On 10/05/2009 10:47 AM, Jon 'maddog' Hall wrote: > I have watched Linux systems improve for the past 15 years. Free > Software is amazing, and it is getting better. Certainly the GAP has > closed between FOSS and Microsoft. The gap may or may not close between > Apple and FOSS.
Depends on how accurate the slopes of your two curves are. I think there's actually a chance of this happening in the next five years. For one, Apple seems to be losing interest in Macintosh, which may affect their slope. A desktop iPhone seems inevitable. I was recently complaining that a Macbook Pro I bought 3 years ago costs the same to 'buy again' today, but that the manufacturing costs have gone down significantly over that same time and it's barely any faster a machine. When I bought 3 years ago I did a component comparison and found it to be a very good value. That same comparison today largely fails, leaving only the value of the software and service to make up the difference. But I still think it's a good value for non-computer geeks. With Macintosh you pay up-front. With Windows you pay on the back-end. Linux installs tend to be somewhere in the middle. When it was recently insisted to me that "Linux on the desktop isn't ready for most users" is an old and tired mantra, and that everything worked now, I typed in this list off the top of my head: "Things that frustrate me on a daily basis would include: pulseaudio is always crapping out (they blame the hardware drivers that work under ALSA), wake from sleep on my netbook is hit-or-miss, syncing my phone isn't yet possible (maybe the next-next version of OpenSync will work), no detection of unplugging an external display (kms will handle this in the next xorg), DPI rendering issues depending on the toolkit/window manager in use (better in KDE 4.3 but still some problems), no usable multi-head configuration tool, crazy-hard file manager, crazy-hard file chooser (depending on toolkit), multimedia codec difficulties (improving), no tear-free video (probably in Wayland), difficult to setup some printers (had to manually configure one wireless HP last week with an hour of googling and an hour of experimenting), video drivers that don't support currently available hardware, Network Manager hoses my routing table, task bar requires too many clicks. I can handle lots of these but my parents can't." The interesting thing about my current list of frustrations is that a good chunk of the really hard ones are being worked on right now. Some of those require significant re-architecture to get right. But from there, a stable foundation for getting a polished system will exist, so things look brighter now than they ever have. That's enough for me to know that if I work on the stuff I can there's a good chance of having a great product in the end. I file *lots* of bug reports, but FLOSS developers actually seem to care about fixing them. For my money, Apple's hostility towards open source on the iPhone and their attempts to get bloggers (as a class) ruled by the CA courts as being unable to be considered journalists for the purposes of protecting sources were too much for me. So I started switching my business desktop workflow over to all-free software a year ago. I'm nearly done - the Macbook Pro is off at AppleCare now getting a new: dvd burner, battery, bluetooth module, keyboard, case fan, and maybe top assembly. Each has minor issues but I bought the machine with the $300 extended warranty and a very nice and very smart US-based support gal helped me get the service all setup in about 20 minutes, and was readily able to listen and understand that I knew what I was talking about and savvy enough to listen to and agree with my diagnostic procedures. The computer is already sold to a friend for about half of its original value (slightly less than the eBay market price), which ain't bad for a 3-year-old laptop (it cost me about a buck a day to own while I had it). I also recognize that Apple employs FLOSS hackers and that they make important contributions to the ecosystem that we all benefit from. There's no bright line here between false dichotomies and every one of the big tech companies has something special to hate about them. Yet, for people who will tend to call me expecting free tech support - they should be buying Apple hardware until Linux is ready. And, yeah, it sounds like Alex got the dweeb at the Apple Store. I've also had terrible service at another Apple store, and yes, Apple charges convenience-store prices for RAM and peripherals. -Bill -- Bill McGonigle, Owner BFC Computing, LLC http://bfccomputing.com/ Telephone: +1.603.448.4440 Email, IM, VOIP: b...@bfccomputing.com VCard: http://bfccomputing.com/vcard/bill.vcf Social networks: bill_mcgonigle/bill.mcgonigle _______________________________________________ gnhlug-discuss mailing list gnhlug-discuss@mail.gnhlug.org http://mail.gnhlug.org/mailman/listinfo/gnhlug-discuss/