Author: Robert Hyatt
Date: 18:11:36 12/05/99
Go up one level in this thread
On December 05, 1999 at 16:42:55, Christophe Theron wrote: >On November 30, 1999 at 09:13:30, Vincent Diepeveen wrote: > >>Here i reply to my own message? Why? >>I"m using this linux program/unix program called Lynx. >>I have 20 lines or so. I DO NOT SEE HOW TO INSERT lines. >>Me as a programmer can not EASILY see how i insert a line. >>Lynx is heaven compared to linux programs. You need to >>read gigabyte of doc files and ask a lot of friends how to >>get things done before you can install it. I never ever tried >>to install my cable modem in linux i never even installed internet >>at my system. Linux is improving, no doubts about that, >>but what is more important in this world, something that works >>wel or something that works better and better yet the others >>improve faster? Same question as for computer chess engines. >>We can only see in the future how it unfolds. For now the >>Merced is gonna be an important obstacle. If companies like >>redhat can offer linux systems that are a lot more user friendly >>and more integrating things with a better compiler than or just >>as good as the visual compiler, then linux makes a chance to expand. As the >>world gets more computer expansion is there anyway, but i guess most important >>is relavite expansion: the % of the market you occupy. >>For now linux is getting used by f'ing freaks who need to spent nearly fulltime >>learning how to work with it. >>that is the main obstacle. Software is of course another point but that's a bit >>smaller points if linux users would be WILLING to pay for something >>the average linux user is either student like me or working at a university or >>learned during his university period to work with it. they don't want to pay for >>anything. that's the main problem for game developers. > > >I completely agree with you, Vincent. > >Linux is probably very good, but it's very hard to notice ! :) > That isn't exactly true. Microsoft has _definitely_ noticed it. They noticed it enough to run a SMP test with a terribly mis-configured linux box, so that they could show how much better NT performs as a file server, and a http server, and so forth. :) I can supply some _real_ data for anyone that is interested... >I have set up one of my computers with Linux, because as a professional >programmer I cannot afford to ignore it. > >It was very hard to get it running. It was hard to get my video card working >properly. It was hard to get the sound card working. > >I tried to get the MSDOS emulation working. It's one of the main things for me: >I want to get rid of Microsoft stuffs, but still need (at least for a while) to >run my DOS utilities. > >I had to read dozens of docs, spend several hours, and finally I gave up. > >Two days ago I had to change the motherboard on this system. Now Linux does not >work anymore. I can boot it from a floppy, but then I have no idea how to get it >working again. > >Compare this with Windows (I'm still using good old W95B): I just had to reboot, >Windows noticed some changes on the hardware, made the appropriate changes, and >it worked in 2 minutes. From my experience, rebooting is so common.. :) My wife boots, connects to her ISP, gets a disconnect, and can't reconnect until she reboots. Disgusts her when I just keep working and let my ppp connection automatically re- connect after a failure with no action on my part... and certainly no re- booting... > > >I'm planning to erase Linux from my computer and try it again next year. My >plans to port Tiger on Linux are delayed. > > >I'm very sad about this: I would really like to work on a non-MS platform. With >Windows I don't feel in control of my computer anymore (especially W98). But >with Linux it's even worse! I feel I don't control anything anymore. Each time I >have the smallest problem I know it's going to take hours to fix it. This is a stretch. Come to Birmingham Alabama. I will show you a company that is managing the electric power for the southeast US, running _linux_. I will show you a campus (UAB) with over 20,000 employees, an enormous medical center, etc... things like our campus-wide voice mail system? Linux. News server? Linux. Email server? Linux. Campus DNS server? Linux. I do a "intro to Linux" continuing education 2-day class 4 times a year. It usually has 10-20 people in it. Maybe 2 are from inside the university. Maybe another 2-3 are just interested in Linux in general. The others are businesses that are using linux in mission-critical applications... It does work. It never crashes. It is utterly reliable... > >And, on purpose, I don't want to spend the needed time to learn the OS. "Normal" >users will not spend all this time. So I want it to be easy enough to get wide >acceptance. At this time, it is FAR from being the case. > > >The less worse solution I have found to my OS problem so far is to stick with >Windows 95B (OSR2). It works on all my computers: 386sx-20 (5Mb RAM!), >486dx2-66, K5-100, PPro200, K6-2-300 and K6-2-450. > >The problem with Microsoft is that you'll never get a reliable operating system: >you get a system that almost works, but has many bugs. When you want to fix >them, you have to get the next version of the OS, which is fatter, does not run >anymore on your computer (allegedly because your 1 year old computer is already >outdated) and brings a lot more bugs than what it fixes. > >I don't want to be part of this crazyness. But nobody offers an alternative. > > > Christophe
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