Yes, I should have stuck with my original 'yawn' rather than get goaded into yet another pointless discussion about naming conventions...

To bring it back to topic, the move to gui OS tools and turning linux into a gui based OS is an important step in making linux easy for all. MS, with all it's faults, at least knows that in today's world the majority of users want a nice easy gui way to do everything. Even experienced users want that. At this stage linux also has CLI tools to do most things as well, although a point will come, and has come to some extent, where some things will only be done in the gui. That will annoy some traditional users, but it's the way things will be...

So part of the 'ease of use' is creating a full gui OS, and I think we now have it with Mandrake and Suse and such. Only a few weak areas like samba config, perhaps...

(edit - oops tink, I didn't even notice what this thread was til today, I thought it was a separate thread. I just was just getting the email notes and clicking... I'll take a bit more time to note where I am next time...)

If more people will move to Linux, more companies will make products for their costumers with Linux support and will mostlikely make their products easier to use/install on Linux.

[Sorry if this is already said, this thread is 131 pages, I didn't read every post]

I honestly hope and pray that this will NEVER happen,
and if it did I'd be one of the "annoyed traditional users"
and it might be time to move on to BSD ;) ... as soon as
they tie Gnome or anything to the kernel I'm out of the
linux-wagon ...


I still believe that catering to "global lazieness" is not the
"right thing" to do, and I would rather have people
understand things than believing they know how they
can drive a computer. But I keep repeating myself ;)


Cheers,
Tink

I know what you mean and I'm also in the traditional heap. I don't suppose we will ever lose the existing tools, but I think certain tools will become more gui oriented than others - like partition resizing or whatever (That's just an example since we still have gui and cli tools for that now). I think the gui will be a shell with linux for a while yet, it's just that it's likely that people will concentrate on the gui tools and neglect the cli tools. Mandrake and KDE, for example, do a good job of hiding the inner workings of the OS from the user, so I don't think we need to see the tight integration that MS uses with windows. This gives the gui OS that windows converts expect, but still give the power users full control from cli... That's the best of both worlds, I just don't know if it's going to continue that way. I think that will depend on who is doing the development work ...

Cheap shot. It wasn't about naming conventions. Good luck trying to run your pc with just a kernel...

Nooo. Really, Tink? In this short thread?

The bloody thing just won't die, eh?

Ahm, aren't you one of those powerful ones with the ability to apply lock and key even to this thread? aka moderators ? Perhaps it'd be something like the coup de grâce .

It was not until the MS version of Windows came out that computers became popular in most households.

Same with the Internet. Few people used the Internet with text only. It was probably about 6 months or a year after the Internet became available that Mosaic and Netscape hit the market as Graphical Web Browsers. After that, the Internet took off. MS Internet Explorer came out about a year after them.

You can complain all that you want about people being lazy and wanting everything easy in a GUI. The fact is that most people have other things in life that is important to them. The computer is simply a tool used like a car is used for going to work or play. (My brother refers to computers such as a hammer, and sometimes thinks that is the tool that it needs. He has used and written programs on UNIX systems since the 1970's and hates it.) Most people simply do not have the time to learn everythiing about an operating system.

And with Linux, no one seems to know everything. I refer to it like a game. There is always something new that requires lots of time which I don't have. The same applies to MS systems.

most stuff that needs to be in a gui for the "average user" already is. Linux. . . is already easy enough for the general population, most people are just too scared to use it. I taught my girlfriend how to use gnome to use my fedora server to watch TV(using tvtime), go on AIM, bring up firefox do some typing. For the most part its VERY easy. . . even installs such as Ubuntu make it difficult for a user to fuck up and the default install of Ubuntu for my ibook was fully functional on first boot. The widespread availability of Live CDs make it even easier for the average user to get familiar with linix since they don't even need to remove windows or attempt paritioning/dualboot setups before they are ready. I have ordered 10 ubuntu lives cds paired with install cds to handout to friends/coworkers who have expressed interest in linux but have also expressed concern over dumping windows. These are people who see me using linux all the time and not fighting popups/adware, freaking out about viruses, or wondering everytime I open my mail program if there is a new virus circulating like wildfire. They also see that the everyday office, web, and communications programs have a familiar look and feel paired with similar functionality.

The problem? If you look around at the distros they all have this peice or that peice of what each distro should be having now. But no one is really to that point where they offer complete ease of use for the average user without stifling your command prompt addicts. Frankely I like a combo of both

[QUOTE]Originally posted by green_squirrel
It was not until the MS version of Windows came out that computers became popular in most households.

Same with the Internet. Few people used the Internet with text only. It was probably about 6 months or a year after the Internet became available that Mosaic and Netscape hit the market as Graphical Web Browsers. After that, the Internet took off. MS Internet Explorer came out about a year after them.


Yes, but MS rode the wave rather than created it. Many people (like myself) had hobby PC's long before windows and even before MS, but the hardware was limitted - ie not enough ram for a page of text. As hardware became better and cheaper, PC's became more useful. And there were other gui systems beside windows. The mac had one and DR had GEM which was just as likely to be the desktop today except the the head of DR was out flying his plane (and DR was undercut with some shadey deal from MS after they practically stole QDOS). Unix also was covered with the superior client/server window system.

And as for the internet. MS ignored that for quite some time and it was left to others to develope - trumpet, mosaic, netscape, etc. Then MS finally saw what it was about and took over as usual using their monopoly position they had developed...

In the end MS was luckily positioned with the right hardware at the start (the IBM PC) and it happened to be the PC that took off. MS was established in that position with DOS way before windows, so they defaulted to the desktop GUI when PC's were powerfull enough. One good/bad thing is that MS initially became popular by piracy of the early OS and this has stuck with people and they still prefer to pirate the OS rather than buy it... Hard to break old habits I guess...

The only time I ever shelled out money for an MS operating system was the Windows 3.11 for workgroups that came with my pentium 60 from gateway and the windows 98 that came with a gateway I purchased some years later. . . and those are the two that I have probably used the least :-p

It is already happening to firefox, people are accepting it with its whole 6% of the market.

I've taught my gf also to use Linux to a degree (we have SuSE 9.1 Pro) and she can now log in, surf the net, type up her reports, send e-mails and play some games. She can even install an RPM she finds on the net directly (though I've warned her off entering the root password unless I'm there for obvious reasons) and run it (usually games!)

We have two computers, one with Windows with loads and loads of souped-hardware mainly for games and one with SuSE 9.1 Pro which is equipped well enough to do work and play most recent-ish games. I don't think I need to say which one is playing up 9 times out of 10 when she phones me at work with a problem

/me shivers ....


I just upgraded my desktop at work from w2k to
eXPeriment ... after the installation the thing new
NOTHING about the VGA controller, the sound-
card or the Network interface ... and the box is
more than two years old.

Knoppix for instance picked up ALL hardware
immediately ...

So much for people crying for Linux to me more
like windows; I for sure am glad it isn't anything
like it, otherwise the thing would have been un-
usable ;)


Cheers,
Tink