[H-GEN] Linux Advocacy [was: Question from a wannabe Linux newbie.]

[Robert Brockway]

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On 17 Jan 2003, Jason Parker-Burlingham wrote:

> Nitpick:  Unix and Linux aren't the way of the future.  They're the
> way of the past.

Hi Jason.  In a sense no current OS is "the way of the future" since I'm
sure new OSes will appear & evolve, learning from the mistakes of the
past.  As it should be imho.  How far off this is - who knows.  Alot of
the experimental OSes that have been developed recently (Brazil, Plan9,
etc) borrow heavily from unix concepts (and arguably implement them
better).  I have no doubt the popular OSes of the future will borrow
heavily from unix in terms of concepts & the unix philosophy.

In another sensem any OS can be the way of the future.  The way of the
future is open standards.  Events in Europe & elsewhere are showing that.

I don't care what OS someone else wants to use as long as that OS follows
the rules.  Microsoft have demonstrably broken the rules many times
causing ire among many in the industry.

> Some people are not on the list to convince anyone about the relative
> merits of anything.

When engaging in open advocacy I am always strict to use the correct name
of products and companies.  Even on the Humbug lists (which presumably has
a somewhat unix orientated audience) I normally stick to this rule also.
Having said this, if someone else uses an abbreviation like M$ on the
Humbug lists I'm not bothered.

> I view the deliberate misspellings, when I notice them, as a evidence
> of a semi-affectionate "love-hate" relationship with the product in
> question.

In some cases I think this is true - eg, netscrape for netscape even when
most of us used it.  Not so sure about Mickeysoft though ;)

> Since Microsoft Windows[1] has the largest market share, it's only
> natural that it will have the lion's share of the nicknames; and since

Yeah, I think this is right.  The more popular certain distros and Linux
in particular get, the more nicknames they pick up (Eg Deadrat for Redhat
- this is certainly an affectionate name).

Has Debian picked up any nicknames yet?

> [1] : It'd appear that even Microsoft can't decide what to call their
>       products these days.

Hehehe :)

Cheers,
	-Rob

-- Robert Brockway B.Sc. email: robert at timetraveller.org  ICQ: 104781119
   Linux counter project ID #16440 (http://counter.li.org)
   "The earth is but one country and mankind its citizens" -Baha'u'llah


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