Can't we all just get along?

[mdlbear]

I'm always surprised at how emotional some people can get about my choice of software. I get ad-hominem attacks when I mention that I prefer Emacs and LaTeX to somebody's favorite WYSIWYG word processor. I stopped allowing anonymous comments after somebody literally accused me of "child abuse" (those words, exactly) when I mentioned that my kids sometimes used Linux. I continually get snide comments whenever I mention that, as a visual illiterate and long-time X user, I find the Mac user interface unuseable. (And I'm not saying that Windows is much better, but nobody sends me hate mail when I criticize Windows.)

Seriously, I get fewer flames when I mention that I'm an agnostic Druid. In fact, I don't think anyone has flamed me about my religion recently.

I'm not asking for tolerance, exactly. Or maybe I am. At least until Linux achieves its goal of world domination. Then we'll see who...

Oh. Right. Sorry about that.

Comments

[elimloth.livejournal.com]

Mandelbear, you and I have probably used, heck - *made* computers since the days of discrete logic. I still have a working 6502 system with hand etched double-sided PC boards and a wire wrapped video card made out of 74xx TTL chips. I've been part of the big-iron mainframe companies, Apple, and Microsoft.

Like yours, my litany of OSes is also long, and along the way I must say my favorite was AmigaDOS. Though I use WinXP (and Vista) pretty much exclusively, I still have my OS 9 based Macs around. I can't stand OS X, I actually like Win XP, and I'd never ever use Windows 1-98/ME. I never liked unix as a client system and linux is not much better, though I like how well linux works in embedded spaces. I loath X-windows, find the damage done by OS X to Apple's once nice UI (well, the top-menu model was a major mistake) makes it ugly to me.

I outgrew 80-column real or virtual displays long ago.

On mice/mouses, I'd like to see 5-buttons, one per digit, but that's venturing into hand gesture systems.

I have gotten to the point where I see the use of computers as ease-of-use devices and that anything that expedites data interchange is often more important than other features. That speaks to marketplace ubiquity, so generally Windows wins hands down.

Now eventually or sooner, WEB services will begin to address data interchange ubiquity and I think the distinction between linux based or Windows based end-clients may become irrelevent. Indeed the WEB services model (or what some people call 'cloud-OS') will commoditize what we think of today as OSes to the point where all that code base will be effectively free. So, this Windows vs. linux debate will just slide into the commodity black hole. When was the last time anyone argued about their wired telephones and their features? Even cellphones are no longer compared - the offered services, however, are considered worthy of comparison becasue that's where the value lies.

[mdlbear]

We differ -- I like X, have been using it and Unix/Linux as a client for most of two decades, and can't stand any flavor of Windows or Mac.

The apps on my desktop are almost entirely 80-column text displays, including xterms, emacs frames, and Firefox (which I configure to the same size as an Emacs window, though the proportional font tends to get more than 80 columns on the screen). Those rare occasions when I have to view a legacy Office document I fire up OpenOffice and grit my teeth at the UI.

I personally don't believe web services will take over in the next decade, if ever, and in any case interfaces are getting more diverse, not less. I do think that open source will prevail, and commoditize OSs and data interchange formats.

None of which really addresses the original topic, which was the degree to which people get defensive about their preferred UI's. Except perhaps to illustrate the point.

[elimloth.livejournal.com]

None of which really addresses the original topic, which was the degree to which people get defensive about their preferred UI's. Except perhaps to illustrate the point.

I think it illustrates the counterpoint, that people can differ and yet remain amicable. When I see you go off on Windows or OS X or GUI versus command line interfaces, I just see you and I differ.

"In an old and perhaps forgotten tradition of a place elsewhere, Draco settles himself next to the bar and offers Mandelbear a drink."

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

Not so forgotten a tradition. Have one yourself.

[mdlbear]

A little of both.

Not forgotten here -- let me buy the next round.