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Re: Open source isn't worth the hassle

Posted: Mon Aug 10, 2009 3:40 am
by Benjamin
Linux was never meant to be purchased. The economic state of a company and the economic environment of a country are not relevant. Linux is pretty much a kernel created by one man. Dozens of thousands of people have contributed to this kernel. They have fixed bugs, added features, created drivers and written thousands of applications to run on it.

I challenge you to learn about and use Linux from scratch.

I use Linux for many reasons.
  • It's very stable. Granted there are unstable apps, but generally it's distro specific
  • I can do things in Linux that lock windows. Importing large MySQL databases for example.
  • Pretty much any program I could possibly imagine or have a use for has been written and is free
  • The command line is very powerful and it allows you to accomplish a lot of tasks very quickly
  • It's much less resource intensive and runs on less powerful hardware
  • I have a lamp stack on my development server
  • ssh and fish? need I say more?
  • security, stability, ad-ware, spy-ware, viruses?
That's all the time I want to put into creating a big list, no doubt there's a lot more I could add to that.

The only bad things I can say about Linux are that:
  • Certain distros release buggy applications that give Linux a bad name
  • Driver support needs a lot of improvement
EDIT: I removed some of the text from this message because I don't want anyone to think that it was directed at them, when in fact it wasn't.

Re: Open source isn't worth the hassle

Posted: Mon Aug 10, 2009 5:07 pm
by Doug G
I'm just guessing, but I think you had one specifically bad encounter with some support forum guys and you're still fuming from it. Let it go, it'll blow over and you'll forget all about it.
Well, you guessed wrong.

Re: Open source isn't worth the hassle

Posted: Mon Aug 10, 2009 5:17 pm
by Eran
so maybe astions is more on the spot

Re: Open source isn't worth the hassle

Posted: Mon Aug 10, 2009 11:52 pm
by JAB Creations
astions wrote:
JAB Creations wrote:Linux is not (yet) really a production platform
JAB you can't say things like this and still maintain any credibility.
  • The Linux kernel and other core OS components -- including libraries, device drivers, file systems, networking, IPC, and memory management -- operated consistently and completed all the expected durations of runs with zero critical system failures.
  • Every run generated a high success rate (over 95%), with a very small number of expected intermittent failures that were the result of the concurrent executions of tests that are designed to overload resources.
  • Linux system performance was not degraded during the long duration of the run.
  • The Linux kernel properly scaled to use hardware resources (CPU, memory, disk) on SMP systems.
  • The Linux system handled continuous full CPU load (over 99%) and high memory stress well.
  • The Linux system handled overloaded circumstances correctly.
See: Putting Linux reliability to the test
...and thus my point is proven!

The issue isn't about stability! It's about usability! It takes me five seconds to open Advanced Find & Replace, paste a function I'm looking for (or some other string of text) and have it show me a list of files that I can interact with easily due to the GUI; and even more to the point AFR is faster then grep in my experience with it (yes, running in a native/not-emulated environment). The keyboard alone isn't a viable enough tool to interact with a computer...the same thing with a mouse. With grep I can't directly open a file (with the mouse) and go back to the console and repeat as necessary. You also have to manually type in the commands (yes I know about the up key though typing means less automation) while a GUI the check boxes and drop down menus only change when you change them and remain the same (such as case sensitivity) though in the console you always have to specify many these things (though to be fair not all things)...there is a lack of automation. The general attitude is, it's already built, why build a GUI for it? Then I have to reply...there isn't a native GUI app for ping in Windows though I've seen actual GUI apps in Linux installed by default for things like ping...I think that is completely backwards from what we need for a production environment. I rarely have to use ping or tracert though I use AFR minimally several times daily. The GUI simply makes interacting with the OS faster even if the OS itself is slower then Linux. If a GUI equivalent was created for grep I will iterate again it would make my personal move from XP to Linux a much more viable option.

Yes Linux is fast...hell Ubuntu installed in under ten minutes in an emulator! They're shooting for a five second boot time I think? I never questioned the stability of Linux...I mean this can only be presumed since stability is a hallmark of web hosting. But saying I can't make these points without risking credibility is a point for me against Linux...the OS is the way other people want it...so it can't be the way I want much less need it...so I can't adopt it in place of XP. This is an issue of developer mindset...I've created something and it works...why change it? The designer's mentality is about making something work better typically by making something intuitive...though in the case I am presenting it's about speed of access.

Getting back to the main topic of the thread...I'm not really following Doug here...it seems more about a general displeasure/write without read sort of thread. Does that make sense? What I would say to Doug is...show us an example of something versus generalizations. I've made a very clear example of one of my reasons I'm still using XP...what I'm not seeing from Doug is a given specific reason he's giving up on Linux. This is like a code thread where the OP is upset that their code isn't working though won't show us any actual snippets of code. :|

As for me I think instead of just ranting I'll see if I can get AFR to work with Wine. :)

Re: Open source isn't worth the hassle

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2009 12:12 am
by JAB Creations
It's official, I love Wine! :drunk:
Image

...and I can't believe how insanely easy it was!

I'm going to try installing some other mission-critical applications and see how things turn out. :)

Re: Open source isn't worth the hassle

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2009 12:15 am
by Benjamin
Well I get what you're saying. Usability is really rather subjective though. The command line can be a bit daunting at first but it's really quite usable. I suspect that you are a very visual person and in that respect you will always be more comfortable with a GUI.

Re: Open source isn't worth the hassle

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2009 12:55 am
by JAB Creations
That's all I'm saying really. :wink:

I was able to get the older version of CuteFTP to work, I'd go crazy without local/server bookmarked directories.

Safari 4 installed though it didn't work...well I was entertaining the idea of simply testing versions of Safari like I do with emulated copies of XP for IE. I'll likely do Safari 4 with IE8, Safari 3.2 with IE7, etc.

I think I'll start my own thread as not to hijack this one. Still I'd love to see Doug find some resolution and get back to Linux by trying to go over some specifics and see if he could get either the issues ironed out or find alternative routes to his goals.

Re: Open source isn't worth the hassle

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2009 12:56 am
by Christopher
Doug G wrote:Well, you guessed wrong.
But the fact that people are trying to guess is what makes your rather dramatic statements suspect. It seems that you could not get some unspecified software and drivers to work on Linux. And that you were able to do what you wanted on Windows. It is a pretty well known fact that Windows is a great solution for many things. Just as certainly there are those here, including myself, who have had the experience of Linux being an excellent solution for many things.

I just don't get the drama ... where you go off on the lack of a viable economic model and the bad attitudes and post dot-com bubble financing, etc.. If Windows works better or you, great. No need to go slagging on Linux because it was not a good fit for you.

Re: Open source isn't worth the hassle

Posted: Tue Aug 11, 2009 6:38 am
by josh
Dude, most IDEs have it build right in, so you can select to replace within a project, things like that...