Re: [tlug] Blog: Ubuntu = Linux / Linux = Ubuntu

[CL <az.4tlug@example.com>]

Edward Middleton wrote:
> CL wrote:
> > As a newbie who can make WIN dance and sing at times then Linux sits 
> > and stares at its shoes (case in point: CJK input), I found the 
> > following blogger's sentiments interesting.  He argues that Ubuntu is 
> > becoming the generic form of Linux and that it is a Good Thing (tm) 
> > and one which may eventually save the OS from itself.  As a marketer, 
> > I have long believed that Linux suffers from too many choices and too 
> > many ways to do the same thing and it is good to find one community 
> > setting a standard. http://blogs.zdnet.com/hardware/?p=1641&tag=nl.e550
>
> What made you move from windows? 
Ah, true confessions time ... because I am a Liberal. 

http://www.self.org

After installing a large number of solar panel power kits across rural 
China, Tibet, Bhutan, and Thailand -- both in village and nomadic 
settings -- and interfacing individual units with solar-powered aid 
stations, police stations, and military outposts, the next major step 
was the One Laptop per Child  program.  The communications capabilities 
of those products interface with the power grid to create distance 
learning opportunities and promote better medical and safety services to 
the remote populations of those areas.  Neither those PCs, nor the 
repeaters, the servers, nor the comms boxes run WIN or anything remotely 
similar.  While I can field strip and repair the hardware in my sleep, I 
feel a need to be able to make better use of the instruction technology 
so that I can better help others. 

Although I read / speak Japanese and Chinese, I learned both for 
military and commercial reasons, so that I could apply other knowledge 
where it was needed.  Projects like Jim Breen's area godsend when the 
purpose is the message and the medium is a distant second as his many 
offerings apply RIGHT NOW.  To that end, I feel a need to be able to 
understand more of the OLPC and the free software movements in Asia.  
But, it is far easier to do it in English and then apply it to Chinese 
and Japanese than to do so natively ... which is how I learned WIN, 
anyway and it worked famously. 

... and, here I am on this list ...

English keyboard, IME input is where it's at.  I _will_ confess that I 
think *nix CJK support sucks and will probably continue to do so until 
the Chinese programmers are told to go sit in a corner and a few 
Japanese programmers who have had successful attitude-ectomies can be 
brought in to make an IME that works as well as MS' does.  I have  
resorted to an InnoTek VirtualBox running WIN XP-Pro J and IME -- which 
isn't completely set up yet -- simply because there are certain programs 
that no LIN version has an equivalent to.
> I think the author of that article missed the Redhat = Linux / Linux = 
> Redhat phase.  While this kind of thinking can make it frustrating 
> talking to newbies,  if it makes things conceptually easier for them, 
> great.   The major move for a newbie is going to be from Windows, 
> after that any other Linux or even other UNIX becomes significantly 
> easier.
With all due respect, that is an education answer and not a marketing 
one.  People will use what they are first taught in any majority of 
instances.  For most of the adult population, education is a limited 
input unless it pays immediate dividends.  You have, maybe, thirty-odd 
Linux / Unix distros and, the average number the typical newbie will try 
is generally thought to be three. 

Those of us who are not typical will keep trying everything until we 
break it, then move on to the next one and break it, too.  We are a 
minority.  A small one.  Some of us are even willing to put up with 
verbal abuse from developers so we can keep trying to learn to use a 
product better ... like, Debian, say. 

The author is correct in his position that if you don't get people into 
something that works easily and makes them comfortable quickly, you will 
lose them in the long run.  To that end, Ubuntu _may_ be what Linux 
needs.  Frankly, I wasn't a fan until I used Kubuntu (I Like KDE, Don't 
Like Gnome) but the irritation levels are far lower, most of the people 
are fair minded, and it doesn't take as long to actually be able to do 
certain things. 

--
CL