Adieu, Fedora

[Tim]

On Sun, 2011-06-12 at 17:07 -0700, James McKenzie wrote:
> Linux can either be the OS/2 of the computing world or the replacement
> for Microsoft's Windows products.  Which do YOU want?  I want the
> latter.  I want people to use, with ease, a vastly better OS.  We, the
> community have to be willing to assist those who want that goal.  And
> remember, we have variety.  We can CHOOSE to use Gnome3, KDE 4, XFCE
> or a number of frontends.  If we want, we don't have to use ANY of
> them.  That is called convenience, and I like that.
> <Soupbox off>
> Folks, we can discuss this to the end.  The decision has been made,
> for us by others, that the desktop will move into the 21st Century.
> Our thoughts, comments and other such are not even under
> consideration.  In other words, we are wasting our time even talking
> about it.

If you're really trying to pursue this "we will be the next Microsoft"
nonsense, the only way to do it is to go about it the same was as they
did:

It'll need to be pre-installed on new computers, Microsoft only achieved
their numbers by doing that dirty deal.  Computer manufacturers will
have to provide drivers for their hardware (because nobody else can).
Or, use hardware that works with standard drivers, and not keep on
changing the hardware that they use (as if that will will happen).

And OS can't ever gain much ground in the consumer world if users have
to get their hands on it, and install it instead of, or in addition to,
Windows.  It needs to be already there, and not as one choice of
computer system out of two hundred products that retailer X sells.

The gee-whiz factor being applied to the latest emperor's new clothes,
i.e. Gnome, is a completely different aspect to the story.  What makes a
user interface good is; if it works, is intuitive, is easy to use,
doesn't lead to the user doing stupid things, and doesn't require a
ridiculously high-specced machine to do basic tasks.  And what's basic
tasks?  Opening file browser windows, word processing, web browsing,
email.  Those are things that shouldn't require 3D live rendering,
etc.  

iPad-like user-interfaces, don't really lend themselves to easy
multi-tasking.  And things that require use of mouse *and* keyboard
don't lend themselves to ease-of-use.

-- 
[tim at localhost ~]$ uname -r
2.6.27.25-78.2.56.fc9.i686

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