What makes some tech savvy people decide to give GNU/Linux a try and others never even bother?

Originally Posted by jmgibson1981 ... At one point my knowledge with this stuff even got me the best paying job I've ever had. Had to give up for ethical reasons ....

Hi jmgibson1981. Could you elaborate on that part?

I worked for a small company in that managed the backend for a large popular website as an entry level sys admin. I was a plumber before that. That website eventually was taken over by the feds and down for good I think. Federal investigations and the whole lot of it. I don't know what happened to the company I was directly employed by. I left after a few weeks. I saw the writing on the wall. At first I just said "im just the mechanic, idc what they do with the car after it leaves me." But even I have limits and they were hosting some stuff that wasn't acceptable to most people.

Pretty sure I had to sign an nda before employment. Suffice to say I'm not sure what else I can say beyond the above. Hell even this may be getting me in a bad spot. I have no clue what it said or the limits.

Originally Posted by jmgibson1981 I worked for a small company in that managed the backend for a large popular website as an entry level sys admin. I was a plumber before that. That website eventually was taken over by the feds and down for good I think. Federal investigations and the whole lot of it. I don't know what happened to the company I was directly employed by. I left after a few weeks. I saw the writing on the wall. At first I just said "im just the mechanic, idc what they do with the car after it leaves me." But even I have limits and they were hosting some stuff that wasn't acceptable to most people. Pretty sure I had to sign an nda before employment. Suffice to say I'm not sure what else I can say beyond the above. Hell even this may be getting me in a bad spot. I have no clue what it said or the limits.

Thanks.

Originally Posted by cynwulf +1 Most people, technical or otherwise, just don't care what OS they run as they have more important things to worry about. The most important thing is that the OS can run the programmes they want it to run.

This is really about it. Threads like this come up occasionally here and elsewhere and the answer is always the same: people see their computer as a tool to get things done. That's it.

As most people see their car as a machine to get them from A to B. Most people don't care to get under the bonnet, start tweaking things, finding out how it works and how they can customise it.

I think it also helps if people have a reference point. For instance, I [and many other family members] had computers all through my youth. That's fine, many do, but that doesn't mean they'll have an interest in Linux and open-source. The difference is that my brother is a Unix expert and that drove a curiosity within me to try Linux out.

But there are other things that people care about. I remember when I used Windows, there were two things particularly on my mind:

1) I didn't understand what my computer was doing most of the time, and I didn't like that feeling at all.
2) I didn't feel safe on the Internet. Yes, I used a firewall and a virus checker, which I updated religiously every day. But that just made me feel less safe, simply because such precautions were necessary.

I certainly didn't come over because of a burning enthusiasm for free software. I always thought it was a nice idea, but I would have stuck to proprietary software if it hadn't constantly made me feel incompetent and unsafe.

Originally Posted by hazel;6017199I didn't feel safe on the Internet. Yes, I used a firewall and a virus checker, which I updated religiously every day. But that just made me feel less safe, simply because such precautions were necessary.

To be fair: Although much of what is done by the bad guys targets Windows that is just because it is the most ubiquitous OS in use. There ARE hacks against Linux, BSD, Android and iOS. I've heard idiots say Apple phones can't be hacked which always makes me chortle.

I don't see my car (Jeep) as a way to get from point a to point b and I don't see my computer as simply a tool to get things done.

My main DD computer is an older Mac Pro, my TV computer is a hackintosh and Linux box, my laptop is a System76, my tablet is an iPad, and my phone starts with i.

My phone will change to a librem 5 when it comes out but until there is a decent linux tablet it'll stay i
My laptop will change depending on my job, while I like my 13" Galago Pro if in my next job my life will be simpler with a Mac I'll sell it and buy a MacBook Pro quick, fast and in a hurry.
My main desktop will pretty much always be a Mac Pro, when the new one comes out I'll get one provided there are no major life changes

There is little to nothing I do that can't be done in Linux and for a couple years I did but for me Apple is like a nicely worn in set of boots.

I love me some Arch but I also love me some OSX especially with homebrew installed.

Originally Posted by smallpond Maybe it should be ProprietaryFirmware/FOSS/GNU/Linux, since the platform code, graphics, NICs, and Wifi all run binaries that might be doing anything.

Just call it GNU. This is how the authors named it. Most people call GNU Linux because Linus is bold and they confuse the kernel with the system. Call it GNU/Linux if you want those people understand what you are talking about. Calling it just Linux doesn't give proper credit to the authors.
Giving proper credit to GNU is important for several good reasons. First off they started it so they are entitled to name it. Second off they are spreading an interesting philosophy, whether you agree with it or not, they provided us with an operating system because of it. When you give proper credit, you grant them more exposure to spread that philosophy. And moreover GNU is the core of it. It is what makes everything tick. We say linux is the "kernel" but that is misleading, Linux talks to the hardware. The true core of it is actually GNU, it is what makes the system run. GNU compiles and links Linux. GNU can compile itself. You can replace Linux and have the system behave exactly the same (e.g. Debian/Hurd, Debian/kFreeBSD). Replace GNU and you have another completely different system (e.g. Android). The operating system is GNU, Linux is the part that handles the interface with the hardware.

Not all open source uses GNU. Apache has its own separate license. There are others as well.

The usual generic is just:
FOSS = Free Open Source Software

Its important one understand what licenses they're using. Before Oracle bought Sun people were equating the license for "Open Solaris" with those used in FOSS and I pointed out that the license made it clear that Sun was retaining rights including revoking the license at whim. After Oracle bought Sun they did exactly that. Oracle also gave OpenOffice to the Apache foundation after gutting its development team and realizing they couldn't make people pay for it.

Apache is an application that runs on top of an Operating System. GNU is the Operating System. Apache can run on GNU, BSD or even Windows.
The GNU peoject is licenced under the GNU General Public License (GPL), which is a "copy left" license. The GNU authors made a point in not confusing Open Source with Free Software. Open source software is not necessarily free. The GNU authors also founded the Free Software Foundation, which defines Free Software as software that grants the 4 freedoms.

The freedom to run the program as you wish, for any purpose (freedom 0).
The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor (freedom 2).
The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others (freedom 3). By doing this you can give the whole community a chance to benefit from your changes. Access to the source code is a precondition for this.

Open source software does not have to grant any of those freedoms to be open source. The Open source term is not well defined. Some people even count the shared source initiative from Microsoft as open source software.
They also defined what is copyleft (as opposed to copyright)
The GPL has a freedom or death feature which means the code will always be free. I won't ever be included in closed source software (I.e like Apple did to BSD)
When you distribute GPL licenced software, the license says you have to distribute the source code with it, including the modified code in case you modified it.
So you either take it and grant all the freedoms that goes with it or you leave it all.
The Apache license has a more lax view on free software.

FOSS is a term that includes free and open source software, which, despite diverging philosophies, have a similar development model.

Linux is licensed under the GPL. If it was not, it couldn't be distributed with GNU and would have been so popular. It was developed to fill a gap in the GNU project until the Hurd would be ready. The Hurd was being developped by the GNU project when Linus Torvald released Linux in the wild. Since Linux was a functionnal kernel and the Hurd was still not ready, developers lost interest and worked on Linux instead. It started there. Linux was developed for the GNU project. The GNU project is still the GNU project but people mistakenly call it Linux.

Linux is ONLY the name of the kernel technically.

The OS contains a Linux kernel as well as multiple FOSS packages often including Apache and other non GPL (or GPL2) packages so asserting "GNU" it the name of the OS is off the mark.

Depending on your distro the OS might even contain non-FOSS packages or even have a "tainted kernel" when a proprietary driver built by a vendor to support their hardware is installed.

Most of us when we say "Linux" are talking about the entire OS even though it isn't technically correct but I'd say that is more generally acceptable than calling the OS "GNU".

Apache is an application that runs on top of the OS. It is not part of the OS itself. The OS itself is GNU or GNU+Linux. The OS is the layer that boots the computer into a state ready to launch the applications you need.
Some GNU applications might arguably be considered a part of the OS. e.g. OpenSsh, apt-get, KDE, etc... but it all runs on top of GNU. Linux runs on top of GNU but it is definitely part of the OS because the OS can not be used without a kernel. It can be used without any other application though. Windows integrates the desktop environment into the OS itself, that is why you can not replace it but it is not the case with GNU. You can choose your DE or don't run any because it runs as an application. That is why I don't consider it to be a part of the OS but a layer on top of it.
If you indeed want to talk about the whole system with the core applications like the package manager and the DE you should talk about Debian, Red Hat or whatever. GNU + apt-get + ... = Debian
But what they all share in common is GNU (+Linux). Debian even has GNU+kFreeBSD, GNU+Hurd and more.
If you call it "Linux", does it include Android, or your router's OS? Android and Debian have few in common. They don't run the same applications and they don't serve the same purpose. Red Hat, Debian or Gentoo, on the other hand have a lot more in common. They run the same applications (Apache, KDE, Gimp, ...), they are binary compatible even. What makes that possible is that they share the same core, which is GNU. With that in mind, I believe it makes more sense to call it GNU or GNU+Linux than just Linux. Linux is misleading, you can include Android if it's about the kernel, or not if it's about the OS. GNU is straightforward, it is Slackware, Mageia, LFS... but not Android.

But everyone calls it Linux. If we start telling people we use an operating system called GNU, they aren't going to know what the heck that is.

Yes, that is the crux of it. Everyone calls it Linux because everyone calls it Linux. To me both are acceptable. I call it GNU in tech circles and GNU+Linux in lay.