Though I realize that there is a Web edition of TurboTax that's available, I'd be somewhat more comfortable obtaining a copy that I could run nativeely (storing data and forms on my local Linux system instead of over the Web). Similarly, I'd be interested in commercial versions of financial planning software, such as Quicken or something similar, and at least conceptually, I'd be willing to pay similar prices to what I'd find elsewhere. However, software is becoming more and more commoditized, so I'd actually prefer to see slightly lower prices for any highly commoditized software, whether on a Windows system or a Linux system.

The day will come, and we all hope it comes soon, you sill see all kind of Linux Tax programs...

My thing (as cheap as I am) isn't "paying for it or getting it free", but is it widely available?

If you are cheap, then why would you not mind paying for it?

I don't want to pay the super bloated prices, but I do want the stuff readily available. ...that and I know someone else may give me a copy if I ask. .... Just kidding, OK?

"Alright, maybe this is a stupid question, but if there is a Mac OSX version of a program, wouldn't it be really easy for a software maker to port it to linux?"
"Finale (music notation program).
IIRC version 2004 for Mac is (finally) a OSX native app, so maybe it wouldn't be too off the wall to port it to Linux? This is the main reason I still use Win2k at work. I don't use Finale at home, so I'm M$-free there, at least."

I've been thinking about that too. Mac OSX is just a BSD, so it should be easy to port, right? If they ported aqua first, that is. Now that would be something, but then mac wouldn't have a harware monopoly, and then they really wouldn't have anything to sell...
As for finale: There are no replacements, but finale is an awful, awful, awful program UI-wise (I learned it in school). It's actually far easier to use the markup language Lilypond, _if only those two idiots - I mean very generous brilliant open source programmer idiots WOULD FREEZE THE LANGUAGE ONCE AND FOR ALL!!!!!
On Mutopia (at http://www.mutopiaproject.org/) they have a lot of documents written in lilypond. You can see for yourself how beautiful they are. Markup source code is also included, but 90% of that is unfortunately unusable, since it requires old versions of lilypond to compile.


Also, mathematica and mathlab already exist for linux, they are just not so popular since neither is open source and both are expensive. There exists CAD programs for Linux also AFAIK.

We have to eat something, in order to live. It may be free.
But if you want to eat something deliciousness....

Well, that wouldn't change the fact that an Apple still beats the socks off of a x86 box that's rated at double the processing power of the Apple, so they wouldn't be all out of stuff to sell. Almost everything available for the PC is also available for the MAC, including audio mastering software. ...but what do most musicians use? Apple!

Sometimes something appears and it's just an all around better item, like Linux is compared to Windows. Same between an x86 platform and a Apple Macintosh platform. Apple's the Linux of the complete computer arena.

Thats the great thing about linux, programmers are working to make cheaper, and sometimes free software that does the same thing as what these big companies programs do, yet big companies charge a fortune...

FlashFXP

"Sometimes something appears and it's just an all around better item, like Linux is compared to Windows. Same between an x86 platform and a Apple Macintosh platform."

I don't think you can generalize about the 'x86' platform. A Mac will always beat a $400, ain't-it-amazingly-cheap pc, but for performance I'd rather have the kind of pc you could get for the price of the Mac. Still might get a Mac one day, but it will be for playing with OS/X, not raw performance.

Also give the devil his due, there are still things Windows is better for than Linux, like multimedia authoring. I had some great fun playing with Audacity, for example, but its still a long way from the proprietary audio recording software available for Windows. The price certainly is better though!

I'd have to say that apples, price to price, will always be better at video editing, 3d modelling, and the stuff I'd use an Apple for.

I'd like to see JASC Paint Sop Pro (Better than Gimp), Thumbs Plus (image catalogger), and Scramdisk (encrypted virtual disk).

...as far as the Mac beating the x86 bunch, this isn't no pocket change box it's going against, but like a 500MHz G4 vs. a 1GHz P4 with double the RAM. I'll be honest, I don't know what they're doing to rig it, but time and time again, it has proven to be faster.

I would like to bring up Multi-Sim. Any decent electronic sim programs available for Linux? All I saw took so many dependencies and modules that had to be downloaded seperately, it would take me longer to set it up than to complete a component-level circuit building session of an x86 mobo.

M$ is only "better" because it is more popular. Linux will take it over (and the PC/MAC race may get much tighter too!).