... newbie's new year rant

[Benjamin Scott]

On Tue, 4 Jan 2005, at 6:03pm, dave at diacad.com wrote:
> --- start of rant ---

  Heh.  What you posted is not a rant by the standards of this group.  ;-)

> On the GNHLUG discussion; I confess much of it is over my head, whether
> dealing with arcane matters or assuming knowledge of Linux not (yet) in
> possession of yours truly.

  I suspect a little of both.  The discussion here, as of late, has been
predominantly fairly narrowly focused, i.e., people with a specific problem
looking for a specific solution.  Such threads tend to be extremely
uninteresting to anyone not working in the same problem space.  I don't know
if the high incidence of such discussion is the current trend, coincidence,
or what.

  And certainly, anyone new to Linux (or indeed, most computer technologies) 
will be at a loss as to what most of the noise here is.  I wouldn't worry 
about that.  Read stuff you're interested in and delete the rest.

> I will stay on it without being able to contribute positively for now.

  Passive readership can be a contribution to the large Linux community.  
And, certainly, if you have the opportunity here, a viewpoint from someone
new is often invaluable.

  Ignore curmudgeons like me and Derek if we get grumpy.  ;-)

> ... and some degree of suspicion as to whether Linux is indeed the Holy
> Grail ...

  One of the best quotes with regards to Linux advocacy I've seen is:

"We are Linux.  Resistance is an indication you have missed the point."

  Linux, being community-owned, doesn't have to make a profit or gain market
share.  Sure, there are many of us who like it, and think it's a good choice
for others, but unlike a commercial product, there's no financial machine
which has to keep running and pushing new sales for Linux to survive.

  While it may be someone's personal Holy Grail, that decision is made on an
individual basis.  For you, Linux may be a potential product offering, a
useful tool or skill, an interesting toy, or a waste of time.

  More briefly: You should only use Linux if you want to.  :-)

> Frankly, my assessment is that software is now in a far more disorganized
> and primitive stage than hardware with regard to general-purpose desktop
> operating systems.

  You're too nice.  Frankly, *my* assessment is that the state of the IT
industry is pathetic.  Nowhere else is it generally assumed that products
will be defective from the start, and might (if you're lucky) improve with
time.

-- 
Ben Scott <bscott at ntisys.com>
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