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

SOMEONE really needs told to get a life

[capplor.livejournal.com]

Child abuse for your choice of editors & operating system? The worst I'd call somebody is "crazy" for that (and of course, "crazy" is usually just a description and not a purgorative.)

So if Linux is supposed to dominate, why can't someone explain to Fred & me how to install it? (Or are you only dominating people who can afford new hardware or have time to backup everything before repartitioning the hard drive with EVERYTHING on it)

[lisa-marli.livejournal.com]

The flame wars, when Andy Trembley created a Hugo Nominees LJ, from Rick Moen who claims anything less than Open Source on your own website is an abomination over at the BASFA list was pretty ugly.
As you know, Rick is Real Annoyed that I can't find the open source programs I need to run only on Linux and that I would rather just buy off the shelf Account Programs that run on Windows. The fact that they are the Industry Standard and nothing in the Linux World has that standard is immaterial.
Religions are ugly no matter what you do.
By the By, Moose has decided he loves the Mac OS, then again, he's highly visual. But he's also working to set up the windows machine to dual boot with Linux. He's real open about his OS, though windoze is his least favorite.

[technoshaman.livejournal.com]

For what it's worth, you won't get any arguments from me about what you use... I mean, yeah, I use OpenOffice but that's just because it's been so damn long since I had a system that would run LaTeX effectively... that and there is the singleton advantage that OpenOffice reads DominantParadigm .DOCuments.... but for what you are likely to use it for (music, science, etc.)? LaTeX is *the* way to go; hell, Knuth purpose-built TeX for such. And good on'ya for keeping the "old school" ways alive. (jeezus, when did 80's tech get to be "old school"?)

And frankly? Windows is abuse, in more ways than I can count. Partcularly 95-98, where you're stuck in god mode all the time whether you like it or not. Anybody that would turn a kid loose on the internet with that swiss cheese of an OS deserves the screams s/he will inevitably be woken with...

OS X is just *different* enough from what you and I grew up with to be really damn confusing. Although I imagine I find it easier than you do because I got so used to shifting gears when I first really got into computers: CCASTGS could log into a pair of Cyber 170's running NOS, a Cyber 180 running NOS/VE, a Pyramid running plain vanilla BSD 4.3, an AT&T 3B20 running the One True Squished'em Vee, a cluster of Sun graphics workstations, another cluster of Macs running System 6 and later System 7, ... and the PC's with Windows 3.1, which I didn't use very much because I had unlimited access to so much better. To me a PC was a big semi-smart terminal.

As for world domination: Frankly, I'd settle for world acceptance. And a belly full of herring.

[mithriltabby]

obsessivewoman is somewhat technical, but not linux-admin technical. But she finds Fedora Core 4 quite usable at home: she knows to hit Ctrl+Alt+F9 to get to her desktop where her entire environment is waiting for her, and all the tools she needs are there. She’s quite happy with how stable it is compared to Windows.

[ravan.livejournal.com]

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.

WTF?? Somebody needs to get a) a clue, and b) a life.

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.

I'm not enamored of the Mac UI myself - to me it's clunky and limited. Too many steps to do basic admin. Mice need *three* buttons, not two or only one! ;-)

[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.

[mneme]

It's somewhat ironic that you mention Emacs and praise X's cut-selection behavior in the same breath...since Emacs is the -only- app I use with any frequency that breaks X's cut-selection behavior (it only puts things into the selection buffer when they enter the kill ring -- though modern emacs at least -also- put things into the cut/paste buffer when they do this, I think).

[sbisson.livejournal.com]

I know the feeling.

I've used pretty much every OS around, but these days run three or four different ones as standard. Oddly I get the most negativity from people who've standardised on one...

To be honest, I'll respect anyone's choices - and I'll defend their right to use whatever tools they want.

After all, that's what they are. Tools.

[gridlore.livejournal.com]

http://www.ichthux.com/

Laugh or weep, as you will.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_amethyst_fire_/]

haha, Linux WILL rule the world.

And my mom works at microsoft :P

[elimloth.livejournal.com]

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