Date: Sat, 12 Jul 1997 19:07:27 +1000 (EST) From: Andrew Perry <andrew@python.shoal.net.au> To: jonahkuo@mail.ttn.com.tw Cc: chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: My opinion about freebsd (fwd) Message-ID: <Pine.BSI.3.95.970712182115.12340G-100000@python.shoal.net.au> In-Reply-To: <Pine.BSF.3.96.970711092112.366G-100000@fallout.campusview.indiana.edu>
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> > about freebsd. Is it only a hacker's workbench? Can only the > > unix gurus can play freebsd well? Does every freebsd user have > > to learn C language? Is the threshold too high to common > > freebsd user? We all have to admit, basically, if one wants to > > join the freebsd community, he(or her) must know what the irq, > > io port, primary, seconary, jumpers are...and so on. Here's my view to anyone who is interested :-) Until last year I was a died in the wool M$ supporter. Whenever we had to install non M$ software we whinged and complained about people not adhering to the standards etc... and we didn't know any better, the only other operating system I've had to deal with is VMS, which is certainly a lot more powerful than windows :-) but it is not the flavour of the moment. I certainly can't imagine having FreeBSD on every desk at my work, I mean, I have had calls from people who type s p a c e instead of pressing the space-bar, and one person who refused to identify herself (it could have just as easily been a male) who's mouse pointer moved the wrong way, she was holding the thing upside down. I think of FreeBSD (and probably Linux although I haven't tried it) as operating systems for the elite, those among us who have enough computer something-or-other to do something different, I can't program in C (although I've started to learn) and am certainly no "unix guru" having only about 12-18 months experience, but I've managed to setup a few FreeBSD boxes, including one which is used as a proxy server. Besides I like to side with the "underdog" and despite limited budget and being supported so much by volunteers (or should I say because of it's support by dedicated experts) it holds a niche in the market that few can challenge. I mean, for a while we were restarting 3 out of 4 NT servers _every_ morning as they would hang during the night, our proxy... lets not start not start complaining about broken microsoft promises, I think they're just like politicians :-) Perseverance is the key and asking on -questions :-) Don't ask on the irc channel, I got kick-banned because my name was andrew and I asked some stupid newbie questions, the only way I got back on to the channel was because they ban so many people they have to purge the banned list to ban new people. It wasn't worth getting back on, ask on questions, if Doug White can't help you he can at least ask the questions which will point you in the right direction, and there's a lot of other dedicated people on there as well. > > Here is one pessimistic view... > > Occasional cases of altruism aside, the motivation for > contributing virtual sweat to a project such as FreeBSD is self > interest. People who (a) find FreeBSD useful for their own > purposes, (b) are programmers/hackers to the degree that they can > (c) implement enhancements to make FreeBSD *more* useful for > their own purposes are the primairy contributers to the cause. > > In usability engineering, a premire guiding principle is to make > a clear and conscious distinction between you, the developer, and > the user. Every design decision that would be visible to the > user must be driven by a clear understanding of the users and > their tasks. The developer's ideas of what makes sense should > only be considered when it can be shown that it also makes sense > to the target user. > > To (over)generalize, FreeBSD is developed by hackers for their > own purposes. In effect, the developers the target audience. It > is still possible to separate your own, possibly > non-represntative, intuitions about good design from those > scientifically grounded in task analysis and usability testing. > In practice, I really doubt this ever happens. To the degree that > the devolper is representative of the FreeBSD users, this isn't a > catastrophe, but it is suboptimal. There are plenty of truly > abysmal pieces of unix software that stand as a testament to > this. > > Of course, it is possible that a volunteer project could produce > quality software with a high high degree usability by > non-programmers. However, given the incentive system that drives > these volunteer software projects, I believe such cases will > always be rare exceptions, not the rule. I believe that this is one of those rare cases, and so do you:-) > > -john > > FreeBSD - puts you in the drivers seat! I like it, hope I haven't accidently stolen it! sorry for waxing lyrical again :-) Andrew Perry andrew@shoal.net.au
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