Sagar Gokhale wrote:
Ok, long rant coming up:
Everytime I see a beginner (aka n00b) ask a ... beginners question
here, a large volume of emails that follow harshly criticise the
person asking the question for not googling, or not RTFM, RTFA,
RTFwhatever. ... Well, ok, not googling is inexcusable, but anyway.
Well.. That is not a attitude one can carry for long in Linux/OSS community. and
I find nothing wrong with it. If someone refuses to learn, nobody can help it.
In my experience, business minded people are typical case. They want results.
They don't care how it is get done.
Works like candy in short term. In long term, well I don't want to be impolite..
What has to be realized by us (the linux community) that most of the
users whom we want to 'convert' are not developers. I know hardline
windows devs, and they're not going to convert. Sure, there's a small
segment of 'upcoming' developers (aka students) who should strictly
follow the usenet rules, and who should RTFM, and who should try and
familiarize themselves with the unix shell.
I must point out a difference here. It is not RTFM and get lost here. When one
is told to RTFM, it is with a pointer. I think that is friendly enough. (Leave
out a few nasties here and there, something always stink..)
But for the larger community of 'others', this advice falls on deaf
ears. Such an audience simply does not have the time to do all these
things; usability is the key issue; things should just work. Anyone on
this list who has used a Mac will know what I'm talking about. (Again,
I know the whole story about apple having to work with its own
hardware, while linux having to work with uncooperative hardware
manufacturers who dont give out their product details). But the truth
is that most things on a Mac just work ... ok, most things other than
their one button mouse.
Thing is, when somebody says he/she does not have time to learn, they don't have
the apetite really. People waste countless hours doing same stuff but refuse to
learn to do it properly.
That is inexcusable. The person loses. The rant causes people on borderline to
jump the wrong way and community loses too..
Don't even get started with mac. If you are not used to it, you might as well
try windows in klingon or vulcan..
Now, its not that linux (or other free os's in general, eg the BSD's)
are not capable of desktop eyecandy. The new opengl based stuff going
into x.org is stunning and way beyond what windows will have in years.
But everyone has to admit to one fact. Linux systems are just not as
usable yet, atleast to my mother and father.
Because they refuse to accept the fact that linux is different. They want it to
work that way. They have no problem learning remote of new TV or controls of new
music system but don't want to learn Linux.
Why? Because probably they run into somebody who advises them to run Linux. It
is a soft target. They can't make it work and suddenly it is fault of person who
has advised. Kinda like engineer manager scenario..
That is the reason I have stopped advising anybody. If they are happy, let them
be. Even if it means they keep their personal finantials in Excel on 98 and have
more than 3500 viruses..(No kidding.. My brothers PC had those many detected..)
As the originator of this thread said, he's gonna want to double click
on an rpm 5 years from now, and why shouldn't he? After all, that
makes more sense than hunting out something called a package manager
in your menu, or going to the terminal and typing rpm -ivh or
something. Now, unless we stop bitching about how these people should
stop wanting to double click on rpms and instead go out and buy a book
on bash programming, linux is never going to start being a threat to
windows. It is important to note that the audience is no longer people
who go "ooo look! shiny new kernel!". Unless that happens, linux will
remain a hobbyist os, and windows will remain the dominant desktop os
(i dont think x86 macOS will overtake windows by then :) )
Your argument is dithering. Package manger and Bash are as (un)related as
surgery and philosophy..
These people are also unlikely to learn the fact that latest windows variants
offer better security by means of an unprivilaged users.
If somebody does not want to learn a multiuser system as a home desktop, he can
not run anything effectively. Not windows, not Linux and neither BSD..
OTOH I have a friend who was running W2K with 4 unprivilaged accounts at home.
He requested a linux installation. I set it up(MDK10.1) and a half hour personal
quick start. Now he is more than happy.
Same goes for any other topic really. How many students ask for IDE in linux?
How many of them cannot make first half an hour thr. gcc lecture? Most is what
my experience is.
Sad but true..
Shridhar
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