In message <[log in to unmask]>, Michael Anderson 
<[log in to unmask]> writing at 10:13:33 in his/her local time 
opines:-
>Roy,

>A Pogo Stick?

Perhaps I was a little harsh. A Trabant, then?

>I have experienced all of the problems that you have described, and 
>with a little know-how they're all easily overcome, as well as 
>unnecessary. Using the right distribution of GNU_Linux you will not 
>have any of these operational issues, GUI everything, no need for the 
>command-line if you prefer not to use it. Even your OpenDocument 
>compatibility problem, is not a problem. Maybe you haven't looked at 
>GNU_Linux at all in many years.

Oh, I wish. I'm looking at it today - a straight-arrow up-to-date Red 
Hat distro on a 64-bit Intel server, accessed on a green-screen 
command-line basis from a Reflection session running on my Windows PC.

If you can tell me how to make this into a GUI interface, I shall hang 
on your every word.

>So, more than 4 year ago, Ubuntu (and many other distro's) went to 
>great lengths to make sure that the desktop/laptop/tablet user 
>experience is positive, and that it just works right-out-of-the-box. 
>Using a very long list of compatible hardware, it is simpler than 
>Windows. I've seen young children have no problem using Ubuntu, my 80 
>year old Mother loves it. The people that have the problems with it are 
>Experienced Windows users, frustrated, unable to find Notepad, or the 
>MS Word Icon, or the IE Icon, Outlook? All the same tasks can be 
>accomplished without Windows, only the names have changed, so there is 
>a learning curve. The learning curve is not more involved than the one 
>required by a new version of Windows that was forced onto you by Microsoft.

I remember the vogue for Linux on netbooks. Or rather the manufacturer's 
vogue for it - users elected in droves to use Windows, either straight 
off the bat, or after puzzling over this funny Linux thing for a week or 
two.

And yes, I thought 'too steeped in the MS way to change' - until all 
these people went out and bought i-thingys with no Notepad, no Word, no 
IE, and not even any Flash. And got on just fine.

So what was the problem with Linux, do you think? An expectation of what 
a PC would do that was discarded with the differing form factor of the 
i-thingys?

>I wonder, would you say Apple's MAC OSX is also a pogo stick?

Nope. Apple take great care over the user experience.

>All your complaints are due to lack of experience, true and valid 
>complaints, but really just simple mistakes on your part.

Mistakes I don't make on my PC when I drop to DOS (or, strictly, cmd) 
which I often do, and can get around in tolerably well.

>I'll explain using your automotive analogy, because GNU_Linux could 
>very-well be a pogo stick, if you like.

>If you want your own custom built car, there are hundreds of 
>grow-your-own GNU_Linux distributions that will enable you to build 
>your own whatever. Sadly, it sounds like you got your hands on one of 
>those, and therefore you think it is a usless.

Red Hat? I don't think it could be more mainstream, could it?

<big snip, as custom distros are not the issue>

>Their are many GNU_Linux distributions to choose from, each requires 
>knowledge and thought. Roy, you didn't think, and therefore "you don't 
>know" that "you don't know".

(a) I didn't choose it.
(b) this is real-world big iron Linux, not a Linux PC.

> The same type of reasoning is what fuelled your 
>OpenDocumentSoftwareComplaint.

Huh?

>--
>Mike

Tomorrow, I have to go and get the 32-bit version of some software a 
colleague of mine painstakingly built on the Red Hat server a couple of 
months back. Turns out 64-bit is wrong for what we need.

I'll use his document from that time, listing the 12 or so dependencies 
he had to resolve, and the extra bits he had to get from here and there.

If I get it right, then my HP3000 COBOL programs will blaze into new 
life as gcc executables accessing an Oracle database. (Or at least, 
after a lot of debugging, they might. Perhaps).

I just hope I can read his document still, though, as the tears of sweat 
and frustration have made the ink run in places :-)

Roy
-- 
Roy Brown        'Have nothing in your houses that you do not know to be
Kelmscott Ltd     useful, or believe to be beautiful'  William Morris

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