[Ilugc] Five crucial things outsiders do not understand about the Linux community
- From: srivasta@xxxxxxxxxx (Manoj Srivastava)
- Date: Thu May 24 20:30:27 2007
On Wed, 23 May 2007 17:06:45 +0530 (IST), Prem Kurian Philip
<prem@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> said:
I think one of the things that the linux community does not understand
about ordinary users is that:
I think that people who write things like this have no clue
about what drives the Linux community. The lack of understanding of
what drives free software developers
1) Installing new hardware and setting it up is still a very geeky
activity on Linux.
1) A computer is an expensive, useful, general purpose
tool. Researching the purchase of the machine and peripherals for
compatibility seems reasonable. As long as it is possible to
accomplish the task with some hardware, it does not matter that
some hardware vendors make incompatible equipment.
Actually, I think it is easier than getting things not blessed
by the Vendor to work on Vista. And now that some hardware
manufacturers are pre-installing Linux, it means that drivers are often
available (Dell distributes their printer driver for my color laser as
a GPL'd .deb).
Frankly, I would not buy hardware before learning whether it
supports Linux; and boycott the other hardware vendors.
2) For most people, OS is not a religion. Most users won't even know
what is an OS and neither do they care to know.
2) Free software is about community; and people who care and
participate, it is not a marketing machine; it is a group of people
getting together to help each other achieve more from computers.
These people are not part of the free software community, and I
see no real reason to try to cater to them. Free software is about
community; is it surprising that no extraordinary effort is made to
pander to those who are resistant to inclusion?
Again, this is not about gaining market share.
3) You get very little support if you call up BSNL/Airtel etc and ask
why your DSL modem is not working with the Linux distro installed
on your machine.
3) The free software community helps each other; and the network has
the results of people sharing how they made things work, and the
pitfalls to avoid.
ISP's, retail shop salespeople, hardware vendors might not be
clued in to free software, which is only recently encroaching into the
mainstream, but the community provides its own resources to each
other. This is why this LUG is here, and why people participate.
4) Games. Need I say more. To say that OpenGL on Linux is any
comparison to DirectX is to be totally deluded.
4) Free software is not everything for all people.
I've generally been very happy with nethack, angband, and tome,
since I don't do twitch games, but I realize that this is not what
people want. I've been OK with Worl of Warcraft using cedega and
transgaming wine emulators.
5) Free software is written by people who have an itch to scratch,
and for like minded people. The basis is what I label as "The
Dinid Philosophers Solution" -- it is written for other people who
pick up the fork and help feed each other.
Feeding hangers on who just want a free meal is not really a
primary motivation. Sure, having the meal in the open where anyone can
pick up a fork lets new fork-weilders join in, but making extraordinary
effort to feed the non-participating is not something very likely to
happen on a broad scale.
manoj
--
Why is the alphabet in that order? Is it because of that song? Steven
Wright
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@xxxxxxx> <
http://www.golden-gryphon.com/>
1024D/BF24424C print 4966 F272 D093 B493 410B 924B 21BA DABB BF24 424C
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