Thursday, 2. April 2009, 19:29:00
I've just read the article with that title, I found it interesting and wanted to share
http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/162457/Linux_needs_critics.HTMLIn short the article is, as the title says, an observation how in the Linux world most of the time everybody just says how they have better stuff than on windows and other operating systems, but there is very little talk about things that need to be improved. Most of such talks are met with a bit of hostility, and often with excuses such as "it's free, don't complain". The author then explains, that there is a big difference between criticism and complaints, in the sense that criticism usually hints at solutions and/or causes.
This made me think, and here are some thought, though they maybe a bit garbled.
Indeed it is true that we need to be able to accept criticism, so that we have a realistic view of things. There are some issues which really are related to the inherent properties of free software, but sometimes those excuses are really overused. The idea with Linux (and open source in general) is that it can replace a commercial system. I believe that it is possible for many uses, and as time goes by, I believe that there will be more and more of those areas where there is high quality free software.
I was also thinking about why the Linux community is sometimes a bit touchy about some things. I remembered when we had some lin/win discussions on our faculty board, and than later on there were talks about how there are some different cultural views between the groups, that Linux people can get a little snappy and such.
Maybe it is true, but I think the reason for that is that you need to invest some effort to get onto Linux, to make some things work. When things do work, you have additional satisfaction of a well done job. You need even more effort to make new software. So when you go thru all that, and you do know why you did it, you have more reason to defend you choices. Because in todays world, on desktop PCs, windows is more-or-less a standard thing, and Linux is a choice. Things change in this department too, but it's not a fast process.
There are more talks about the topic, there is a good article here:
http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/Biculturalism.html which also explains some of the main reasons for different cultural views of lin and win users. It is a bit older, so some arguments are probably irelevant by now, and maybe not everything is true, but there are some good points in there.
On another note, it is interesting that most people who use Windows most of the time talk about problems. I would also note that most of the talk are complaints, not criticism
All in all, just a few thoughts, in a bit of a mess...
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