To many people, the move from Windows to Mac and OSX might seem very odd indeed. To them, Linux would seem a better choice. Personally, I get along fine with *nix. I first used it in the Berkeley flavor in 1981, at Berkeley, as a matter of fact. I have used it on and off ever since, on a variety of platforms and in a number of flavors. But even in the Ubuntu variant of the Linux flavor, *nix still does not have what it takes to be Everyman's operating system.
Why? Even with any current user-friendly version of Linux, you have to spend too much time in the basement mucking about with the plumbing. Most people, certainly well over 95%, simply will not do that. To continue the metaphor, they just want to call a plumber, not get out the wrenches. Please hold those howls, and refrain from telling me again that it's so easy that Grandma can do it. That is either *nix over-enthusiasm speaking or your grandmother is Grace Hopper. Remember, I use this stuff, and have been (probably) using it since before you were born.Instead of screaming at me for defiling your operating system of choice, go back and help the Linux community do the few things that need to be done to perfect your system. Get it to support all of the hardware that XP does, and maybe then some. Make it as easy to use as XP is, and maybe make it even easier. Make it so nobody has to play with the plumbing unless they want to. Do that, and it's a winner in the marketplace. Don't do it, and Linux will stay where it is: a good system for servers and for geeks and hobbyists like you and me.
A parenthetical note: in a large corporate environment, changing to Linux would make at least as much sense as changing to OS X, for one big reason. The IT support folks are primarily geeks. They might work on Windows machines, but they are born tinkerers. Most of them are probably Linux-savvy, either working on corporate Web servers or using *nix at home. They could probably support Linux in their sleep.
Tomorrow: Why I left Windows.
You admit it yourself: You have been using *nix since the 80s. That is one of the biggest problems with getting to Desktop Linux.
There are two factors preventing Linux from reaching the desktop, the technical and the social ones. The technical ones are being worked on rather nicely, as most people I know have found Ubuntu to "just work", with one exception.
It is the social factors that are, every single time, completely overlooked.
See, you've used it so long, probably without advanced GUIs, that you default to using the command line. Various recent linux-based operating systems (Ubuntu, for example, being the one I use) use either Gnome or KDE, and are fully capable desktops that don't require terminal commands to work. The way the "oldies" such as yourself default to the "hard way" of doing things when asked about linux is what alienates a -lot- of people from using it!
Posted by: Izkata | June 3, 2008 3:53 PM | Permalink to Comment