Messages in this thread |  | | Date | Wed, 22 Jan 1997 23:48:34 -0800 (PST) | From | "W. Reilly Cooley" <> | Subject | Re: Good point of Linux over Windows NT |
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This thread is not really too relevant to this list, but since it is here, I shall put forth my notions on the subject.
If what is desirable here is attention from corporate users, then there are several strategies which may lend an air of "validity" (to the corporate bosses' eyes) to Linux:
1. "Linux Certification" Sounds dumb and trendy, but its much easier to get employment with a CNE or MCE (or whatever they call it), than to say, "Duh, I've been hacking Linux pretty seriously for the last few years." Seems like some of the commercial organizations could agree on some exams (with, of course, part of the profit from the fees going to further Linux development).
2. Benchmark comparisons in major industry periodicals. This is dangerous insofar as the validity of these magazines may be biased by "Corporate Subscriptions", but there ought to be someone other than Linux enthusiasts harping its merits.
3. A bit less fanatacism and reactionism. I recall reading in Byte many issues ago an article on Linux that compared its enthusists to Amiga enthusists, and cited that the comparable zealousness may harm corporate acceptance more than it helps. I think perhaps he is right: Which would be more appealing: a room full of CS grads yelling "Linux rocks!" or Microsoft with nice, pretty logos and a large base of usable applications?
4. More brainlessness and user-friendliness, both in use of the OS (a nicely pre-configured window manager would do) and of installation and use of applications. That is largely why people like MS Windows and why people write applications for it. This may sound heretical, but, point of fact, what do we really want? We want to be able use UN*X (preferably Linux) at work. Jobs! That's what the people want! This will only happen if we let less advanced users in on the game. Either way, we'll end up fixing neophytes' systems. Would you rather it be Windows or Linux? This is largely why Mac has managed to hold such a large percentage of market with a closed, propriety system over DOS.
5. Applications!! Applications!! That's also partly why Windows won out over OS/2 (despite the fact that OS/2 could run 16-bit Windows apps faster than Windows). This is partly also why NeXT never took off, nor did the eariler movement to market UN*X flavors for 80x86 (the price didn't help that either). Ultimately, if the OS has no applications (and ones that look good--unlike many of the stock X apps), then few will use it. We already have several big applications: Netscape, Mathematica, WordPerfect, etc. Adobe makes several products for Sun and SGI. How difficult would a port be? Another idea is support for cross-development, perhaps supporting (or translating) code from IDEs like Visual C++, Visual Basic, Borland stuff, etc. Perhaps a free implementation of the Microsoft Foundation Classes, for X/UN*X, that could be compiled with g++?
I have been following up on the NeXT buy-out, reading with some interest in the attempt to merge the OSes. Sounds like a bad idea. Nevertheless, one of the commentators mentioned that an improved Mac shell would incorporate features of the NeXT OS, but drop the UN*X shell and commands. It occurred to me what a splendid thing it would be if someone developed an OS which had both a nice, user-friendly GUI, for the graphic designers and secretaries, and a good command-line interface, like a UN*X shell and commands, that's fully tweakable. Imagine--a real choice!
W. Reilly Cooley ---------------------------------------------------------------- The Naked Ape Consulting 1509 NE 10th Ave., #104 Portland, OR 97232 503 287-2165 wcooley@navi.net http://www.navi.net/~wcooley
A horse walks into a bar and the bartender says, "Hey, why the long face?"
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