Please forgive me for being a blood-sucking leech...

Don't take me wrongly, I do respect those that have struggled through the early years. I've "been there, done that", myself.

My very first "IBM clone" was an 8088-based Tandy w/256k RAM, monochrome display and no sound card, running MS-DOS v2.11. I've spent more time than I care to remember copying drivers, editing startup and config files, and reconfiguring HIMEM to keep drivers out of precious 'user RAM space' every time a new device became available, or every time I upgraded my OS. And we didn't have any forums to help with problems. I did figure it out myself when my brand-new sound card was using the same IRQ as my mouse, causing conflicts and system instability.

As far as I'm concerned, P-n-P BIOS and auto-hardware detection didn't come a moment too soon. But I do realize that's just a matter of opinion...

Cheers

That's just the problem - it already has.

That all being said, I just brought a Ubuntu box on line. Resurrected some older hardware and gave to someone who just needs a computer to get some work done - one that I won't be able to be around to maintain. Hadn't looked at Ubuntu for a few years and must admit it has come along quite nicely. Nothing wrong with Shuttleworth - he has his own agenda and deserves the credit for putting his money where his mouth is. Wouldn't be the distro for me, however.... (Yeah, okay, I'll admit I've gone over to the "bright" side and am on Solaris these days because ZFS is just that compelling...)

Peace-- gotfw

Mark Shuttleworth is a shrewd and highly successful entrepreneur who has already achieved a great deal (this whining elitist has not been a space tourist, yet!). The man is very intelligent, rich, powerful and influential with a huge Ubuntu community of followers. It's precisely his own agenda that tends to worry me. He is in a position where he could soon dictate the future of Linux if the other Linux communities don't pay close attention.
P.S. I looked into 8.10 but am not joining the ranks of Ubuntu followers).

This may not be the place for it, but hell, the polls are closed so...

Why do you reference Shuttleworth as a "whinning elitist"? Mind you I've only had limited interaction w/him, and not in some years (pre Ubuntu days) but I never got that read from him. To me he seemed fairly philanthropic, and pretty targeted on helping improve things like education in S.Africa. But maybe I was just naive and his agenda all along was to develop his own Linux distro, get it out there everywhere, and then rake in the big bucks providing support? If so then I agree that he is one shrewd cat indeed...

If you'll note from my previous posts, I am definitely not in the camp that feels the need to bring *nix to the masses, slay the evil M$, commercialize FOSS into a profit center, etc. Imho, commercial interests waving a few dollars around have already exerted far too much undue influence and corrupted more than a few dev heads to push for corp agendas over technical excellence. But it also undeniably has driven progress on other things as well. So I guess we have to take the good with the bad. The real issue with bringing *nix to the masses is the shift in demand from technical excellence from a fairly tech savvy user base that has a clue or two, to eye candy, bells, whistles, etc. from a user base that tends not to look past the shinny chrome.

P.S.; Slack has survived this long and I don't see it fading into oblivion as long as folks like you are around so think there will also be certain distros that eschew popularity in favor remaining true to "the Unix way". It's just far less likely to win these popularity contests with the masses.

No, the whining elitist is ME. Not at all Shuttleworth.
English is not my mother tongue so sometimes things don't turn out as intended. In that case I was referring to myself.

I got it right, but then again I've been following along the entire time. How was the appendectomy? I've nearly finished my cuckoo clock!

We whining elitists are busy folk, you know.

Absolutely, I fully agree.
Thanks for reading and understanding.
The appendectomy was painful and the stitches hurt a bit.
I have not started working on my cuckoo clock yet.
I have been tied up all weekend updating my resume.
I am enrolling at NASA to train to become a space tourist. The Russians are also being contacted.
I am accepting donations.
That's 4 Is in a row. I guess, some of us whining elitists like to show off.
Cheers,
dora

Have Used so many, Maybe Knopix is the one.

Agree to that
"humanity to others"
Words like this, is what scares me the most.

Only Mandriva for me too !

Maybe some people just want to do other things besides write code. Just a thought.

Ah. But I note you're not communicating via 1's and 0's so not too '1337 yet. Apparently not all that cuckoo either...

Peace

P.S>; Next time try staples. Or better yet, skin glue ;-P

Next time try to figure out what is really bothering you before posting!!

Hi, Dora~

Pardon me for being a buttinski here, but I'm most certain gotfw was trying to be humorous, not offensive...

Cheers

Who said you have to write code? My shell scripting is sloppy, and my C makes people scream and run for cover.

There are lots of other contributions people can make, like writing up-to-date documentation, designing themes, wallpapers or icons. Even suggesting different user interface layouts.

To do any of that you really have to understand how the OS and it's components work. You don't need enough knowledge to rewrite the thing, just an understanding.

People who give you the "stupid look" when you reference things like dd, fdisk, wget, make, grep, locate, or (heaven forbid) man; just don't make the cut.
-----------------
Shuttleworth reminds me a lot of a young college dropout that once proclaimed a dream of a personal computer in every home. That young man grew into a multi-millionaire, is now semi retired, but still consulting to those that peddle bug-laden insecure software for outrageous prices.
-----------------
Speaking of the MS clan, be this a bit belated.... Congratulations on finally halting software piracy. Vista is so crappy that people not only won't buy it, they won't even even steal it on the Internet!