Nice Jos.
Andreas Jaeger just asked me to port this to the project and so I did.
Thanks for the feedback.
Andy
On Mon, Sep 13, 2010 at 1:21 PM, Jos Poortvliet
On Monday 13 September 2010 20:43:33 Andy wrote:
To me, the best thing that you guys can do is first define "Who do you want to target?"
Andy, my friend, within a few days the strategy team will release exactly THAT part of our new "who are we" thing :D
Don't great minds think alike?
;-)
Why? because it is the best decision that will show you what you want. Something that I can envy from Ubuntu, for example, is the fact that they always wanted that "human connection" with their users. They displayed this in all areas in marketing and I think it still sells well. I believe openSUSE is a tool that helps power users primarily but has lost the feel of what it is like to have newcomers in their distribution.
Many may fear that because you take a more "novice" approach to the desktop, that it will take away from the ability that power users have to use the distribution. But to me the matter is more simple. Power users will be more comfortable if they use openSUSE that has a more minimalistic and simpler approach to the desktop because that way, They will be able to focus more on the tasks that they are performing rather than devising ways to customize the desktop to their needs, and things like that.
Amen to that. Powerusers don't want to have to search for something and things have to work out of the box as much as possible. But they don't want to be stuck with what they got, either. It's about balance. And there is still a choice there - if you focus so extremely on 'novices', as Ubuntu does, you DO de-optimize for powerusers, I have little doubts about that. I think openSUSE can affort sitting a bit closer to powerusers - not making things hard but at least making things accessible to them when they need it. openSUSE has always done that - which is why it is so popular with system admins and other experienced computer users. I think we must keep that legacy in honour, even when we try to make sure everyone can use our software. Powerusers are ALSO human, despite what you might have heard ;-)
Please, remember that there is hidden potential within the novice users you can attract to openSUSE.
Andy
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