One of the advantages of combining public transport and mobile computing is that you can spend the time you’re commuting on something useful (if you consider blogging to be something useful of course). I’m using LyX to write this article, but Firefox, GIMP, LaTex2RTF, ImageMagick, Apache, MySQL, PHP, Graphviz, bash, GCC and my own 4tH compiler are installed as well. And no, this is not a Linux laptop, it is a Windows XP laptop. Yes, your deduction was correct, I’ve been providing MS-DOS and MS-Windows versions of 4tH for as long as I can remember, it’s not like Microsoft has recruited me lately. And no, it is not my laptop, it is my employers laptop. Since the Netherlands may be most retarded country in the world where Open Source is concerned it automatically comes with MS-Windows. Fortunately, I was able to install my own stuff as well, because a Windows XP laptop with MS-Office is less than useful to me.
Strangely enough, I get the same remarks from MS-fan boys. They never ask me if there are any useful word processors available (yes, LyX) but if it can run MS-Office. Of course you can using Wine, but there are so many fine other word processors available for Linux. But no, it has to be MS-Word and nothing else. I can understand why. Using another program, even if it resembles the one you’re used to, is like sleeping for the first time at the home of your new girlfriend. When you try to find the bathroom at night the chances are you’ll end up lying face down in the hallway. Of course, in time you will learn to find your way around, but it is frustrating (and humiliating) at first. So when people change Operating Systems the first thing they’ll look for is a way to run their familiar applications. They will only switch if there is no other way.
I remember when I switched from MS-Windows 3.1 to Linux I used Paintshop Pro for a considerable amount of time before I finally switched to GIMP. I used the Linux version of Wordperfect. I updated my diagrams with Novagraph Chartist at work. Finding, selecting and learning Linux alternatives took me a lot of time, time that I could have spent on creating content. Sometimes I was even forced to recreate or reformat content. But once I had familiarized myself with an application I had no reason to switch again. I’m never going to relinquish my LyX, Graphviz or Dia for that matter. In comparison, MS-Visio and MS-Word are applications of a distant past and do not offer me the versatility or comfort I’m used to.
LyX simply works, nuff said. Its format is simple enough to interface with and versatile enough for the most complex of documents. When I insert a picture it stays where I put it instead of jumping to different places or being overlaid with text for no obvious reason. The pages are automatically numbered and adding a Table of Contents is just a few clicks away. Graphviz automatically creates a diagram from a simple definition. I don’t have to place edges or nodes manually and it interfaces perfectly with LyX. Just like Dia, by the way. I must admit, I only use Open Office to read MS-documents, I don’t create too much content with it, but it is a wonderful application. GCC is my compiler of choice, although I rarely need it except to compile my own 4tH compiler, which I use predominantly to write programs. And who doesn’t use Firefox? Only those dwelling in the Valley of the Ignorant.
Some would like us to believe that Open Source applications are lacking in functionality, but I sincerely think they are wrong - or spreading FUD for that matter. I think Open Source offers great applications and I think the community should be more confident and proud of what they have achieved. If you’re using Open Source applications you’re using next generation tools, new and exciting paradigms, which will offer you a headstart once the MS-dinosaur has realized this and has implemented it in its products. And in the meanwhile you will enjoy having the advantage.
I haven’t touched MS-Word for anything serious in a long time - and when I was forced to do it I regretted it every single minute. I’m a writer, not a layout artist. I wanna type, I don’t want to be bothered by adding and maintaining the layout. LyX works like I want to work. This is a chapter, this is a section, this is an enumeration, here comes the Table of Contents - take care of it. And LyX does. ’A’ is connected with ’B’ and ’C’ and ’B’ is connected with ’C’. Put them in borderless, cyan boxes. Now make a diagram. And Graphviz does.
These are the things that make you productive. I’ve never seen anything MS-like do that. They believe in blue ribbons. I don’t. BTW, did you know that you can buy an add-on that makes the ribbon interface disappear and reverts you to an interface that was brand new when the dinosaurs roamed the earth? I guess there must be real market for it.
I don’t even think it is the fault of Microsoft. For several reasons it is very hard to change human behavior. Knowledge is valuable. You don’t change from expert to newbie voluntarily. It diminishes your personal and professional value. People want to get the job done. They don’t have or take the time to learn a new tool, even if this investment makes them more productive in the long run. That behavior is one of the most important obstacles in the adoption of Open Source products. People are only willing to change if their applications don’t change. Most of them don’t know what a kernel is and even less why they should care. As far as they are concerned if it runs MS-Word it’s a kind of ’Windows’.
The Open Source movement can use this behavior to its advantage. If people use Open Source applications they will run Open Source operating systems. It is not a question of ’if’ anymore, but a question of ’when’. So when a friend asks you for a bootleg copy of MS-Word, install OpenOffice or Abiword. You can replace Photoshop or Paint Shop Pro with GIMP, Quark Express with Scribus, Visual Studio with GCC and so on. Now that KDE makes the jump to the MS-Windows desktop the choice of applications has become even wider. And then you wait. MS-Windows will fail at some moment in time and you know where your friend will turn to.
Closed source software is a wonderful thing, especially if you have to pay for it. While ’free speech’ is vitally important, I guarantee you that ’free beer’ attracts more visitors. Fortunately for us, Microsoft made it very unattractive to install MS-Windows. First you either have to pay for it or go through a difficult procedure to bootleg it. Second, their main attraction is not so attractive. Who wants Vista? Not even the most fanatic MS-fanboy wants that on his machine. Third, installing MS-Windows is going through hell. If you have old, vanilla hardware, a modern Linux distribution will probably support it. Pop in the DVD and off you go! Where a MS-Windows installation leaves you with a bare bone machine, Linux will already offer you a wide choice of applications. Applications your friend already knows, uses and loves. You don’t break the barrier by tearing down walls, but by dismantling them stone by stone.
There are developers that refuse to port their FOSS software to MS-Windows. There are even developers that deny others the right to compile their FOSS software for MS-Windows. Personally, I don’t think that’s a good idea. First of all from a public relations point of view. If you want to leave the impression that Open Source developers are a bunch of religious zealots whose next move will be the bombing of the Redwood headquarters, that’s absolutely the way to do it. Second, for what? Those who use or are forced to use MS-Windows and have the required know how will do it anyway. And those who haven’t will be frustrated. Nice going. You lived up to your principles and that’s it. Period. Your little pet project is not the killer application that will turn people to Linux. Tough luck. I’m afraid you’ll have to live with it.
What most FOSS fundamentalists seem to forget is that MS-Windows users can be converted to FOSS users. Even better, a large number of MS-Windows users are FOSS users. The simple fact that someone uses a Microsoft kernel doesn’t mean he has joined the dark side. Most people won’t even care. If there is a good, cheap alternative to MS-Windows they will use it as long as it doesn’t cause them too much trouble. Applications are the key factor here. So instead of trying to force people to change their kernels, we have to ease them into using our applications. Yes, maybe some people will continue to use MS-Windows kernels, because it is easier to run MS-Windows applications on an MS-Windows kernel than it is using Linux and Wine. Yes, maybe Microsoft will continue to earn some money by selling MS-Windows kernels. But in the end, when GCC, OpenOffice, Scribus, Inkscape, Dia, Firefox, GIMP and the new KDE desktop have become the applications of choice, who do you think has won?
Friday, February 15, 2008
Saturday, January 26, 2008
Stop making stupid lists!
Having had a scientific education I know something about the basic problems of classification. You're facing this enormous variation of a real life population and now you have to recognize and define properties, devise some way to measure them and then group them together in a way that not only makes sense, but gives you some useful insight in the world you're trying to analyse. So welcome to the wonderful world of taxonomy! Originally the term taxonomy referred to the classifying of living organisms; however, the term is now applied in a wider, more general sense and now may refer to a classification of things, as well as to the principles underlying such a classification.
Talking of classifying living organisms, one of the most well known people in this field is Linnaeus. A strength of Linnaean taxonomy is that it can be used to develop a simple and practical system for organizing the different kinds of living organisms. Over time, our understanding of the relationships between living things has changed. Linnaeus could only base his scheme on the structural similarities of the different organisms. The greatest change was the widespread acceptance of evolution as the mechanism of biological diversity and species formation. In short, the properties Linnaeus had chosen to create his hierarchy of species were feeble at best. Even less well known is that Linnaeus originally established three kingdoms in his scheme, namely Plantae, Animalia and an additional group for minerals, which has long since been abandoned for obvious reasons.
Some have argued that the human mind naturally organizes its knowledge of the world into systems. This view is often based on the epistemology of Immanuel Kant. Anthropologists have observed that taxonomies are generally embedded in local cultural and social systems, and serve various social functions. Let's face it, people simply like order. It neatly organizes the chaos around them. Of course this isn't true. The chaos is still there, we just don't see it anymore. Any ostrich will tell you that is a smart move. A good example is our love for hierarchies. In the real world, there are very few real hierarchies. Tim Berners-Lee, arguably the inventor of the World Wide Web, put it this way:
Accepting that the basic way to order information was a network gave us the World Wide Web and killed off the hierarchy based Gopher. BTW, the term taxonomy may also apply to relationship schemes other than parent-child hierarchies, such as network structures with other types of relationships. Taxonomies may include single children with multi-parents, for example, "Car" might appear with both parents "Vehicle" and "Steel Mechanisms"; to some however, this merely means that 'car' is a part of several different taxonomies. The basic problem is not taxonomy itself; it's the people who devise and use them.
I agree, this introduction was a bit longer than I intended and so far I have only scratched the surface. I will refrain myself from going into the Tractatus of Wittgenstein or any work of some major philosopher for that matter. I just want you to understand that there is a whole world beyond classification. It's not just drawing a few lines on the back of an empty cigar box and scribble some labels above them. I think that is why I rarely venture myself into the field of classification and preferably only if I have to. And even then I'm painfully aware that I'm probably making some pragmatic and arbitrary choices rather than designing a classification that will stand the test of time.
Classifying people is even more dangerous. The best and the worst have tried and failed. Classifying people has been one of the core evils in human history. It has been used as an excuse to murder, deport, mutilate, enslave, exile and torture people throughout time. It's what I've been calling "labeling" all the time.
One of the people who cannot restrain himself to venture in this field is Bruce Byfield, who is an excellent technical writer by the way. And he'd better restrict himself to this field, because his talents on other fields are - let's say - limited. In one of his most recent articles, he tries to classify the FOSS community and consequently fails. I can easily find myself in several categories, which means the classification itself is of little use.
Yes, I do object to Microsofts business practices, which means that according to Bruce I must "hate Microsoft". No, I do not hate Microsoft, because that's an emotion. I merely think that the industry would be better off if its influence would deminish. That's an opinion based on valid arguments, which is by any measure a significant difference. I do use proprietary software from time to time because there is no other way to fulfill my needs. Which makes me a "mainstream advocate". And yes, I find $150 for an Operating System an outrageous high price, which makes me a "bargain hunter". On the other hand, I maintain several FOSS projects, so I'm an "Open Source developer" as well.
I fail to see how of a combination of my spending habits, my hobbies, my attitude to certain business practices and the choice of my software are a valid way to put me in one category or another. In short, I cannot escape the conclusion that this is just another stupid list. It pretends to be a useful aid "to navigate you through the community", but as a matter of fact it is of no use to anybody. And poor Bruce is not alone. Every now and then a blogger, an editor or a writer of some kind ventures in a field he knows so little about.
I have some little advise to you all: read the Tractatus of Wittgenstein for starters, try to understand it and come back later. Having faced your mental limitations will have been such a humiliating experience that you'll think twice before you ever publish such a stupid list again.
Talking of classifying living organisms, one of the most well known people in this field is Linnaeus. A strength of Linnaean taxonomy is that it can be used to develop a simple and practical system for organizing the different kinds of living organisms. Over time, our understanding of the relationships between living things has changed. Linnaeus could only base his scheme on the structural similarities of the different organisms. The greatest change was the widespread acceptance of evolution as the mechanism of biological diversity and species formation. In short, the properties Linnaeus had chosen to create his hierarchy of species were feeble at best. Even less well known is that Linnaeus originally established three kingdoms in his scheme, namely Plantae, Animalia and an additional group for minerals, which has long since been abandoned for obvious reasons.
Some have argued that the human mind naturally organizes its knowledge of the world into systems. This view is often based on the epistemology of Immanuel Kant. Anthropologists have observed that taxonomies are generally embedded in local cultural and social systems, and serve various social functions. Let's face it, people simply like order. It neatly organizes the chaos around them. Of course this isn't true. The chaos is still there, we just don't see it anymore. Any ostrich will tell you that is a smart move. A good example is our love for hierarchies. In the real world, there are very few real hierarchies. Tim Berners-Lee, arguably the inventor of the World Wide Web, put it this way:
Many systems are organised hierarchically. The CERNDOC documentation system is an example, as is the Unix le system, and the VMS/HELP system. A tree has the practical advantage of giving every node a unique name. However, it does not allow the system to model the real world. For example, in a hierarchical HELP system such as VMS/HELP, one often gets to a leaf on a tree (..) only to find a reference to another leaf (..) and it is necessary to leave the system and re-enter it. What was needed was a link from one node to another, because in this case the information was not naturally organized into a tree."
Accepting that the basic way to order information was a network gave us the World Wide Web and killed off the hierarchy based Gopher. BTW, the term taxonomy may also apply to relationship schemes other than parent-child hierarchies, such as network structures with other types of relationships. Taxonomies may include single children with multi-parents, for example, "Car" might appear with both parents "Vehicle" and "Steel Mechanisms"; to some however, this merely means that 'car' is a part of several different taxonomies. The basic problem is not taxonomy itself; it's the people who devise and use them.
I agree, this introduction was a bit longer than I intended and so far I have only scratched the surface. I will refrain myself from going into the Tractatus of Wittgenstein or any work of some major philosopher for that matter. I just want you to understand that there is a whole world beyond classification. It's not just drawing a few lines on the back of an empty cigar box and scribble some labels above them. I think that is why I rarely venture myself into the field of classification and preferably only if I have to. And even then I'm painfully aware that I'm probably making some pragmatic and arbitrary choices rather than designing a classification that will stand the test of time.
Classifying people is even more dangerous. The best and the worst have tried and failed. Classifying people has been one of the core evils in human history. It has been used as an excuse to murder, deport, mutilate, enslave, exile and torture people throughout time. It's what I've been calling "labeling" all the time.
One of the people who cannot restrain himself to venture in this field is Bruce Byfield, who is an excellent technical writer by the way. And he'd better restrict himself to this field, because his talents on other fields are - let's say - limited. In one of his most recent articles, he tries to classify the FOSS community and consequently fails. I can easily find myself in several categories, which means the classification itself is of little use.
Yes, I do object to Microsofts business practices, which means that according to Bruce I must "hate Microsoft". No, I do not hate Microsoft, because that's an emotion. I merely think that the industry would be better off if its influence would deminish. That's an opinion based on valid arguments, which is by any measure a significant difference. I do use proprietary software from time to time because there is no other way to fulfill my needs. Which makes me a "mainstream advocate". And yes, I find $150 for an Operating System an outrageous high price, which makes me a "bargain hunter". On the other hand, I maintain several FOSS projects, so I'm an "Open Source developer" as well.
I fail to see how of a combination of my spending habits, my hobbies, my attitude to certain business practices and the choice of my software are a valid way to put me in one category or another. In short, I cannot escape the conclusion that this is just another stupid list. It pretends to be a useful aid "to navigate you through the community", but as a matter of fact it is of no use to anybody. And poor Bruce is not alone. Every now and then a blogger, an editor or a writer of some kind ventures in a field he knows so little about.
I have some little advise to you all: read the Tractatus of Wittgenstein for starters, try to understand it and come back later. Having faced your mental limitations will have been such a humiliating experience that you'll think twice before you ever publish such a stupid list again.
Wednesday, January 9, 2008
A brief exercise in FUD dissection
Sometimes you stumble across an article that makes you wonder whether people are spreading FUD or whether they are really that ignorant. When you take it down, bit by bit, it becomes more and more obvious how ridiculous their statements are. This one is from Adrian Kingsley-Hughes. It is a well written article and it seems as if he knows what he is talking about. Well, since I have an unexpected free half hour as I wait for a call to be returned, let's take this baby apart..
That implies that if you install Linux on a system that does meet the appropriate system requirements it will work not fine. Let's see what the system requirements of OS/X are:
That's not a vanilla PC, isn't it? It's actually rather particular. Here are the system requirements of Red Hat. Does Adrian Kingsley-Hughes have an example of a system like that that did not properly run Linux?
That is true where the desktop is concerned, but it is not true for the server market, which will be a whopping 38% in 2008. The desktop takes the same kind of hardware as the servers take. It has the same architecture. So the knowledge that vendors have can be applied to desktops as well with much ease.
I don't know why the moment you buy a piece of software, all the advantages of a free OS are instantly vaporized. Is all commercial software for Linux that much more expensive than that of their MS-Windows or OS/X counterparts? And I don't see the erosion as well. Are you put on a black list the moment you buy a piece of software, so you have to buy all the software? Is there more and more free software going commercial?
I know what Adrian means. He means to say that you get the Operating System for free and probably your only motive for doing so is because you don't have to pay anything. The moment you begin to pay for software that argument becomes null and void. First of all, I paid for most of my Linux distributions for the simple reason I like shiny CDs and nice manuals. Still, the most expensive version cost me less than half than the most basic MS-Windows version. Second, when using MS-Windows you have to buy a helluva lot more software than when you first login a Linux system. Unless you're prepared to search on the web for FOSS software, of course, like OpenOffice.org and Gimp. Talking about hidden MS-Windows cost ;-). Finally and most importantly, the main reason to run Linux is not because you don't have to pay for it. Security, performance and stability come to mind, to name a few. Oops, I forgot to mention to avoid harassing and spying on your own customers.
The same applies for MS-Windows. There are numerous examples on the web where people have to wait for official MS-support. When I wrote about this some time ago in a humorous way, there were even people who took it serious because of their own experiences. So, even if this statement is true, the only real difference is that Linux community support is free.
Sigh.. Why do IT people love monopolies and dictators so much? Do we have a certain "totalitarism" gene that is turned on by default? This statement always makes me think of an extra feature on the Borat DVD, where Borat points out every single brand of cheese on the shelf and asks the stunned grocer whether this is cheese as well. After five minutes Borat blurts out: "Why do you need so many kinds of cheese?".
If you happen to find this funny, you will understand why I consider Adrian to be one of the worlds funniest people, coming only slightly behind the great Borat himself. Allow me to rephrase that: "choice is a bad thing, because choosing is confusing for the consumer". Hmm, I think we should consider another economic model, because Americans are denied the privilege people had in the former Soviet Union: no choice. Now I understand the true meaning of his last words "It's easy to allow that word 'free' to overwhelm the senses" ;-)
When you take a copy of Windows XP, Vista or Mac OS X and you install it onto a system with the appropriate system requirements, chances are (..) [it] will work just fine.
That implies that if you install Linux on a system that does meet the appropriate system requirements it will work not fine. Let's see what the system requirements of OS/X are:
Mac server or desktop computer with an Intel, PowerPC G5, or PowerPC G4 (867MHz or faster) processor; 1GB of physical RAM; 20GB of available disk space.
That's not a vanilla PC, isn't it? It's actually rather particular. Here are the system requirements of Red Hat. Does Adrian Kingsley-Hughes have an example of a system like that that did not properly run Linux?
While Linux communities like to believe that this 0.7 per cent user base is bigger than it is, and some companies are now paying lip service to Linux, no matter how you look at it, 0.7 per cent is a small number. And even with the best will in the world, the amount of effort that vendors can seriously be expected to put into Linux, given the low market share, is not much.
That is true where the desktop is concerned, but it is not true for the server market, which will be a whopping 38% in 2008. The desktop takes the same kind of hardware as the servers take. It has the same architecture. So the knowledge that vendors have can be applied to desktops as well with much ease.
Sure, you can buy software players, some of which are rather good, but the advantage of a free OS starts to be eroded if you instantly have to put your hand in your pocket.
I don't know why the moment you buy a piece of software, all the advantages of a free OS are instantly vaporized. Is all commercial software for Linux that much more expensive than that of their MS-Windows or OS/X counterparts? And I don't see the erosion as well. Are you put on a black list the moment you buy a piece of software, so you have to buy all the software? Is there more and more free software going commercial?
I know what Adrian means. He means to say that you get the Operating System for free and probably your only motive for doing so is because you don't have to pay anything. The moment you begin to pay for software that argument becomes null and void. First of all, I paid for most of my Linux distributions for the simple reason I like shiny CDs and nice manuals. Still, the most expensive version cost me less than half than the most basic MS-Windows version. Second, when using MS-Windows you have to buy a helluva lot more software than when you first login a Linux system. Unless you're prepared to search on the web for FOSS software, of course, like OpenOffice.org and Gimp. Talking about hidden MS-Windows cost ;-). Finally and most importantly, the main reason to run Linux is not because you don't have to pay for it. Security, performance and stability come to mind, to name a few. Oops, I forgot to mention to avoid harassing and spying on your own customers.
You've promised someone that Linux is so much better than Windows. If you get a really obscure error message or particularly weird problem, you could be waiting for help for a long time.
The same applies for MS-Windows. There are numerous examples on the web where people have to wait for official MS-support. When I wrote about this some time ago in a humorous way, there were even people who took it serious because of their own experiences. So, even if this statement is true, the only real difference is that Linux community support is free.
When Apple's ad campaigns focused on the single Leopard version being easier for consumers than the myriad Vista choices, the company was onto something there. Too much choice is a major turn-off.
Sigh.. Why do IT people love monopolies and dictators so much? Do we have a certain "totalitarism" gene that is turned on by default? This statement always makes me think of an extra feature on the Borat DVD, where Borat points out every single brand of cheese on the shelf and asks the stunned grocer whether this is cheese as well. After five minutes Borat blurts out: "Why do you need so many kinds of cheese?".
If you happen to find this funny, you will understand why I consider Adrian to be one of the worlds funniest people, coming only slightly behind the great Borat himself. Allow me to rephrase that: "choice is a bad thing, because choosing is confusing for the consumer". Hmm, I think we should consider another economic model, because Americans are denied the privilege people had in the former Soviet Union: no choice. Now I understand the true meaning of his last words "It's easy to allow that word 'free' to overwhelm the senses" ;-)
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