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The destructive desktop — Linux in trouble?

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Re: The destructive desktop — Linux in trouble?

#51

Post by etomer »

hp wrote: post #39

This article is not well-informed. I worked on or sat next to people who worked on a lot of the stuff mentioned. So you can take me as biased or as having a clue or both as you wish. A general point, the changes described here have been over the course of something like 15 years. So the article seems to be making a "stuff keeps changing!" point... but we are talking about over 15 years. Think about changes to hardwar…

"And if you wonder how you were supposed to install these packages without network access: by periodically calling ifconfig and ip route add until you finally managed to fetch all the data before NetworkManager would mess it up again."

Doesn't make any sense either, NetworkManager is a service that can be stopped like any other one.

Re: The destructive desktop — Linux in trouble?

#52

Post by loftsy »

Danieru wrote: post #50
fsniper wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if I could downvote. Linux is always about choice. If you have enough information and time you can choose what ever software stack you want with it. You can even change any configuration software that comes with your distribution with any tool you want. Also author does not rant about building a self owned distribution. The rant can even be considered good if you do think Linux is only about graphical desktop applica…

OP is referring to this: https://www.redhat.com/archives/rhl-devel-list/2008-January/...

Yes I was but I couldn't find it. Thanks for the reference :)

Re: The destructive desktop — Linux in trouble?

#53

Post by sciurus »

tankenmate wrote: post #49
sagarun wrote: post #5

This is factually wrong: Then you try to figure out how to configure NetworkManager from the command line. There's no tool in the entire distribution which lets you do that nmcli lets you configure network manager through command line http://manpages.ubuntu.com/manpages/maverick/man1/nmcli.1.ht...

Not on any current Ubuntu LTS (we are talking primarily about servers here).

You still don't need to configure NetworkManager to get a network connection. You can use the old methods (/etc/network/interfaces or /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts) instead.

Re: The destructive desktop — Linux in trouble?

#54

Post by nknight »

FooBarWidget wrote: post #10
asto wrote: post #4

I've never done any systems programming on Linux (or any other OS for that matter) so I can't comment on most of the article but I HAVE configured a network on a Fedora box on many occasions and it's simpler than the author's making it out to be. On my fedora computer, I can just run system-config-network from the terminal and have a GUI pop up where I can configure network devices and DNS addresses with no need for…

I suspect that the author is used to the old interface, involving manually writing shell scripts that call ifconfig and friends. And now he's pissed off because he can't do that anymore and concludes that the system must suck, or that his "freedom" is in jeopardy because his old way is no longer supported. Well I see things differently. Users should be free from interference from ancient and non-user-friendly cruft.…

Operating systems with much more reliable and user-friendly network configuration interfaces (Windows and Mac) continue to permit advanced users to fiddle with their settings on the command line without actively impeding them.

Desktop Linux has gone from assuming users are developers to assuming users are morons who must be protected from themselves. This, and some other imbalances (such as surrendering good sense to a deified few designers) brought on by attempting to imitate the established "friendly" systems without actually understanding them is at the root of the continued failure to gain serious traction.

Re: The destructive desktop — Linux in trouble?

#55

Post by [deleted] »

fsniper wrote: post #30
loftsy wrote: post #13

tl;dr - Author tries to patch together his/her own distribution; and fails. To provide a good user experience you need to know if the network is up or down; and when it changes. UNIX does not provide this. This is why NetworkManger is now part of the "Linux Platform". The biggest myth in open source: "Linux is about choice".

if I could downvote. Linux is always about choice. If you have enough information and time you can choose what ever software stack you want with it. You can even change any configuration software that comes with your distribution with any tool you want. Also author does not rant about building a self owned distribution. The rant can even be considered good if you do think Linux is only about graphical desktop applica…

[deleted]

Re: The destructive desktop — Linux in trouble?

#57

Post by hollerith »

nailer wrote: post #27

It's 2012. Who cares? I think Linux on the desktop hit its peak in the early 2000s, when 'Windows, Mac and Linux' was in people's minds, we had Linux companies like Loki and Transgaming etc, commercial games from Epic and ID, proper UX-focused companies like Eazel and Ximian, etc. I think most people have given up, but that's OK: Linux on the desktop, back then, still made a huge difference to today. GNOME had GTKHTM…

Some of us like Linux on our desktops (and laptops) and do not use web apps for anything intensive.

The only web app I make intensive use of is Google Reader, and I plan to move away from it. I am glad that so many programmers and startups can make a living on a platform (the web) that is not controlled by any gatekeeper, but I would be sad if I were forced to move to something like Chrome OS.

Yes, only about 1% of users of desktops and laptops run Linux, but that situation is probably sustainable given how knowledgeable and resourceful that 1% is.

If you do not want to see discussion among that 1%, maybe you could just avoid articles like this?

Re: The destructive desktop — Linux in trouble?

#58

Post by randallsquared »

darklajid wrote: post #26
repsilat wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or they could link statically. They're both under the LGPL, and it seems like the sensible thing to do if they're only using the library for hash tables...

Didn't downvote you, but .. How? The project authors certainly don't care about people with 'special' requirements. For them it just saves time. Now the packagers _could_ do what you suggest, but especially for such a central library it doesn't make sense. You want to have only one version of that thing for a gazillion reasons. The original request for this thread? Well, it seems that person wanted to port a library…

The project authors certainly don't care about people with 'special' requirements.

The source of all these problems in a nutshell. No one has a reason to polish the UX for a case that never happens to them.

Re: The destructive desktop — Linux in trouble?

#59

Post by xxiao »

i must say something for this topic. i fully agree with the author, that linux is becoming a mess these days when you need customize it, e.g for embedded systems or headless servers. and the first thing I _always_ do is to remove network-manager, that's an ass-hole app!
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