I agree with you James, I'm all for different distros, so I didn't want it to sound like I want a monopoly in linux like exists with windows, and an other person on the list made the point that it is often the differences in libraries and where the libraries are that makes the difference. My only point, that I don't want to belabor it, is that for a end user, the easier it is to install some software and have say a Gui run the same or very similar on red hat 9 vs suse 8.2 vs mandrake 9.0, etc, the better it is and the less hassle that is caused software distributors to ensure that their products don't have to be substantially reworked to run on the various distros, so that when they release a "linux" version, it is essentially a linux version, the better it is, particularly while the operating system is trying to get its legs in terms of personal users. wayne
Not to be too pendantic, but I am not sure "divergence" is the right word. All the distributions are moving in the same direction, but the difference is in the details. The thing is that you *can* get the apps to work. Maybe not by simply downloading a single package. Instead you have to download a dozen to get all of the libaries, etc. However, that is changing as there are tools available that will generally get all of the necessary components for you.
On the other hand. I consider myself a linux expert compared to the majority of the users, but a "knowledgable user" compared to many on this list. However, I personally find the mechanism for installing new software very annoying in comparison to Windows. Today I had to install two new products on my Windows machine at work and they installed very easily. Recently I wanted to install something on my Linux machine but I found out I was missing a couple of things that needed other things to install, which needed still other things.
I'm all for different distros as Linux is all about choice. However it should be a "choice" like Microsoft where I cut myself off from everything else.
My two cents.
Regards,
jimmo