What Linux can learn from Microsoft

[Newby]

http://www.linux-watch.com/news/NS5991301042.html

I also think that the sheer number of distributions is what also tears Linux apart. When you buy Windows, you buy just that. Windows. When you install a Linux distro, there are so many different variations of what you could get. Your average home user isn't gonna like that.

[Warrior]

I've said this before as well, until they can have one common format for most things then it won't work. Until they can have some sort of Documentation (Vista's Help center is amazing) then it won't work either. What about tech support for people using it on the desktop? Linux is good but it lacks the "Fit and finish" that Windows products usually have.

I also disagree heavily with what he says about Office 12, the ribbons are it's best feature. He probably hasn't even used Office 12..

And I'm still skeptical about the "By this time next year Linux, not Microsoft would hold the the advantage of Common Interfaces"

That doesn't seem like it will happen at all unless Linux changed how it works completely.

[MyndFyre]

Microsoft is getting to blow this one, though. The Office 12 interface is brand new, and many users see it as a major annoyance. At the same time, Linux is getting its act together, The Portland Project, a working group of all the major Linux desktop players, is helping develop not just common APIs (application programming interfaces), but common user interfaces as well.

While I'm not a particularly big fan of Office 12, I'm going to weigh in on this remark.

I've watched my mom use Office for a long time.  I'm a big user of shortcut keys - I figured out by the time I was 15 that the shortcut keys for superscript and subscript were CTRL+SHIFT+= and CTRL+=, respectively, and to increase a font size press CTRL+] (CTRL+[ decreases).  I learned these things because it was taking forever to do it manually for chemistry homework.

Back to my mom.  I made her a list of common keyboard shortcuts.  I taped them to her screen.  She still uses the mouse to get around.  Whereas I compulsively type ALT+F, S to save my documents, she either clicks the disk icon or goes to the file menu to click Save.

I think that for the general luser population the interface change will be good.  Microsoft (if you read their developers documentation) is changing its user interface focus to task-based workflow, which has evidently been the result of the last ten years of psychological studies and focus groups.  Their new documentation strategy is a "What would you like to do?" strategy, with topics for tasks instead of the traditional help system.

It'll really piss off current power users the most, which will be the people who write the articles and whatnot, because while they haven't changed *too* much around, there's just enough to be annoying.  Like the Format menu in Word is no longer Alt+O, so knowing that the paragraph dialog was Alt+O, P screws me up.  I haven't actually done anything substantive in Word 2007 though, so I don't know if there's even a paragraph dialog box anymore.  So yeah, I hate the new menu (or "ribbons" if that's what you're referring to), but I'll get used to it.

I also think that the sheer number of distributions is what also tears Linux apart. When you buy Windows, you buy just that. Windows. When you install a Linux distro, there are so many different variations of what you could get. Your average home user isn't gonna like that.

That's an interesting point.  Plus software comes in many varieties for each specific distro, and I've run into not being able to find software for a distro that I was using.  Like, while I love fedora core, I can't find XMMS for it.  Or I can't get it to compile.  Or something.  It's frustrating.

Anyway, that's my two cents.

[Ergot]

x86] link=topic=6802.msg83788#msg83788 date=1153616450]
That's an interesting point.  Plus software comes in many varieties for each specific distro, and I've run into not being able to find software for a distro that I was using.  Like, while I love fedora core, I can't find XMMS for it.  Or I can't get it to compile.  Or something.  It's frustrating.

Anyway, that's my two cents.

That's the reason I left Red Hat behind.

[iago]

http://www.linux-watch.com/news/NS5991301042.html

I also think that the sheer number of distributions is what also tears Linux apart. When you buy Windows, you buy just that. Windows. When you install a Linux distro, there are so many different variations of what you could get. Your average home user isn't gonna like that.

Isn't Windows Vista going to have like 10 different versions?  Isn't that going to be the same mistake?

[Sidoh]

Isn't Windows Vista going to have like 10 different versions?  Isn't that going to be the same mistake?

Not really.  While I don't agree with spliting the OS into 8 different versions, the version names I did see were fairly intuitive.  An average computer user isn't going to be able to tell you any differences in features from just hearing the names "Slackware Linux" and "Fedora Core 5."

[MyndFyre]

Isn't Windows Vista going to have like 10 different versions?  Isn't that going to be the same mistake?

Windows software is binary compatible.

When I want updates, I don't have to recompile my kernel or my source code.  I don't need to download an RPM or make <blah> something so that it's linked with my libraries.  I don't even need to recompile my drivers across different versions of Windows unless I intend to backport them to Windows 95 or so (even Windows 98 supported WDM, and NDIS was supported as long ago as Windows 3.11).

If you had to obtain different kinds of software to run on different flavors of Windows Vista, then yes, it would be the same mistake.  But the kernel, the executive, the memory manager, the security subsystems - they're all the same.  I hesitate to even say that the user-mode execution environment is different; the shell might vary slightly across flavors, but no.

The different editions of Windows Vista will be based around what peripheral software is included.  Business editions don't need Media Center, for instance, and home users don't need the encrypting file system, BitLocker, or Internet Information Services.  The only thing that might be significantly different is the starter edition, but that's designed for markets that we probably won't ever be a part of.

I'm not quite sure why this is so difficult for you to grasp.  Even Ergot understood what I had to say about software availability.  You go to a website, and they have software for Ubuntu, Debian, general Linux, etc.  Then your source tree has different dependencies... Ugh.  And now it's being addled with even more distributions with x64.  With Windows all I need to do to make sure software is working is stick to the Win32 API.  Or, if I know I need to go back as far as Windows 98, I know the .NET Framework binaries will be binary-compatible even on x64.

[iago]

x86] link=topic=6802.msg84008#msg84008 date=1153709185]
Windows software is binary compatible.

So is the majority of Linux software, and statically-linked Linux software.  But Linux users happen to prefer source.

x86] link=topic=6802.msg84008#msg84008 date=1153709185]
When I want updates, I don't have to recompile my kernel or my source code.  I don't need to download an RPM or make <blah> something so that it's linked with my libraries.  I don't even need to recompile my drivers across different versions of Windows unless I intend to backport them to Windows 95 or so (even Windows 98 supported WDM, and NDIS was supported as long ago as Windows 3.11).

Depending on which distro you use, you probably don't have to recompile your source.  Most distros keep the kernel up to date and make it easy to update it.  And again, if something is statically linked, then you don't have to recompile everything.  It's the same as Windows -- if you want to use dynamic linking, you're going to end up with version issues.

x86] link=topic=6802.msg84008#msg84008 date=1153709185]
If you had to obtain different kinds of software to run on different flavors of Windows Vista, then yes, it would be the same mistake.  But the kernel, the executive, the memory manager, the security subsystems - they're all the same.  I hesitate to even say that the user-mode execution environment is different; the shell might vary slightly across flavors, but no.

You don't on Linux, either.  The way it's distributed is the way Linux users prefer, not that way that's required.  Look at Opera and VMWare -- both are binary packages that work across all Linux versions. 

x86] link=topic=6802.msg84008#msg84008 date=1153709185]
The different editions of Windows Vista will be based around what peripheral software is included.  Business editions don't need Media Center, for instance, and home users don't need the encrypting file system, BitLocker, or Internet Information Services.  The only thing that might be significantly different is the starter edition, but that's designed for markets that we probably won't ever be a part of.

Isn't that the problem with Linux that was brought up?  How will a dumb user know what somebody is talking about when they say, "you don't get BitLocker but you do get Media"?  How is that any different from comparing "Slackware" to "Red Hat"?

x86] link=topic=6802.msg84008#msg84008 date=1153709185]
I'm not quite sure why this is so difficult for you to grasp.  Even Ergot understood what I had to say about software availability.  You go to a website, and they have software for Ubuntu, Debian, general Linux, etc.  Then your source tree has different dependencies... Ugh.  And now it's being addled with even more distributions with x64.  With Windows all I need to do to make sure software is working is stick to the Win32 API.  Or, if I know I need to go back as far as Windows 98, I know the .NET Framework binaries will be binary-compatible even on x64.

Yet again, they don't have to.  Opera, VMWare, Firefox (all Mozilla software), Cedega, OpenOffice, for example, provide a single binary package.  So do lots of others.  I don't see what's so difficult for you to grasp that your "problem" is done because that's what many users prefer, not because it's a requirement. 

[MyndFyre]

I don't see what's so difficult for you to grasp that your "problem" is done because that's what many users prefer, not because it's a requirement. 

If so many users prefer it, why does Linux have such little desktop marketshare?

[iago]

x86] link=topic=6802.msg84020#msg84020 date=1153710583]

I don't see what's so difficult for you to grasp that your "problem" is done because that's what many users prefer, not because it's a requirement. 

If so many users prefer it, why does Linux have such little desktop marketshare?

Sorry, I meant it's what LINUX users prefer.  There are distros out there that don't require any knowledge of compiling, like Suse that doesn't even come with a compiler by default. 

But like I said, there is a lot of Linux software that runs on every distro, and it is possible (even easy) to make software that does.  So that's not the problem, despite what you seem to think. 

[Newby]

http://www.linux-watch.com/news/NS5991301042.html

I also think that the sheer number of distributions is what also tears Linux apart. When you buy Windows, you buy just that. Windows. When you install a Linux distro, there are so many different variations of what you could get. Your average home user isn't gonna like that.

Isn't Windows Vista going to have like 10 different versions?  Isn't that going to be the same mistake?

You know what the difference is between the 5 versions of Vista?

Some registry keys and some software installed.

That's it. 75% of the versions are practically the same. From my experience, the only difference is registry keys and a download for "Ultimate Edition package".

[Joe]

As for the distribution problem, get Ubuntu. Sure, APT is lazy, but it's right there. Do you want XMMS for Ubuntu? sudo apt-get install xmms.

[Ergot]

Same with yum, pacman, emerge, etc...

[iago]

You know what the difference is between the 5 versions of Vista?

Some registry keys and some software installed.

That's it. 75% of the versions are practically the same. From my experience, the only difference is registry keys and a download for "Ultimate Edition package".

I guess that means they're artificially creating a problem in an attempt to make money.  I wonder if it'll boost or harm sales... :)

[MyndFyre]

You know what the difference is between the 5 versions of Vista?

Some registry keys and some software installed.

That's it. 75% of the versions are practically the same. From my experience, the only difference is registry keys and a download for "Ultimate Edition package".

I guess that means they're artificially creating a problem in an attempt to make money.  I wonder if it'll boost or harm sales... :)

Well, you're the communist and they're the capitalist pigs.  I'd guess that they probably have the marketing strategies down better.  :P