Re: True Believers

Dr. Deb wrote:

A word of advice to those who have tried the latest Novell offerings and
found them "wanting" for various reasons.

There are many "true believers" in both Novell and Linux in general. Like
all who place their validation outside themselves, they get very offended
when someone points out a deficiency in the object of their "faith" (cf.
the Pope's speech in Germany).

Knowing that the "faithful" are abound on this site, and others, do not be
surprised or offended when they exhibit less than courteous responses.

For those of us who have tried both 10.1 and SLED 10, and found them
seriously wanting for our needs and purposes (we probably do that silly
stuff of using them for "work" and production), continue to post - MAYBE
Novell will get the idea.

For the "true believers" just maybe the world is actually round. Ideas
different from what you are used to are not necessarily bad ideas, they
are
just different. The odd thing is, the new idea could actually wind up
being right.

Deb

Well perhaps the fault lies within YOU !! I think you're missing the point,
and there are many points we could make. As for the comment about
a 'production environment' many of us on this list use SuSE every day and
so we are using it as such. We could discuss individual aspects and make
points about each. This would be productive if conducted in good faith for
purposes of 'discussion'. But that is not what typically happens with many
people. Sometimes there are thoughtful people who express an opinion in a
way that is meant to actually improve a program. To do so is perfectly
acceptable. But often people just make some stupid remark about this
problem or that and don't really want improvements made. They just want to
bitch about this, that and the other... So let us say that you're using a
program and it doesn't behave the way you want. First, is it a function
that's missing or is something not working the way you'd expect it to. If
it's the former than contact the package maintainer/developer and request
that feature. If it is the latter than let us know and perhaps we can help
fix it...This is how to get things done.

Hey, my xyz package doesn't do this.. Does anybody else think we should
have this capability ?? Why yes we do. Let's let the developer know
that.. O.K. I contacted the developer and he/she says that by the next
release he/she will try to include that feature... That's how things get
done. Or perhaps the developer says 'sorry, I'm too close to a new release
but perhaps the following release we'll include that feature. Or maybe
it's, 'sorry, not enough demand for that', or maybe it's 'that will break
this other feature'.. So, my point is that if you are sincere, and go thru
the steps, and speak niceley, then perhaps you'll get what you want.

Now you and a few others have this bad habit of calling people in this group
zealots and other unkind names. That is why you don't get the respect that
perhaps you think you deserve. That's your own fault. We are not
zealots ! You need to take into account many factors before you go about
making pronouncements like you have here. Just look at your title, 'True
Believers'. That's a load of crap. The truth is we use Linux because we
CAN do real work. You start mentioning 'faith' and you look foolish. You
get people defensive before they even respond to your post. Most questions
on this group are questions about how to get a program to do a certain
thing or how to fix some problem. So we tend not to like to take time for
advocacy.. I certainly don't see the name 'advocacy' in the name of this
group... So, as others have mentioned, if that's what your looking for
start a new group.... I'm sure Yugo and Flatfish would love to talk to you
there !!

If you look at the history of Linux and its' development over the last 5 or
6 years you would see a tremendous improvement in stability, usability,
applications, hardware detection, etc.. I remember when I started to use
it how lacking it was. It's made remarkable progress, 'despite' the lack
of assistance of most mainstream hardware manufacturers. There are many
reasons for this. Most are out of a desire by manufacturers to keep there
captive users..captive. To control the markets. To keep there users stuck
with them... Despite this and the total monopolistic stranglehold
Microsoft has exerted thru legal and illegal actions Linux gets better by
the day.

One of the major pluses regarding linux and open source is that you, the end
user can get involved to make it better. So instead of calling people
zealots, 'faithful' or whatever else you want to call us why don't you get
off your high horse and lend a hand. Make positive recommendations. Do
some development. Be constructive. Learn to play politics. Get things
accomplished. Make a donation. Stop being such a complainer. There's
plenty of that around. If you don't like Linux stop using it and use
something else. No one is going to tel you you have to use it. If you
don't like it don't use it. It's that simple. Yes, it could be better.
Yes it will get better. Now do you want to help make it better or not ??
If not don't bother us !! We are here to use it and we will make it
better. If you want to help..good. If not..too bad. I'll bet not one
user in this group spends there time going to a Microsoft group to bitch at
those users or to call them names. We have better things to do. And we
WILL make it better. We will contact developers and offer suggestions. We
will continue to use open source applications because we believe in
FREEDOM !! We believe in sharing. What do you believe in ?? Profit ?
Nothing else ??

Anyway, that's enough 'evangelizing' for now. I've got real work to do
helping others who have work to do.

Have a nice day.

And by the way, when was the last time you posted any suggestions directly
to Novell ?? I've called them a few times and they've always been
receptive to useful improvements. I've contacted numerous developers for
new functionality and I almost always get a positive response. Often a new
feature will show up within just a few release cycles. I've contributed a
few bucks here and there to projects. It pays off.

P.S. For your information the world is an oblate spheroid !! So no, you
can't jump off........

.

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