT has a similar problem.
2. All documentation should be provided in SGML at the maintainer level so that distributions can put out text and HTML, or anything else they decide is appropriate. For many purposes, HTML simply isn't good enough, so a blanket ban on SGML is short-sighted. My theory is that any documentation is better than none, so I wouldn't complain if it came in GIF format.
3. This one's nonsense, I'm afraid. Debian is using 3.3.2, which is hardly "retrograde". So it's missing the G200. So what? You fail to understand that upgrading an enormous suite of software like X takes a long time to fully test and integrate with the rest of the distribution. Fortunately for Red Hat, that's something they've never been too bothered about (hence all of the recent updates and patches, security advisories, etc). Shame on Red Hat, perhaps?
Rob Wilderspin
Why not have the partitions mount natively? (Score:1)
Installation issue... (Score:1)
If RedHat (blindly) assumed that you wanted to use the entire hard drive as a Linux root partition, installation would be just as easy as the Win95 one. Instead, RedHat assumes (correctly) that you may want to have other OSes installed.
You may want multiple OSes installed on your computer, but you're in a decided minority. The majority of people who buy computers have no interest in maintaining multiple OSes. Therefore it is correct from the standpoint of "what most people want/will want" that Microsoft assumes your entire drive will be used for Windows. Just as it should be a correct assumption for Linux distrubutions like Red Hat.
I'm not saying there's no room for an advanced setup wizard to allow those of us who are technically included to fiddle with every detail, but if the goal is to get as many people up and running on Linux as possible, there must be a "most" common setup that is no more difficult than popping in the CD-ROM, booting, and perhaps asking the few questions that the Windows 98 setup requires.
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And nobody wants that (Score:1)
Why in _hell_ should the widget set be forced upon applications by the OS? What on _earth_ should one have to do with the other?
I love Linux, and firmly believe it's the HolyOS. But lets face it, not everything in Linux is beautiful. It can be pretty downright complicated and difficult to deal with at times. All these little components with their own little configurations to get right.
But the problem is just on an order of complexity less than that of the Windows System Registry, where everything gets screwed up at the same time in the same place. Linux is _modular_, which means we can make one thing work right at a time. No wonder the Windoze flavors are so poor. Wouldn't your baby OS be unhappy if someone hacked a ring3 UI from a completely unstable OS in on top of your ring0 kernel (can you say WinNT 4?).
I think it's pretty impressive when we moved my friend's HD to his new 450a, and spent 7 hours getting Win95 to work right. See, it needed drivers for the new IDE controller (BX chipset). Which were on the CD that came with the motherboard. But Win95 couldn't talk to the CDROM since it was using the realmode disk drivers since it couldn't talk to the IDE controller...and after we fixed that we had to fiddle with ever _bloody_ one of his interrupts. And all this in 640x480 since untill the interrupts were right we couldn't install proper vidcard drivers. Yuck.
By contrast, when I moved my old HD to my 450a, Linux worked perfectly and flawlessly with no effort. I was up in 30 seconds, and had X reconfigured for the new video board in 30 more.
Don't even _talk_ to me about MacOS. The last time I used a Mac, I got a window open with no little close box on the title bar. The program provided a "quit" button in the interior of the window, but it didn't work -- just restarted the app. I had to shut off the frikkin computer. Now that's _sad_.
You want a consistent look and feel? Use the same widget set (GTK+, Qt) in a suite of applications (KDE,GNOME). I'm not impressed by interoperation except between _MS_ apps. Which is the same as saying the KDE and GNOME apps work right with other apps in their respective suites. No biggie.
But the GNOME and KDE developers are working towards a common ORB that will bring true interoperability to the desktop. Users will be able to mix and match at will.
Now _that's_ cool.
Don't you DARE knock 3dfx (Score:1)
BTW the dithering on a V3 or SLI'd V2's in 1024x768 is pretty sweet.
It is debatable whether nVidia's TNT boards come close to 3dfx (speed penalty due to D3D tho). Nothing else on the market today even competes.
I think he's talking about WinModems (Score:1)
Not everyone ignores valid criticism (Score:1)
Solid engineering criticism that is clear and well presented will usually be accepted by any half-decent engineer that happens to read it. That doesn't necessarily mean that he or she will voice their support, but then that shouldn't matter to people that want input rather than political visibility.
Also, if you state reasonable specific requirements rather than making broad-brush criticism then you'll stand a much better chance of affecting the course of development. Even better, join a development team (not necessarily officially) even if you're not a developer: evaluators are needed just as much as programmers, and any reasonable designer will be more than happy to accept additional "customer requirements".
Finally, it's pointless to say that "the community needs to accept criticism better". As we get more and more non-professionals in our midst, the situation will get worse in this regard, not better, so what you're asking for becomes ever more like changing the world. As a direct goal, that's impossible in practice. Just aim to change your own microcosm instead, and if everyone does so then the world will in time slowly change for the better.
Interface argument still not holding (Score:2)
But this phase, with KDE and GNOME competing, is a necessary one in reaching the One Open Standard, which is what is really needed.
I don't doubt that one will eventually remain. When KDE and GNOME will have more or less ripened, then I think development will probably focus on compatibility with each other, and after that they'll merge or something. And all those differently looking WM's will probably become skins on the One Emerging Open GUI Standard. Which will of course never stop evoluting.
Hope so, anyway.
Easy to install? Bollocks! (Score:1)
Problems hit so far:
1) My hard disk was too big. I had to specify 'linux hda=1580,255,63' when running the boot disk.
2) My network card wasn't supported with the supplied kernel (2.0.32). I had to download a new version of tulip.c and recompile the kernel to see the network.
3) My graphics card & monitor *still* aren't set-up right for X. They weren't listed in the Xconfigurator program, and I'm having a hell of a time hacking through the config file. I gave up yesterday, and went out to enjoy the sun instead.
And I haven't even *STARTED* with the sound card yet.
Searching Dejanews has uncovered a few odds&sods of useful information, but I'm still not quite there.
OTOH, I have floppies with Windows drivers for my monitor, graphics, network & sound cards. So installing them is a total no-brainer.
Windows installed with no fuss whatsoever. Linux isn't there after a week of plittering. Fact.
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So much for honest discussion (Score:1)
Dialup/PPP (Score:1)
Maybe it's a anomaly but I don't think so, with the same login it took me much longer with Redhat/Caldera.
Maybe the question should be... (Score:2)
So I ask, what is Linux for, and who is it for? It's so damn cool to be even able to ask this question.
Dialup/PPP (Score:1)
I think that's one area that could really be improved, judging by the amount of confusion that seems to be out there. Once a newbie can get on the net, they can seek out the information from within Linux, rather than booting back to windows to search... and Linux suddenly becomes a lot more enjoyable.
Some of the linuxconf / control panel / whatever tools have certainly helped, but there still seem to be a lot of people confused about this basic setup.
Corrections, Additions and Deletions (Score:1)
Oh, yeah. Lemme see, compare Win2.1, 3.1, '95, and '98 (with the IE-integrated desktop enabled). Click the box in the upper right corner of the window to maximize it -- or was that end the program? Double click on the desktop to bring up the task manager -- or was that move to the bottom of the screen to reach the taskbar? Double-click the program name in the Executive to launch it -- or was that on the icon in Program Manager -- or single-click on the icon in the Start menu -- or single-click on the icon on the desktop?
Yep. Can't fault Microsoft for interface consitency. It's always different.
Corrections, Additions and Deletions (Score:1)
In short, Windows only had a consistent interface if you stuck with the default installed GUI shell. And, if every one of those Linux boxen was installed with the same version of the same distro using the distro's default shell, you have the same consistency.
Corrections, Additions and Deletions (Score:1)
Frankly, there isn't enough KDE or Gnome specific software out there to make the issue any more serious than the NT-98 inconsistencies. Sure, they're worse in potentia, but right now they're both just different frosting that run "generic" X apps.
Well, not exactly... (Score:1)
With regards to the content, I say the following. I've spent a *lot* of time behind multiple flavors of UNIX, including my own Redhat Linux variant at home, and they are all shades of the same, ungracefully aging way of doing things.
NT & 98 are by no means the wave of the future, but they are more hardware-compatible, easy to manage (on a small scale), and more suitable for the modern desktop than anything running X. Sorry.
What Linux needs is games (Score:1)
You can. Or, at least, you will. id is releasing Q3A concurrently on Linux, Mac, and Win9x. Thus, not only will playing on Linux be possible, it will be official and supported.
The myths that aren't myths (Score:1)
Maybe your video hardware wasn't supported ? ( if it was supported, installing would be dead easy )
Unfortunately, installing an OS on unsupported hardware is kinda difficult. Try installing Win95 or MacOS on an ultra-sparc some day.
And nobody wants that (Score:1)
Interface argument still not holding (Score:3)
The MacOS has an interface.
EVERY application on the Mac conforms to and uses the interface in some way. Heck, even Windows has better coverage.
I'm not picking on KDE and GNOME just because they are late to the game and have not picked up steam - I'm saying that until there is one pervasive standard that eveyone can agree upon, you can forget any notion of a pervasive GUI.
No one in the real world wants to make the distinction between KBiff and GBiff. It might be entertaining to you, but its a hassle for people who want to get things done.
Installation issue... (Score:1)
From sliding in the CD to finished product was about 30 minutes -- and it was considerably easier than the Win95 installation for this machine!
Whereas the Windows 95 installation required DOS-mode card services for my two PCMCIA cards (Ethernet and modem), the Mandrake installation Did The Right Thing -- this is by far the smoothest install of any operating system I have ever installed -- and I have installed plenty, from Novell NetWare 2.15 to MS-DOS to Win3.11/95/98 to other far more esoteric systems.
I simply picked "workstation" installation, and away it went. No boot floppies, no fuss about PCMCIA, no fuss about the nonexistent floppy -- no fuss at all. The Win 95 installation requires the manufacturers' disks for the PCMCIA cards -- the Mandrake installation Did The Right Thing and loaded the appropriate modules automagically. All I had to do was configure the networking interface (which, with Linuxconf, is a snap), and I was back up.
The Win 95 installation required fdisking and formatting the hard drive from floppy (can't boot from CD!) Win 98 can boot from CD -- but still requires me to swap in the floppy to get the PC-card drivers! Mandrake booted from the CD smooth as silk.
The only fly in the ointment was the poor quality of the XFree86 display, but that is a Cirrus Logic problem.
egoless? (Score:1)
egoless? (Score:1)
I'm not so sure about the egoless part. Care to clarify that one?
So...? (Score:1)
If you look at the RedHat installation guide, it recommends a certain set of partitions. For new users, why can't there be an option that allows the installation process to create these partitions/mount points for you by default? Not only that, but the hoops you have to jump through to support a large hard drive seem unncessary - these should also be hidden from the average user. There's still a ways to go before Linux (Redhat at least) is as easy to install as 'doze is.
This article was unimpressive. (Score:1)
I am not the least bit impressed by this article. The poster on
However, the main flaws in OSS and Linux are more fundamental than merely the status quo of today's Linux. They are inherant structural flaws in the OSS development method. This kind of attack is hard to argue, and it relies mostly on intuition and reason. I believe that Linux's lack of user friendly features is a shadow of the true nature of OSS development, not something that time will ever address entirely. OSS, as described by ESR, exists to 'scratch an itch'. It doesn't take a great leap of faith to assume that it is the developers itch that is getting scratched. Neither does it take a leap to assume that OSS developers are different from the rest of the world. Thus their needs, 'itches', are different as well. An experienced hacker doesn't code an intuitive and coherant graphical help system to help himself. He may do it to prove a point, that Linux can be user friendly, but I don't believe this is an integral feature of OSS. Once this point is 'proved', then what. What keeps the hacker asking, "What does the user want?" I have strong doubts about OSS' ability to meet and sustain the needs and wants of the average user. Both in quantitative and qualitive aspects.
I also think that people need to bear in mind that software is not a static thing. Commercial software will continue to raise the bar and mix things up. It is not as if OSS can slowly rise to level of commercial software. It must move rapidly if it is to have any chance of supplanting commercial products in any arena.
Re: Installation issue... (Score:1)
Rhavyn
linux often easier to install (Score:1)
I think the reason winXX often is easier to install is that:
1 M$ assumes you don't have any other operating systems (all the winXX's overwrite the MBR I think).
2 You probably don't need partition you hard disk to install windows, as some form of winXX has probably been on it before.
3 M$ makes a lot of choices for you.
I am sure one could make a linux distro that did the same assumptions and therefore would be as easy to install.
To my own experience, I have a toshiba libretto 50ct on this I wanted both linux and win95. I have no CDROM for this.
To install linux I used a laplink-cable (plip and nfs) and a boot-floppy that's all.
To install windows I had two choices, floppies (all 22 of them, yeah right!), or install dos and the use fastlynx (via laplink again) to copy the contents of the win95 cd to my hard drive and install from there (I did this).
I other words the Win95 install was harder, needed additional sw (fastlynx), and a lot less elegant.
Why ape Windows? (Score:1)
I like Linux the way it is, with its powerful, text-based typesetting, database, software development, and data-analysis tools. If I wanted a very visual desktop, I'd be using Windows (it already comes "free" with all the PCs I have), and I think the same is true for most current Linux users and contributors.
In my experience, non-computer types have no problem learning systems like LaTeX, SQL, or AWK. The initial learning curve is a little steeper than for the GUI-based equivalents, but people seem to come up to speed on the more powerful aspects more quickly than on Windows. Windows is designed for quick and easy selling; it promises to be usable by anybody without any investment of time, but it only delivers that for the most trivial aspects of its programs. That is appealing to customers, though, and it is achievable only with something Linux cannot easily compete with: expensive marketing and public relations.
Windows-style GUI apps isn't even where the next generation of mainstream applications is going. Rather, they are going to be web-based, server-based, and use small Java GUIs downloaded on demand. Linux is in an excellent position to cover the server end of that, and if Mozilla doesn't completely disintegrate, it will also be a reasonable client. KDE and Gnome are looking towards the past, not the future.
If Linux just became a free Windows clone, it would lose something in the process. While there are still some rough edges even in the text-based tools, I believe that efforts should be directed at addressing those. It seems to me that a focus on beating Windows at all cost is harmful.
Maybe Linux can retain its current user base and also acquire a serviceable complement of Windows look-alike GUI apps. But I'd rather tread very carefully in that direction; there are a lot more important areas to worry about it seems to me.
PS: Yes, Linux is easier to install than Windows.
What does 'Interface' mean?? (Score:1)
The Mac has an INTEGRATED graphical interface. KDE is an interface, so is a keyboard, the screen, a cranial implant... Wether the interface comes with icons and windows as part of the OS, or layered on top of a CLI, makes no usability difference, does it?
KCD, GNOME, etc are shells - true. They are layered on top of X, the standard graphical interface to unix, which talks to the OS just as all the various CLIs do. The argument is purely about the definition of the term.
If there was a ubiquitous, common 'interface' to Linux, I'm sure that the same argument could be had between software types and purists. The latter would argue that it's not really an interface to the computer, but rather to the software, and who would claim that it should be embedded in hardware - much as you claim that it's not an 'interface' simply because it is not integral to the OS. A purist could make the argument that the human 'interface' to the machine should be uniform, regardless of the hardware or software. We should be able to walk up to a Cray, and SGI, and HP or a PC and interact with a standard interface.
As I recall from recent discussions, one goal in the Linux kernel is to keep the actual OS interface small and clean. We layer the MMI 'interfaces' on that standard, and thanks to the clenliness of it, we have a choice of 'interfaces' to place between ourselves and the machine.
So the issue is really about keeping the interfaces between the layers standard. Sounds like a sound programming practice. It would be really nice to be able to run any application on any GUI on any OS on any hardware. Now, how do we get there?
Corrections, Additions and Deletions (Score:1)
> NT are extremely developer friendly. If you can
> get past the bloat of MFC (which Windows
> developers seem to have no problem doing), it is
> an extremely complete GUI API.
Out of curiosity, in this "complete" GUI API, how does a user change the look of the widgets by changing themes (like Gtk+), and from the programmer's perspective, how does one to remote displays to other computers?
Ho-hum, another ain't Linux great article (Score:1)
Now, one can make things more complex than the inherent complexity of a given level of control fairly easily, but you will never be able to make things simpler than the inherent level of complexity of a certain level of control.
That's why computers will never be appliances. Appliances have one function, sometimes two. A computer can do almost anything that you can imagine (using computer-oriented imagination on a reasonable scale
Speaking of FUD... (Score:1)
Anyhow, NT can't do 8+ processors any more than Linux can.
The journaling file system is a real fault that doesn't affect all that many people, but I suspect a good portion of the intended recipient of that article. I think that this is in the works, so it is a real problem, but isn't being ignored.
Speaking of FUD? (Score:2)
That said, NT delivers none of these, and people in droves talk about migrating from IBM mainframes to NT, so there's no reason they shouldn't migrate to GNU/Linux too.
Agreed, but... (Score:2)
Linux (Score:2)
time to get used to. It is not all that difficult
to install if you RTFM(Read the Fsckng Manual).
It isn't exactly a no-brainer, but neither is
Win 9x or Win NT. For most things, the defaults
are choosen well, and the casual user will not
have to muddle with them much. Getting on the net
is easy. It's getting X to work that can be a
challange. However, again, if you RTFM, and
you have supported hardware, it's no big deal. I
particularly like Red Hat's Xconfigurator. It
does the job in 90% of cases I have encountered.
What it mostly boils down to is that you should
READ the documentation available to you. Most
users don't get Linux because they want point and
click mindlessness. They get it because they want
the power and stability that it offers. Anyhow
I'm done preaching to the choir.
What Linux needs is games (Score:2)
Think about it for a minute. Do most people really need Pentium 3s with 128MB RAM? Or 8MB video cards? Or huge, fast HDDs? If they want to play games they do. But if all they want is MS Office and Net access, a Pentium 100 works just fine (and a Linux 486/66 box does that job even better).
But if you want to play games (and who doesn't? that's the only reason I keep a Win95 partition around), you have to go with Windows. Except for Quake, Q2, there's just no games for Linux. And games are really what drive hardware advances, and are probably responsible for most decisions to buy a new PC. If there were shrink-wrapped Linux games on the shelf at Fry's, the average guy would start noticing Linux. If you could only get Q3 Arena on Linux, you could bet that market share would increase.
I seriously don't think that Linux will ever be a choice for desktop users (and I'm talking about home PCs, now) until there are as many games for Linux as there are for Windows/MacOS.
-B
The real reason Linux is so hard to learn... (Score:2)
Nah, I think this kind of thing varies wildly from person to person. Some people have a near impossible time learning a "first" interface. The oh-so-easy point and click interface has been known to baffle otherwise intelligent people.
Personally, I grew up using the Apple IIe. When it came time to switch to DOS, I found my Apple experience helped me. Same concept, just slightly different words. Then from DOS to VMS, same thing. From VMS to unix, even better. Unix command lines work the way I always wished all the previous ones had.
Like I said, it really varies from person to person.
But I'm still perplexed why you couldn't start cribbage. In both DOS and unix, it has to be in your path. You would then type the name of the executable "cribbage" (which you said you did). That should have been it. Only thing I can think of that might have thrown you is case sensitivity. But that's something that's usually stressed in any "intro to unix" sheet. The other thing would be using "/" instead of "\" if you were typing out the full name. But that, also, should be one of the first things explained to you.
Every car seems to have the controls set up just a little different (some a lot differently). But after a few minutes, you figure it out. Just don't be afraid to push some buttons and twist some knobs. And if all else fails, read the labels.
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Speaking of FUD... (Score:2)
"""
Mr. Iams said Linux excels in four areas: Internet providers, entry-level computer networks, specialized computing devices such as network routers, and scientifically oriented computer "clusters" that link scores of PCs to make a single supercomputer.
But he said Linux currently lacks some of the features demanded by corporations that intend to run their entire business on computers. Among them are the ability to run simultaneously on many processors in a single computer and to keep a log of what the computer has done.
"""
Ho-hum, another ain't Linux great article (Score:3)
Try installing Linux on a machine with a CD Writer or ISDN card or TV card. I ain't saying it isn't possible but it sure isn't as easy as Windoze.
Your article began promising to tackle the real issues of using Linux and ended being a propaganda piece. When are all the Linux hackerz going to realise that by giving people the false impression about Linux you are doing more harm than good?
Take Joe User: he reads this, is tired of Windoze, thinks "okay, Linux ain't so scary I'll try it." Buys the CD. Puts it in... oh dear, his AGP video card isn't on the list... what to do? Download some guys source and compile it. Oh dear his standard issue network card (say DLink DFE 530TX for sake of argument) isn't standard either. What about his ISDN card???
Net result: Joe User is never to be seen using Linux.
Tell people the truth! Linux ain't Windoze. It has power, raw power but it won't making using it easy. If you like OSs you'll like Linux. If you think a computer should be something you turn on and start using productively it ain't for you (without some expensive consultancy fees).