h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

As a member of a large computer users group in Houston, Texas, I routinely read heckles from the tech guys that we should all stop using Windows. This is directed at the membership in general, which consists mostly of non-programmers on a single machine at home, struggling to achieve or maintain some level of proficiency with standard commercial applications. Typical are MS Office, Adobe Photoshop, Internet Explorer/Outlook, and similar apps.

The tech's pitch is predictable - "____ OS is free and you can do anything you can do in Windows". IMHO, this is a dramatic overstatement - the apps I mentioned are invariably in far advanced versions and thus quite "mature". Yes, Microsoft is arrogant and unethical, and yes I wish I had options. But realistically, if you want the ability to run the vast majority of applications, some you haven't even discovered yet, Windows is far and away the best option. I'd like to see this change, but its up to the software publishers IMHO - Adobe (Photoshop, Premiere), Discreet (3D Max animation), Steinberg (music apps), Electronic Arts (games), etc., etc. And, of course, the publishers would probably say they have to go with the "standard" to hold down development cost. Sigh.

FWIW.

While it is technocally true that a great number of applications are only available on windows, this is becoming less true every year.

taking the examples you have used, you can use openoffice instead of microsoft word / office, and get everything but the macros, providing 95% compatability with other people using word / office. while this doesn't sound very good, you must bear in mind that every new version of office and word also breaks backwards compatability with some features, so the choice is between changing once, or changing every time you "upgrade" word / office.

Photoshop has a competitor that is as competent in the Gnu image manipulation program (or gimp), which suports all the features but CMYK colour seperations which is only used for professional printing, and the barriers to implimenting that have been removed in the last update, so it should be coming soon.

I don't know Discreet, but animation has long been supported using povray, and the industry standard for this is already moving to linux so the filmakers can exploit the benefits of cheaper licensing anyway, so linux support for animation is comming along fine thank you. see also

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/alabaster/FFM1789982?thread=405659&skip=0&show=20#p5149594

cubasis by stienberg is the standard for musicians, but that is comming along nicely as well, see

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/alabaster/FFM1789982?thread=405659&skip=0&show=20#p5149631

browsers are very well supported under linux, I can think of 10 without much difficulty. A list of all the browsers I know of is available at http://www.xyroth-enterprises.co.uk/wbrowser.htm which is not linux specific.

Email is similarly well supported, also, most viruses are currently spread with outlook express, so it can be argued that full outlook compatability is not desirable. but again there is quite a list wich can be found at http://www.xyroth-enterprises.co.uk/mailprog.htm again, not all of them are linux specific.

There was recently quite a disk of 500 opensource games on one of the magazines, which filled a dvd, and some suppliers of commercial games do include linux support, they just don't shout about it. Unreal tournament springs to mind, but there are quite a few others.

The "development cost" arguament no longer holds water I am afraid, due to the fact that more than half of all software development now happens under open source, and that figure is rising every month.

Also, if you develope in windows, you tend to write windows specific programs due to some of the lock in problems. if you develope in linux, there are multiple cross platform libraries which allow you to develope the program once, and then release it simultaniously for apple, microsoft, and linux with only a recompilation required.

This is a lot cheaper than developing one version for windows, another for mac, and a third for linux because you get the extra markets of mac and linux for free.

Also, you can run a lot of windows software using the crossover tools, like crossover office to run word, ms office, etc, wineX to run a lot of windows games, and so on.

The reason tech guys don't like microsoft software is because it is usually full of holes, which they nd up having to provide support for, and despite their claims to the contrary, microsoft don't support proper remote debugging, so it is much harder work than is necessary.

I've used the 'gimp' program quite a bit on both Windows and Linux, and I have to say that the one feature that stands out, taking it above and beyond its commercial competitors is the scripting functionality (called script-fu). So, if I have lots of things I often do in order to alter images (eg - resize, lighten edges, add border, add text in font 1, overlay text in font 2, etc, etc), I can just script it and save myself lots of time.

There are still some gaping holes in open source coverage - for example - a Dreamweaver style HTML editor would be nice. And something to compete with soundforge would be good. I've used bluefish and audacity on Linux, but neither matches up to the commercial competition.

Also - in case anyone is interested - slashdot were discussing this paper: http://firstmonday.org/issues/issue9_4/levesque/index.html
"Five Fundamental Problems With Open Source Software Development"

Script-fu is extremely powerful yes, but completely unusable by the average computer user or graphic artist. You need to learn to program before you can use Script-fu. Photoshop's ability to record macro's is much easier to use, but less powerful. So while there is a trade-off, I'd say it's not an equal one - what use is all the power of script-fu if many people can't use it at all? Photoshop macro's can't do everything you may need, but at least you can easily get them to do some of it.

I think Script-fu is a perfect example of the major shortcoming of most open-source applications and systems. At some point the average user runs into a wall where some sophisticated technical knowledge is needed. At that point it becomes much easier to pay a Microsoft. Apple, or Adobe to think for you.

The argument about the number of applications on any system is and always has been moot. It's the same argument Mac users have been hearing for decades. The truth is that most people only use one or two dozen applications and stick with those for as long as they can, so it usually does not matter at all if Windows has 80 billion games and linux only has two thousand, no one will ever use all of them on either system or ever come close to that. The only time it matters is if there is *one* specific, specialized and indispensable application that runs on only one system, and that type of things cuts both ways - there are things that run on linux or mac that do not run on windows.

I would really like to believe that Open Source software is as "mature" as Windows apps (meaning user friendly), but here is an actual exchange between two guys (not me) who are setting up a new Special Interest Group (SIG) for digital photography:

QUOTE

>I've dowloaded GIMP over the weekend. It isn't for a newbie. First
>the
>GUI is not quite windows standard. It is awkward to work with if you
>are
>used to using programs like MS Office/Works. The File browser is
>very
>awkward to use. It looks very powerful though.

Ok, so it's not the easiest program in the world to use - a program
written by geeks for geeks. We can't complain too much if it's free,
though. Maybe V.3 will be better.

END QUOTE

This is not the kind of testimonial that attracts lowly end users like myself. And on the Mac/Windows platform war (as someone pointed out, decades old), I'll also pass - this is being decided for me by developers like this guy:

http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/Platforms.html

Both those articles make good points, but ignore the fundamental dynamic of most open source software.

When I write a program, I write it because I can't find anything online which is both available, and does what I need.

If I don't see the need to make money out of it, then I will often share it with some friends. I might then add some extra features that they suggest, or expand the number of environments in which it runs to help them out. (in fact i am currently doing just that with some programs)

If I Publicise it enough, some more people might start to use it, and a few of them might tell me what is wrong with it.

then we hit the real problem.

every open source project, and most other projects have a fundamental limit on experts available time. If I get 20 requests for the same minor modification, and 1 request for a omplete redesign of the user interface, guess which oe gets implimented.

Most open source software is at this stage. it is available for you to try and if it helps then so much the better.

Later on, when an application gets a big enough user base, it starts getting more programmers (or documentation writers) and the usability goes through the roof.

occasionally one of these projects will spin off a library which makes the whole job of writing software much easier, and suddenly the standard of new software goes up a lot for no apparent reason.

this happened with the gimp. it spun off gtk, which then ended up being used as the basis for the gnome desktop environment.

If there are not enough users, the features that get worked on are the simple ones to do, hence feature creep.

"features" are usually minor modifications and quick to do. documentation takes longer to do, and often doesn't become available until the 1.0 release of the software. (or if you are used to windows software, version 3). however it is often very usable and useful long before that, and tht is the dilema.

the docs don't get writen until it is viewed as complete and stable by the authors, but the system is put to use long before that, so newbies moan about the lack of documentation.

This is largely down to the people who put together distributions, who have a preference for shovelware instead of making sure they provide one or two good programs of a given type and contribute good documentation to those projects. The same is true for the configuration tools, they are also a responsibility of those bundling the software.

So lets blame the right people shall we. if we want a badly documented bunch of software with a dozen bleeding edge programs that do roughly the same thing then get the distribution that does that. If you want stuff that is bomb proof and well documented then use that instead.

"If you want stuff that is bomb proof and well documented then use that instead."

Yup, that's what I want. I really wish I didn't need an operating system at all, I just want to use familiar tools like Adobe Photoshop, with lots of tutorials, other users to talk to, low cost plugins and books, etc.

But I guess an OS is still a necessary evil.

What looks to be happening, is that the OS has got stable enough that you can't add value there.

that means you have to add it somewhere else.

this was first done with internet connectivity, by implimenting tcp/ip in windows to compete with the unix alternatives which already had it, and then in the browser wars, again to compete with unix.

as an interesting side point, internet explorer is now only available on microsoft, whereas most of the rest are available on multiple platforms, so it looks like they can't make money there any more.

Office software used to be profitable, but now you can get 95% of the same functionality as word from open office, it can't last long.

now it is media players, where they are trying to sell restrictions on being able to play the music you have already bought, compared to open source which adds no such restrictions.

as to bomb proof software, the current best system for this is debian linux, which makes sure that it is audited for bugs and security holes, and openbsd which is similarly security audited.

Well documented is a different matter, even windows which undoubtedly has quite a bit of documentation ends up with lots of "for dummies" books telling you how to use the suposedly well documented and intuitive software, so that has a long way to go yet.

"Well documented is a different matter, even windows which undoubtedly has quite a bit of documentation ends up with lots of "for dummies" books telling you how to use the suposedly well documented and intuitive software, so that has a long way to go yet."

I have to say that one of the main reasons I use Linux is for just this issue. I find it utterly infuriating that with Windows things just stop working, for no clear reason, and all you can do is use a help file that probably just tells you to start the programme in the way you just did, and gives up when that doesn't work (or, worse, just pretends - 'Now click the button marked....' - that is has worked). With Linux you can track down what the problem is, and, in all likelihood, there's a plain text file with the settings in, that you can fiddle with until it works again.

Which is not to say that everything does work perfectly, but I find myself far less often ready to chuck my monitor out the window and scream 'NO I DON'T WANT TO USE THE F***ING WIZARD'!.

Case in point - recently re-installing Windows 98 SE I tried to get onto the net to track down all the necessary updates, but every time I clicked the IE button, it brought up the 'Register with MSN' screen. Eventually I gave up on trying to persuade it that I didn't need a new ISP since I was on a home LAN, downloaded Firefox in Linux, and used that, which was perfectly happy.

So to return from my Windows-rant, major components of Linux (and no, not pre-release software by teenages in Lapland) tends to have very well documented features, and, more importantly, customisation done in user-readable files, rather than by a computer than knows better than you and refuses to listen when you tell it clearly (in binary) what you want it to do.