Neowin.net

Not to mention the ASUS eee PC

And yet I can do in Linux everything I was doing in Windows

The Apps are there people just need to let go of the MS crutch and see

Adobe aren't ploughing money into making Adobe Suite CS3 for Linux though are they? Instead Google are funding Wine to make Photoshop work. There are plenty of industry standard applications that aren't native to Linux yet, and this will hold Windows users back.

I'm sorry, but NO not all the apps are there. Please find for me a version of Mathcad that works in Linux. Thanks, ok bye.

You mean like Maxima, Scilab, or Octave?

No, probably not all apps are there. But it wasn't long ago that people were saying Linux could never end up on the desktop, yet now it's able to fill most users' needs. The fact is now people are actively looking for and developing Linux desktop software, and even shipping PCs with Linux pre-installed. It seems like more and more people are wondering if Linux will be a viable desktop alternative until one day you find yourself being able to do 99% of what you need in it.

Even if you're dead-set against Linux for some reason, you at least gotta appreciate the competition and alternatives, not to mention that you don't even have to even think of running Linux to start using some of its native applications.

Anyway, at least if you need to, you can run Mathmatica and Mathcad in the WINE compatibility layer... or even VMWare/QEmu/etc. So it's not like you're stranded.

For anyone who wants to use their data or retain functionality they seek in whatever computer their choose, it would be advisable to choose platform agnostic software. The whole ISO standardized document format debacle is pretty much making the point that people need to start thinking of how they can persistently use the applications/data they need without being tethered to something that you can't control.

http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?t=257343


Lawl, kthxbye.

Yes, the linux foundation does seem to be a bit more mature then some certain other corporate people (ballmer and jobs for example).

Well, Linus Torvalds is still a no-holds-barred politically-incorrect person who says things the way he sees it. exampleI think that being a technical leader, rather than a corporate Executive Officer gives him a little leeway. At least in his opinion.

You gotta love the first comment in that link you provided, though....

Heck, I know plenty of people that aren't aware that an "Apple" computer is a real computer and can run real apps. They say things like "I need Internet on it (or Internet Explorer), does a Mac have that?"...

I don't bother to tell them about Linux.

The ironic thing is that use to be the excuse to go from Windows to Mac OS.

And that's inaccurate how???? With so few applications that run "natively" on Linux and the chore it is to get your devices up and running can you really expect Joe Blo to first research it all and then book off a weekend just to set up a computer?

You said it!

Personally,
Excellent idea by HP, even if it a copy cat move, but still a good one. Also think that was a lousy choice of a Linux distro to use though. Darn good thing it wasn't aimed at joe blow user, because Suse is one of the LAST Linux distros I'd recommend as it one of the LEAST user friendly distro's there is, IMO.

You can run all Linux apps on Windows pretty much anyway, so from that point of view, why would you ever run Linux? The reason lies not in the apps but in the way the OS is managed. It's about preference. A lot of people who use Linux just want to get away from nag-ware, ad-ware, installations that try to hijack your computer's preferences, drivers that you have to hunt down on the web, or require you to have original CDs, applications that don't play nice with file formats that aren't blessed by the company that made the app, applications designed with artificial limitations placed on the user, applications that allow integration with a wider variety of partner apps and devices, user interface customization and system flexibility, the ability for advanced users to be able to go deeper to understand and fix problems in their own system (i.e. error messages that make sense and you can trace to the root of the problem, flexibility in logs and inner machinations of system underpinnings, solutions that you can customize, hotfixes that you can modify and shape to your specific needs), etc.

Last edited by HalcyonX12 on 10 Apr 2008 - 23:49

Maybe if all the versions of Linux were not so "specialized"
...I found what I am looking for in RPM but not in DEB...
Ok, there is a McGyver Episode on how to install the RPM as a debian package. Not something I can tell my mom how to do over the phone.

Or Star Office - either looking at a Spread Sheet created on there in Excel or sending a MS Excel to it...does not look the same when you put in formatting. The mathematics in the cells are right but the format looks like the side of the Partridge Family bus.

Then there is Enterprise Linux from Oracle (specialized somewhat). Red Hat variant but trying to get it to play a video - plan on spending a rainy weekend to get it going. Sure it is accomplishable but the end result looked like the result of a visual basic practice example.

Also, unless I missed the chapter on how to make users have similar (default) applications on there desktops, I dont think there is a "common" desktop container that can be shared
*I could be very wrong here

I am sure there is a Linux that has more "ease of install" than another Linux - or has more polished apps.
Wait am I thinking of the new mac osx?

Until I see a Linux machine that is really cool - I have no need to migrate.

I do have to admit - SLAX on a portable USB drive is a pretty gadget

I know that you are probably trolling, but please give me a specific example of what you found in RPM format that isn't in DEB.

(because, you know, most sane people use their package manager, rather than googling package names in hopes of a hit to install manually)

Then you probably weren't looking in your system's software repository. Just use Add/Remove Software, click "search" and then type in the program you wanted, then click install.



Your mom doesn't know how to install software even on Windows, so what are you trying to get her to run a pre-release version of some program?



Dunno what you're referring to, I use OpenOffice and I don't see what you're talking about... and even then not really the spreadsheet part. If you just specifically want to run MS Excel and not any office Suite then yeah, nothing else will cut it.



Your mom needs to worry about Enterprise Linux on her laptop/desktop? Or is it a system admin that's fooling around and wants to watch a video? Here is why there are different distributions for different purposes/needs. And actually it's pretty easy to just download a binary of VLC and run it on any version of Linux.



It's as easy as setting up a default profile and then telling the system to use that as their template.