What is Digg?125 Comments
- FredFredrickson, on 10/09/2008, -18/+57Look, I'm a designer and a developer as well, and frankly, I just can't find this tangible Microsoft "evil" everyone always complains about. I bought my copy of Windows XP, and I run it on a nice system, and I've never had any problems with it.
Don't get me wrong - I like Linux too, and hey, if you want to make the switch, then more power to you.
Just stop blaming it on this ridiculous "evil" *****. You can develop and design just fine on Windows, just like any other OS. Microsoft doesn't wrong you in any way, unless perhaps you're using a pirated version of Windows... and if you are, you've got no room to complain. - liljay2k, on 10/09/2008, -1/+35Maybe he should make a switch on his web server.
- 10goto10, on 10/09/2008, -8/+40Basically, what the author is saying is, "I just run my preferred Windows applications on a small laptop, and I only use their most basic functionality, so I might as well ditch them altogether and settle for tools that sorta do the job as well." What's the point?
- llamaspit, on 10/09/2008, -2/+16I agree that people need to stop using the "MS is evil" thing as a crutch. Although some of MS's tactics have been shady at best, once you start thinking in terms of "I'm moving TO Linux" rather than "I'm moving AWAY from Windows", you really can start seeing the benefits of Linux. Otherwise, you'll be comparing apps like Gimp to apps like Photoshop, and you'll be very disappointed. Changing your view, however, will help you stop making those comparisons and allow you to appreciate Linux for the multitude of reasons that actually make it superior.
- harisund, on 10/09/2008, -3/+14No, that's like saying you're not really doing math unless you are using numbers.
- UnConeD, on 10/09/2008, -3/+13Microsoft isn't evil because Windows taints your soul when you boot it. They are evil because of their business practices:
- Embrace, extend, extinguish: with IE, Microsoft has taken an open standard (HTML), extended it with proprietary tech to try to lock people in (ActiveX, DirectX filters, VML, ...) and then leaving it undeveloped for 5 years while web developers were asking for improvements.
- User abuse: with Office, Microsoft changed the document format over and over, ensuring that people and businesses would need to buy the newer version to open documents they received.
- Protectionism: even though Office was a hotbed for new features and UIs, this code was never folded back into Windows and made available to other developers... compare this with e.g. OS X, where spellcheck is a system-wide service available to any app.
- Blatant disregard for the tech community: with Office Open XML, MS not only pushed a spec that was unfinished, rushed, bloated and inconsistent, but they also corrupted the ISO certification with bribes and abuse of process. Even though there was already a clean, accepted spec available (ODF).
MS didn't get their market share for being good. - koonchu, on 10/09/2008, -3/+13A switch to what? Homosexuality? Vampirism? What is up with Digg headlines these days???
- commentbot, on 10/09/2008, -9/+18I agree... I find odd prefering ditching one's favorite applications for applications that are new, with less functionalities, that require tweaking in some cases. And he is not even saving money, as he already spent the money in proprietary applications. Ubuntu and friends is fine for someone who really can't or doesn't want to spend money, but otherwise, you can't compare gEdit with Dreamweaver, native IE with IEs4Linux, or Photoshop with GIMP, LOL... Just my opinion. BTW, I think Paint.NET is a better suggestion as a replacement to Photoshop, and it does run on Linux using Mono.
- llamaspit, on 10/09/2008, -1/+10It's true, Linux applications many times do not have the wealth of features that some Windows applications have, but it's improving, however slowly. I use Linux on my desktop, and have been for about 4 years now (Ubuntu, mainly). But I do have to switch to the laptop for some things.
1. Photoshop
2. Testing in IE
I use Windows for music recording as well, but I wouldn't call that a critical app as it's a hobby.
The truth is, Gimp is NOT a replacement for Photoshop. It may have many of the same features, but it's a pain to use and I already know and have Photoshop, so what's the point? It's my thinking that there needs to be a direct replacement on Linux for Photoshop, with an interface that people are used to. It's the only way to truly change the average users' perspective of Linux being a "hobbyist" OS. Similarly for other apps as well.
And I refuse to load IE, or Wine for that matter and sully my perfectly good Linux installation with non-native code. I don't even run KDE apps in Gnome for the same reason.
The Linux community needs to compete, not just "offer an alternative". I like not being on the forced upgrade path MS provides, but I do still find myself using Windows from time to time, and that needs to change. - aladrin, on 10/09/2008, -1/+9I agree with you, except for this:
"Ubuntu and friends is fine for someone who really can't or doesn't want to spend money,"
No, they're for people that like what Ubuntu offers. Part of that is being free of cost, but I actually -prefer- many of the applications to their Windows counterparts, even the commercial ones. It's not just for 'poor people'. - JohnFlux, on 10/09/2008, -1/+9You sound confused between Microsoft ( a company ) and MS Windows (a product).
Using a product (MS Windows) will not tell you much at all about the ethics of the company (Microsoft).
It seems really strange to say that because Windows worked well for you, therefore Microsoft is not evil. - Sakumi, on 10/09/2008, -4/+12This article kinda explains why linux ISN'T ready for the mainstream. He is having to lose functionality to make the switch... thus it's not a viable alternative.
- stonebone4, on 10/09/2008, -0/+8Web designers that enjoy not starving.
- KragTheDigger, on 10/09/2008, -2/+9I was expecting a 'trading places' kind of thing... curious as to whether a developer could produce anything acceptable from a (web? architectural?) design perspective, and whether the designer would simply quit or would learn to swim in code..
- StandardsDT, on 10/09/2008, -0/+7Those who do not want to alienate majority of the world from visiting their site, especially from small corporations to the big ones.
- BradBrown, on 10/09/2008, -0/+6"If you’re not handwriting code, are you really a developer anyways?" - He's definitely not the brightest bulb. You use whatever tool results in quality code in the least amount of time. If writing code equates to developing, we're not developers unless we're using assembly language (the more verbose, the better a coder you are). 10 years ago I was writing ISAPI DLLs by hand; today I can get by with PHP or ASP. Still, the result is the same, and I consider myself a developer.
- jimmyp3016, on 10/09/2008, -1/+7You should try out Aptana Studio as a dreamweaver alternative.
www.aptana.com
I made the switch about 2 months ago and love it. And yes its free. - PabloIV, on 10/09/2008, -0/+6Even though he switched he's only talking about his laptop. Leaving implicit that his main working computer is still working on Windows.
As owner of a small development firm I use the platform that gets the job done the quickest.
The web server runs on red hat enterprise 4, my laptop on ubuntu, my main work machine uses XP sp3, and my entertainment computer runs Vista. Each one does it's job very well and each OS is only as good as the tools you can run on it.
This almost religious OS hating is silly and useless. - FredFredrickson, on 10/09/2008, -0/+6Exactly - as well as having an open mind about different OS's, and not digging trenches where they shouldn't be. I run both Windows and Ubuntu, and I love both.
- jjidi, on 10/09/2008, -1/+7Mirror?
- Thuktun, on 10/09/2008, -0/+6By this logic, Windows isn't a viable alternative to Ubuntu or MacOS because they have useful features that Windows doesn't have.
- Murdats, on 10/09/2008, -0/+5yes but at the same time that linux apps are improving their features, so are all other apps.
linux has to do it faster to catch up. - agentlame, on 10/09/2008, -0/+5@Krissam don't be an ass.
- beautifulbeast, on 10/09/2008, -0/+5I use Aptana too and do all my HTML marking by hand.
I like Aptana and it's a very promising tool that offers support for Ruby On Rails, but it's Java and that means it's a memory whore too :( - Dumbledorito, on 10/09/2008, -6/+11"Some of them are awesome, and yes some of them kinda suck, and best of all they are all free!"
Why does the phrase, "you get what you pay for" spring to mind?
"If you’re not handwriting code, are you really a developer anyways?"
WTF? That's like saying you're not really doing math unless you're using a slide rule. - regx, on 10/09/2008, -1/+5I switched a long time ago. For vector graphics check out Xara. I run Kubuntu and love the fact that in Konqueror you can split the window as many times as you want and save it as a profile. The fact that it can browse ftp, sftp, ssh, svn and cvs removes the need for any other 3rd party app for filemanagement, but I still use the command line for scp, tar and rsync. Quanta is much better than dreamweaver if you actually write code. Heck, the built in syntax highlighting in kate (KDE's equivilent of notepad) is better than dreamweaver if you write code. Windows users check out scite to get a small glimpse http://www.scintilla.org/SciTE.html.
For photoshop I just run photoshop7 under wine and IE as well. It is a shame to have to run any windows software because just IE and the required libs plus photoshop is larger than my whole linux installation.
Anyway, power to you - you are better off. Much better!
And to whomever said you get what you pay for, whith software you are paying for restrictions! Open Source = freedom! - reginaldino, on 10/09/2008, -1/+5The "MS is Evil" mentality generally does not come from people's views of MS products, more from its business operation in general.
"Embrace, extend and extinguish," - skeeterbug84, on 10/09/2008, -2/+6Microsoft will continue to dominate because they have a very strong development community. They have a huge and well documented API, and a great toolset to go along with it. Look at XNA and DirectX. Developers can easily port their games from windows to the 360. This is a huge incentive. I won't even get into the Windows API or .NET.
I see questions posted in the Ubuntu programming talk forum in regards to IDE's and the only thing that happens is a flame war or someone telling them to use a text editor. Linux distributions need to come together and support a unified API and set of development tools. - Phate8263, on 10/09/2008, -0/+4I honestly believe that people that say "Windows XP works great for me all the time" Must be smoking something, or only use the bare minimal programs.
Things I can think of off the top of my head.
1. Windows won't let you delete files if it decides you shouldn't.
2. For some reason, It always takes 10 minutes to shutdown?
3. It won't let me kill processes It thinks I shouldn't.
4. The fact that I have to run AVG all the time.
5. The fact that every new program I install thinks it needs to load everytime I start windows. And then to get rid of them I have regedit, and goto current version->run->startup programs and remove the goddamn registry key because its not listed under start-up programs.
6. Windows firewall asking if I want to allow every program I install to access the internet.
7. Having to install drivers for every little piece of new hardware.
Now I'm a gamer, and I use windows all the time for CSS and Warhammer, but that doesn't mean I like it... - llamaspit, on 10/09/2008, -0/+4Regarding Virtualbox - I've used vmware in the past, and I know Virtualbox is different, but I'm not a big fan of virtualization if I can avoid using it. Memory concerns, etc. I know that to get the job done, these things are necessary right now, but it'd sure be nice to be able to ditch all the others and just be using Linux and Linux apps.
- llamaspit, on 10/09/2008, -1/+5Some really great points about the distinction of MS as a company and Wndows as a product. I think people confuse the two far too often.
Even in perfect conditions, programming an OS such as Windows is a herculian task. And the MS programmers who have to deal with each successive version of Windows face things that Linux developers simply don't have to deal with. Think about how much fun it was to transition the Windows user base from fat32 to ntfs. And to provide tools that, at least in most cases, gracefully allowed that change to happen, that's no easy feat. Combine with that legacy registry problems, legacy drivers, networking, legacy apps, etc., and it's amazing that the developers are able to pull it off time after time (Vista and ME notwithstanding). And in a closed environment as well.
So give props to developers, and if you have to make someone the villain over there at MS, look at the strategic positions, up higher on the ladder.
BTW, I'll say it again, I'm an avid Linux zealot, so before you think I'm a shill for MS, think again. I just think it's wrong to villify the folks in the trenches, trying to do a good job programming the stuff. - arcticsoft, on 10/09/2008, -0/+4I like aptana, but i hate that it doesn't really install, you just run it from a folder. Plus how cheap does it have to be to not even have an icon? To get it going right I have to update the icon myself?
I tried a lot of editors and my favorite is bluefish. - bstockwell, on 10/09/2008, -0/+4Lots of people, for my internship I have to test in ff3 + 2, ie6 + 7, and safari
This is where ubuntu + a virtualbox installation of XP comes in handy - WileEPeyote, on 10/09/2008, -1/+5After having heard a lot about Ubuntu, I decided to install it recently (I haven't had Linux on a machine since RedHat) on a spare P4.
It installed easily, recognized all my hardware and runs like a champ. I actually prefer it as an OS; it is cleaner, quicker (on older hardware no less) and more intuitive. The only issue is that I cannot use it for work or high-end games. I don't want to run software in a VM, the experience just isn't the same.
I have been playing with writing applications (non-web) on it, there are a couple of promising tools, but I can't tell yet (haven't learned them well enough) if it will be as easy as the Express edition of C# 2008. Anyway, that's my experience so far... - seventhc, on 10/09/2008, -3/+7Linux is in the mainstream. It doesn't need to have 90% of the market to be considered mainstream. It might not be the answer for everyone and thats why it's important that everyone has a choice. Everyone should just use what works best for them.
- inactive, on 10/09/2008, -0/+4Linux isn't a viable alternative for designers in the same way Mac isn't viable for hardcore gamers. It's about what you need, not what's mainstream.
- numb, on 10/09/2008, -0/+4I'm sure some developers could make the switch to designer, but I don't think I'm one of them. Learning the tools is the easy part for me, but I lack the visual artistic skills to make things look as nice as a talented designer can. I'm grateful that I have a talented web designer to whom I can farm out those tasks. My designer on the other hand has no interest in programming and is happy to farm out his development work to me. It works out great for both of us this way. However, there are definitely people out there that have the skills to do both parts well.
- captaindigger, on 10/09/2008, -3/+7"The designer voice in my head says, “What about Photoshop?” and the developer in me says, “What about testing on IE6? What about Coda?”
and the digg reader in me says,
What about a server that doesn't go down after 20 minutes on the front page of digg? - arcticsoft, on 10/09/2008, -0/+4Very true on the html side. I hear tons of people say they are writing "html code". html is formatting not processing, thus not code. If you are writing html you are formatting a page, not coding.
- infiniphunk, on 10/09/2008, -2/+6"I just can't find this tangible Microsoft "evil" everyone always complains about."
Probably because many of us expect a higher standard from or software vendor. If working within the constraints imposed upon you my Microsoft's EULA's is acceptable to you, fine. To many of us, it's not. I've used Windows for years, and I've also used various versions of linux for years, and frankly, after a while you start to see just how bad the Windows way of doing things sucks. If you're willing to accept it because of that application that you just can't live without (IE6? really?) then that is a standards compromise on your part. If you are willing to say Microsoft 'isn't so bad' then perhaps McDonald's "isn't so bad" and Dodge Caravan "isn't so bad"> - inactive, on 10/09/2008, -0/+4I'm still running PS7 in Wine under Ubuntu to offset the lack of features in Gimp. Gimp is improving but you're absolutely right, not a replacement for Photoshop. Other than that though, I really have no issues. And I don't mind using Wine, actually it's quite funny in a way. I always know I can just uninstall the whole platform and simply delete my ".wine" folder. All gone.
- FlareHeart, on 10/09/2008, -7/+10I do not think Microsoft is evil, their products have bugs just like every other software on the market. They simply get more flack for it because they have such a large market share and their bugs affect a lot more people. Linux has its fair share of bugs too...I use it myself, and it's not perfect but it is certainly a nice change if you are looking for something different from Windows. I dual-boot myself with Windows in one partition of my hard drive and Linux in another. I use both on a regular basis and don't have any problems with either one.
- 6dust, on 10/09/2008, -1/+4Not sure how long ago you tried Aptana, but Studio does have an installer and an icon.
- redwallhp, on 10/09/2008, -2/+5I made a switch recently too, from Windows to Mac. A lot of my preferred software is multi-platform (Firefox, Twhirl, etc). I had to buy a Macintosh copy of Photoshop, and hunt down some free alternatives for other apps I use (Textwrangler instead of Notepad, for example). My MacBook is now the ultimate web design and development machine. I find I work more efficiently on it too, with Spaces and Expose.
- JohnFlux, on 10/09/2008, -1/+4Going from linux to windows would also cause you to lose functionality. It's all about what you needq
- seventhc, on 10/09/2008, -0/+3When was the last time you walked up to 10 random people on the street and asked?
- neowolfwitch, on 10/09/2008, -1/+4He's probably looking at the realities of lagging support and the eventual demise of XP, and the piss-poor performance of Vista unless you shell out for new top-of-the-line hardware. He also may have just decided he's tired of giving Microsoft money for software that seems to devolve with every new release, when there are so many free alternatives available now.
- Krissam, on 10/09/2008, -2/+5How can you even begin to compare dreamweaver with gedit?
They're completely diffrent programs, one is a kickass texteditor, the other is a web design app.
But while we're doing the comparisms how about comparing
Gedit - Notepad
The Gimp - Paint
Openoffice.org Writer - Wordpad
Just to compare a few of the applications that you get more or less as a standard. - armo, on 10/09/2008, -2/+5"there isn't a single *desktop* app which only runs on Linux that I want."
Killer for me now: Compiz and Amarok (linux only atm)
"you dont have to install an entirely new operating system to run..."
It was only when I'd been using mainly open source apps on Windows that I decided to give Linux another go, haven't regretted it for a second and can't see myself going back to Windows for quite some time (never say never). My experience tells me the apps run far, far better on Linux. OpenOffice launches about 10 times quicker, Firefox's memory footprint is way smaller. When it comes to multi-tasking the performance difference, as well as the ability to manage the windows, is huge. My boss is always commenting on how busy my screen is, yet how quick it is.
Wrestling with boot loaders? Grub's always just worked for me. I've seen NTLDR is missing or corrupt a fair few times in my windows days though.
As for hardware, it really isn't that difficult to make sure you buy Linux compatible hardware. I'd far rather be spending my money on hardware upgrades than software any day... - Phate8263, on 10/09/2008, -0/+3@Dubbsacc
No you might want to rethink your statement.
"For example, a dynamic table which would probably have a data source tied to it, would start something like asp:table instead of table."
Your not talking about HTML, your talking about a template rendering language. NOT HTML. -
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