[aklug] Re: windoze 7 sucks

From: Kevin Miller <atftb2@alaska.net>
Date: Wed Oct 20 2010 - 08:22:50 AKDT

James Tweet wrote:
> This is why Linux will never overtake Windows. All of us here are comfortable
> going into a config file and changing a setting. The rest of the planet is not.
> If we want Linux to overtake Windows. Step 1 is to GUIfy everything. Then get
> our documentation so that when a new user wants to change some setting. The help
> page points the person to the GUI utility first then farther down is
> instructions to change the config file manually.

Um, no. What's configured from the command line is largely not userland
programs. In general, there's nothing to configure with 95% of the
stuff that the 'rest of the planet' uses. Install Firefox? It just runs
afterward. Thunderbird (or your favorite email client)? Same thing.
After they're installed you may have some basic set up to do, but that's
probably in the GUI/program. OpenOffice.org? Same thing. Heck, most
stuff the normal user wants is pre-installed on the major distros and
you don't have to do much of anything afterwards.

Where you hit the CLI is installing something like FTP, apache, openVPN,
stuff like that. If you're at a sufficient competency level that you
know you need that, you're probably competent enough to open a text
editor and read a man page. And what we find is Linux rules in the
server room. Clearly, sysadmins aren't put off by the CLI.

There's very few programs that I've come across in normal user space
that actually require CLI access. YMMV of course.

It's actually kind of ironic, but Windows seems to be suffering from
Linux Envy. For instance, it used to be that you could pretty much
fully manage MS Exchange from the GUI. Exchange 2007 and on relies
heavily on powershell. There's a lot you can't do from the GUI even if
you wanted to. (Unfortuantely, powershell is a poor subsitute for bash.)

Or take the MS Server 2008 Core release. You get on it and you're in a
cmd shell box. No start button, no GUI admin programs, no nothing.
Close the cmd box and you're sorta stuck. There is some three fingered
way to get it back IIRC, but I've forgotten what it is. The CLI is it
in Core. Of course, when you want to install a program it kicks off a
graphical installer, but that's at the application level, not the OS.

I like having a GUI option for configuring - sometimes it's just easier
to fire it up, click a couple things and be done with it. But having a
config file to tweak by hand when needed is a definite plus.

I believe the reason that we lag on the desktop isn't because of the
CLI, but mostly because of marketing. Few commercial apps are release
for Linux because it's market share is so low. It's market share is low
because of so few critical apps, and lackluster support by the big boys
such as Dell, HP, etc. Kind of a chicken and egg scenerio...

...Kevin

-- 
Kevin Miller
Juneau, Alaska
http://www.alaska.net/~atftb
In a recent poll, seven out of ten hard drives preferred Linux.
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Received on Wed Oct 20 08:23:06 2010

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