On Friday 11 August 2006 14:41, Seth Goodman wrote: > On Tuesday, August 08, 2006 6:43 PM -0500, Paul Johnson wrote: > > On Tuesday 08 August 2006 10:38, Seth Goodman wrote: > > > Since the end-users we need to interest, if we are ever to break > > > out of the expert niche, will run X and use GUI's for everything, > > > being limited to low-end 2D performance will be an ongoing > > > problem. > > > > I thought the niche Debian was trying to fill was rock solid > > stability and reliability in a 100% free software format. If I'm > > confused, let me know. > > <OT discussion> > > That's a reasonable goal, even a good goal, if you are willing to remain > a small, exclusive club. If you believe that people who use Debian need > to be comfortable with the command line, consider natural language as a > second language behind PERL and be fluent in regexp's, then it will > remain a terrific operating system for the few. Maybe this is what most > people in Debian want. I'm relatively new here, so if that's the case, > please educate me. It's not that hard if you use a desktop environment and use the desktop environment task during installation. Getting it installed is the tricky part, but you'll only have to do it once. And if you don't like aptitude, there's kpackage, and I'm sure there's Gnome frontends, and even a web frontend (if you're really brave or on a trusted network). > However, if you have a desire to bring quality, free software to a wider > audience, you're not likely to get there with the present vision. For > the majority of casual computer users, who are hostage to a certain evil > corporation, the GUI is not just a convenience to be used after fully > mastering command line operation. Though if you were read the HTML installation manual, or even just the mastheads, you probably would have gotten a base install with KDE installed without much problem. > We presently _require_ people who use Debian to do this, or they are > effectively hamstrung once it's installed. Only if you aren't reading your monitor during installation is this a problem. > Why do we require this? It's not for technical reasons, but because we > believe it is _better_ for them as computer users. Hypothesis not supported by evidence present. Sounds more like pilot error. -- Paul Johnson Email and IM (XMPP & Google Talk): baloo@ursine.ca Jabber: Because it's time to move forward http://ursine.ca/Ursine:Jabber
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