On Thursday 14 September 2006 9:37 pm, Mike Noble wrote:
One of the main reasons is: what linux distro do the companies install on their systems (SuSe, RedHat, Mandriva,etc....). For the windows side it is easy, there is only one, Windows XP (or whatever the current Windows version is at the time. Close. Microsoft does not issue a new realease all that frequently, and essentially it is a cloning operation.
And, on the Linux side, not only do you have the distros themselves, but you
also have other choices, such as whether to configure for KDE or GNOME.
we had a Linux installfest a few weeks ago, and one guy (a retired MIT
professor) had a laptop with RHEL 4 installed (from PCs for everyone). He
wanted us to help him configure it. Unfortunately, they apparently did not
give him the root password. Since this was a new system, I sent him back to
the store, but PCs for everyone closed their store in Cambridge, Ma after
some drunk judge crashed into it (they were adjacent to the courthouse).
What Linux needs is a simple cusomer configuration interface that would come
up the first time, and allow the customer to configure the system. YaST
comes close to this. Essentially, the system would be configured with the
distribution sources (eg. DVD 1) set up as the installation source. The
system would be configured for a typical office workstation. The first time
wizard would be extremely user friendly, and after the initial root
password and user password, it would take a very short tour.
--
Jerry Feldman