[clue-talk] A Significantly Better Mousetrap, was Re: [clue-tech] Mephis linux

[Collins Richey]

On Wed, Nov 19, 2008 at 5:07 PM, Nate Duehr <nate at natetech.com> wrote:
> David L. Willson wrote:
>>
>> Unless I misread your post, you're unexcited by any of the things others
>> are doing, and you have no exciting ideas of your own to promote.  I'm
>> sorry, but I find myself unable and unwilling to contribute to that mindset,
>> and I find it darned curious that you would think the perspective valuable
>> enough to share considering how unlikely it is to motivate anyone to try to
>> do anything.
>
> Heh... I have plenty of "exciting ideas" but they are unrelated to Linux.
>
> Usually they're in the form of integrating RF systems for Ham Radio and
> others.  Linux is sometimes used, but it's not critical to any of it.

Hmmm, are those RF systems in as miserable shape as you seem to think
Linux is? Do you actually have to "do something" to make any of them
work?

>
> I'm a USER of computers, not a developer.  Sometimes you just have to know
> your own limitations.  Just like I'm not a politician, I still can have
> opinions about how they do their thing -- I have opinions about software
> development.

Do you just carp about how the politicians do their thing, or do you
make an effort to get involved to improve the results? We already know
the answer for Linux.

>
> I also work for a company that develops a lot of software, and have been
> doing support for many generations of the stuff... so my perspective is
> different than many Linux fans who are almost always developers of some
> sort.

Totally wrong. Most of the Linux fans I've known over the past decade
are not developers of any sort.

>
> (I've actually been fairly careful to keep specifics about my experiences
> with corporate software developers out of this thread, but they certainly
> color my opinion.  Without getting into too much detail, there have been a
> lot of promises that "oh, we'll fix that in the next release... or in the
> next hardware platform" of core problems on things I've worked on at every
> company I've worked at for a couple of decades.  Those fixes either are
> botched (happens more often than companies want to admit) or they're
> de-scoped by managers... and even though the support staff knows the problem
> has been around and annoying customers for decades, it's still there... in
> every version released... but, I also see the same types of things going on
> in open-source.  No difference.)

You've lost me there. I've seen so many things fixed in Linyux and
open source over the past few years that I've lost count.
>

> By many developers standards that means I have no say in what they work on.
>  That's fine, but Linux zealouts always say that "the problems get fixed by
> many eyes"... no they don't.  They get fixed if the devs want them fixed.
>  The users are rarely consulted on what they'd like to see fixed.

Where did you come up with this ridiculous idea? There is a lot of
consultation with users. Of course, there is that category of user
that has determined that problem x is the most important thing and
that then whine a lot when others don't agree that problem x is really
significant.

> You can
> turn in bug reports and beg as much as you want, unless a dev decides your
> problem is worthy of their time, hundreds of people can complain and the
> bugs will remain open from release to release.

I can think of a few cases like this, but such cases are an
infinitessimally small part of the whole. I still have the mail tracks
from a bug I reported that went through 3 releases of Ubuntu (and
other distros).  It has to do with the way Grub determines device
ordering at boot time. The developers didn't ignore it. It just took a
very long time to fix. There were very likely a few hundred duplicate
reports of the problem.

>
> So in all... I'm just curious how we get to a world where the end-users'
> desires trump all and actually get worked on.

Nirvana?

>
> Linux isn't "broken" in the sense that it doesn't work on the desktop. Linux
> just has lots of little cracks and busted little stuff, making it kinda
> rickety on the desktop.

But of course the alternatives like Windows are perfect and never
exhibit any cracks and busted stuff. And of course the M$ developers
are really end-user friendly, ready to jump at your beck and call.

Meanwhile, I'm curious. Have you found the perfect computer and OS
that does everything the way you want, one where the developers jump
every time you whine?

It appears that you will make every effort to help out with RF
problems, but you can't be bothered to help out in the open source
arena. A clue: not all who help are developers. So why do you care to
comment when others want to know about pluses/minuses of various
distros since none of the distros can meet your impossible standards
anyway?

-- 
Collins Richey
     If you fill your heart with regrets of yesterday and the worries
     of tomorrow, you have no today to be thankful for.