Re: Re: [debian-knoppix] OT: SuSE, Lindows, & Xandros was: Knoppix installed on HD, and alternatives....
On 8/22/2003 - 05:55:41, John Culleton said:
> On Thursday 07 August 2003 14:55, Shawn Milochik wrote:
> > <snip>
> >
> > > Though I woudn't have gone so far as you, I did experience odd and
> > > unsatisfying results in my several attempts to use (and like!)
> > > Suse...
> >
> > <snip>
> >
> > > > I want to have nothing to do with money making machines
> > > > such as Xandros, Licorice :) and Lindows.
> > >
> > > Then you may be missing just the right solution to your problems. I
> > > paid my dues over a year ago by signing-up as a "Lindows Insider"
> > > even before their initial release, just so I could follow its
> > > evolution to maturity. I'm telling you, this one is quickly
> > > getting to the point of being excellent for the total newbie. Oh,
> > > it's persnickety when you use it on multi-boot
> >
> > <snip>
> >
> >
> > I agree with both of you on the SuSE bit. I am testing SuSE Desktop
> > 1 for a review for my website, and I can't say I really like it.
> > It's not intuitive, and for $600 USD, I'd rather buy a copy of
> > Xandros and spend $500 on hardware.
> I think in about 7 or more years using Linux I bought a distro just one
> time, and that was because of a hardware problem on my machine that
> required a CDR. That was Slackware for less than $50.00, maybe about
> $30 American. Since then I have downloaded all releases and more
> recently burned them on cdrom. Right now I have copies of SuSe, Debian
> Slackware, Knoppix and Gentoo on CDR, all free. I am running Slack,
> in the process of building Gentoo (takes lots of overnight downloads)
> and use Knoppix as an emergency backup. So why pay $600, or indeed
> anything at all? Free means you are also free to discard one distro in
> favor of another without cost.
>
> Just my 2c.
> --
> John Culleton
> Able Indexers and Typesetters
> http://wexfordpress.com
>
>
>
I agree that freedom (in both senses) is very important to Linux. I would
never pay $600 for a Linux distro (I got a review copy for free), but I am
also not against paying a reasonable price for a distro like Xandros or
Lindows.
The reason is that, for whatever reasons exist in reality, the open-source
community has not provided many things taken for granted in Windows, such
as never having to edit a config file to get a wheel mouse working or a
digital camera to be detected. If skilled developers have taken the time
and produced a very useful distro such as Xandros, it is well worth my $39
to have the Xandros File Manager and other niceties they have developed as
closed-source software. Sure, as Linus has been quoted, "Software is like
sex, it's better when it's free." But if nobody's come up with an
open-source solution, and you don't want to be an expert in configuring
your OS, then closed-source is the only option.
When the Open-Source community caters to the average user, proprietary
software won't have a leg to stand on. Until then, the best solution for
the average user is a compromise between ideologies.
Shawn
--
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