| Author |
Message |
linuxdoctor
Infallible Persona
Joined: 23 Apr 2005
Posts: 1307
Location: Ottawa, Canada
|
 Posted: Sat Apr 26, 2008 11:28 am Post subject: |
 |
|
One of the things that I find frustrating when people talk about Linux is that most people don't know what they are talking about. This thread is no different. Let me address some of the errors that I've seen on this thread.
On his initial post beginning this thread he lumps in FreeBSD and Solaris in with other linux distros. FreeBSD and Solaris are not Linux distributions but are variants of Unix. Linux is itself a variant of Unix but it is independent of other other two aforementioned variants. FreeBSD is a variant of the Berkley Standard Distribution (BSD) which is an offshoot of the the Bell Labs Unix Release 6 dating to the mid-1970's. Solaris is yet another independent Unix variant from Sun Microsystems and bas its origins in the 1980's. Linux is the baby of the pack with it's origin set to 1993 with a computer science student at the University of Helsinki named Linus Torvalds.
| SolidRaven wrote: | | On top of that, the X Window System concept has been in active development for over 20 years by now I think. In other words, a lot more mature than the windows GUI. The first versions of X Server had to run on hardware that windows 3.1 wouldn't even boot on... |
A lot longer than that. X Windows has been around since the mod-1970's. The X Windows concept is itself pretty interesting. This was back in the days when computer hardware was very expensive, filled rooms or, in the case of the minicomputer, closets and had relatively small amounts of memory compared to today's computers. The original Unix systems ran on a Digital PDP 11/45 with 192K core memory and about 10 megabytes of disk-pack space. That's it! User interfacing was through external terminals rather than the integrated graphics hardware and keyboard we find in desk-tops and lap-top computers today. All the 'fancy' stuff like graphics was accomplished through fairly primitive "control codes" transmitted to these terminals and was generally pretty slow.
The X Windows concept introduced a sophisticated and intelligent communications protocol between the computer and the graphics terminal to efficiently implement complex graphics functions including windowing and most of the functionality we still see on today's systems. This functionality however required the design of special terminals, called X terminals and were relatively inexpensive. Well, inexpensive in terms of the the price of computers ($1-million and higher). X terminals sold for a few thousand dollars and ordinary character terminals sold for about a thousand. Over time the popularity of X10, as it was then called, grew and more was demanded of it than could be efficiently be handled over slow serial links. With the advent of high-speed network technology, specifically the Ethernet in the 1980s, the X display protocol was redesigned for implementation over networks and X11 was born.
X11 is designed as a hardware independent protocol and has been implemented on a variety of hardware and software platforms. While X is generally considered to be a feature of Unix systems, X servers have been developed to run on non-Unix operating systems by BeOS and even Windows. One of the nice features of X Windows is that any two (nor more) systems that can communicate with each other over a network and can run an X server can actually display output and receive inputer in a relatively seemless manner.
| Xtreme $niper wrote: | | With all that development, it's still kind of odd that they haven't bothered to put the time and effort into getting linux to appeal more to the mainstream crowds who don't want to learn how to use terminal. Ubuntu is one of the only ones that have ever gone even remotely mainstream. |
This is just plain wrong. Don't look now but Linux is mainstream. It is the system of choice for servers and highly reliable computer systems. The main reason that Linux isn't, perhaps, even more 'mainstream' is because of Microsoft itself. People either forget, or are perhaps too young to even know, is that back in the 19080s when the "personal computer revolution" began there weren't that many computers out there at three to five thousand dollars a pop few people could afford it. When IBM began to aggressively market it's version, called the IBM-PC, it almost immediately dominated the market largely because of it's name. Everybody knew that IBM was the world's largest computer maker and everybody naturally wanted to be a part of that. When IBM turned to Microsoft to provide an operating system Microsoft was the major beneficiary of the success of the IBM-PC eventually making it the world's largest software supplier.
When linux came along in the 1990's Microsoft had essentially a captive market. Linux was never a product owned by any company but a student research project that exploded thanks to the internet. It isn't owned by anybody so nobody exploit for their own personal profit. That doesn't mean that there haven't been successful companies selling and using Linux. Redhat was the first major Linux startup to be worth more than a billion dollars. IBM is now investing heavily in Linux as are many other companies like Sun Microsystems, Oracle and Adobe. All that is needed now is for consumers to "get with the programme" and start using Linux in even greater numbers.
More to come.
_________________
Misanthrope: someone who realizes that humans really are as stupid as they appear.
If you think I'm 'politically' incorrect you have the wrong politics. |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
linuxdoctor
Infallible Persona
Joined: 23 Apr 2005
Posts: 1307
Location: Ottawa, Canada
|
| Posted: Sat Apr 26, 2008 1:34 pm Post subject: |
|
|
... continued.
| ClickFanatic wrote: | | Linux is out of the 'terminal era', by the way. Ubuntu was one of the first to move away from the Linux stereotypes and now a lot more distributions are following in its footsteps. |
Nowhere near true on both counts. Linux is most certainly not out of the "terminal era." It surfaced in 1993 about twenty five years after Unix was invented and well into the era of Unix as a mature sophisticated operating system. In 1993 WIndows was in the 3.1 era and IBM and Microsoft were fighting over what OS/2 was supposed to be. Linux inherited the sophistication of Unix through the GNU Project and X11. Linux began as a far more advanced OS than Windows ever was and remains superior to today's version of Windows still.
As for Ubuntu and sterotypes, where does that come from? Ubuntu is not really any different from any other distribution. There are basically two 'styles' of Linux distros out there: Debian style and Slackware style. All of today's distributions can trace their origins to one or the other. Ubuntu is from the Debian branch of Linux distros with fixes to some of the many Debian limitations. Ubuntu is currently one of two 'fashionable' distros available today. The other is Gentoo.
There really isn't much difference among the various Linux distributions. It is all in the packaging that makes the difference. How Ubuntu has become "well known" for "moving away from the terminal era" is probably some sort of Ubuntu propaganda. In any case, as far as I'm concerned, any "moving away from the terminal era" is a step backward and not an improvement. There are absolutely no GUIs in existence anywhere that can surpass the utility and power of the GNU tools. I can always do things simpler, faster and easier with on the 'terminal' than I ever do with a GUI.
| Xtreme $niper wrote: | | Perhaps the linux community needs to do a better job of educating people? That costs nothing but time, which with a wiki page and some enthusiastic people probably wouldn't take all that long. |
Actually we're doing a pretty good job of educating people. The problem is we're faced with aggressive marketing from Microsoft and the huge inertia from the corporate world. Schools get their computers often for from Microsoft through their many giveaways for educational institutions, libraries and community centres which would, naturally, include Windows. If they wanted to use Linux they'd have to buy the computers first which would cost them money.
However the tide is turning. Governments all around the world are mandating the use of Open Source Software in the civil service and in education which means that, in most cases, Linux would the OS of choice. In France schools and universities are forbidden by law to purchase proprietary software at all.
Things will change in the long run. Experts are already predicting the demise of Windows. Even Microsoft things so, but they aren't going to tell you that.
| Scar wrote: | | i love using Photoshop, If i switched to linux i'd have to use Gimp. You can't compare those two. You might be able to compare gimp to paintshop pro, or even paint.net but it can't even do alot of the simple tasks that photoshop can. Why limit myself? I'm not a hacker, nor a coder, or a computer person. |
How many times have I heard this one? I really like the quip, "Why limit myself?" My question to you is, "Why limit yourself to Photoshop?" There isn't much that Gimp can't do that Photoshop does and perhaps there are things that Gimp does that Photoshop doesn't. More often than not it's a case that Gimp does things slightly differently than Photoshop that users have just become used too and don't want to learn something new.
Yes, things are different on Linux. There are many different software packages that do things differently than the major available programmes but so what? Unless you're dead lazy why not learn something new? Why limit yourself?
| Scar wrote: | I would like too see some of these distros charing money, then they'd have even more resources to polish the project and even get in contracts and what not with major software & game developers and get something out there to make linux worth using.
|
This is a myth that Open Source/Free Software is less sophisticated or polished than "for profit" versions. In a great many cases, perhaps at this stage most of them, are just as polished, and maybe even more polished, than their "for profit" competitors. My experience is that people who complain about this are just too lazy to switch. They're used to doing things "their way" and anything different is just too uncomfortable for them. Gimp is not any less polished than Photoshop, it is just different.
| ClickFanatic wrote: | | SolidRaven wrote: | | Strange, I've had applications that run faster in wine than on windows. |
How is that supposed to make sense? WINE has to 'translate' the program's system calls, so logically speaking it should be slower than Windows (or equally fast at best). |
Not always. It is actually possible for an emulator to run faster than the target it is emulating. That depends on a large number of factors but it all boils down to differences in how each system does things. For instance, Microsoft, except for video, I/O performance is notoriously slow. Linux has very good performance in this regard. An application that is I/O intensive would more than likely run faster on Linux than on Windows. It is also known that a lot of Windows is badly coded and borrows heavily from old legacy code that could be a decade old or more. Wine is young compared to that and a lot of the interface routines are far more efficient than their Windows versions resulting in greater speed for Wine.
On the whole, Linux is far faster than Windows and noticeably so. Wine capitalises on this speed advantage to close the performance gap. One advantage that Windows does have is that the graphics system is somewhat faster than implementations of X. XFree86 has been notoriously slow but the newer X.org version is quite a bit faster and is beginning to replace it in most modern Linux distros.
Windows' advantage in graphics comes from the fact that Windows only supports one set of hardware. X, on the other hard, is designed to work on a lot of different kinds of hardware. The result of this is that while Windows only needs to care about one set of hardware specifications, X has to take a more general approach that works on practically everything. The result of this greater generality means that X is somewhat slower than Windows. X was designed to work on practically any set of hardware Windows was not. As a result Windows does have an advantage one which, because of bad coding, is largely wasted.
_________________
Misanthrope: someone who realizes that humans really are as stupid as they appear.
If you think I'm 'politically' incorrect you have the wrong politics. |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
martin
Cafe Montevideo
Joined: 17 Mar 2005
Posts: 1030
Location: Uruguay
|
| Posted: Sat Apr 26, 2008 2:29 pm Post subject: |
|
|
I tried Mandrake 10, Red Hat, Debian Lenny, OpenSuse, Ubuntu and Kubuntu. I prefer the KDE environment. I'm now dowloading the new OpenSUSE 11.0 Beta 1 DVD, it looks very nice! 
_________________
http://martin.com.uy
http://cafemontevideo.com |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
ClickFanatic
Est. 2005
Joined: 18 Jan 2005
Posts: 4135
Location: A particular geographic area
|
| Posted: Sat Apr 26, 2008 3:10 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| linuxdoctor wrote: | As for Ubuntu and sterotypes, where does that come from? Ubuntu is not really any different from any other distribution. There are basically two 'styles' of Linux distros out there: Debian style and Slackware style. All of today's distributions can trace their origins to one or the other. Ubuntu is from the Debian branch of Linux distros with fixes to some of the many Debian limitations. Ubuntu is currently one of two 'fashionable' distros available today. The other is Gentoo.
There really isn't much difference among the various Linux distributions. It is all in the packaging that makes the difference. How Ubuntu has become "well known" for "moving away from the terminal era" is probably some sort of Ubuntu propaganda. In any case, as far as I'm concerned, any "moving away from the terminal era" is a step backward and not an improvement. There are absolutely no GUIs in existence anywhere that can surpass the utility and power of the GNU tools. I can always do things simpler, faster and easier with on the 'terminal' than I ever do with a GUI. |
Thanks to the Ubuntu project, many tasks that could only be done in a terminal are now possible via a GUI.
Many people think using Linux is synonymous for using a terminal. This is the stereotype that Ubuntu is quite effectively getting rid off.
I don't deny that some tasks work better when done in a terminal, but a GUI is much easier for novices.
_________________
Captain Jell-O Buster from the Future
[img]http://feeds.feedburner.com/sparepencil.1.gif[/img] |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
linuxdoctor
Infallible Persona
Joined: 23 Apr 2005
Posts: 1307
Location: Ottawa, Canada
|
| Posted: Sat Apr 26, 2008 3:46 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| ClickFanatic wrote: | | Thanks to the Ubuntu project, many tasks that could only be done in a terminal are now possible via a GUI. |
Again, where does this come from? Ubuntu is really no different from any other Linux distro available today. Ubuntu is a Debian based distribution running KDE as the default desktop. You get the same thing on SuSE or Fedora with the KDE desktop.
There is nothing that the KDE desktop on Ubuntu 'now' does that any other distro with the KDE desktop doesn't do.
I repeat, there is very little difference between the various Linux distributions. None are better than any other and seems to be a matter of personal choice. It's all in how each different community (Ubuntu, Gentoo, Fedora, Mandriva, SuSE, etc.) define what is important to them.
To claim that Ubuntu is responsible for anything that the other distros cannot do borders on the incredulous. Still, any system that ties itself too closely GUI system, as Windows does and, unfortunately, as Gnome is moving itself, is severely limiting itself and doing their users a great disservice.
GUIs window managers in general are far more cumbersome when you need to get some 'real' work done. The more you try to make your window manager do the more trivial your computer experience becomes.
Only beginners may need to have a window manager that does everything for them. This beginner phase lasts only a short time and they should teach themselves how their system really works. In due course they could do away with their "do everything" window managers and upgrade to a "light weight" window manager that does only those things that really need to be done. I use IceWM and that's all I need. There are plenty other light weight window managers out there too.
By the way, that's another feature of X11. You can have your own window managers that looks the way you want it to look and does what you want it to do. You aren't stuck with only one, like Windows, or forced to use the only that the seller wants you to use, like Windows too. In Linux you aren't forced to do anything; you have complete freedom. As someone said earlier on this thread: why limit yourself?
_________________
Misanthrope: someone who realizes that humans really are as stupid as they appear.
If you think I'm 'politically' incorrect you have the wrong politics. |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
spock
iSpock
Joined: 23 Mar 2005
Posts: 2947
Location: The Netherlands
|
| Posted: Sun Apr 27, 2008 5:43 am Post subject: |
|
|
| linuxdoctor wrote: | | ClickFanatic wrote: | | Thanks to the Ubuntu project, many tasks that could only be done in a terminal are now possible via a GUI. |
Again, where does this come from? Ubuntu is really no different from any other Linux distro available today. Ubuntu is a Debian based distribution running KDE as the default desktop. You get the same thing on SuSE or Fedora with the KDE desktop. |
Ubuntu is using Gnome as default window manager.
You guys are both right in my opinion. You can do the same things in Ubuntu you can do in many other distributions. (I believe OpenSuSE uses Gnome as default interface to)
However, ClickFanatic is partly right because Ubuntu has made many easy to use configuration programs that work quite well and make configuring the system less painful for novices. (However, I usually want to configure things that can't be done using those tools, and in the past versions of Ubuntu I had lots of strange problems with the graphical tools (all stupid bugs  ), so usually I finally have to rely on the command line anyway. But it'sgreat for beginners)
_________________
My new site
My OpenTTD data package |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
linuxdoctor
Infallible Persona
Joined: 23 Apr 2005
Posts: 1307
Location: Ottawa, Canada
|
| Posted: Mon Apr 28, 2008 5:02 am Post subject: |
|
|
| spock wrote: | | Ubuntu is using Gnome as default window manager. |
A friend of mine runs Ubuntu and the desktop is definitely KDE. Perhaps there is a choice. I'm running Fedora 8 (at the moment) and at installation time you have the a choice between installing either Gnome or KDE (or neither or both).
Personally, I make a habit of changing distros each time I get a new computer. That way I keep on top of what's going on in the Linux distro world. I tend to avoid Debian based distros because I vehemently disagree with Debian politics (neo-liberal pseudo-socialist anarchocommunist). On the whole Debian based distros tow the Debian political line and so I tend to avoid them all. However, I do "test drive" them from time to time but I definitely won't do a permanent install.
With about a dozen Linux distros out there there is quite a lot of choice available.
_________________
Misanthrope: someone who realizes that humans really are as stupid as they appear.
If you think I'm 'politically' incorrect you have the wrong politics. |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
ClickFanatic
Est. 2005
Joined: 18 Jan 2005
Posts: 4135
Location: A particular geographic area
|
| Posted: Mon Apr 28, 2008 9:09 am Post subject: |
|
|
| linuxdoctor wrote: | | spock wrote: | | Ubuntu is using Gnome as default window manager. |
A friend of mine runs Ubuntu and the desktop is definitely KDE. |
That would probably be Kubuntu. Or he must have replaced Gnome in Ubuntu.
The difference between Ubuntu and Kubuntu is not only the desktop manager, but also the package of applications that is installed by default. Kubuntu mostly has appliKations and other Qt-powered software, whereas Ubuntu has GTK-based applications.
By the way, there is also Xubuntu, which uses XFCE. It is also GTK-based, but it aims to have as few Gnome dependencies as possible.
_________________
Captain Jell-O Buster from the Future
[img]http://feeds.feedburner.com/sparepencil.1.gif[/img] |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
Xtreme $niper
Lifeless Person
Joined: 29 Mar 2005
Posts: 1534
Location: Canada
|
| Posted: Thu May 08, 2008 9:51 am Post subject: |
|
|
| linuxdoctor wrote: | | Xtreme $niper wrote: | | With all that development, it's still kind of odd that they haven't bothered to put the time and effort into getting linux to appeal more to the mainstream crowds who don't want to learn how to use terminal. Ubuntu is one of the only ones that have ever gone even remotely mainstream. |
This is just plain wrong. Don't look now but Linux is mainstream. It is the system of choice for servers and highly reliable computer systems. The main reason that Linux isn't, perhaps, even more 'mainstream' is because of Microsoft itself. People either forget, or are perhaps too young to even know, is that back in the 19080s when the "personal computer revolution" began there weren't that many computers out there at three to five thousand dollars a pop few people could afford it. When IBM began to aggressively market it's version, called the IBM-PC, it almost immediately dominated the market largely because of it's name. Everybody knew that IBM was the world's largest computer maker and everybody naturally wanted to be a part of that. When IBM turned to Microsoft to provide an operating system Microsoft was the major beneficiary of the success of the IBM-PC eventually making it the world's largest software supplier.
When linux came along in the 1990's Microsoft had essentially a captive market. Linux was never a product owned by any company but a student research project that exploded thanks to the internet. It isn't owned by anybody so nobody exploit for their own personal profit. That doesn't mean that there haven't been successful companies selling and using Linux. Redhat was the first major Linux startup to be worth more than a billion dollars. IBM is now investing heavily in Linux as are many other companies like Sun Microsystems, Oracle and Adobe. All that is needed now is for consumers to "get with the programme" and start using Linux in even greater numbers. |
Well I suppose what I meant when I said that linux is not very "mainstream" is from the home user perspective. I know very well that linux is popular and widely used for servers and other business environments. My main point was that most home users don't know about linux. You're right in the fact that Red Hat was another mainstream distro, and now most average geeks tend to know what SuSe, Mandrake, Debian, etc are. But fact of the matter is, most average geeks don't equal the average computer user. I don't particularly view the business world as something that would define the mainstream in this case, because I was comparing Windows as a home computer OS to Linux as a home computer OS.
| Quote: | | Experts are already predicting the demise of Windows. |
Well that I can definitely see. If Vista isn't an indication that Windows is going downhill, I don't know what is. Windows 7 is probably going to be the release that makes it or breaks it for Microsoft. I, for one, have already gone to a unix based OS (although most unix geeks would cringe at the relation); OS X. I only use Windows at work now.
_________________
Come visit Shattered Abstracts! (Photoblog!) |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
LP-SolidRaven
Dictator of the Dump
Joined: 06 Jun 2004
Posts: 7359
Location: The cheese is made out of moon
|
| Posted: Thu May 08, 2008 12:00 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| ClickFanatic wrote: | | linuxdoctor wrote: | | spock wrote: | | Ubuntu is using Gnome as default window manager. |
A friend of mine runs Ubuntu and the desktop is definitely KDE. |
That would probably be Kubuntu. Or he must have replaced Gnome in Ubuntu.
The difference between Ubuntu and Kubuntu is not only the desktop manager, but also the package of applications that is installed by default. Kubuntu mostly has appliKations and other Qt-powered software, whereas Ubuntu has GTK-based applications.
By the way, there is also Xubuntu, which uses XFCE. It is also GTK-based, but it aims to have as few Gnome dependencies as possible. |
You can have both installed at the same time...
_________________
| Quote: |
<bart416> I just realized something
<bart416> we celebrate the fact that this piece of rock made one rotation around a glowing ball of plasma that is kept together due to its own gravity well
<njsg> HAPPY NEW YEAR
<Easter> ^^
|
|
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
ClickFanatic
Est. 2005
Joined: 18 Jan 2005
Posts: 4135
Location: A particular geographic area
|
| Posted: Thu May 08, 2008 2:09 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| SolidRaven wrote: | | ClickFanatic wrote: | | linuxdoctor wrote: | | spock wrote: | | Ubuntu is using Gnome as default window manager. |
A friend of mine runs Ubuntu and the desktop is definitely KDE. |
That would probably be Kubuntu. Or he must have replaced Gnome in Ubuntu.
The difference between Ubuntu and Kubuntu is not only the desktop manager, but also the package of applications that is installed by default. Kubuntu mostly has appliKations and other Qt-powered software, whereas Ubuntu has GTK-based applications.
By the way, there is also Xubuntu, which uses XFCE. It is also GTK-based, but it aims to have as few Gnome dependencies as possible. |
You can have both installed at the same time... |
Quite impractical though, since you would have to manage multiple environments. I did it once, but it wasn't very useful (you can use Qt applications in Gnome anyway, or the other way around if you want).
_________________
Captain Jell-O Buster from the Future
[img]http://feeds.feedburner.com/sparepencil.1.gif[/img] |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
linuxdoctor
Infallible Persona
Joined: 23 Apr 2005
Posts: 1307
Location: Ottawa, Canada
|
| Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 5:19 am Post subject: |
|
|
Don't confuse Qt, which is an application development environment, and Gnome, which is a desktop.
Qt is a basically an API and a set of tools that enables the development of cross-platform applications.
Gnome is one of literally dozens of desktops available for Unix/Linux systems.
_________________
Misanthrope: someone who realizes that humans really are as stupid as they appear.
If you think I'm 'politically' incorrect you have the wrong politics. |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
ClickFanatic
Est. 2005
Joined: 18 Jan 2005
Posts: 4135
Location: A particular geographic area
|
| Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 7:14 am Post subject: |
|
|
| linuxdoctor wrote: | Don't confuse Qt, which is an application development environment, and Gnome, which is a desktop.
Qt is a basically an API and a set of tools that enables the development of cross-platform applications.
Gnome is one of literally dozens of desktops available for Unix/Linux systems. |
Sorry about that, I didn't structure my sentence very well. What I wanted to say is that despite the desktop environment being either Qt or GTK oriented it isn't a problem to run applications based on a different graphical toolkit in them.
_________________
Captain Jell-O Buster from the Future
[img]http://feeds.feedburner.com/sparepencil.1.gif[/img] |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
The Grinch
Lifeless Person
Joined: 15 Dec 2004
Posts: 6208
Location: Chuck Norris's nightmares.
|
| Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 1:30 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| linuxdoctor wrote: |
| Scar wrote: | | i love using Photoshop, If i switched to linux i'd have to use Gimp. You can't compare those two. You might be able to compare gimp to paintshop pro, or even paint.net but it can't even do alot of the simple tasks that photoshop can. Why limit myself? I'm not a hacker, nor a coder, or a computer person. |
How many times have I heard this one? I really like the quip, "Why limit myself?" My question to you is, "Why limit yourself to Photoshop?" There isn't much that Gimp can't do that Photoshop does and perhaps there are things that Gimp does that Photoshop doesn't. More often than not it's a case that Gimp does things slightly differently than Photoshop that users have just become used too and don't want to learn something new. |
haha @ you being funny. Might as well use MS paint too, right?
You obviously do not use photoshop. You really compare the two honestly, if you did you would truly understand what i am saying, and what millions of others are saying. You can go ahead and reply and say that you use photoshop or have alot in the past, when in truth there is no possible way that you could.
and of course you could learn how to do each special effect pixel by pixel in gimp, but why?
The only thing you can compare Gimp to would be Paint.net or maybe even Adobe Fireworks. Thats about it.
If gimp was even close to touchin Photoshop i seriously doubt that people and companies would dish out hundreds of dollars still for Photoshop.
If you think you can do the same thing with them then lets meet up and have some designing contest. you can use your beloved gimp, and i can use my photoshop. The contest will have a time limit, and wouldn't allow any plugins/extensions (nothing third party).
Linux has been around for a REALLY long time now, and it still hasn't massively taken off. There is a reason for that. Why ignore it?
Ubuntu is really the closes it has gone to being mainstream, and it's not very close. Alot of people just do not like linux. And it's not because there arent little to no programs that they use that you cant on linux, but the overall feel when they actually try to use it. It just doesn't work out.
Wal-Mart even recently stopped selling Linux based pc's in their stores because no one really wanted them. they sold most of them, but it took awhile. They only sell them online now.
I only liked one Linux Distro which is dreamlinux, but it still isn't ready for me to switch from my Vista full time and only use it. I wish i had options, but i don't. I'm stuck with Windows and Vista, which isn't a bad thing because it works perfect for me, but i'd still like to have the option. Sadly i don't unless i want to use mac.
Maybe in a few more years i will, but it doesn't seem that way since linux hasnt had a powerful hit yet (i mean mainstream/commercial/ etc)
_________________
http://www.damnidunno.com | http://www.snapcite.com |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
krt
...
Joined: 11 Jan 2005
Posts: 4780
Location: Down Under
|
| Posted: Fri May 09, 2008 5:46 pm Post subject: |
|
|
| Scar wrote: | | You obviously do not use photoshop. You really compare the two honestly, if you did you would truly understand what i am saying, and what millions of others are saying. You can go ahead and reply and say that you use photoshop or have alot in the past, when in truth there is no possible way that you could. |
| Scar wrote: | | If gimp was even close to touchin Photoshop i seriously doubt that people and companies would dish out hundreds of dollars still for Photoshop. |
Haha... get over it. Photoshop is currently better than any open source equivalent feature-wise and with usability. GIMP having 3 separate windows for a typical layout alone should be enough to send this message. Out of curiosity, did you pay for your copy of Photoshop?
| Scar wrote: | | i love using Photoshop, If i switched to linux i'd have to use Gimp. |
CS2 on WINE works flawlessly from what I hear, Photoshop Elements works great seeing it first hand, even CS3 works if you can get around the install (don't know too much about this though, supposedly a "portable Photoshop CS3" works great.
| Scar wrote: | | Linux has been around for a REALLY long time now, and it still hasn't massively taken off. There is a reason for that. Why ignore it? |
Yes, it has not taken off on the desktop, but this is not because of a Linux shortcoming (unless you count indirect effect which is a small user base, and if you want to talk about reasons, think unethical, immoral and even unlawful business tactics and taking a lenient stance on piracy to help get its market share).
Linux on the desktop has passed the point of inflexion on a typical product life cycle graph, it is now under going exponential growth fueled by government and educational adoption which will see Windows' advantage of being the "standard" being eliminated. Users will increasingly no longer see Windows as an integral part of the computer.
Java and Adobe AIR combined with browser advancements will also push the migration the web and cross platform applications which will take away Windows' other advantage, developers creating OS dependent software which runs on Windows only as it is the logical business choice. Unfortunately, a slow down in growth of broadband and general internet connectivity is slowing this down.
So those factors will contribute to getting a non Windows market share significant enough within the next decade or so that many more developers, vendors and manufacturers will focus on cross platform or multiple OS support which will continuously trigger more growth for Linux. The same thing happened with Firefox and IE except on a smaller scale (adoption, adaptation, support etc. being much easier).
| Scar wrote: | | And it's not because there arent little to no programs that they use that you cant on linux, but the overall feel when they actually try to use it. It just doesn't work out. |
I can understand aesthetics as the default Ubuntu theme is a tad too conservative and customising the theme can be a bit daunting, also, there is a vast majority of useless and crap contributions for theme components so it can be hard to just get something nice looking. But the "feel" and behaviour of Gnome is great and much better than Windows. |
|
| Back to top |
|
| |
|
|
|
Forum FAQs 
Knowledge Base 
Memberlist 
Usergroups 
Hosting
Register
Donate 
Profile 
Log in 
