Re: RH and GNOME
Hi,
>>"Petra," == Petra, Kevin J Poorman <ewigin@SoftHome.net> writes:
Petra,> we have to maintain a user base greater than 'us' (meaning
Petra,> developers) in order to survive,
And I think that user base has never been in jeapoardy,
really. After all, IMHO, this is the best darned distribution out
there. I think there are enough people out there who feel the same
for us not to be running in fear of the sky falling.
Mind you, I am not saying we should prevent greater popularity
of Debian (despite the temptation ;-), I am just saying that untoward
doom and gloom is uncalled for.
Petra,> and while the user base is NOW increasing, (from what I can
Petra,> see) I also, see ppl, who converted to redhat, because of
Petra,> problems, in a: versions of software that where to old, in
Petra,> bo, b: install problems, c: problems with "Almost standard"
Petra,> software like X.
And I see no evidence that we are not working really haed to
resolve bugs in the software. I fail to see what you wish to
accomplish by this statement: if indeed we were ignoring hiccups in
our distribution, you would have a point; right now, this comes close
to mere complaining, and is not really constructive.
Petra,> what we need to realise is that ppl now want everything given
Petra,> to them on a gold plater, yesterday. ppl and that includes
Petra,> managers and IS workers, don't want to take the time to read
Petra,> docs, or configure things.
I think I do not want to be busting my chops for such, pardon
me, idiots. Any one who refuses to learn how to use their tools
effectively is being short sighted. I have no problem in accepting
that Windows 98 is the perfect OS for such people.
Not every OS is meant for everyone.
Petra,> Somewhere there must be a middle ground between win 95 with
Petra,> no user control, and us, with user configuration, of just
Petra,> about everything. for debian, to survive, we must find that
Petra,> middle ground.
I think we are closer to achieving the sweet spot than you think.
Petra,> which is why we will will fade away unless we find that
Petra,> middle ground. we must have a distribution, that is IS, and
Petra,> corparate management useable, so that it will have a market
Petra,> share at all, once corps. start useing it, it will spread on,
Petra,> as joe can say, wow I can use this at home, because now I use
Petra,> it at work as well....
Try and fight MS on its own grounds, and you shall fail.
Petra,> Again, your mis reading what I'm trying to say. STOP
Petra,> READ. Listen to what I am saying. a MIDDLE GROUND of caring
Petra,> for our users, is possible without sacrificing our "moral" or
Petra,> "ethical" standards for software.
What the hell makes you think we do not care for our users? We
care. We care enough not to let their brains wither away with spoon
feeding ;-) We are indeed striving for ease of use, and for a geater
degree of assistance in configuration of complex software.
I think the problem is that the solutions we espouse are not
close enough to windows for your liking.
Petra,> Hell if we cared for our users, just a little more, I'd bet
Petra,> my shirt, that we would quickly become the most popular
Petra,> distribution, and then we wouldn't have to wine and bitch
Petra,> when some lsb choses a standard, thats not ours... because
Petra,> they would probably chose ours... get it...
Actually, I think you have no idea of what you are talking
about. You are somewhat like the management, who pick up nice, big
sounding ideas all the time, but really have not thought through the
nitty gritty dirty details.
Petra,> "We (Debian) should put forth the effort to care for our
Petra,> users, just a little bit more than we do.
Really? How? By abandoning the users who do not run a GUI?
Half of my machines do not run X.
By making it harder to adminster a system remotely? A text
based system works under telnet. I refuse to abandone those users.
Petra,> We should not, comprimise our software standards, for
Petra,> "freeness". We should work to write a "Debian Standard
Petra,> licence" that is basicly gpl, without the bugs.
What bugs? I find the GPL to work exactly as it should. We
need a strong license that ptomotes and actively propogates free
software, and the GPL does that.
Petra,> We should try to mainstream Debian in any way we can, with
Petra,> ad's, banners, logo's... etc. as this will help us grow in
Petra,> the long run.
Umm, ok. Pray do so, if this is a major goal of yours.
Petra,> We should put away the long held bias agianst X and other
Petra,> Gui's and develop a Gui OPTION for an Instalation, (posibly
Petra,> based on ggi, or maybe wxwindows (I think thats it's
Petra,> name).
Why do you think a X based system is better? That would
immediately abandon people who do not run X. It would make
adminstering a workstation harder. It would restrict what one can do
to whatever the GUI programmer has provided buttons for.
I think that would actually be a step back/
Petra,> We should improve the error hadleing of the debian
Petra,> install program/script. Ie: fix it so errors are displayed in
Petra,> a window, instead of the background... thereby helping you
Petra,> read the message.
Yup. error logging would be nice. Do you have a technical
proposal? Which would save the error messages for later, and also
work for people who do not run X?
Petra,> We should develop a system of testing
What do you think the testing and QA groups do? Please do your
homework.
Petra,> and a "Debian certification" so that debian power users, have
Petra,> a leg to stand on when trying to pitch linux to companys. and
Petra,> finaly we should all listen a little more, and type a little
Petra,> less. (myself included).
I personally am against the certification prtograms, since in
my experience none of them so far have been worth anything
much. However, if some one can come up with something that rises
above atamping mediocrity, go right ahead.
Petra,> A modification to the gpl, written by a lawyer I know, would
Petra,> cost us ~45$ us. to have a completly air tight (cough)
Petra,> license that incorparates what we want without any of the
Petra,> flaws, of the gpl, or artistic.
I fail to find anything wrong with the BSD, Artistic, or the
GNU public licenses. What flaws? rather than repeating your original
statement, it would be edifying if you treated us to a view of what
you percieve as a deficiency.
manoj
--
Rid of craving and without clinging, an expert in the study of texts,
and understanding the right sequence of the words, he may indeed be
called "In his last body", "Great in wisdom" and a "Great man". 352
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@acm.org> <http://www.datasync.com/%7Esrivasta/>
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