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switch to......

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billy_gates:
I agree 100% with lazy gamer.  With my past experience with RedHat and SuSE and Windows and OSX.  I think he is right on.

Faust:
So if your new you can have difficulty installing an application on Linux, whats your point?  I've seen plenty of people try and fail to install on a Windows PC, and also on a Mac OSX PC. Yes, most people are unaware that rpms/debs/source can all be different for each distribution, but that problem also exists with people trying to run Windows .exe installers on a Mac OSX box.  (No, I'm not joking.)  It's a steep learning curve on most distributions, probably because some (eg Debian / Slackware) do not know how easy things have to be made for new users to get it.  Learning a new OS isn't going to be easy - no one said it would.  I defy you however to tell me that a competent computer user could have difficulty on red hat 9 - but wait, I'm not allowed to talk about a newbie distro like that am I?   ;)    
quote:and no, I'm not talking about Red Hat or Debian, Linux.
--- End quote ---
 (In case you haven't noticed guys Red Hat and Debian are actually Linux distributions.)
Oh and can I have an actual example of one of the "so called desktop distributions" errors?  In something other than a minor distro that no-one uses?

[ May 29, 2003: Message edited by: Faust ]

Faust:
All OS's have good and bad points - the main "problem" with Linux is that it isn't as simplified as some people wan't it to be.

Calum:
i can see what you guys are saying, and i agree with it, all except for those "linux isn't all it's cracked up to be" type remarks. that is simply garbage.

however onto the substance:

all that stuff you mentioned is the result of your vendor, the person who packaged the berkeley, gnu, linux, perl, and many other free types of software all together and attempted to give you an idiot proof method of installation.

Now you might say "microsoft does pretty well at that job, how come so many linux distributors are not so good" well, linux is about choice. some people's "good" is another people's "bad". with linux if you choose to get a distro that is shit, it is as much your fault as linux's. That said i know linux will get blamed for distributors' slackness and user stupidity more and more in future. that's why i was so worried about lindows, people will try it, hate it and never touch linux again.

As to the how many linux newbies can repartition their drive etc question, how many windows newbies can do all that stuff? i put it to you that newbies to windows (in fact so called "experienced" windows users) are just as clueless. A bad workperson always blames their tools, and there seem to be a lot of computer illiterate bad workpeople out there these days. If you can't do basic administration tasks, get a macintosh.

This said, i DO NOT wish to seem like i am an elitist who is trying to alienate newbies. i was there once, and in many ways i still am. I simply advocate intelligence and learning about stuff instead of what appears to be the de rigeur solution in the windows world, which is just bitching about it. With linux you DO NOT have that excuse. For one thing everything's infinitely more configurable so you are not pitting your wits against a black box OS when you do something and for another thing, there is a huge community out there willing to help you. Contrary to what you might have heard, people telling you to "try this" and "try that" is a LOT more helpful than the standard windows help advice of "reboot then reinstall".

lazygamer:
Good response Calum.

Well I suppose the answer, until 2-4 years from now, is to present a "switch, but don't expect to just jump right in flawlessly" attitude. Or is that the wrong answer?  

Learning new shit is ok, I won't let it put me off no matter what, but I'm just thinking of those silly ass windoids.  ;)

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