What is Digg?223 Comments
- ggidster, on 10/11/2007, -16/+132Desktops will *likely* follow? I'm not convinced and I think this works the other way around. The reason for Windows popularity is down to the fact that there's so much software available for it. Remove that software back catalogue and you have nothing. People choose their OS based on what applications they want to use. The Apple OS and Mac hit the desktop in the publishing world because the software applications (Quark/Photoshop etc) for it were the best at the time. If the best DTP programs around in the late 80's had been Windows/DOS based, Apple would never have made it. The quantity of fabulous open-source server applications available is what has driven Linux to be a primary server OS of choice. To drive it to the desktop, you need killer desktop applications.
- diggapleaze, on 10/11/2007, -5/+83By that same token, I guess this unfortunately makes us all Windows users as well. ;)
- brufleth, on 10/11/2007, -18/+95"The clueless screaming for help!"
Wow! Right there is a reason Linux turns people off. The attitude that if someone doesn't know how to compose some obnoxiously long command they're "clueless."
I develop tools for ENGINEERS with more experience and degrees than you will probably ever have and I KNOW that expecting them to be able to remember every stupid ass command to do something they only do a few times a year is just silly. Some of us just don't have the memory for it.
I use a command line daily but I'm also frustrated daily because there is either something new or something I do very rarely that I can't remember how to do. Command lines are frustrating because they aren't intuitive, unlike a well made GUI. And the first one to mention man pages gets stabbed in the eye. - slsanity, on 10/11/2007, -15/+73Why does every Linux user assume that people who don't use Linux are confused or misguided? Like "if we just understood" we would be making the switch.
Here's a wake up: Most users like their operating systems. I duel-boot Windows and OS X and I love both of them. Would it be nice to run all my applications under one OS? Sure it would be great, but Linux doesn't solve that issue (and please don't give me this "WINE has come such a long way, now it only takes 10 man hours of work to get a non-platinum supported app to run". And their definition of "run" is very very loose).
I understand how Linux works. I understand it's advantages and disadvantages just like every other educated computer user and yet something interesting is happening: I'm not making the switch. Honestly these half condescending, half "we're trying to help you!" articles need to take a page from their own book and just enjoy what you use.
Your OS isn't your religion, you aren't required to indoctrinate others. - Homunculiheaded, on 10/11/2007, -11/+68re: the command line article
typing text in a gui is not using the command line. When I write an essay am I using the command line because I am entering text? When you enter information into GUI fields you are adding parameters to a command which is handled by the user interface, not entered by the user. The key word in 'command line' isn't 'line'... it's 'command'!
I'm not anti command line by any means, I use it every day in both windows and linux, but it's very, very important for advanced computers users and CS people to understand the very radical difference between how we see a GUI and how a 'normal' human user sees a GUI. Technologically savy people see the GUI as a pure metaphor for the functions that are being performed. When you click a button on a website you know that what's really happening is an image of an unpressed button is being replaced by an image of a depressed button while your executing a command to pass your data to the server...
normal users think 'I am pushing a button'.
A well designed GUI is perceived by the user as being 'magic' and working like real world objects do rather than how computers do. This 'magic' is actually important because human minds do not innately operate the way digital machines do. - JosephDurnal, on 10/11/2007, -5/+51To be considered a user, I think you'd have to have it installed on your desktop. Using the logic in this article, we are all Cisco IOS users too, not to mention solaris, aix, z/OS, and .
- cquinnd, on 10/11/2007, -4/+47Heck, many of us are still OS/2 users by that criteria.
- jmkiii, on 10/11/2007, -3/+35We use just about everything around us. I have used a rock as a tool, does that make me a cave man?
Don't answer that! - inactive, on 10/11/2007, -3/+26Darwin is based on Mach and tiny pieces of FreeBSD, not BSD. Get it right.
- Xageroth, on 10/11/2007, -6/+28Mac: "I'm better than you, Windows."
Windows: "***** you, Mac."
Linux: "I'm better than you, Mac."
Mac: "***** you, Linux."
Windows: Ya, ***** you Linux, you stay out of this." - dystopianray, on 10/11/2007, -2/+23@bysin
The PS3 does not ship with Linux, it must be manually installed. - Murdats, on 10/11/2007, -1/+21wow, you combined a bad insult with horrible spelling,
great work at demonstrating who is the real 'looser' - Philluminati, on 10/11/2007, -1/+18ha ha ha ha ha ha. This is priceless
- manifestdata, on 10/11/2007, -15/+32Man Linux users sure do spend a lot of time writing blogs and submitting the stories to Digg hoping to bring users around. Instead of writing this crap, why don't you spend some time helping them since it is an Open Source project. Oh wait, you don't know jack ***** about coding and just jumped on the bandwagon? I guess being a Linux cheerleader is the next best thing.
- dgh1973, on 10/11/2007, -4/+21By this logic, we are also all AS400 users. What does this have to do with breaking into the desktop?
Lame. - MiddleOfNowhere, on 10/11/2007, -7/+23@ Shigun:
> Anything that you can do on a "killer desktop application" in Windows can
> be done either in OSX or Linux as well.
In OS X - yes. In Linux?
I beg to differ.
Take e.g. professional audio and video. There is nothing that comes even close to Cubase or Sonar in the Linux world. Which doesn’t make the latter a bad OS. It’s just that you can’t catch up with fifteen years or more of product development just because the fanboys want it to be that way.
FileMaker, FrameMaker, Dreamweaver, Photoshop, Picasa, Help & Manual, Outlook: Give me all these Windows/Mac apps or equally stable Linux apps with consistent GUIs, and I will gladly switch. Or maybe not, as my various Windows XP boxes work just fine (which admittedly took some tweaking and a trillion patches from Microsoft). None of my machines has crashed in weeks, and I have a pile of games on top of the apps mentioned above.
So frankly - why bother? - ninj3, on 10/11/2007, -3/+18@Shigun
I tried the switch recently. A mistake on a VAIO laptop. The desktop was great and all but I lost tonnes of special functionality with the laptop. And the main reason I use my laptop is for designing on the move. I could find no easy intuitive method of installing the Adobe suite on Linux so i gave up. It was useless to me.
Yes I know, it must be possible to modify my Linux to make all the extra buttons and fingerprint security to work, and use WINE to install and use adobe stuff. But frankly, it's too hard. It's not easy to do. I'm no programmer and I don't have the time to learn the intricacies of Linux customisation.
Therefore, I will use whichever OS can do what I need, and do it with minimal fuss. Windows has many, many faults. But for all its vices, it still allows me to do my work, easily, and in the end, that's all I really want out of my OS.
The thing the Linux pushing community should understand is that, although Linux can theoretically do absolutely anything Windows or Macs can do, until it becomes really easy to do it (like duh...point and click easy), us non computer specialists won't make the switch. - stalefries, on 10/11/2007, -1/+15Ooh, I love using .
- mapkinase, on 10/11/2007, -2/+15Yeah. I am a Caterpillar user. I bought a house that was built many years ago using Caterpillar.
- JSager, on 10/11/2007, -9/+21I don't use Linux because it is filled with security holes and usually comes bundled with a bunch of unnecessary software I have to delete. I mean who uses AOL these days, honestly?
- 3mpire, on 10/11/2007, -0/+12By that logic we're all communists because so many of our goods we use on a daily basis come from china: http://www.made-in-china.com/
- Azimuth1, on 10/11/2007, -11/+23"So, if you're a Web user, you're a Linux user."
And that's good enough for me, thanks.
*Continues to run XP* - Veight, on 10/11/2007, -5/+15What a stupid article.
- totallyAMAZING, on 10/11/2007, -9/+19Darwin is based on BSD not Linux. Get it right.
- wxjunkie, on 10/11/2007, -9/+18"Desktops will follow" has been the mantra for what, ten years now?
- betterth, on 10/11/2007, -9/+18So, since Linux/OSS has copied functionality from Windows, does that also make all Linux users Windows users?
Are all Open Office users Microsoft Office users?
Why is every single year proclaimed to be year of the linux and it never is? I've used plenty of distros and I've met maybe one that was ready for a non-tech person to use them. And I knew with that one, if I gave it away, I'd still have to field endless amounts of questions.
Put it this way. As long as Linux is the way it is, it'll never be ready for the desktop. It needs to be user friendly, and Linux never has been. The only distros that are user friendly are just installed with all the unfriendly parts already done.
But until some distros actually make a leap and make an OS that, as apple says, "just works", they'll never be ready for the desktop. - Moriya, on 10/11/2007, -10/+19@chingy- please show me a Linux distro that requires you to "type a bunch of commands" to play an Mp3. Obviously you've never tried Ubuntu - it DOES allow you to do everything through a GUI and has wizards that make it easy to use - the command line is more for power users. Also, the reason why you've never seen a download link on a page is you don't have to search out a download page to install new programs under Linux, simply use add/remove programs (under Ubuntu) or a package manager like synaptic to get and install your new programs quickly and easily.
call me a robot but your argument sucks. - hmmmok, on 10/11/2007, -6/+15Harsh, but pretty accurate in a lot of cases.
- Homunculiheaded, on 10/11/2007, -3/+11"it DOES allow you to do everything through a GUI"
I think the 'everything' is a bit of stretch, can you install software that's not contained in any of the package manager repositories? That's a pretty simple request, and as far as I know there's no way to do it through the GUI. (although if there is I'd be interested). - burty89, on 10/11/2007, -1/+8@chingy1788:
http://www.sandisk.com/Products/Catalog(1249)-SanDisk_Sansa_Connect_MP3_Player.aspx
http://www.linuxdevices.com/news/NS2155128286.html
http://www.engadget.com/2007/01/08/sandisk-sansa-connect-wifi-portable-audio-player/
@Homunculiheaded:
It depends if the software is distributed as a deb file, if it is then you simply double click & then click install in the window that will appear. If not, you'll either have to add a repository or (rarely) compile from source. - Darcy, on 10/11/2007, -7/+14"Wow, that's harsh"
But absolutely correct. - BZKyle, on 10/11/2007, -2/+8OMG SOME1 IS USING LINUX!!1111111
WE MUST POST IT ON DIGG!!!!!!!!ONE!!!!
I use Linux, and I'm getting tired of this happening every single week. - L0t3k, on 10/11/2007, -1/+7@slsanity
You're making an equally obvious mistake. You assume that all linux users are like that. Most are not.
I run a nearly all-windows network at work, program almost exclusively against the .net framework, have only linux boxen at home, and i'd love to have a macbook.
Nowadays it's more about preference than practicality, except for the very few people that actually own, say, Photoshop. Oh, and yes, wine is a lame stop-gap. Not to diminish a clever little app, but that's what it is. When I decide to use a linux distro on a machine, I assume that any windows stuff I'm going to use will have to be used in a VM, decide how necessary it is, and then decide if performance on that particular app will be a key issue. If it is, then linux isn't the best os for that machine. When I go to build a media center, I want a mythtv system. When I want a laptop that's going to be used for security intensive work, I use a linux distro. When I get a new machine for my mother, it'll probably be a windows machine or a mac.
The only situation that really bugs me is web servers. The .net framework is so nice to work with (it's the thing MS really got right) I prefer to write for that... but I want the security and configurability of a *nix box, which win2k3 + iis can't provide. Mono sucks. Sorry, it's bad and monodevelop is worse. So anyway, that situation is one that always makes me squirm.
I'm still open to suggestions on that one. :) - gen2ux, on 10/11/2007, -0/+6* shakes head *
- Phocion55, on 10/11/2007, -3/+9I play rugby. But I don't turn the power off. Does that still count?
- morningblur, on 10/11/2007, -1/+7@ Homunculiheaded
Yes, since the Dapper Drake (or maybe Edgy Eft, I forget specifically) release, you can download a .deb file directly from the internet, double click on said file, and install it without entering the command line. It isn't perfect (sometimes dependencies aren't met and you have to do some additional work) but it has usually always gotten the job done for me. - daftman, on 10/11/2007, -2/+7why would they fear microsoft? Google isn't afraid of any legal battle as yet. Hint: Youtube
- scot524, on 10/11/2007, -2/+7I am one of the few hundred thousand users or so that uses Linux as a desktop operating system but I am burying this article as inaccurate. Linux success stories in the embedded and web server markets will not necessarily translate to more desktop adoptions. I could be wrong, perhaps watching TiVo could trigger a mass adoption of Linux.
I usually enjoy Vaughan-Nichols' articles, but this one is just inane. - loganbh, on 10/11/2007, -0/+5"Because it ships on nearly all new computers and you have no choice whether you have it or not?"
Dell started to change this. - griz, on 10/11/2007, -3/+8"and desktops will likely follow."
That's a bold assumption.
Penetration into the markets mentioned does not follow that desktops are next.
It's about as silly as saying that since Apple now dominates the online movie and musice
download markets and the PMP market and soon the mobil phone market that
they will soon dominate the desktop market. - Grimdotdotdot, on 10/11/2007, -2/+7So if we use the Internet we're Linux users?
So if a die-hard Linux user visits on of the millions of websites hosted on a Wndows server, is he a Windows user? - inactive, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5I'm glad i switched to linux , i ran it in vmware for a long time and worked with it for years. I finally made the jump (the hardest part) after a while you customize it to your liking then you just wont go back to windows. I don't have to waste time with antivirus, and spyware. I only need to run a few apps in wine and most of everything i need to do works well in linux. I run into issues at times, but ubuntu has a great support forum and i enjoy the challenge of having control over my os, instead of it controlling me.
- thcobbs, on 10/11/2007, -2/+6***GASP***
You mean.... we all USE OPERATING SYSTEMS ?!?!?!?!
Is it any wonder that businesses choose the free alternative to the pay-per install alternative? The maturity of linux allows it to be a stable platform to build your application on. Trust me, it's not that linux is the Saviour of the computer world.... it's just the cheaper workable solution. - tuzziel, on 10/11/2007, -3/+7Pity Linux is such a mess.
- FyberOptic, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5There's a huge difference between using services which take advantage of linux, and using linux for ones self. Linux is best suited to powering servers, which is why it's so widespread across the internet. Windows is best suited to running desktop machines, which is why it's so widespread amongst users. Your average person doesn't want the burdon of configuring and dealing with linux on a daily basis, and you can't blame them. Hell, even I use Windows on my own PC, just because I know of the frustration linux can cause from dealing with it on servers I manage all day.
So no, we're not all linux users. Sorry zealots. - zyl0x, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5Well, I do use Google and cell phones, but you can't prove I use the web!
- daftman, on 10/11/2007, -4/+8You're reading it from a linux_unix section of digg.com
WTF do you expect? Windows stories? Go to the windows section and you pretty much see the shame thing.
"Oh wait, you don't know jack ***** about coding and just jumped on the bandwagon? I guess being a Linux cheerleader is the next best thing."
Kinda prove that everybody can contribute to linux in one form or another. You can do this for every OS as well so what's your argument? I see alot of preaching Mac fanboy and windows fanboys who aren't coders as well - Murdats, on 10/11/2007, -3/+7anti_virus? spyware?
what are these strange terms you speak of
I have been using windows for years without these and have come accross neither (well cept on other peoples computers, but if you have the skill to use linux, you have the skill to use windows compently (sp)) - xspinkickx, on 10/11/2007, -1/+5actually Darwin is an open operating system built around the XNU kernel which is based on the mach3 micro kernel and parts of Free BSD5. OS X is then built around Darwin, the core of OS X. The linux kernel has nothing to do with Darwin or the XNU kernel.
Also Linux is not an operating system linux is just a kernel. - erikerikerik, on 10/11/2007, -2/+5indeed. soooooooo many flavors.
nearly tooo many to pick from. -
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