Langa bashing (was Re: Problems getting Linux into homes)

[Wade Chandler]

Sean Estabrooks wrote:

> On Sat, 24 Apr 2004 19:00:29 -0400 (EDT)
> "William Hooper" <whooperhsd3 at earthlink.net> wrote:
> 
> 
> 
>>So if you buy a copy of Windows XP and your modem manufacture doesn't
>>provide drivers, that means Windows XP is not for you?  No, it means
>>that you need to be careful checking your hardware compatibility.
> 
> 
> The amount of supported hardware is likely much greater on Windows XP and
> most commodity hardware should work fine.   Which probably is a
> demonstrable advantage of that OS over Linux.  Of course, which OS is
> appropriate for any given situation is likely to depend on more than one
> particular modem being supported.
> 
> 
>>As I've mentioned before, Mr. Langa fails on two points:
>>1) He provides no specifics (that I've seen) of what hardware he is
>>talking about.
> 
> 
> Fails at what?   He was relaying his personal experience not making a bug
> report to developers.
> 
> 
>>2) He seems to be hung up on the closed-source support structure.  In
>>other words his attempt at a solution is to call the support line, not
>>check out what experience others have had with similar hardware, or ask
>>for support on a mailing list.
> 
> 
> Any conclusions he makes may not be valid but then you're welcome to
> challenge them.   Basically all i've heard people object to is his
> audacity to relay a personal experience with Linux that was
> frustrated by the current level of hardware support.  Haven't heard anyone
> disagree with him that Linux supports less hardware and can be more
> difficult to configure than some other O/S's.
> 
> Cheers,
> Sean
> 
> 

How much more punishment does the list have to take on this topic :-P. 
Use Linux or don't use it.  The lack of support for one product or two 
or even three really means nothing to anyone until it's their hardware 
that's not supported.  There are plenty of devices supported on linux 
and there seems to be more supported on Windows.  This is a current 
reality.

I happen to have all of my hardware supported on my current Fedora 
system.  Sound, video, lan, scanner, track ball, and printer.  I didn't 
plan that.  I just gave it a go with the hardware I had in the box (It 
was actually an upgrade from RH9).  I'm content.  There are definitely 
many more drivers than there were a few years ago.

I think the real answer to ones (new) experience with linux will be 
based on either their luck (they have all their hardware supported), or 
they have done leg work to make sure they have drivers for their 
hardware and/or have gotten different hardware that did have drivers, or 
they know a little more than the average user about their system and can 
work around simple configuration issues.

Most average windows users have a hard time with linux because they 
usually have a hard time with windows as well.  Not only from the 
hardware, driver, install point of view.  I know seasoned windows 
programmers who still ask me questions about windows hardware and simple 
network or install issues.

I have customers who don't understand what the "tree" is when viewing 
their files and ask where the C drive is.  I also have the occassional 
customer who will delete system files or application files because "they 
didn't install them".  Think they'll do well with a root shell until 
they are willing to have a deeper understanding about what the computer, 
the os, and their own role play in their computing experience?  Most of 
them don't want to know, but does that mean Linux should be less than it 
is to accomodate a perception that one group of computer users have?

I think the real answer lies in the simple fact that most users of 
consumer computers don't have the knowledge nor desire to know more 
about the computers simple features and especially the more complicated 
issues of hardware and drivers (not to say linux hardware is very 
complicated).

I think that is changing though.  I think the younger generations are 
growing up on computers and have a better understanding of how they 
operate and there are probably more of them willing and wanting 
something more feature rich.  This is exactly what I find linux to be in 
comparison to windows....more feature rich.

Myself and I believe many others use linux because we can do more with 
it.  This isn't to say you can't run applications on Windows or do a lot 
with it, but to simply say that most distros default installs put a 
default windows install to shame when relating to applications 
installed, and the infrastructure of linux tends to support more 
features (X Windows, different window managers, /proc, shells and all 
the command line apps, even differences in memory swapping and 
paging..., and the linux community ).

I install Fedora and I can have multiple server softwares, scripting 
environments, development environments and an over all more usable 
environment (very rich text editors, multiple forms of communication and 
chat, multiple office suites...etc).  I can also log into my linux 
machine from a remote location and without getting into a graphical 
session control almost everything in my machine....try that with a 
standard windows install (shoot try that with an enhanced setup).

To wrap up.  I had a machine which had windows 98 second edition on it. 
  I wanted to put XP on the machine, so I got my disk and started trying 
to setup the machine.  I couldn't do it.  For what ever reason XP kept 
rebooting at a certain point in the installation initialization.  So, I 
put linux on the machine.

Anyways.  Those are my perspectives and experiences.