Re: Why so hard to setup hardware? Control panel?

From: mike (spamme0_at_juno.com)
Date: 02/08/04 

Date: Sat, 07 Feb 2004 17:46:00 -0800

Michael Black wrote:
> mike <spamme0@juno.com> wrote in message news:<4024CDE9.40900@juno.com>...

> I think you're missing a fundamental understanding of "Linux".
>
> Linux is the kernel, that everything else runs on top of.
>
OK, strictly correct, but not helpful. Let's call it the computing
platform alternative to windows.

Some people like to whittle for the sake of whittling. Some
use that knife as a TOOL to create other stuff.
Linux people are knife builders and whittlers. There's nothing wrong
with whittling, it just doesn't do any good for the rest of us.
Knife building is good. It would be nice if the knife handles were
similar enough that we could figure out how to use them as tools.

People who want to get work done, don't care about the difference
between a kernel and an application. All they care about is how
easy it is to get other stuff done.

People who develop hardware and software for profit want a a platform
with a large installed base
that's consistent so they can write one driver, one installation script
and have one technical support group.

Users can't use an OS that doesn't support the hardware/software they need.
Developers can't waste resources on platforms with small installed base.
Even if they had the resources, they can't risk angering MS by openly
supporting linux. There's way more to lose in the MS market than one
could gain in the L market. Fragmentation of the L market
hurts both users and developers.

> The GNU project supplied many of the utilities.
>
> X comes from another group.
>
> KDE and GNOME are each done by yet other groups.
>
> Others supply other utitilties, and applications.
>
> These are the pool for all the "linux distributions". Everyone uses
> these common elements to make up their distribution. A distribution
> is merely a collection of those pool items. One of the key
> differences between distributions is the actual selection of what
> is included, plus philosophy. Think of a distribution as merely
> a collection of what everyone else is using.

The problems I have with the distributions are inconsistency and
incompatibility. The manpages and howtos refer to tools that are not
included in the distribution...or are located in a different place...
or won't run because they assume I've already run some other tool.
Or the configuration tool doesn't work...I need a different
configuration tool for this case. Networking is a case in point.
Depending on the distribution and the hardware platform my results have
been everywhere from "works fine right out of the box" to "can't figure
it out at all". I'm sure you could look at the failed system
and point out some trivial fix. That YOU can fix it is not the issue.
That I CAN'T fix it is the issue.

Much of the documentation is written in "geek". You can (and many do)
blame me for being too stupid or lazy to understand it. But a more
productive attitude might be, "how can we make this stuff easier to
understand?" It is good that I'm seeing "recompile the kernel"
a lot less these days. Granny is NOT gonna recompile the kernel
no matter how much you wish it. Nor will she want to spend the week
reading howtos to figure out how to get to a command line interface
to run modconf...oops, it's linuxconf...no wait, I need SWAT for this...
no, I need to edit /usr/lib/X11R6/Config/config/CONFIG/TeXTfILe
and enter a bunch parameters that I have no way of knowing. Then
I can install samba, start the servers manually, edit the configuration
file with a bunch of other parameters I have no way of knowing.
Don't need swat at all ;-(
>
> So there is "standardization", at the level of individual projects.
> If there's standardization like you want, then we might as well
> dump all but one of the distributions,

That is EXACTLY what I advocate. It will be much more attractive to the
masses. The geeks won't care, they just recompile the sources and make
their systems as different as they wish.

Even Windows has gone way too far integrating stuff into the OS that
need not
be there. It's more about ruining the competition than need to be
inculded in the distribution.

> because the only reason
> for multiple distributions, beyond "branding", is to offer something
> that the others aren't.

There are two reasons for a new distribution.
1) Hey look at me!! I'm so cool I developed the best linux distribution
in the world...and I'm not even out of high school.
2) I'm gonna make a bunch of money off this.

#1 is the reason we're in such a sad fragmented state. Why should I
worry about standardization? I can be cooler without it.
If #2 ever happens, Gates will yank it right out from under them.
I've never seen a plausible business model for linux for the masses.
Geeks, what's business? Server infrastructure, probably. Masses, no.

>
> Some of the problem people must experience is that the different
> distributions don't advance at the same rate, while the individual
> projects are coming out with newer versions. So if the version of
> the distribution you pick is using an older kernel version, it will
> never be able to deal with hardware that has come out since that
> kernel version came out, while another distribution with a more recent
> kernel version will work fine with that hardware. But this is not
> because of "different distributions" but because one hasn't moved
> to the latest kernel. The same applies to all the other things
> that make up a distribution.

I can go download the latest version of somedll.dll and upgrade my
windows system to the latest and greatest functionality. Or maybe I
need a service pack. Why can't I do the same with linux? I can't
because there are so many different versions/configurations of
everything! Different distributions progress at different paces
BECAUSE there are different distributions.

>
> All your talk of "control panels" confuses me. I don't have any
> control panels on my computer. That's because I'm not runing
> a desktop, and indeed rarely run X. Your vision of "standardization"
> is monolithic.

Back in the old days, I couldn't imagine needing a mouse for anything...
until I started doing graphical PERT charts on a MAC Lisa.
Today, I can't imagine trying to manage an MP3 collection or surf the
web without a graphical user interface. With linux, figuring out which
tool applies in THIS distribution on this hardware is half the battle.
The other half is calling up the psychic hotline to figure out what
parameters to give the tool.

I like the Knoppix user interface best because it's a lot like the
windows user interface. That doesn't make it better, just more usable
given my experience, and the experience of virtually all casual computer
users on the planet. It has a familiar control panel to configure
the system. If it actually worked to configure the system, it would be
great. And it's NOT a hardware problem, the Feather variant of Knoppix
autodetects and runs all my hardware just fine from the CD.

Linux won't do anything that I can't already do IMHO better on my
windows 98 machine.
I want linux because I'm unwilling to upgrade to XP and give MS
unrestricted access to my hardware/software/data. If it weren't for
MS' intrusion into my existence, linux wouldn't even be considered.

I'm willing to spend a LOT of effort making linux work even though it
won't support many of my desired applications and hardware.

I'm retired. I have 100% free time. I have a lab full of computers
to experiment on. And I still ain't been able to make it work for the
most basic tasks...at least not all at once on the same hardware platform.

I'm not asking for help on a specific problem, at least not in this thread.
I'm suggesting that mere mortals can't get over the first hump in the
learning curve. Linux developers need to spend more time automating
installation and configuration of basic functionality. Some consistency
in the tools would help the whole community.

mike

>
> Michael 

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