From kragen@dnaco.net Wed Jul 15 12:37:31 1998 Date: Wed, 15 Jul 1998 12:37:30 -0400 (EDT) From: Kragen To: rebecca lynn eisenberg cc: rebecalist@bossanova.com Subject: RE: lose98 In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII X-Keywords: X-UID: 526 Status: O X-Status: As a rabid Linux user, I feel obligated to play devil's advocate here. On Wed, 15 Jul 1998, rebecca lynn eisenberg wrote: > According to Linux fans (of which there are many) (and who, if tonite's > crowd was any representative sample, tend to be very loyal and loudly > devoted) Occasionally fanatically devoted. Some Linux people are just offensive to be around (unless you're a Linux user yourself). > , Linux is rated higher than any other OS in user support. (see > http://www.redhat.com/redhat/datapro.html). According to those studies > (taken for what they are worth, of course), Linux is also the only OS other > than NT that is gaining market share in corporate environments. I don't put much stock in those surveys. Still, the various inaccurate numbers are pretty compelling when put together. > The advantages of Linux (besides price) are pretty numerous: because the > code is openly distributed, bug fixes, patches, upgrades and drivers often > appear more quickly and are often available for a greater number of > peripherals and devices, &c. On the other hand, new devices (less than a year since initial release), unusual devices (like data-acquisition boards), and devices with documentation available only under NDA all tend to be rather poorly supported. This is changing somewhat. > Plus, although the software and source code > are offered for free, numerous companies make decent revenues selling > support packages (and by selling software bundles on nifty CD-ROMs). And also selling supplementary software (BRU, the backup and restore utility, is an example), and selling hardware with Linux on it (Cobalt Microserver's Qube and RaQ, Corel's NetWinder, VAResearch's $5,000 workstations, Carrera Computer's Alphas, etc.). > An interesting point made by one of the speakers tonite, also, was that > people complain that Linux is hard to install -- and it may well be It is. Not entirely Linux's fault. > (I'm > still waiting for someone to send me a Linux box to test that for myself; I > can tell you from experience that installation of MacOS is so easy that I > would bet that my cat, my 5 year old cousin and/or my grandmother could > install MacOS) Apple had the advantage of designing their platform so it would be easy to install OSes on. Linux folks didn't. Nevertheless, I understand the two ports of Linux to the Mac (one supported by Apple) are both rather hard to install. > -- but most users purchase Windows machines with the OS > preinstalled, so they never get a chance to experience what a frickin' pain > it is to install Windows as well. (Again, I'm still holding out to test > that firsthand.) I haven't installed Windows yet. I've installed Linux several times. > I'd really like to see Linux take a slice out of the M$ monopoly; the > speakers tonite (albeit all personally invested in the OS war) were > optimistic that it will. Competition and choice are good things. It already has. Linux has more market share than Windows NT, and almost as much as the Mac. Kragen