I was reading the interview of Mr. Tourrilhes and something struck me, copied and pasted is the question.

LQ) Recently, a hotly debated question has been: "When will Linux be ready for the desktop?". When do you see that happening (or has it already)? and what do you see as 802.11*'s place in that?


The answer was a bit longer so I wont paste it in...but what struck me as interesting was the comment that Linux nor any other OS is ready for the desktop, ie the public. I am fortunate/unfortunate (pick one) to work a job where I field calls from the public all day to troubleshoot various issues, rarely advanced ones. I work for a broadband company, and probably 80% of the calls recieved are M$ issues, software related. This includes spyware, adware, AOL software problems, OE, etc. And naturally the company only supports IE and M$ and OE...

My question is, how much of this would be a problem if computer sellers, Dell, Gateway, HP, Compaq, etc, sold computers with prepackaged, functioning Linux OSes?

The general public seems very adept at trashing microsofts various OSes, and it seems, considering the public, who arent advanced users, would be better suited with a stabler OS that had less flaws and was less vulnerable to worms and such. This would of course require makers to publish drivers for hardware on easy installer cds( )....among other things, but it seems the public buys whatever they see in the store.....im rambling now...

any thoughts?

I also want to mention default settings on IE like (Enable third party browser extensions) ugh

Dell has an agreement with Microsoft to prepackage WindowsXP, I know that HP was selling a low-cost desktop that has Mandrake but I haven't heard much about it, Wal-Mart is selling linux computer with the rest giving it some public attention. A lot of people right now can't use their prepackaged XP computer well, so would throwing a different OS in help? People might have to relearn some stuff but distros like Mandrake making Linux really easy. The general public can trash windows quite well, what was it, around 20+ pieces of spyware on the average computer, but relize that less than 3% of the computing population use linux, most of whom are computer proficent, if you are going to right spyware which would you choose? Security does play into this though, most people run their computers as administrator in windows but it doesn't matter because I can be the lowest of the low and still release a virus. The people at Microsoft say that Linux is getting away with security through obscurity, which makes a little sense, but not to the extent that people using IExplorer simply go to a website and have their system comprised.

well you sorta emphasized my point, not explained well...the public doesnt really know how to use windows....a change to linux wouldnt be much different, and it would be cheaper for the customer...just need to know the left button from the right one, and what to click to get "the internet"