On Thu, 2003-05-01 at 07:52, dep wrote:
the problem is that companies get very defensive, which is counter-productive. when an install goes bad, on a machine that was working just fine with something else, then "well, there's something wrong with your hardware" is simply not going to satisfy anybody. it's insulting and it's demonstrably wrong, in that the machine was
How is it wrong and insulting? I don't get that. Anyone stupid enough to not understand that Linux has limitations when it comes to hardware support, has forfeited the right to be insulted, frankly. Because that's a moronic point of view for them to have. Linux doesn't support hardware as well as Windows. Fact. Everyone in the world knows this. Everyone deserving of the title Systems Admin, CTO or even Help Desk Lackey should know this and understand that there are some exceptions where the hardware isn't compatible (particularly brand new hardware).
working before. it leads to broader judgments of the company making the statement. the strongest true statement that can be made, especially in an evolving standard such as acpi, is "the way we do it and the way your motherboard does it are incompatible."
This reminds me of a problem I was having last year with some memory. Maybe some here will remember it. The memory worked fine under Windows, back when the machine was a Windows box. When I went 100% Linux I started having kernel panics. Finally someone convinced me to test the memory. I did and the memory was bad. Now is that SuSE's fault or Linus's fault that bad memory isn't handled more gracefully? I don't think so. Linux handles the memory in a technically sound manner that means I get more kick out of my computer running SuSE, than I ever did under Win2k. Windows handled the memory differently. So instead of kernel panics that lead me to test the memory almost immediately, I got random losses of data, infrequent blue screens and program slow-down that I lived with for years, not really understanding why they happened. So if you mean that Linux should gracefully deal with poor hardware and poor hardware implementations... no thanks.
but see, there are a couple of problems here. first, the failure modes are such that very few would guess that acpi is the culprit. second, even if it were correctly identified, getting online to do any of this is problematic, because among the victims is the network card. third, the people who it is hoped will be aided by a very simple install are also the ones least likely to be able to diagnose all of this, and the ones least able to find the above and to carry out what it says. there are a lot of clones in the world, and a lot of people who haven't the foggiest notion of what motherboard they have, and so on. in short, the above makes a lot of assumptions that i don't think are justified.
Well, SuSE should probably be more receptive to gathering this kind of information via phone. I'm definitely with you on that. If they actually had something resembling technical support, it could probably be handled this way. Once again, though, with regards to clones, the fact that Linux hits such a high percentage of hardware these days is amazing. I remember the days of having to hand pick every component to ensure compatibility. You still should check HDLs, but largely that problem is over. Yes, Windows is easier, but of course it is. It's the Monopoly to which all hardware vendors write drivers. To complain about that and put the blame on SuSE is beyond silly. There's only so much they can do (not to mention all the open source projects that actually comprise the distro) when they're fighting the monster that is Microsoft's entrenched monopoly.
perhaps you are right. but perhaps, and based on my having followed development for awhile, linux acpi support is not entirely mature, even as the standard itself appears to be evolving. so, again, assigning blame seems to be both premature and, anyway, ultimately pointless if the object is being able to install and use suse linux on one's machine. the user is less concerned with why it doesn't work than with making it work.
and the above will no doubt be cast off as a rant, which to me is simply a symptom of the problem.
It's a symptom of a problem, all right. You just need to ask yourself who has the problem. I guess you think we have the problem because we're willing to live with such a Shoddy product, in your mind. Preston