I guess we can only hope that by the time Apple stops shipping Classic on every machine that companies will have made native OSX software..

Thats silly. Linux might be the single best documented item on the internet. As a beginner - God, I want to kill the bastard who popularized the term newbie - you're not faced with the more complex problems of linux. Primarily, you're attempting to get your system installed, connect to the web, play a DVD or mp3, or something of that nature. Any of those problems can be found and solved within 1/2 an hour if you're really clueless with what you're doing.

The problem is, people aren't interested in Google'ing their question and then attempting the process of elimination of how to fix the problem. Unfortunately, beginners would rather Google "Linux Forums", find one, and then ask for help.

If you're under the impression that there isn't much documentation for linux out there, Google the Linux Documentation Project. See exactly how little there is.

...to add to what Jestah was saying.. not only is there tons of internet documentation for FREE there is this $50 book called the Redhat 7.2 bible.. it has commands and such in it... and everything else you need to learn...

Right Freakygeek, the Redhat Bible (which Amazon sells for $34.99) is one of MANY fantastic hard copy resources out there.

Although I strongly advocate supporting the Linux community, for a beginner theres no reason to spend $35 on a book. The LDP has just about every resource you need to become an extremely proficient user - for FREE! They have How-To's and full blown books! Lack of documentation is never an excuse for Linux.

Edit: Stupid vB Code being identical to the uBB code I'm so used to.

Is it because that the terminal could bypass permissions?

Or maybe its not really the Mac on a Unix architechture at fault, but rather GUI orientated software that didn't set permissions, but caught keywords or something?

its because tehy were told hackers would break into there system from the cli, thats what i think, tehy find stupidest resoneans and do stupider things (i wouldent be supried if tehy started making veryone a complete idiot by giving them pills that kill most of there brain at birth so tehy cant make anyhting to hurt other people)

Mac is based on Unix for goodness sake, do they know that?

Thats what Mac is largely known for (thats why its used for education purposes) and they remove it because of that?!

I have just gone to the my home country in Asia and found virtually very little about Linux there. You can hardly find any book regarding linux and those available dealt with redhat 5! Also most IT schools are geared towards MS as the certification is almost a most for IT professionals there.
If somebody wanted to install linux then he has to order it through the net and because of the dollar exchange rate buying through the net that would be at a prohibitive cost.
Granting he is able to buy the software, then he will have a hard time finding somebody to help him install linux.

Which makes the topic of this thread all the more important. In my opinion these should be done in order for linux to be more acceptable to the general population:

1. There should be some sort of a "political and economic clout" pushing for linux.Everybody here should admit that MS has a lot of clout while linux has NONE! I also don't know how it can be done,sorry. Is MS greedy? Well I know that it is not a charitable institution-it is a business so can you blame them for wanting to maximize profit?

2. All of the so called linux geeks should come up with a COMMON DISTRIBUTION to rival MS. I know a lot of you will disagree because of the so called "freedom of choice" or whatever you call it but hey guys, there is even a rivalry between different distros and some are even attacking each other( my distro is better than yours thing!)!

Brilliant, bongski55. You've managed to rehash the 10-year-old+ arguments of everyone who wants to defeat microsoft. It's kind of redundant unless you have a way of making it happen. And as for your united distro suggestion, um. It's not just freedom of choice... it's that people legitimately disagree about what's better. *that's* where freedom of choice comes in. Besides which, how are you going to force other distros to merge with you? It isn't going to work. *nix is just going to have to come up with its own way of defeating windows.

This sort of request is the reason that we have Windows. It's also the reason why Windows is as buggy as it is today. A HUGE amount of Windows code is dedicated to relieving the user of ANY responsibility to learn ANYTHING about computers. And, for those of us who actually know how computers work, it is a universal truth that the more you complicated the plumbing the easier it is to stop up the pipes.

As for me, I think that Linux should should become MORE difficult. The further it is from Windows, the better. The more complicated it is to use, the more that the user has to learn about computers. And that IS a good thing!

Quote:

Is it because that the terminal could bypass permissions? Or maybe its not really the Mac on a Unix architechture at fault, but rather GUI orientated software that didn't set permissions, but caught keywords or something?

That is Exactly my point! The CLI in Mac (terminal) does NOT by pass admin password authentication!

Quote:

This sort of request is the reason that we have Windows. It's also the reason why Windows is as buggy as it is today. A HUGE amount of Windows code is dedicated to relieving the user of ANY responsibility to learn ANYTHING about computers.

This is just exactly one of the things I hated with my first PC (win95). I didn't really enjoy tinkering with it until I started playing in REGEDIT.

Windows being easy to use is not what makes it buggy. What makes Windows buggy is the fact that it is and continues to be poorly built, because of so called market forces requiring a new version on the market every 2 years. An easy to use Linux GUI, without all of the bugs associated with Windows, that would "relieve the user of any responsibility to learn anything about computers," can be built. It would just take more time than the so called market forces would allow.

Make Linux more complicated would not be a good thing. Not everyone wants to go to college in computer science in order to learn how to setup their computer, and install and use the programs that they want and need.

This thread is starting to look like a sunday morning tv line-up.....Is there such a term as "OS thumping"? I am born again! Linux has saved me! Hallelujah! C'mon! Lets move towards a solution. According to the now long gone thread-starter, Mr Parr, this thread was started to simply appeal to developers to make Linux more accessible. I can see the point. The hardware vendors sure aren't. Very few $$$companies$$$ are pushing it. But, there is change. I bet those who are new to computers and wanted to save a few bucks with a Lindows PC from Walmart probably find a Windows PC confusing to use after a while. There are plenty of Mac users out there that are getting along fine in their happy Mac-dom, not at a loss for lack of software out there. And, don't be fooled. There are many fewer choices for Mac users that Windows users. Come to think of if, did Paul even mention Windows in the post?

I am going to create an open source hardware company or something one day.

And Nvidia is quite open minded, sadly their drivers don't work *that* well. But excellent anyway.