I would add to this that people that have something to accomplish don't want to waste time with experimentation or mucking about in an operating system. They not only lack the interest, but they are also just trying to get work done. Beyond that, they really don't care how cool the OS is. Most of the business folks I know are this way, and that is OK. They should not have to worry about tweaking an application or OS in order to get their work done. This gives a lot of credence to the notion of a computer as an appliance that requires no more thought to use than the telephone. A better metaphor might be a computer as a toolbox. I don't want to think about how the handle of the screwdriver that I choose might be better shaped - I just want to use it to remove or replace a screw. No OS meets this criteria today. One advantage of MS's ubiquitousness is that it takes little thought to move from one computer to another. The goal is to get useful work done, not be absorbed in how the appliance works (or doesn't in some cases ;-) ). My $0.02. -ronc On Wednesday 13 June 2001 10:19, Paul Abrahams wrote:
Curtis Rey wrote:
Now I'm doing SuSE and it kicks ass. Games run great. Reiser fs saves me the worry of crashed drives and lost work. People are afraid of change and things they don't understand. I have never been afraid to try things - if I fail I learn. That's what I learned that translated straight to Linux.
Alas, that's exactly one of the reasons why Linux is having such a hard time making headway in the desktop market. Unlike you, Curtis, most people are afraid to try things, particularly when it comes to computers. If Linux isn't easy to use when you don't know much and aren't very smart, then how is Walmart going to sell a Linux machine to its average customer?
But of course that's just half the story. The other half is the lock that MS has on the retail marketers both direct (Gateway, Dell) and indirect (PC Connection, Best Buy, Costco, etc.) combined with the plethora of Windows-only software (Quicken, Photoshop, many games) and hardware (Winmodems, some video cards).
One of the smartest innovations that KDE2 introduced (with KDM) is the fully automated login. It may give Unix security buffs conniptions, but being able to turn on your machine and after a minute or so have a fully usable desktop without doing anything more is a real advance in usability.
Paul