On Thu, Sep 23, 2004 at 01:58:10PM +0100, Matt Parker wrote:
On Thursday 23 Sep 2004 13:33, Brett Parker wrote:
I'm currently working at a company that runs linux on the desktop... or at least on *MY* desktop. Yes, I do know that it can be bent to run on windows, but why do that when you can run it on a real server and use remote repositories if you're stuck on using windows as a development platform?
Well that's all that I needed to demonstrate to me where you're coming from. You're point of view is that Linux is the only *real* server available and that Linux runs quite happily on *your* machine.
Incorrect, Linux is *not* the only real server platform available, windows, however, is *not* a server platform. The BSD family are all viable, commercial unix is viable, Mac OS X is even viable to some extent. All those have one thing in common though, they're designed from the ground up with multiple users in mind. (OK, so Mac OS X is a little fluffy on the multiple user front, but it's there, lurking in the background).
You need to realise that this is by far and away not the common point of view out there in the commercial IT world. By accepting this fact is the only way things are going to change. It's like that wierd putty you could get in the 80s - if you applied soft pressure you could mould it easily, but if you hit it with a hammer it was hard as a rock.
Weirdly, I've discovered that over the years, sometimes the *ONLY* way to communicate with some people (especially sales people) is to hit the over the head several times, as otherwise all the explaining happens on a daily basis, start gentle, then hit 'em when they're blatently not listening, or are very misinformed. Now, you see, the way you started this thread made it look like you were deliberately baiting, especially due to the nature of the posts on SVN when you, as you admitted early, but in a shroud that half masked it, that you hadn't actually even *USED* it. *HOW* can someone with no experience of a particular product manage to try to slate it as heavily as you seemed to be? It'd be like slagging off OS X without even trying it. Or saying that all beer was foul because you had one bad pint.
BTW, at my company I have almost 100% Linux machines with just the one Mac. I run Windows in VMWare to check stuff out on there. I'm 100% a Linux advocate, but there are ways to go about getting it accepted, and ways that make people put up barriers to defend themselves against an onslaught of overly-technical and passionate language.
The only reason we have windows about here is that, weirdly, being an ISP, occasionally we need to be able to access the products that we support. Being a small ISP means that we tend to actually *listen* to the customer, not sit and read a script. And, weirdly, we also try our hardest to support products that we haven't heard of.
I'm not a 100% linux advocate, I chose it because it fitted with the way I worked, and has done for a *long* time. Over the years my desktop has changed, I've been through most window managers, and have chosen the 2 that are most accessable for my uses. Then, my main uses are XTerms and a webbrowser, mutt is my e-mail client of choice, with thunderbird a close second.
As for it being accepted, given most mainstream IT magazines now appear to advertise at least linux servers, and the lines of Micro Mart have a weekly installment of "linux mart" (this can be interesting some weeks), it's not for me to get it accepted, my view is that people should *choose* the operating system that best works for them, be it Mac OS X, Linux, or even Windows. What I don't like are people saying "this doesn't work" or "this isn't stable enough" when they haven't even bloody used it.
Thanks,