Date: Fri, 13 Apr 2001 18:45:25 -0700 From: Rob <europax@home.com> To: Terry Lambert <tlambert@primenet.com> Cc: Rahul Siddharthan <rsidd@physics.iisc.ernet.in>, Kris Kirby <kris@catonic.net>, Brett Glass <brett@lariat.org>, Chip Wiegand <chip@wiegand.org>, FreeBSD Chat <chat@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: Just an observation - MUA's seen in the lists Message-ID: <3AD7ABB5.39FBC405@home.com> References: <200104140000.RAA20921@usr02.primenet.com>
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Terry Lambert wrote: > > > > o FreeBSD steadfastly refuses to choose a > > > single official GUI and toolkit (this is > > > one of the reasons Microsoft states they > > > have not ported Office to Linux) > > > > When did Microsoft say that was a reason? > > In an interview with Dave something or other, VP over Office > and similar products, in an article on Slashdot. He said > that that was _one_ of the reasons. Another reason he gave > is the Linux communities hatred of everything Microsoft. > FreeBSD doesn't have that handicap (Knee-jerk Kamikaze > Fanatics Against Microsoft). > > > And do you honestly think they would port it to FreeBSD if "lobbied" > > to do so? > > No. For the other reasons stated. They might, if FreeBSD made > their ABI run everywhere, like Linux seems intent on doing, since > it would immediately buy the UnixWare, SCO OpenServer, Solaris, > and other x86 UNIX systems (maybe even Linux) as potential > customers. > > > > o FreeBSD does not have a standard install > > > software system that is as sophisticated as > > > InstallShield, for use by commercial > > > software installation > > > > It seems to me that all a company needs to do is supply their own > > install and uninstall programs, which are graphical front-ends to > > the pkg_add and pkg_delete commands. One click, pkg_add; another > > click, pkg_delete. > > No. To be as kind as possible, pkg_add is a piece of shit. > > > > o FreeBSD does not have a standard method of > > > installing and uninstalling startup and > > > shutdown procedures for third party layered > > > software that would allow such software to > > > replace FreeBSD default components (e.g to > > > replace Sendmail with MS Exchange for FreeBSD). > > > > The thing to do would be to have separate startup scripts in > > /usr/local/etc/rc.d or whatever for exchange, and ask the user to say > > sendmail_enable="NO" in /etc/rc.conf (any competent sysad should know > > to do that, surely?) > > No. That is not to the level of ease of use which they require > of a product which has tehir name on it. Read their guidelines > on the Microsoft Developer web site, some time. > > > Besides, I don't think one should encourage them to port MS Exchange > > for FreeBSD. (Or MS Office, either, actually. Unless it switches > > to some open XML-based document format, as I read somewhere they're > > planning to do.) > > Yeah, and while you are discouraging them from doing that, > people are buying Windows for their desktops because of the > average estimated $2,500 per seat that a company spends to > train their employees not being portable to FreeBSD because > the applications on FreeBSD don't follow the Windows style > guidelines, and it's impossible to hire a temp worker who is > already trained on the FreeBSD specific applications, but it's > easy to hire someone trained on Office to fill in for a day > down in your finance department. > > It's about money, which is what the people who don't pay money > for their software can't seem to understand, and why they aren't > making any significant inroads into The Real World(tm). Cost is > not measured in software costs: that's the least of it, or people > would balk at paying Microsoft's rates. As a starving college > student, you might like free software and balk at the cost, but > as a starving college student, your cost for Microsoft products > is "a lot of money", while your time is practically worthless, so > 80 hours spent learning TeX costs you less, overall, than buying > the product would. But now try to get a temp job doing TeX to > make some extra money. > > > > o FreeBSD management and operation is far from user > > > friendly; thus a Microsoft product would be as hard > > > to manage as any other package, well below Microsoft's > > > usability standards: > > > > > > o Fixing this requires a "regitry" style system > > > > /var/db/pkg? All one needs is a GUI tool to use it. Surely Microsoft > > would be willing to write that if they thought it was a big issue. > > No. A centralized configuration data store, so that (as an > example) one MS product which knows about the innards of another > can get information about it from a central place, through a > single API. > > > > o FreeBSD's developement environment is nowhere near as > > > usable for shallow programmers of desktop software as, > > > for example, Visual BASIC or Visual C++. > > > > kdevelop? > > Is that the Visual C++ equivalent for FreeBSD, widely hailed by > FreeBSD application developers as such, so that it now costs > next to nothing to hire kids right out of colledge to use it, > without having to spend money to train them on it? > > > > Really, FreeBSD is unsuitable for use as an MUA supporting > > > desktop machine, unless your users are much more sophisticated > > > than average. > > > > I disagree. > > Of course you disagree. You are a geek, not a secretary or a > stock broker. > > > The reason most users use windows is that they get it > > pre-installed; they don't find it any easier to fix if they have a > > problem. > > Sure they do: > > 1) Call help desk > 2) Help desk reinstalls machine or brings you a replacement > 3) Go back to using the computer as a tool, instead of as > an ends in itself (like some geek) > > > I have installed linux (around 2 years ago, when the GUI's were > > much less polished) for people having trouble with their > > windows machines, and they're continuing to use that linux > > installation to this day. > > They probably get pissed when they get a PowerPoint presentation, > Excell spreadsheet, or Word document as an email atttachment. Or > you installed the entire shop that way, and they are a small closed > shop that doesn't often communicate with other businesses in The > Real World(tm) > > > Netscape for email and web browsing, > > Staroffice for basic word processing, KDE 1.0 desktop, and they're > > quite happy. Today, I'd go for FreeBSD with KDE 2.x; I agree that > > I couldn't ask them to install it themselves, but if I did it for > > them, I'm quite sure they'll be happy with the end results. > > Until they had to do business with someone other than themselves. > > If I'm buying an $16M package of sub-prime credit loans at a > rediscounted rate form Credit Suisse-First Boston, you can be > damn sure that the data they send to me is going to be in the > form of an Excell spreadsheet. > > If you do business with _anyone_ else using your computers, you > _can't_ live with a closed shop system. That's jus the way > business is. > > Terry Lambert > terry@lambert.org > --- > Any opinions in this posting are my own and not those of my present > or previous employers. > > To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org > with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message I started to enjoy MS products more when I realized that I could script them with PythonWin using the Microsoft COM. Its fun to use Excel as the GUI for a data gathering application. Sure to amaze the co-workers. Rob. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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