Desktop Linux (fwd)

[Jeff Kinz]

On Wed, Feb 25, 2004 at 06:43:11PM -0500, Chris Brenton wrote:
> Dude, sounds more like you've made up your mind that Linux on the
> desktop sucks and nothing anyone is going to say is going to change
> that. That's totally fine, but for many of us who have given it a
> chance
> it works just fine.

Nothing I love more than someone who decides they know what I'm thinking
and gets its completely wrong, "Dude". :-)  (I'm pretty far beyond the
"Dell" Generation but I appreciate the "Dude" anyway. Thanks.)

I guess you missed the part of this thread on how well the installation
of Linux desktop systems replacing public windows systems worked. Since
I'm a Linux advocate it could hardly be my position that Linux sucks.

I'm simply trying to point out what is likely to be the most important
"perceptual" issues with trying to make Linux on the desktop succeed in
the mass market. 

The issue here is "what does Linux need to become successful on the
desktop"?

And if you haven't been listening closely-  I am a strong, and 
successfully Linux advocate because I understand the perception
issue.  Linux works fine for you, and me and many others but if 
you want Windows desktop users to start spontaneously migrating to 
the Linux desktop in large numbers, You must make sure that they 
deeply desire the change.  Otherwise they will avoid the pain of change
at all costs. 

Telling people "Oh, you gotta learn all new applications", or "You gotta
buy and install this other thing here to get your checkbook program to
work" does not mean less pain for them. It means more pain.

OpenOffice and StarOffice(Essentially the same product) are the most
successful word processing products in the Linux market for one main
reason: They look and work just like Microsoft office.

How many organizations have you converted from Windows to Linux as
an outside vendor?  Its not easy and the perceptual state of the
customer's mindset is first last and always the most important piece of
the puzzle.

When it comes to convincing people to move from windows to some
other system, the two words you will be hearing are "seamless" and
"transparent". 

We (The Linux community) still have work to do in this area.

> On Wed, 2004-02-25 at 14:17, Jeff Kinz wrote:
> > Also gotta work w/Intuits tax software....
> 
> And again, as I stated before, that works as well (at least last year's
> edition ran fine for me).
Excellent.  Thats one more notch in the belt to convince folks.

> > "Mom - if you want to use Quicken, you have to go to this other company
> > and buy and install their product too, then Quicken will work."
> 
> Oh paleeeese, Windows users are already used to buying a product and not
> having it work out of the box until they hunt down the company's support
> site and install the latest drivers. If they can handle this, they can
> handle a one time software install.

No, they aren't used to it.  Most people get their system from a company
like Dell and almost everything they want is already there.  MS-Office,
intuit etc.  For the few people that do need to buy Quicken separately,
it usually installs just fine and works just fine, for 99.5% or more of
the customer base.  


> 
> > Works for us geeks, but won't pass the "That's too strange test" for 
> > real end users.
> 
> Huh? Installing software is too strange for end users????

No, being told "You gotta go get this other product and install it before
this first one you bought will work" is too strange for them.
 (Nice attempt to oversimplify things though.  :)

-- 
Jeff Kinz, Open-PC, Emergent Research,  Hudson, MA.  
"jkinz at kinz.org" is copyright 2003.  
Use is restricted. Any use is an acceptance of the offer at
http://www.kinz.org/policy.html.