Yeah, people do tend to take the easy way out. Giving up on Linux and running back to Windows is definitely the easy way out. That's why I think it very important for linux designers to follow the engineering philosophy "engineered by geniuses to be operated by idiots" if that be the intent of the distro.

The manuals on online doc's have to be fool proof, and the wizards must explain ALL that is happening in a short co-hesive manner so that the lazy house-wife, or Aunt-Tilly can understand.

To further explain, I truly think that a distro, like SUSE for example, should just pull a noob off the street, pay him to sit there and without coaching, see if he can install SUSE on a pc and get online and print as a minimum.

If the noob fails the distro fails! It should not even be released to the public as gold. It should only be released to the Open source community for enhancement and fixes with information why the noob failed so that Novell and the community can fix it.

Why this is not done for so many distro's I do not understand.

Here is a link from Kaspersky about the viruses for linux. Last year the number of viruses doubled for Linux according to them:

http://www.viruslist.com/en/analysis?pubid=184625030

When Linux supports wireless devices out-of-the-box, and can connect to USB devices without the user having to type in ten lines of code, and can install without screwing the hard disc's partition table, then it'll be ready for desktop. I would love to use Linux, unfortunately I can't.

The partition problem is an obstacle yea for sure. In fact I had an issue when I first tried out linux. Something I did wrong with Grub. I could not get it out of my boot sector. Fortunately from years of HD failures I knew of HD scripts and I manaully erradicated my boot sector, then reformated then reinstalled. LOL, Windows prepared me for failure, hahah ironic.

Fortunately there are some distro's that dont even need a swap when installed for beginners, DSL is one of them that they can try. Tho the installer is in console, but they do use colored fonts.

The funny thing is the old-timers like me don't mind "console" so much, as PC's back in the day used that. It's really the newer generation's that are inclined to have issues with a black screen and blinking white cursor or text based installer.

Console <3, and I'm 16.

Anyway, Linux is on my desktop; it does everything I need it to do. The thing is...Windows can do it too. The difference? Linux lets me be in control of what goes on. last time I checked, the person uses the computer, the system should assume the user knows what whe/she is doing. Just my opinion.

One issue with wide implementation of Linux is, of course, money. Learning isn't an issue; learning Linux is like learning Windows, just gotta spend some time. It's just that people want to make some money off their software, and Windows fits that idea.

I guess all I'm saying is that Linux works for me 'cause I control it, it can do what I need it to, and I don't have to empty my pockets for it.

You have to make a partition to install windows too.
I had to feed my wide's xp box two cd's to install drivers for a usb enclosure and cd burner inside it and my linux machine detected and I ran k3b and it used it with no typing involved.

Any OS can do what you need to do if you try hard enough Just to do what you need with windows you have to be sure to keep it updated and run antivirus and antispyware.

Linux can do what you _need_ to do and do what you _want_ to do. Since I made the switch I have had more time for other things, I've actually managed to finish one project I started. With windows I lost my focus when I have to stop to remove spyware which got installed when I simply mistyped a web site address even though I was running as a non admin user and had disabled active x and java. I had to put aside whatever I was doing at the time to fix my system. Then when it stopped recognizing my usb drive so I couldn't move some files around until I rebooted into safe mode and deleted all the phantom device entries for it so I had to stop whatever I was working on again.

Thats why its ready for the desktop, I've been able to progress form the tinkering with the OS stage to using it to do other things, I never made it that far with windows, by the time I got windows working good and set how I liked it and got the maintenance down it was time to reinstall.

I think linux has great potential in becoming idiot proof, without pissing off the experienced users (Which won't happen, because they are the ones who write it, for christ sake). You can set up a simple graphical interface, but without loosing the command line. While I have no problem with the command line (my first pc was a C64) I really appreciate tools like yast. And having seen how it improved over the last years, I don't think It will be long until the first idiot can successfully set foot on the stony surface of linux.

I'm old enough to have seen all stages of microsofts os from dos to Longhorn Beta. And I was always pissed off when they tried to simplify things, but just made it harder and harder for those who knew the previous os.
I can't really imagine this could happen with linux.

One last thought... That might sound odd, but if Linux suddenly became the leading operating system... I'd be a little pissed off. I like the odd look when people try to figure out what I did with my desktop, or when I take a live cd to a friends house to fix his harddisk, and he has no idea what is going on, or the mandatory "In linux, you could do it." comment.
So I'm pretty happy with the state it is at now. Easy enough for me.

I'm shure they'll do it as soon as they are going for that market. But honestly. It really doesn't look like they wanted to bait the average windows user with 10.0.
Maybe with future releases.

It's pretty predictable what the average user wants, and unfortunatly one point is (I'm sorry to point this out again, I really am... it's so stupid)

... games

So there's not much they can do, other than keep doing their best, hoping that Longhorn sucks donkey balls, and that eventually people will port their programs (but most important the G/\Mzzz!!11!) to linux.

Install Ubuntu...trust me. I installed it on an old Thinkpad and it detected my wireless automatically, and detected my USB mouse and Joystick while powered on and both worked without me touching anything. It also had a battery thingy running in the system tray and has the ability to view/asjust clock speeds. The user community, forums, faqs are unbeatable for this distro as well.

Another great "Out of the Box" Distro is Xandros. Detects windows networks and partitions out of the box and has everything else setup as well. It also does the partitioning for you if you can't handle that. I haven't tested USB or Wireless on this one though, but I would be surprised if it is a challenge.

Mr. Swillis

This is a good point. But I have a couple things to say anyway.

A. Games are not #1 for *everyone*. Does your mom play World of Warcraft? Does your Grandfather play City of Heroes? Most likely not. And if so, I don't it's their primary reason for having a computer. What do they use it for? Internet, E-mail, IM, Music, Videos, Documents...this is all quite easy in Linux.

B. For those that think games *are* #1, things are definitely moving forward. Sure you have things like WineX/Cedega, but you may that emulators like this slow down performance. And I will agree with that.

BUT, many games are also ported natively by third parties, or even the games companies themselves. Here are some examples.

Loki used to port games like Unreal Tournament, Quake3, Enemy Territory, etc, and would only require a small download for the install script that would work with the regular Windows game CD.

Epic and ID are two big gaming companies that now release linux installers on the actual games. UT2003/2004, Doom3, Quake4, etc. I will agree that it isn't very advertised, but it's true. This will only continue to grow as the Linux user community grows.

Mr. Swillis

Windows/Mac generally comes preinstalled. So, any effort that's necessary for a user to install an OS means it's extra effort. Desktop users do not want extra effort; therefore, until Linux is preinstalled on computers, it is not ready for the desktop.

Employers looking to hire, who post positions over the net, usually expect a resume in MS-Word format. Most users want to easily create a fancy looking resume with a template. Fancy templates do not translate well from open-source word processors to Word document format. Users do not want to worry.
Many employers will also accept pdf format, which many open-source word processors will convert to. This is extra effort, which most desktop users do not want.
Until employers will accept documents in the native format of open-source word processors, Linux is not ready for the desktop.

Free software replacements, for proprietary software, was once a selling point for Linux. Many of these are now also available for Windows, like Gimp, Firefox, OpenOffice.org, Gaim. A motivation for desktop users to switch to Linux is gone.

Users buying a printer, or PDA, or scanner, or soundcard, or any other addon device, usually get a "setup CD". When this CD does not work, and users have to access user groups to be able to get their new device working, they will think, "I am not ready for Linux." Some advancements have been made on hardware recognition (ie, gnome-volume-manager), which, if advancements continue, may alleviate this issue. When every device has a setup CD for Linux, then Linux will be ready for the desktop.

Linux does come pre-installed on desktops. You can get these at places like Fries, Compusa, or many places on the Net (I heard that Dell was even considering it).

You can save to MS-Word format with Open Office. Not to mention that creating a PDF in Linux is every bit as easy as it is in Windows.

I agree with this one...except for the motivation part. It's not just about having a free OS, but an OS that won't crash or be riddled with viruses and spyware.

But this one is WAY wrong. You know why there aren't "setup CDs" for Linux? Because you don't need them!

I have never had to go out of my way for hardware except for video cards, which you have to do in windows anyway, and there are more Linux distros that COME WITH the ACTUAL NVIDIA DRIVERS, which Windows does not.

Linux speaks to hardware MUCH MUCH better than Windows ever has. Remember win2k and 9X? What was that? You had to install drivers for EVERYTHING. Even in XP you have to install drivers for anything outside the Motherboard and some Nics/Modems.

NEXT!

Mr. Swillis

Wow I wish I lived where you live Mr. Swillis, CompUSA does not have anything here for Linux

Linux PC's do cost way more than windows pc's. That's a function of supply and demand and will change. Maybe a barrier for some, but not the growth of the OS. I would tell those that get sticker shock for Linux pc's that they at least get faster updates, better support, stability, no need to buy all the third party app's and get caught into the consistent upgrade schema that has become so predominent in the windows world.

For companies desktops linux is very little if none on CRM. But there is a project in the works and I have high hopes for that in time.

Linux is great on the internal hardware side of things so far me. Once I go beyond the case of the pc is anyone's game. Printers, scanners, etc.

I still am not happy with my linux experience for multimedia tho I can't stream practically anything for news except CBS news' site or fox news which uses flash.

I can say this about linux. It's amazing to see what people can do out of love for something vs. people that design something as part of "their living".

29: For video streams, try KPlayer. It works quite well. Also, make sure you have the w32codecs installed. If you're using Debian, both the KPlayer and the w32codecs package are available by adding
deb ftp://ftp.nerim.net/debian-marillat/ sarge main
to your sources.list. For etch or sid, just replace the term "sarge" with the appropriate release (either "etch" or "sid"). For Ubuntu, it should be available in Multiverse, I think. For other distros, you can likely search for an rpm via Google. Good luck.