Re: Linux vs Microsoft

Eric S. Raymond (esr@thyrsus.com)
Sat, 17 Oct 1998 09:24:43 -0400


Alan Cox <alan@lxorguk.ukuu.org.uk>:
> > If Linux is to seriously compete with M$ on the desktop, something will
> > have to be done in order to ease the burden of installation and
> > configuration for the non-technical user community. No small task. Of
> > course Linux was no small task either.
>
> You keep forgetting - the average user couldnt install windows 95 either,
> not and then sort out the video cards and other stuff. They solve it by
> buying preinstalled machines.
>
> Nowdays you can do the same for Linux

There are two reasons this is a poor argument:

1. We shouldn't settle for being as bad as 95. It's beneath us.

2. The "buy a preinstalled machine" advice won't be convincing until
the big boys (Dell, Gateway, etc) make such an option generally
available.

-- 
		<a href="http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr">Eric S. Raymond</a>

The following is a Python RSA implementation. According to the US Government posting these four lines makes me an international arms trafficker! Join me in civil disobedience; add these lines of code to your .sig block to help get this stupid and unconstitutional law changed. ============================================================================ from sys import*;from string import*;a=argv;[s,p,q]=filter(lambda x:x[:1]!= '-',a);d='-d'in a;e,n=atol(p,16),atol(q,16);l=(len(q)+1)/2;o,inb=l-d,l-1+d while s:s=stdin.read(inb);s and map(stdout.write,map(lambda i,b=pow(reduce( lambda x,y:(x<<8L)+y,map(ord,s)),e,n):chr(b>>8*i&255),range(o-1,-1,-1)))

What, then is law [government]? It is the collective organization of the individual right to lawful defense." -- Frederic Bastiat, "The Law"

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