Date: Sun, 16 Dec 2001 21:13:14 +0100 From: "Anthony Atkielski" <anthony@freebie.atkielski.com> To: "f.johan.beisser" <jan@caustic.org> Cc: "FreeBSD Chat" <chat@FreeBSD.ORG> Subject: Re: UNIX on the Desktop (was: Re: Why no Indians and Arabs?) Message-ID: <002f01c1866e$1e4d9510$0a00000a@atkielski.com> References: <20011216112759.U16958-100000@localhost>
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f.johan writes: > i'm curious, why would you say it doesn't work well? It is a less appropriate choice than Windows or the Mac, for several reasons, including: 1. Windows and the Mac OS were both designed specifically for a windowed, desktop environment; UNIX was not. 2. Windows and the Mac are single-user, dedicated desktop operating systems; UNIX is a multiuser timesharing system. 3. The native user interface of Windows/Mac is a GUI; the native interface of UNIX is a simple text display. THe former is better suited to desktop environments (friendly, attractive, ergonomic); the latter is better suited to servers (inexpensive, efficient, fast). 4. The number of useful desktop applications for Windows and the Mac exceed the number of such applications available for UNIX by several orders of magnitude. 5. Windows/Mac have virtually no security, but considerable flexibility for things like games (the two being inversely correlated); UNIX has much better security, but is less friendly to insecure applications like games. Desktop enviroments favor flexibility over security. 6. Since most of the world is running Windows (or the Mac) on its desktops, compatibility concerns strongly favor this operating system for new installations. 7. Users are more likely to already be familiar with Windows (or the Mac) than with UNIX, even in GUI incarnations of the latter. I'm sure other reasons exist as well, these are just the first ones that come to mind. Many of the reasons that favor Windows and the Mac on the desktop also favor UNIX in the server domain. Assets become liabilities when moving from desktop to server, and vice versa. It isn't really possible to have an operating system that handles both environments optimally, and UNIX shines strongly for servers, whereas Windows shines strongly for desktops. Unfortunately, many recent converts to UNIX (especially the most primitive of UNIX systems, Linux) seem not to consider any type of use of computers important outside the desktop, and so they believe that any suggestion that UNIX might not be the best desktop operating system is some sort of death blow to the OS. Nothing could be further from the truth, of course, as UNIX works very well on servers, and servers are just as important as desktops. UNIX can even be made to run on mainframes, and, while that isn't necessarily a good idea, if one must choose, better to have UNIX on the mainframe than Windows. To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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