Bug#705576: [RFR] wml://intro/about.wml
On Sat, Jul 6, 2013 at 4:04 PM, Justin B Rye <justin.byam.rye@gmail.com> wrote:
> It's a 100% bug-free solution to all life's problems,
> requiring no human intervention at any stage, and I especially love
> its rich chocolatey flavour!
I especially like the 100% bug-free chocolate coat! :D
(Sometimes, it really pays of that I always forget to unsubscribe
from a mailinglist I had subscribed to follow a single thread)
So, being on a sugar high now, let me crash the party:
Every time I read "package manager" I am thinking of some guy in
a truck, driving packages around town, handing them to addressees.
(every job has a fancy name today: as a key-account manager, you are
the person in the hotel giving keys to people at the reception)
Also: Not a surprise that I need this "APT" thingy if I have to manage
thousands of packages to make use of my system – even if I only need a
browser and a mediaplayer (aka: 2 packages)! [0] Heck, "Manage", that
sounds like I am the boss and have to take care of my underlings, get to
know them, give them work assignments and so on. Sounds like a lot of work …
And, given that I read this page because I have no idea what Debian is,
its my top priority to install Debian (and thousands of packages) on all of
my thousand computers…
Why can't my computer be like this silly "smartphone" in my pockets:
Browsing in a huge catalog of software, I pick what I like and it does
all the magic of installing it. No surfing around the web to find a page
which looks trustworthy enough to download from. No regular checking of
these webpages again for security updates and new releases. Its like
Cockaigne, just that everything is labeled with a price tag.
So if you want to "sell" me something: Tell me that my search is over,
that I have found the place every smartphone vendor has ripped the idea
of simple installation from while carefully attaching price tags everywhere,
because in Debian, the installation is not only easy, but also free:
Free of charge, free of vendor lock-in, free of the worry this software
will be removed from the market, includes a bunch of viruses, that
while this app might be "free of charge" reading the terms I would have
discovered that I give the author all rights on my first born child,
that I will be imprisoned for sharing it with a friend or that even if
I am the best programmer known to mankind I can't fix the only bug in
this masterpiece of software because the source is nowhere to be found.
I will not provide an alternative wording though, as a) I am incredibly bad
as a smooth talker and b) I believe I shouldn't advertise my own product
and c) I also believe this feature isn't distinctive enough anymore:
Many distros have a package manager as well as many other ecosystems:
programming languages, browsers, text editors, games … all of them come
with there own "store" nowadays (looks like my sugar high wears off).
But to say at least something useful: The "Linus Torvalds" link on that page
results in a 403 error (and while being in that paragraph: Can we please drop
the description of Hurd? I have no idea what "microkernel" and "Mach" is,
"collection of servers" sounds like a server-farm (possibly in the cloud) and
"implement different features" is a really good idea, given that we already
have stuff 'implementing the same features' (compared to what?). Oh, and if
you grant me a second kill: the Microsoft remark further down the page.)
Best regards
David Kalnischkies
[0] This isn't made up. Its kinda embarrassing, but just between me and you
let me tell you a little story: Its exactly what I thought then someone told
me about SuSe and this great manager called "YaST". A few months later I had
to decide which Linux distro would be the chosen one and Debian (derivative)
made it not only but also because this SuSe+YaST thing sounded incredibly
complex and useless to me… I mean, who needs a package manager, right?
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