Christopher Cox wrote:
>
> Yeah, I felt a little foolish after I determined that www.redhat.org is
> registered up to 127.0.0.1.
>
> But in the other hand I would not put linux on a client of mine's desk at
> this point. Closet, yes, desk, no (Linux is replacing some NT & Unixware
> servers). Mandrake has made some large strides in making the OS more user
> friendy, but it seems allot less stable as well.
Why not? It's fire and forget!
I did this _exact_ thing with my parents. They use the computer for
exactly two things: email and web browsing. Prior to the Linux
Experiment, I got calls weekly about something that didn't work. They
don't abuse the machine, they haven't loaded anything on the machine.
It just pukes.
I put in the Linux machine, configured it once for their dialup
connection, gave them both logins, started X, and showed them how to
connect and start Netscape.
Ameritech isn't gaining any long distance money from them calling me
anymore. I'm not losing my hair trying to debug the latest bits that
ended up under the desk. And they're damned happy!
For business use, you bet I'd do it. In a heartbeat. The only thing
holding me back right now is the non-availability of industry-specific
applications.
I can guarantee you that management would be extremely happy if we could
move to another solution. No business risk from illegal software would
be right up there -- a local hospital recently got fined $250,000 for
employees copying software. No licensing issues when implementing a new
server -- that could save us large amounts of money. Remote
administration, software distribution, system management. All at zero
cost. I recently looked into PC-rdist for use in distribution Y2K
patches to the 100 PCs in our shops. Each of the solutions was
outrageously priced considering we could do the same for _ZERO_ dollars
on another platform.
If people would look at this from a _SYSTEM MANAGEMENT_ view, they'd see
that Linux offers tremendous value.
For home users, we've been straddled with a number of issues because of
the Windows dominance and our notion of playing fair. Dual-booting,
installing it themselves rather than pre-installed from a vendor, no
vendor support for hardware, etc.
Consider the possibility of Linux arriving preconfigured on your next
machine. That reduces the difficulty of installation problem to exactly
nothing. For the most part, you can download binary packages that you
install quickly and easily. And system cleanup through the package
management system beats Windows uninstallers any day. How many times
have you looked at a drive after uninstalling a Windows application and
STILL found remnants of it on the drive? How many times have you been
bitten because two applications each install their OWN, modified library
into the system directory? Count how many times the uninstaller just
threw up it's hands and asked for YOUR advice about shared libraries
that it didn't have a clue about -- do they belong to me? can I delete
them? what else is going to break?
It's a VERY real problem that administrators on Windows platforms face
day in and day out. Do YOU have time to sit and track the dependencies
of each piece of software on the machine? How do you explain to the
user that while the application functions correctly for the PC across
the hall, it doesn't work on theirs despite the fact that they're
loading the exact same copy of the exact same application and libraries
as that other PC (it's a network install)?
I'm living this life. I get paid well to do it, but if you think I
don't pine for the possibility of doing it in a better way, you're
nuts. I'd LOVE to put stable computers in front of these people that
don't break when I install a Microsoft-issued service pack onto a
computer that contains nothing but Microsoft software and vendor
drivers.
> I really am hoping for Inprise to release BCB4.0 to Linux, then I suspect a
> lot more apps will make themselves available....but that is only a guess.
I don't get this logic... Compilers, IDEs, libraries and the rest have
been available on Linux from the very beginning. What sort of "magic
bullet" is BCB4? Is it just that it offers a pretty picture for
programmers to look at while coding so they don't feel intimidated?
--
Steve Philp
Network Administrator
Advance Packaging Corporation
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
