Surely this is some kind of joke.
The average user needs exactly the same computing environment as other
average users, whatever its strengths and weaknesses.
> "EverythingLinux, an online Linux store, announced today that it will
> donate Red Hat Linux and Sun's StarOffice CDs to PC charities upon
> request.
Who at a charity has what it takes to negotiate the RedHat package
selection inquisition, let alone read installation manuals, create boot
floppies and partition hard drives? What are they going to tell the
recipient when they get thrown into vi, and have no idea at all what is
happening?
:q!(enter)
Why won't it read a floppy disc? Can I play Windows/MS-DOS games on
it? I can't eject the CD. How can I install my latest inkjet printer,
or scanner? The horror!
Maybe one day open source desktop software will become easier to use and
close enough to the mainstream experience to be interchangeable.
Star-Office and Gnome/KDE are a step in that direction. But a charity
operation is going to be giving computers to people who want their
computer to be a helpful, familiar tool immediately. They don't want to
be on any more of a learning curve than possible, and they certainly
need to be compatible with the computing environments of all their
friends, schools and workplaces.
- Robin
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.1 : Tue Jul 31 2001 - 03:10:04 EST