Re: [Sheflug] Back to Windows

[Neil R Porter <n.r.porter [at] xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Fri, 2002-10-25 at 21:54, Alex Hudson wrote:
> On Fri, 2002-10-25 at 15:03, Jonathan Hipkiss wrote:
> > In my opinion LINUX will remain a niche OS, used only by techies and
> > UNIX professionals.  It will never attain widespread recognition and
> > remove Microsoft's dominance until it has been made much much much
> > easier to install.
> 
> You'll come crawling back - they always do :o). 
> 
> To be honest, the installation isn't hugely important. It's as easy now
> as it's going to get, and popular belief is that GNU/Linux systems are
> as easy to install as Windows (e.g., SuSE, Mandrake, et al). This may
> not fit with your particular experience, but try installing Win98 on a
> reasonably current PC. Try installing any version of Windows on a
> current machine, for that matter. WinME on that era hardware is about
> the sweet spot; I would say earlier and later OSes are harder to
> install.
> 
> Linux is one of the few OSes with growing marketshare. In fact, I
> believe there are only two - Windows NT (2k/XP) and Linux. Maybe OS/X,
> but I would doubt it. If you wish to join the MS future, where they tell
> you what software you may or may not run[1], what data you may or may
> not have[2], and where you give them remote access[3], fine, you can
> have that. Some of us rate the freedom away from all these things, and
> the freedom of Free Software in general, as far more important that how
> difficult something was to install...
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Alex.
> 
> [1]. Eg., VNC is unusable on XP for licensing reasons
> [2]. Eg., You may not record audio and copy it under WMA 9
> [3], Eg., WinXP SP1 EULA.

Here here.  Although point 1, I get VNC server to work beautifully on my
XP machine and use the client on here (Mandrake 9.0 laptop), so my wife
can check her email without having to go into the attic.  Unless I've
missed your point?  'unusable for licensing reasons'?

Also, although I didn't want to take up the cudgel because I'm sure he's
had enough grief recently, but I personally couldn't go back to
Windows.  I have just the one machine (XP, which imo is the best Windows
release so far, and I've tried them all over the years) running Windows
for legacy/wifely reasons.  Whenever I have to sit there I am left
thinking, so what can I actually do with this machine?!  I mean it's
brain dead apart from a few nice apps.  Anyhoo, stop preaching to the
converted Neil, and just sit back in the knowledge that the grass is
indeed greener on this side :)

Best wishes

Neil

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