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GNOME GUI

GNOME/OSS Article 66

Posted by CmdrTaco from the more-mainstream-open-source-stuff dept.
MidnightRider writes "Monday's The Dallas Morning News has a front page article about GNOME and OSS. " Lots of stuff about Miguel. Brace yourself: We're gonna be smothered with mainstream Linux articles this week.
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GNOME/OSS Article More

GNOME/OSS Article

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  • There are a lot of lamers with Linux, however at least most of Linux/FreeBSD/... users can explain what exactly happens when they run tar and use pipes. Not something to be too proud about, but definitely a step above "highlight the text and press 'bold' on a toolbar to emphasize a word in email".
  • Fair question, but if the choice though limited is far superior that may suffice for many.

    Linux need not run on every desktop to be a force to be reckoned with. That is, where is it that Linux must become a monopoly to succeed?
  • when recruiters call me asking for that,
    i politely explain to them that i dont have
    windows or word97. especially if they are looking
    for unix people, they should not expect you to
    have windows. clueing the recruiter in on the fact
    that unix is not a program that runs in DOS and
    that word97 does not exist for it helps.

    the email that insists on it, i just delete.
    chances are you dont want to work for them.

    its the same reason i always go to interviews with a fresh coat of black on my nails. if they give
    me any crap about it, i probably dont want to work
    for them.
  • I totally agree. It is true that Mexico, Brazil and Pakistan are developing countries, but they have massive resources to pull something like that. Haiti and Ghana, on the other hand could not probably do something like that. The Central American region who at one point could have attempted to do that was beaten to the dust by Hurricane George last year, and they could not possibly spend any resources in the next 3-5 years in anything like this. At least at this time, this kind of projects can only take place in what I call the "developing mastodons", countries that although underdeveloped, have the enough resources (both human, tech and money) to pull (or at least try to pull) something like that. Most of these "mastodons" are in Latin America, India, Pakistan, Vietnam, most Arab countries, Nigeria, and a few other countries in Asia and Africa. For many other smaller countries, projects like that will just not be possible in the near future.
  • Someone dared to mention Gnome without giving equal time to KDE. Break out the asbestos and the clue stick..

    I thought it was a pretty good article though. Except for the misunderstanding about Wine.

    Daniel
  • It was probably confusion..I could see gnome-libs being released soon and a few of the smaller libraries, but the rest..

    Daniel
  • Okay. If we're going to predict future use based on the present, let's at least do *one* thing-- use the first derivitive of growth-- let's not look at the swelling numbers of Linux apps, but the *rate* at which they are swelling, and the rate at which that rate is increasing.

    The number of applications for Linux is growing tremendously. Although there are few end-user apps (relatively), the infrastructure is now in place, and has been for a couple of years. The number of applications announced *daily* is astounding. As the number of Linux users grows, the number of Linux programmers grows. (No, the rate of programmer/user growth is not linear, but the number of users is irrelevent. Only the number of programmers matters; and it follows that the more users we have, the more programmers we have.)

    Besides, there are more IRC clients for Linux than there are total MS-Windows applications. So Linux *does* have more software than MS-Windows.
  • Wine is hot on your trail.. Or at least that's what the article seems to suggest.



    GNOME is not the only project to make a user-friendly interface for Linux.
    A similar project called Wine coordinated by a Swiss programmer also is in progress. Plug-ins that provide translation between GNOME and programs such as Microsoft Word are on the way.


    I personally don't see how they're similar at all. Could just be me though

  • Africa (Score:1)

    by Tsk ( 2863 )
    The closing Gap is a nice Idea but is only worth when the country has computers. So Globally what is says is true for "middle" developed country, but for "real" third world countries It's false.

    One other good thing about this article is : not a word is said about KDE : no flames wars !! Even though I consider Plurality a needed value for Open software. KDE vs GNOME wars is for me the same kind of techy battle that pushes the products higher and let the Final users (you and Me) choose.

  • Just because teachers will be using Linux/GNOME in school does NOT mean that they will be teaching more fundamental or universal concepts of how computers work than if they had Windows machines. You know what it takes for that? Good teachers and motivated students.

    Most people simply want to be able to poke around a GUI, learn how to use very specific applications and know as little as possible about the underlying product. They take "business computing" classes or some such and avoid CS. We think of this as "point and drool", but that is all most people WANT. And you know what? GNOME and KDE will let you point in drool almost as much as Windows.

    Now if the teacher and students are motivated to learn more about a computer ANYWAY, than Linux is great, because they will be able to tinker with/study anything in the system at all.
    It has wonderful academic potential, but once again you need a good teacher to make any USE of this.

    The bottom line is this: replacing Windows with GNOME is going to have little effect on those who only wanted to learn application specific skills. They'll just learn GNOME-specific skills instead which will be even less useful than equivalent Windows skills because Windows is far more common (although that might change in Mexico).

    And you know what? Mexico isn't installing these systems because they too have tasted the grand spirit of Open Source Software. They are doing it because they're broke and can't afford MS. That isn't a bad reason, but it is a BUSINESS decision, irrespective of underlying technology. Honestly, they probably also resent US companies anyway and like using "Mexican" software. If MS is seen as typical of US business, I'd resent it too. If I was Mexican I'd take pride in Miguel, and if I was Finnish I would take pride in Linus. Nationalism counts for something, no?

    If I were in school right now, I know I'd prefer Linux over Windows, but I am hardly typical. Of course even when I WAS in school, we learned general programming principles, not how to use DOS. Why? Because I was in CS courses, not business courses and because I had a good teacher.

    Again I state: the teacher makes the difference.

    --Lenny
  • Hallelujah! There's too goddamned many GAP stores around. I'm glad they're deciding to close it.


    --
  • I understand that IT professionals working in Mexico can make really decent money.

    And if you worked there you'd never have to miss an episode of Sabado Gigante!



    --
  • Do I need more coffee or did this article say
    that GNOME will be released on Wednesday?
    As in "1.0"???
  • of KDE (which I like), you have to respect Miguel. You can tell where the other GNOME developers live by looking at the hours of their posts to the mailing list and their commits to CVS.

    As far as anyone can tell from this evidence, Miguel doesn't ever sleep.

  • cool (Score:1)

    by nadador ( 3747 )
    As far as mainstream articles go, this one is a pretty level headed, and seemingly well-informed for the mainstream.

    This is a pretty cool deal. But I've got one problem. As much as I can tolerate different pronunciations of daemon, FAQ, Linux, etc., I will never be able to say "guh-nome" like the article says it should be pronounced. I know it might be right, but I can never bring myself to do it.


    Andrew Gardner
  • Couldnt say it better myself
  • ...here in Linux's Own Country it's just as bad. Wherever you go, windows flying in your face.

    One colleague, a highly competent professional scientist, even managed to give me an MS Word file where the section headers had been written using "finger paint" -- write section number, press space bar, type header text, paint header with mouse and make it bold. All in "normal" style, of course.

    Yuck.
  • i could swear that i read that article a long time ago, just that this time the only thing that seemed different was the recent announcement. other than that, it read almost word for word of a previous article.
  • I know several families whose kids (and they are bright kids) do nothing but hang out on IRC and play starcraft ... they're wizards at it. However, they don't even know how to shut the win95 machine off - they just power it off. They don't even know how to copy files from one directory to another. Truly the US is a nation of utter morons.
  • Maybe your view of the world is warped.

    Have you ever considered that?

  • Hmmm (Score:1)

    by Booker ( 6173 )
    As much as I love Gnome (I've been playing with it since 0.1x) I really wonder if it's ready for release. I think it's close, and getting better all the time. But there are still some freaky things on my box (maybe it's just my setup).

    Things like "Help" buttons which have no effect make me wish that they'd wait just a little longer to release this thing. The session management is generally cool, but it hasn't been working for me 100%. For example, gnome-session seems to freak out when I try to change window managers. Anyone know the correct way to do this?

    Hopefully I've just got accumulated cruft that's messing up my install - have others had better success?

    Don't get me wrong - I think Gnome rocks, and I think the development team has done a wonderful job. I just wonder if a formal 1.0 release is a few weeks premature.

    And one other small beef - I don't like the way gnome-session defaults to enlightenment, and the way the gnome pager suggests that you use enlightenment... smacks just a bit of IE4 "bundling" to me :-)
  • OSS is indeed a MS acronym. For OLE Structured Storage. Those "magic" folders like printers and dial-up networking and control panels are OSS.
  • I ask for Halflife, I get told to run Quake or xbill. I ask for photoshop I get told to use gimp. The apps aren't there.
  • That it is. But a 'vette is no ferarri.
    Actually, I lie, I don't really need photoshop, but could use some decent DTP software. xfig don't cut it, and gimp isn't quite right for the purpose...
  • Which were ignored by the mainstream press since, well, Halloween...


  • GNOME (pronounced guh-NOME),

    Damn, I didn't know that

    But Red Hat is prounounced REED-hawt, right? ;)

    W
  • So whats taking Microsoft so long to die?

    --
    Paranoid
  • Sunday afternoon I saw all the Gnome 1.0 rpms sitting in RawHide at ftp.sunet.se
  • Are we seeing a computer revolution in Mexico, they appear to have big plans for linux..

    Revoulition (from www.dictionary.com)
    6. A total or radical change; as, a revolution in one's circumstances or way of living.
  • It's interesting the way that the press is treating the way that Linux is growing.

    But, from what I see, the most important thing is that institutions from all the countries that have thier important data in computers, and are connected to a network, whether it is local or not, should take really good care of the OS which they are working with.

    Those institutions, shouln't use propietary software, which is something that they can't control. As an example, should Iran or Libia, or even Israel use NT for their military pourposes, knowing that the US goverment wont let Microsoft use anything they could't crack. What about banks all over the world, if needed, the US goverment or even a Microsoft engineer could get to know confidential data at any moment.

    Would you give a copy of key that keep all your data to Mr. Gates?

    Even more, what about propietary formants?.
    Should an institution make you own propietary software to access to some public domain data.
    As an (real) example, let's imagine that the bases for some institutional job are only accesible through the internet, and they're in the famous, but not free, '.doc' format, should I own the Microsoft Word 97 to be able to get the job?. Why is that job avaliable only for people that have bought it?. Why not LaTeX?

    Security!!!. It's funny how many people are willing and ready to take a WORD document from someone else who they do not know and open it without checking it B4, without even thinking that it can contain a macro virus. All their work could dissapear in few minutes, and it's possible that all the documents of the company could vanish in few hours. The whole office suite is a whole danger for your data.

    What Do I want to say?

    All that institutions in every 'computerized' country, SHOULD use open source software and open formats. For their own security they should never trust software from which the do not have the source code.

    That's where GNOME and Linux can do their job.
  • So, Mexico is going to put Linux in its schools, while I suspect U.S. schools are likely to continue teaching Windows. So, Mexican students will be learning general principles of how computers work (which can be applied to GUI-based systems as well as the command line). U.S. students are likely to be learning how to use specialized applications, using specific commands and procedures which may not apply to other programs, or even future versions of the same application. I'm looking forward to seeing how the next generations of students turn out.
  • This is one of the most unique mainstream articles I've ever seen. They even put RMS's name before Linus's! And RMS is a "programming genius" while Linus is a "Finnish programmer". How unusual!
  • Um, calm down. The article is mostly about Miguel de Icaza, who isn't from America at all (in fact, he was barred from it). And another thing, the article was written BY A MEXICAN! I'm sure you have justification for your axe-grinding with the American people (feel free to yell at me next time you're over), but this isn't the time.
  • IceWM is good looking and functional, and it supports themes ;) I never thought WindowMaker was remotely functional. I ran afterstep for a while, when the 1.0 versions were out, and i customized it nicely and i liked it. It's become progressively more WindowMaker-wanna-be. Blackbox has potential. Enlightenment doesn't much like my P100 with 32MB RAM either ;p
  • I saw the same information in the SV life section of the SJ Mercury news yesterday, I considered sending a note to Rob about it, but figured it'd already been mentioned here, and I'd just missed it.... guess I was wrong
  • The reporter spun it a slightly different way, in a manner that makes sense given their readership (an area with pretty strong Mexian community) emphasizing the advantage that those who have money against those who don't is seriously reduced by Open Source. M$ and the SPA are constantly whining about the "billions" they are loosing in Eastern Europe, Asia, and South America. Wouldn't it be sweet if their problem was "solved" by the people there preferring to clone Linux+Gnone CDs instead of Windows & Office CDs.
  • I'm all for OSS. I hope it takes over the whole world. But are there really enough applications to make it feasible? People won't even buy macs because they think there's not enough software, and macs have a ton of software compared to linux/gnome. Other than applixware and personal internet stuff, what can you do with linux?
    (here come the flames....)
  • 2004. The newspapers are talking about the collapse of the Linux dream that happened at the end of 2002. "It began in 2000. Following the wild success of the first Commercial applications, and the influx of Linux into the business, the community soon became fractured as the dreams of OSS faded away into the 'real world.' Insiders said it was like the death of the Haight-Ashebury following exposure by the media after 1967."

    Human nature, people. Human nature.
    Dreams die.

    -sts-
  • No copyright? BUZZZ!! Wrong...GPL is a copyright, it just gives you the rights! :)
  • I think that most people should understand the concept of license, don't you think? How about:

    "In open-source software, the license on the underlying command codes allow all to see and improve on them."

    Sound good?
  • to read when i woke up and got my paper this morning.
    but i'm somewhat concerned about this "1.0" because last time i tried to compile ORBIT, it wouldn't work... that was just a few days ago. :/

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