[OT] End-user uses for x86-64 (was: Why are still not at 64 bits)

Jeffry Smith jsmith at alum.mit.edu
Sun Feb 18 03:50:35 EST 2007


On 2/18/07, Thomas Charron <twaffle at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>  That the Linux community pushing 'You now have choice' breaks down
> when it comes to the general public.  And that perhaps we can actually
> learn from WHY people prefer Windows in general.
>
My experience (from putting GNOME/KDE boxes in front of people) is
that most DON'T care - they care about what they can do.  However, try
and buy a box w/o windows at Circuit City/Best Buy/etc.  They buy
Windows because that's what's sold.  They use Windows because that's
what they're used to.  They're used to it because that's what they
bought.  They bought it because that's what's sold.  Rinse, lather,
repeat.

Real world experience:  had my wife (who lives in MS Word/Excel) sit
down at my laptop, with GDM running.  Told her I'd copied some of her
documents to her home directory, wanted to see if she could edit them.
 Gave her her username & password.  Did NOT tell her how to log in,
how to pull up apps, etc.  Purpose was to see how easy it was.  She
types in the username, hits enter.  GDM asks for password.  Types that
in and hits enter.  Gets Gnome - sees foot down at the bottom, decides
it's like the "Start" button.  Pulls up the menu, goes to "Office
Applications" (or something like that - the obvous place for such - I
use WM & xterm to enter commands), sees something called
"OpenOffice.org".  Must be like MS Office.  Pulls that up.  Goes to
"File-Open" - gets the Open File dialog in her home directory.  Opens
her document.  Edits.  Hits print.  Prints to default printer.  Hits
"File-Save" File is saved.

Bottom line - she, a complete newbie to Linux, could use it as easily
as MS - but MS is what's on her work computer because that's what they
contract for, because that's what the big names sell.

jeff


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