Date: Wed, 30 May 2001 03:43:36 -0700 From: Terry Lambert <tlambert2@mindspring.com> To: Stuart Krivis <ipswitch@apk.net> Cc: FreeBSD Advocacy <advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: ExBSD Message-ID: <3B14CED8.3CE0D7FB@mindspring.com> References: <014301c0e249$debd93f0$0300a8c0@oracle> <4.3.2.7.2.20010523093020.017d3fb8@mail.threespace.com> <8072844.990964800@[192.168.1.60]>
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Stuart Krivis wrote: > > My opinion/experience is that Windows is much easier to > > use than UNIX for most desktop tasks, and things like > > the "Internet Connection Sharing Wizard" make setting > > up DHCP servers much easier than editing routing tables > > and config files in /etc. I don't think Windows offers > > as much > > Most of Windows networking is badly broken. > > Ease of use? Windows isn't easy to use. What you are > seeing is the large number of people who already have > some small amount of experience with some flavor of > Windows, so they have a head start. FWIW, and not to defend it unduly, but he has a point. The primary business expense with desktop systems is that the initial training costs are around $2,500 per seat (1999 figures from HCI studies). The thing that makes Widows valuable is that it has a common look and feel -- so the time you spent learning to run one control panel applet is immediately applicable and transferrable over to the other control panel applets and the training you spent learning Word transfers over to Excel and other applications. And this is why the training per seat is "only" $2,500. Comparatively, UNIX is a real mess, even if every application you use is a Motif application, and every programmer religiously followed the Motif Style Guide, there is still a lot of room for variance, where the user experience for Windows is significantly more controlled. Even in the face of "desktop themes" (the worst idea, from a support perspective, ever to make it into release, with DHCP following a real close second), Windows is more usable for the average user. To top everything off... employers don't have to pay the $2,500 per seat training fee, since any temporary worker they hire from any agency will have some kind of Windows training, if they are able to operate a computer at all. Maybe it not "fair" that Windows has this advantage: but there is an easy answer: enforce the Windows Style Guide, and the use of particular windows managers (e.g. fvwm95, as an obvious choice) and particular widget sets in new UNIX programs. Doing that would mean that all that prepaid training would be immediately transferrable to UNIX, as well. > Do you actually have any proof that Windows is easier to > use or easier on the eyes? I didn't think so. It's certainly easier for the average user to use a new and unfamiliar program the first time. It's called a shallow learning curve. Whether you personally value that or not, employers do, and employers pay the bills; UNIX will _never_ make significant inroads into the office desktop market until it addresses the training and learning curve cost issues. > Prevailing on the desktop? Most people don't have much > choice. They didn't evaluate all the options and decide > that Windows is best for them. Actually, they did. They just used the yardstick of cost. > Application availability? How many spreadsheets do I need? Only one: the one your temp agency person knows how to run. > How many of the large number of Windows apps actually > differ from each other in significant ways? That's a benefit, not a negative. It means zero training costs. > How much time is wasted because you must reboot constantly > when you're installing or removing a Windows app? That's what IT people are for, and you only need one or two of them. You can get by on one part time person, if you agree to standardize everything for all your employees so that the IT person doesn't have to deal with oddball configurations. > It makes evaluating apps a real chore. That's what IT people are for: to have evaluated these things on their last jobs, so you can just pay them to tell you the answers they know. You are paying for what is stored between their ears. And Windows is getting better, slowly. Microsoft wrote the RFC on IPv4 stateless autoconfiguration. It's almost to the peoint where you can plug your network together and have everything "just work"; SLPv2 will take care of that, and if the Microsoft "standard" wins, then UPnP will do it instead. The progress just seems glacial when compared to having the source code available for hacking to fix something you find annoying, but which no one else could care less about. -- Terry To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message
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