Amiga.org
Amiga computer related discussion => Amiga Hardware Issues and discussion => Topic started by: pixie on June 30, 2004, 04:19:59 PM
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I've installed Linux and a FreeBSD and from an user POV they are severly lacking in UI issues, badly!!! If not because some good programs namely for Internet and AmigaOS surelly kicks both of their arses!
More the problems I had with them, I still can't put my xp partition to boot.
I know that Linux is user friendly et all, it only is picky with its friends, but friends like this I want nothin at all, vive l'AROS, vive MorphOS vive l'AmigaOS, cos they still kick some arses (major ones icluded)!!
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pixie wrote:
I know that Linux is user friendly et all
It is!? :-?
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As in, neither Linux or FreeBSD have a UI (other than a command line)? :-)
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use another distro. I have Red Hat on my laptop. multiboot easy.
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They're just kernels, sarge
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they have but they (gnome kde) suck badly at it and as for installation, yeck!
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I don't think AmigaOS is much more user friendly than Linux to someone who has never used it before.
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linux community usually says about its user friendlyness:
'Linux is user friendly... It's just picky when choosing it's friends'
I can't say they're wrong but... I don't have to be his either! :-P
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Maybe I had bad luck on installation, but an OS shouldn't be so bloated... heck! I had about the same time or more then installing XP!
but my grief is on graphical interface
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au contraire... Windows borrows many things from AmigaOS or use the same patterns of usage, wherever... the linux isn't and isn't exactly great on the new things...
MUI has much more configurability then any of those (I was rather intriged with enlightment but couldn't set it to use...)
On Amiga you install (or at least on pre 3.1) graphically, whereas here you dont' (well neither the XP but we all know how good microsoft is)
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Hmm. Maybe you would like this:
http://www.lysator.liu.se/~marcus/amiwm.html
Hasn't been updated since '98, but Debian (at least) maintains a current package. I tried it once but I rather prefer Windowmaker.
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Failure
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fx wrote:
I don't think AmigaOS is much more user friendly than Linux to someone who has never used it before.
You're kidding?
I got my first Amiga in '99 and it was incredibly straightforward.
I was using it fine in a matter of minutes.
Linux took months of headaches, and I just gave up.
Sure, I could learn it all by "reading the {bleep}ing manual" and so on, but I dont want to read a manual for ages to learn how to do something as simple as use an operating system.
Operating systems should be simple, after all its just something for you to run programs on.
Anyone who thinks differently needs hitting over the head with a unix manual, because they are just limiting the amount of people who can use computers, or indeed be bothered to use computers.
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AmigaOS has always been incredibly straight-forward in my opinion, though it may be a complete PITA for users of higher-end Amigas that have had more hardware hacks than original hardware left in them :-)
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Man, Linux sucks big time.
I use Mandrake 9.2. The gui is dog slow on my Pentium II 350 + 128 mb mem + ATI Radeon 9200! Okay, it doesn't recognise my video card but surely, on standard vesa 1024*768 mode, it should run fine, shouldn't it?
I mean, win 3.11 works flawlessly at a resolution of 640*480 on my 386 laptop!
and btw. AmigaOS is way much more user friendly than Linux.
I firstly used MSDOS, so I am not biased.
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So whats wrong with Kde ? I think its kewl.. And apparently, so does my brother in law. He's just spent over £1200 on pc "Bitz" (Athlon 64 Msi mobo etc) and wants ME to install Debian on his new 200gb drive. Along with Win2Kpro (he's dumping XP)
He was VERY impressed with the debian distro thats running on my A1
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Linux (now) isn't as complicated as people make it out to be. I'd expect any expert AmigaOS user to be able to function properly in a Linux environment. Mac and Windows users that aren't familliar with editing configuration and startup files, or using the CLI might be a little lost.
One thing to note though is Linux isn't some magic operating system that makes obsolete hardware new again. It is possible to get decent hardware running with a modern distribution like Mandrake 9.2. Just stop all of the unneccessary daemons and turn off the graphical enhancements (eye candy) and it'll run fine.
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pixie wrote:
I've installed Linux and a FreeBSD and from an user POV they are severly lacking in UI issues, badly!!! If not because some good programs namely for Internet and AmigaOS surelly kicks both of their arses!
Mi thowts on Lyenux, to. It mo blowtid than those ol winders. That ther purple hat ain't no betr. Mi winders bootn 1 horse lap round barels. Lyenux taken four o five laps ezy. Mi calf dun roped five tymes by tyme Lyenux dun bootn, to. Mi ol a1200 bootn fastr thn ropin and lapin both. That ther new Amiga gewie simpl. Fastest in texas it shur thang. Fastr than dropins too, if yu get what im sayin.
--cowboy tauk- from texas - ain't no pixiez here, partnr.
:-)
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I don't think, give some limitations of course, poeple that like computers should be that conserned about user friendliness. They should be more concerned about the effectiveness, responsiveness, multitasking and that kind of stuff...
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Everytime I see linux I believe more on Amiga..
Portugal goooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!!
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I don't think, give some limitations of course, poeple that like computers should be that conserned about user friendliness. They should be more concerned about the effectiveness, responsiveness, multitasking and that kind of stuff...
And how many people are we talkin about, 5%, 10%? The Joe User wants the things done, and easely and AmigaOS provides that...
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And how many people are we talkin about, 5%, 10%? The Joe User wants the things done, and easely and AmigaOS provides that...
Actually, it's Windows, Mac, and Linux that provide what Joe User wants to get things done. Especially when the things he wants to get done includes on-line banking, typing documents for work, etc... It's the application support that is key to an OS, and right now, it's Windows, Mac, Linux. In that order. :-(
Lack of a modern browser and office suite kills AmigaOS before it has a chance.
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pixie wrote:
Maybe I had bad luck on installation, but an OS shouldn't be so bloated... heck! I had about the same time or more then installing XP!
but my grief is on graphical interface
Your grief is on the graphical interface. So far I've seen lots of steam venting, but very little actual problems. So what are they?
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One thing to note though is Linux isn't some magic operating system that makes obsolete hardware new again. It is possible to get decent hardware running with a modern distribution like Mandrake 9.2. Just stop all of the unneccessary daemons and turn off the graphical enhancements (eye candy) and it'll run fine.
Yes... This isn't stated enough. Lots of times the argument is used the Linux extends the useful life of hardware, etc. What isn't mentioned is that you can't expect the latest features to run on that older hardware.
For the most part, if you stack up, feature for feature, a Linux build against a Windows build, the Windows build will run faster. The thing is, Linux can be trimmed down and lightened. But, you do have to be a more advanced user to know and realize what you do and don't need to have a useful system.
This makes the learning curve for starting on low-end hardware even harder. Not only do you have to learn Linux, you have to try to learn it from a build that may be either too large or too small for your situation.
The larger distros (Mandrake, Linspire, Fedora) are very easy to learn and use. These have graphic installers and package managers that are quite a bit better than found in Windows. But these distros need horsepower. And lots of it.
The smaller distros (and the BSDs and whatnot) are much more difficult, if you're new to them. But they can run faster, because they are a little trimmed back... So they don't need quite as big a system... It's all a trade-off.... And finding the sweet spot is tough.
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Uhm. IIRC, Slackware has shorter install time than XP. And it runs less services than standard RH or Mandrake. If you dislike big and bloated GUIs, try FVWM. It is small and quite fast. There are ready to use perl scripts to make it act close to few other WM or even OSes.
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trochej
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I don't think AmigaOS is much more user friendly than Linux to someone who has never used it before.
Compared to a modern computer, no. Compared to a 15-year-old UNIX system... oh, man. :-)
Maybe I had bad luck on installation, but an OS shouldn't be so bloated... heck! I had about the same time or more then installing XP! but my grief is on graphical interface
It's the lack of standards and coordination that's the problem. Linux is very widely standardized, but the UIs that people build on it are so fragmented, it's horrific. Try installing Debian, then Mandrake. HUGE difference, but it's basicly still the same OS (Linux and GNU).
Linux people just can't agree on a standard way of doing things, and they don't want to, either. The whole idea of free software is doing whatever the hell you want... or almost.
au contraire... Windows borrows many things from AmigaOS or use the same patterns of usage, wherever... the linux isn't and isn't exactly great on the new things...
I see very little AmigaOS in Windows. Apple had a lot more respect for the Commodore Amiga than MS did.
Sure, I could learn it all by "reading the {bleep}ing manual" and so on, but I dont want to read a manual for ages to learn how to do something as simple as use an operating system.
The best part is when they write the documentation in HTML and don't tell you how to start a text browser from the shell prompt on the emergency boot disk. I always have to read Linux documentation on my Windows computer. :)
I always wondered how you're supposed to install Linux from tarballs right off the Internet. FTPing from a shell is such a pain.
I use Mandrake 9.2. The gui is dog slow on my Pentium II 350 + 128 mb mem + ATI Radeon 9200!
KDE is an embarassment for Linux. It's utlra-slow, heralds visuals instead of function, and works no better than any Windows toolkit. It's a shame that GUI programmers are regarded as second-class in the programming world, but they do deserve it to a point.
One of these days I'll get around to writing my own GUI toolkit.
Mac and Windows users that aren't familliar with editing configuration and startup files, or using the CLI might be a little lost.
The thing is, most basic things can be done in the control panel, and Windows is almost guarenteed to boot into a GUI. If Linux has a problem, you'll be staring at a shell prompt with no clue where to start looking for the problem (and no web browser to log onto forums and ask questions).
Linux could really benefit from a GUI "safe mode".
I don't think, give some limitations of course, poeple that like computers should be that conserned about user friendliness. They should be more concerned about the effectiveness, responsiveness, multitasking and that kind of stuff...
You'd think the term "user-friendly" would be considered so 80's, let alone 90's. I remember when stores were telling me their "new" Windows 3.x systems were so user-friendly, and gave me funny looks when I mentioned the Amiga.
I also had a top-feed scanner that was user-friendly because it scanned automatically when you put a sheet of paper in it. The problem was, it started scanning instantly, and if you didn't put the sheet in at a perfect 90 degree angle, it would crush the paper. I would've preferred that they put a button on the scanner so I could at least tell it when the paper is set, and I'm READY for it to scan! Needless to say, I now have a flatbed. :-)
And how many people are we talkin about, 5%, 10%?
Those numbers are useless. It's said that 60% of the Internet runs on UNIX clones. According to my web stats, about 1% of my visitors use Linux, 3-4% use Mac, and 95% use Windows. I get about 8-10 gigs of traffic a month.
So far, an amazing 3 people visited my site with Amigas in the last couple years. :-)
For the most part, if you stack up, feature for feature, a Linux build against a Windows build, the Windows build will run faster.
Linux builds are so abstracted that practically anything UNIX will run. The downside is that they are damn slow and built on ancient standards, and pretty much require you to do things the UNIX way whether you want to or not.
Windows is faster than Linux overall, but speed isn't everything.
The larger distros (Mandrake, Linspire, Fedora) are very easy to learn and use. These have graphic installers and package managers that are quite a bit better than found in Windows. But these distros need horsepower. And lots of it.
I'll contest that. I've never seen a package manager in those distros that worked properly. You always have some damn dependency problem that gets in the way. Also, people overlook bugs and obscure error messages. Mandrake drives me insane with its endless barage of error messages (which just print errors and don't actually RESOLVE them), and the endless stream of bugs and glitches that really make Windows look stable by comparrison.
Linux doesn't crash, but the apps written for it are always questionable. Many Linux distros these days are getting much sloppier and focus on graphics and beating Microsoft at thier own game.
MacOS should be an example of the perfect computer. Use someone else's proven OS, and just build your own desktop. I really wish XWindows would drop dead.
There are ready to use perl scripts...
Ugh. Please don't say the "p word". Maybe what Larry Wall really wanted was to write his own shell. What's so hard about opening the Perl interpreter, rather than trying so hard to properly escape one-liners? Shells are for shell commands, not passing code to an external interpreter!
I also don't like that Perl has continuously been re-engineered to make it work like other languages. Or, maybe I'm just pissed that so many Perl books do a sucky job of teaching people how to write actual perl code. Doesn't anyone know how to use this language properly?
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Waccoon wrote:
It's the lack of standards and coordination that's the problem. Linux is very widely standardized, but the UIs that people build on it are so fragmented, it's horrific. Try installing Debian, then Mandrake. HUGE difference, but it's basicly still the same OS (Linux and GNU). Linux people just can't agree on a standard way of doing things, and they don't want to, either. The whole idea of free software is doing whatever the hell you want.
You have a very good point there. However, there are times when I fervently wish people would stop doing that (whatever the hell they want) and work towards one, or at the most two different GUI toolkits. I think I have had to install five or six on my computer just to run all the applications I require to do my job. One doesn't do this, the other one doesn't do that, and it all amounts to confusing the heck out of me, not having standard ways of copy-pasting, invoking menus, and so forth, and wasting disk space. There is a richness in being able to customise things to your own liking, but as you said, on Linux it has become a nightmare. Windows most definitely has a big advantage there.
KDE is an embarassment for Linux. It's utlra-slow, heralds visuals instead of function, and works no better than any Windows toolkit. It's a shame that GUI programmers are regarded as second-class in the programming world, but they do deserve it to a point.
Eh? I don't use KDE (nor Gnome), but this surprises me to some extent. I've always favoured KDE since it simply used what was available, and was not burdened by ideological open source arguments as is Gnome. (And as you undoubtedly know, that is Gnome's sole raison d'etre.) Can you please be a little more specific as to why KDE is slow and not very special, or point me to a site which explains things in more detail? Thanks!
One of these days I'll get around to writing my own GUI toolkit.
Please, no. And if you do, keep it for internal, private use, unless you can persuade people that your toolkit is really the best thing since sliced bread. :-)
MacOS should be an example of the perfect computer. Use someone else's proven OS, and just build your own desktop. I really wish XWindows would drop dead.
I'm not very fond of the system either. It's unique in that you're able to use a graphics system remotely, but since that requires a network connection with a fair amount of bandwidth, I am beginning to question the sanity of keeping it alive too. Perhaps that is a worthy programming project? Developing a new graphics infrastructure for Linux? Much better than writing yet another toolkit if you ask me. :-)
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Waccoon wrote:
I always wondered how you're supposed to install Linux from tarballs right off the Internet.
It's not very much fun, especially if you don't have any sort of a bootstrap kernel to get you started. But, this is how it was done in the old days. Boot up with a boot floppy (with limited kernel), then start compiling system specific stuff onto your manually preped hard drive. Much fun, I only did it once on an old ALR SMP 486 server. There were no precompiled kernels available for the architecture so I had to do my own.
KDE is an embarassment for Linux. It's utlra-slow, heralds visuals instead of function, and works no better than any Windows toolkit. It's a shame that GUI programmers are regarded as second-class in the programming world, but they do deserve it to a point.
One of these days I'll get around to writing my own GUI toolkit.
I'm going to disagree with this. KDE is a great environment and gets better with every revision. I see nothing wrong with adding some visual flare to spice up the desktop. And, since most distributions are using it as their standard, it will only get better.
The thing is, most basic things can be done in the control panel, and Windows is almost guarenteed to boot into a GUI. If Linux has a problem, you'll be staring at a shell prompt with no clue where to start looking for the problem (and no web browser to log onto forums and ask questions).
Wrong. Windows can boot to safe mode for non critical errors, but for system critical failures (bad patch, driver, service, etc.) you have to use the recovery console, a (very limited) CLI.
In Linux I can run X in any runlevel or from a floppy if needed. But, most fixes that would cause me not to be able to boot could be fixed easily from the command line.
For the most part, if you stack up, feature for feature, a Linux build against a Windows build, the Windows build will run faster.
Windows is faster than Linux overall, but speed isn't everything.
I don't agree with this. On the same hardware, running the same application, they should be relatively the same. But, It really depends on the application. (ie. I know for a fact that my machine can serve web pages via Apache faster than the Windows version.)
I'll contest that. I've never seen a package manager in those distros that worked properly. You always have some damn dependency problem that gets in the way. Also, people overlook bugs and obscure error messages. Mandrake drives me insane with it's endless barage of error messages (which just print errors and don't actually RESOLVE them), and the endless stream of bugs and glitches that really make Windows look stable by comparrison.
YaST on SUSE has never given me a problem. If there is a dependancy problem with a 3rd party (unsupported) app, then it's up to the user to get the file. Otherwise, it solves dependencies just like it should.
MacOS should be an example of the perfect computer. Use someone else's proven OS, and just build your own desktop. I really wish XWindows would drop dead.
I don't see your problem with XWindows really. Can you explain more.
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Speelgoedmannetje wrote:
Man, Linux sucks big time.
I use Mandrake 9.2. The gui is dog slow on my Pentium II 350 + [cut]
Well, if you run Mandrake, it's no wonder you think that Linux is bad for your health. :-D All those distributions that are hyped UserFriendly are usually overfeatured and bloated. Strength of Linux and it's distributions lays usually in ability to tailor it to ones needs. Unfortunately, it means that you have to get under the hood and tinker with it. If you don't want to, well, you get it for free. While I disagree with the argument, that crappy software is crappy when closed and not crappy when opened, still, it explains a little. :-)
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trochej
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I'll contest that. I've never seen a package manager in those distros that worked properly. You always have some damn dependency problem that gets in the way. Also, people overlook bugs and obscure error messages. Mandrake drives me insane with it's endless barage of error messages (which just print errors and don't actually RESOLVE them), and the endless stream of bugs and glitches that really make Windows look stable by comparrison.
Maybe I'm just blessed by the package manager gods. Everyone except me claims that package managers have sent them on a route straight into dependency hell, never to be heard from again. As strange as it sounds, I've used APT, URPMI, standard RPM, and others, sometimes together on the same system, even... And no problems, outside of occasionally having to "force" a package here and there to nudge things along. APT with the Synaptic front-end is really about the coolest setup I've ever seen.
The last time I truely fell into dependency hell was messing with updating IRIX 6.5.12 on an SGI Octane. (While there is something inherently cool about IRIX, it has lots of paths straight to hell on many things! eeeesh!)
MacOS should be an example of the perfect computer. Use someone else's proven OS, and just build your own desktop. I really wish XWindows would drop dead.
Actually, I don't mind XWindows, itself, that much. It's just the idea of using it for everything under the sun that really sucks. I wish X would be de-emphasized, and a (single) good native desktop adopted for workstation installs. (There's no reason XWindows can't work like it does on OS X. Have a real local desktop and just load X when you need it, dump it when you don't...)
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[cut]
Perhaps that is a worthy programming project? Developing a new graphics infrastructure for Linux? Much better than writing yet another toolkit if you ask me.
Weeks ago almost every single distribution I know dumped XWindow in favor of X.org.
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trochej
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Linux builds are so abstracted that practically anything UNIX will run. The downside is that they are damn slow and built on ancient standards, and pretty much require you to do things the UNIX way whether you want to or not.
Windows is faster than Linux overall, but speed isn't everything.
I disagree. First: which Windows? My LFS runs my box faster and more reliably that Windows 2000. I can do more tasks at the same time. And there is, of course, the question, wheter doing things UNIX way is a bad thing?
Or, maybe I'm just pissed that so many Perl books do a sucky job of teaching people how to write actual perl code. Doesn't anyone know how to use this language properly?
As do many books on programming in C, using APIs and so on... There are also good books on Perl out there.
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trochej
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In the golden days when I used to spend my entire life scrabbling
through Aminet for stuff to build my Workbench up nice I always
groaned when I came across the following:
1) A program that didn't have a GUI
2) A program that needed complex Shell parameters (LHA anyone?)
3) Anything written in AMOS
4) Any Linux port (things using ixemul etc.)
5) Any distribution that had orange and navy blue icons (WB1.3 ARGH!)
:-D :-D :-D
Long live the GUI, down with command lines.
Oh, and longer live Directory Opus!
:-)
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Long live the GUI, down with command lines.
I find it useful, when I can fit full rescue system on one floppy. I also don't know, why should I install GUI on a server, where it would only waste reasources.
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trochej
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So far I've tried more Linux from Kernel 1.1 through 2.4, I have to say that as time has gone on problems with daft errors, dependancies, and sloppy distros have gone through the roof. This isn't the fault of the kernel, more that distros are including too much software, and making a full install the only working configuration ...
Being stuck in a command line when things go wrong isn't a problem when you can work out where the error came from, rather than trawling through increasing numbers of directories and config files. The last time I felt confident about knowing Linux enough to handle it myself was when running Red Hat 5.1 :-(
No matter how much I have tried Linux has always felt like an adversary (when it doesn't work it's because it doesn't want to work), Workbench has felt like a friend (when it doesn't work it's not intentional).
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So far I've tried more Linux from Kernel 1.1 through 2.4, I have to say that as time has gone on problems with daft errors, dependancies, and sloppy distros have gone through the roof. This isn't the fault of the kernel, more that distros are including too much software, and making a full install the only working configuration ...
Try Slackware (http://www.slackware.com/). No dependencies, minimal default installation. Or, if your have time: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/. Everything your way. :-) (OK., that your way was a joke, I know :-D.)
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trochej
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The larger distros (Mandrake, Linspire, Fedora) are very easy to learn and use. These have graphic installers and package managers that are quite a bit better than found in Windows. But these distros need horsepower. And lots of it.
However, some programs still will not run with the package managers/graphic installers and STILL insist on using CLI, leaving the average Joe Public confused and often frustrated.
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Ilwrath wrote:
The smaller distros (and the BSDs and whatnot) are much more difficult, if you're new to them. But they can run faster, because they are a little trimmed back... So they don't need quite as big a system... It's all a trade-off.... And finding the sweet spot is tough.
BSD, harder than Linux? You must be on drugs. :afro:
But seriously, the "speed" you kids feel (or don't feel) on the desktop is more a function of the massive GUI toolkits in use than anything else. To put it charitably, that's what Windows would feel like if it didn't compromise security or stability... and the situation on UNIX-alikes is much like that with MS-DOS; things are fine until you start WIN.COM.*
@Whoever: No such thing as "XWindows," the dumped project was XFree86.
*If it helps, remember that the X server itself is basically just a big, full-featured graphics driver... one that any system with 32MB RAM can probably handle easily. It's KDE and Gnome... or worse, running programs linked to major portions of each of the two at once, which you'll probably end up doing with a 'cute and friendly' distribution like Mandrake until you learn better... that really bog the system down. There is a single major counterexample that comes to mind -- if you are still running XFree86 4.1 or possibly 4.2, the "XRender" extension was horribly slow when first introduced, and is now taken advantage of heavily by roughly anything offering AA fonts.
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Wrong. Windows can boot to safe mode for non critical errors, but for system critical failures (bad patch, driver, service, etc.) you have to use the recovery console, a (very limited) CLI.
I have seen it the bad way, I try to fix the MBR but without sucess until now... I've tried all under the roof without luck... :-(
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No matter how much I have tried Linux has always felt like an adversary (when it doesn't work it's because it doesn't want to work), Workbench has felt like a friend (when it doesn't work it's not intentional).
Exactly my feelings... Even when Amiga crash you know what you'd done 'wrong' so you wouldn't do it next time, heck even my father could spot what he could or couldn't do... :-D on Windows (and on linux too), most time you get an halted application which one doesn't know if it crashed or is just hanged up for no apparent reason...
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pixie wrote:
Exactly my feelings... Even when Amiga crash you know what you'd done 'wrong' so you wouldn't do it next time, heck even my father could spot what he could or couldn't do... :-D on Windows (and on linux too), most time you get an halted application which one doesn't know if it crashed or is just hanged up for no apparent reason...
Personally, I think the hanging-program-argument is a non-issue. If an application hangs, it hangs, whether it is an Amiga, Windows, Linux or some other OS. There is no blinking warning light on the screen telling you about it. You have to infer the fact that it did hang from long periods of unresponsiveness, or unreasonable and unexpected CPU loads. The major difference is that recent versions of Windows and all versions of Linux can quickly dislodge the offending program without bringing down the entire system (except in very rare cases), and even reclaim most to all allocated resources. Try that on an Amiga.
If you are lucky, the offending program really crashes, but I see little difference in the Amiga informing me of a 80000003 Guru, Linux of a segmentation fault, and Windows telling me the exception taken by the CPU (sometimes :-)). The names may be different, but the message is clear everytime: 'Don't do what you did just now, it's bad for my silicon'. In all cases, you knew what you did. Unless the error was very complex in nature, and you still wouldn't have had a clue.
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Personally, I think the hanging-program-argument is a non-issue. If an application hangs, it hangs, whether it is an Amiga, Windows, Linux or some other OS.
In my experience with Amiga it rarely happened if at all, on AROS when it crashes it does it immediately ad also never see it hang... but it is y personal experience, whether on windows it does it all the time.
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Slackware is the best distro I've tried so far, but that was a long time ago (it was the last one on a.out binaries, can't remember the version now!).
In general under Workbench you don't have the huge pile of demons/TSRs/services that you do under Linux/Windows, hence easier to work out the source of the error. Cue quote from the recycling hippie in the Simpsons "Simplify, man!"
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Another hilarious thread, with some people demonstrating a remarkable lack of understanding of what they are using, or else stuck with a mentality and ideas from ten years ago.
Let's see: "Linux ix slow and bloated." Bollox. Some Linux distros have default installations which are bloated, yes. Modern mainstream Linux distros are not suited for use with ancient hardware with the default installation, also yes. In both cases, either use optimised distros for your need or tweak one of the main ones to remove everything that you don't need.
"Windows is faster than Linux on the same hardware." Again, bunkum. Default Windows desktops are faster than default KDE or Gnome, yes. That's because default Windows desktops are actually quite spartan both in fuctionality and features. Add enough third party tweaks to Windows to bring it to the same level of features as KDE and Gnome, and Windows slows down considerably.
"AmigaOS is the king of user-friendly". Oh boy! There's a time warp if ever I saw one. AmigaOS was user-friendly 10 years ago, relatively speaking, but not today. By today's standards, even when compared to Linux, AmigaOS is a nightmare for anyone except those who have a decade of familiarity behind them. Not only is quite a lot of stuff counter-intuitive really, but there is little consistency and far too many missing features for a modern OS.
Try getting AmigaOS to print to a network printer, for instance, then think how much trouble a complete AmigaOS novice would have.
No, AmigaOS is only a panacea in the mind of the few and the ignorant, and I mean that in the nicest possible way. They say "ignorance is bliss", and in this case it is most certainly true. :-P
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By today's standards, even when compared to Linux, AmigaOS is a nightmare for anyone except those who have a decade of familiarity behind them.
? Swap those two to get that right, as far as I'm concerned.
Workbench is quirky, but the whole system is so much simpler under the surface - yes it loses features for that, but then look at what you get with mini-linux in it's tiny 20Mb footprint.
That said Windows seems to get more and more complex, so that when you get problems it ends up being as hard to work with as Linux (ie. when Windows Update stops working after installing an 'essential update').
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"AmigaOS is the king of user-friendly". Oh boy! There's a time warp if ever I saw one. AmigaOS was user-friendly 10 years ago, relatively speaking, but not today. By today's standards, even when compared to Linux, AmigaOS is a nightmare for anyone except those who have a decade of familiarity behind them. Not only is quite a lot of stuff counter-intuitive really, but there is little consistency and far too many missing features for a modern OS.
Explain it further please... I used a lot of OSes in recent years, and have to say that AmigaOS does many things right when it comes to UI experience... and altough many things are lacking the back bones are there... Devs for example, shell and gui integration, visual installation (I never saw AmigaOS being installed through monotasked system like them all) ... etc. Many thing could be improved I don't discuss that, but a nightmare!? Please... I had to learn AmigaOS as well as Windows (MacOS and QNX at some extent) and now Linux, and none compare to AmigaOS...
You see I also said nothing at all, but as you didn't specifiedP
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Could someone define user friendly ?
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My own experience is otherwise...i got my first Amiga (500) in 1996 b/c i just wanted to play games. One day i decided to boot the WB 1.3 disc and never read the manual. As a computer novice it wasn't obvious that to get a menu bar to appear i had to push (AND hold) the RMB.. The devs, sys, etc drawers meant nothing to me. Software failures and corrupted disks were very common but I just put it down to a "virus" whatever that was.
However using System 7 on a Mac was far easier for me, it felt simpler and more intuitive. I would argue that for someone who just wants to get the job done, than a Mac is a more intuitive option.
But once you learn more about AmigaOS you do see that MacOS is more limiting. It certianly wont easily let you see what it does to system files. But then most people use their computer as a means to an end ie its a tool so who cares, apart from computer hobbyists?
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There's three ways to look at it I guess - From the point of view of user-friendliness that is.
User 1: As far as just someone getting work done most any modern user-interface is going to be 'ok' - you click on an icon or a menu, click some buttons etc and do your work or play a game.
User 2: From the point of view of an advanced user how easy it is to install the OS, programs and tweak bits and bobs or whatever is always going to require some manual reading but it varies.
User3: Sorting out when things go wrong (as a user or support person) is another kettle of fish.
System7 on the Mac was about as friendly as it gets for the user 1, and hell on earth for 2 and 3 - ie. not much tweaking without going to extreme measures, and if networking didn't work right off there wasn't much you could do about it. Workbench/Intuition is a bit of a mix and is pretty good for all three. Windows leans towards User 2 but user 1 can dip their toes in it, while user 3 cries into their MS technical reference. Linux is heaven for 2, hard work for 3, and fine for 1 as long as they never have to touch anything outside if the GUI or upgrade at all.
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Holley wrote:
There's three ways to look at it I guess - From the point of view of user-friendliness that is.
User 1: As far as just someone getting work done most any modern user-interface is going to be 'ok' - you click on an icon or a menu, click some buttons etc and do your work or play a game.
User 2: From the point of view of an advanced user how easy it is to install the OS, programs and tweak bits and bobs or whatever is always going to require some manual reading but it varies.
User3: Sorting out when things go wrong (as a user or support person) is another kettle of fish.
System7 on the Mac was about as friendly as it gets for the user 1, and hell on earth for 2 and 3 - ie. not much tweaking without going to extreme measures, and if networking didn't work right off there wasn't much you could do about it. Workbench/Intuition is a bit of a mix and is pretty good for all three. Windows leans towards User 2 but user 1 can dip their toes in it, while user 3 cries into their MS technical reference. Linux is heaven for 2, hard work for 3, and fine for 1 as long as they never have to touch anything outside if the GUI or upgrade at all.
I think Linux is a bit of a dangerous option for user 1, and there are a lot user 1's out there.
For instance, installation. User 1 probably wont install Linux successfully and when they do, it wont be runing at its optimum because they will be too nervous to delve into preferences optimising things and changing settings.
Linux aint friendly, its scary for user 1.
AmigaOS suits all 3, although user 3 will be at places like amiga.org and not Amiga technical support :lol:
Mac like AmigaOS is also good for all 3, same for Windows. Not really Microsoft technical support, but the fact that there are so many PC users aroudn that one of them is bound to be able to help you out
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I think Linux is a bit of a dangerous option for user 1, and there are a lot user 1's out there. For instance, installation. User 1 probably wont install Linux successfully and when they do, it wont be runing at its optimum because they will be too nervous to delve into preferences optimising things and changing settings.
Linux aint friendly, its scary for user 1.
I think Holley was meaning that User 1 could use a Linux system, if it were first configured for that user. Say something like a work computer at the office. User 1 should have no problem using OpenOffice.org instead of MSOffice, and Firefox instead of IE. For user 1, installing and configuring ANY computer would be a very scary and un-optimal event.
Basically, I agree with all of these ratings. Though, honestly, I think Mac OS X hits the sweet spot of balance nowadays. A pretty interface for user 1, some tinker space and the ability to run many linux apps with a simple recompile for user 2, and a nice unix-like core for user 3.
I'd run a new Mac as my primary system, if I didn't have such a games addiction.
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Believe it or not, Mac's are gradually improving as games machines as the user base increases along with the demand for games.
You like Unreal Tournament 2004? You can get it on the Mac.
You'd be surprised how many PC games are available on the Mac, although granted there isnt enough games coming out for the machine.
Then again we dont want the danger of Mac becoming another Amiga, being regarded as merely a games machine with a keyboard and mouse ;-) by one half, and a great creative machine by the other half.
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I find the Amiga to be a very usable system and I have much less than 10 years of epxerience under my belt with it. Some parts of the OS do need to be explained, but it would perhaps take ten or fifteen minutes to do so. Then, if you want, and I haven't bothered yet except changing a filesystem once, you can get into really fancy things like custom editing the drivers for your devices, or moving just about any folder on the system drive around. Between the way Miami works and the way windows handles TCP/IP stuff, I choose Miami, having done plenty in both. Amiga is pretty spartan though, and the amount of workbench hacks needed to make it look slick is annoying, but on the other hand it runs on slow processors with almost no memory.
My experiences with linux lead me to believe you can have A) a fast newish computer running something like Fedora B) An older computer running an Xwindows session that looks worse than vanilla Workbench 3.1 and C) a very powerful text shell. Nonetheless, I think Linux is a great server operating system, and great for home use if you can afford to run a big distro, mind you, a 1GHz cpu with 128 to 256 megs of RAM will do the basics in even Fedora... seemed to work fine on a 1.3GHz Duron/128MegRAM/ATI Rage system. Most people I know don't have a system that powerful even though, although they certainly aren't expensive.
I don't have much experience with macs really, but the times I have used them they seemed very nice, although the dang dockbar always autohid, and if you left it alone to go get lunch (used some G4 OSx machines at an art class) the screen would blank into some kind of power saving mode that often involved photoshop crashing.
Windows. Windows can be a PITA. Windows users like to use IE and Outlook. The barely realize how many virii and trojans they get on their system, it gets buggy stable and inconsistent, also the way Xp and 2000 work are different enough to make help docs for one often worthless because of some undoable step for the other. That said, with the free AdAware, and AVG Antivirus, plus firefox and Thunderbird (and optionally stuff like gAIM) I find windows works very well. It's finicky about hardware, but so is every OS. I can get along in Xp with 128 megs of RAM easily, and 64 if I stay off've the games (with 64megs Gnome is sluggish). I use all that free third party software, and one a nice Vaio machine (1.4GHz P4, 384 megs PC800 RDRAM, Geforce 2 MX; 400MHz FSB *IIRC*).
Then there's FreeBSD, very stable but a less userfriendly than windows or linux or amiga or mac for desktop use. Also less binaries floating around.
I find QNX to be very nice, although you'll have no RAM left for apps, it'll run without swap in under 32megs of RAM, it's very easy to get a basic desktop setup, but I have yet to be able to find all the boot scripts and whatnot so I can't edit them. Like BSD QNX lacks binaries (I know they have linux emu, but that's still a hassle then, yeah yeah yeah GCC Makefile my butt ) :-P
Linux is perhaps put in an unfair light. Amiga OS 3.1 is very old, that's why it can run on a 68000. Windows is rarely upgraded on a machine, and usualyl comes with, so it's rare to find someone whining about Xp on some ancient machine. MacOSX certainly won't run on a 604 either, which is about equivalent to Linux not running on Pentium 1s. QNX is efficient and modern though, and OS4 seems to be too.
My thoughts anyhow, Jeff
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I don't have much experience with macs really, but the times I have used them they seemed very nice, although the dang dockbar always autohid, and if you left it alone to go get lunch (used some G4 OSx machines at an art class) the screen would blank into some kind of power saving mode that often involved photoshop crashing.
Like a lot of irritating things in operating systems, this can be easily solved.
Dock > System Preferences > Screen Effects and switch the screen saver off.
In that same preferences panel you can switch power saving mode off, just like you can on a Windows machine.
You can even turn the dock off auto hide. :-)
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pixie wrote:
Exactly my feelings... Even when Amiga crash you know what you'd done 'wrong' so you wouldn't do it next time, heck even my father could spot what he could or couldn't do... :-D on Windows (and on linux too), most time you get an halted application which one doesn't know if it crashed or is just hanged up for no apparent reason...
Well, actually, when Guru meditation happened, it looked like a lottery. On A500 I wasn't able to tell the reason most of the time. On Linux, when application hangs, in most cases you will know after you issue ,,ps''. A sittuation when whole system hangs or crashes is a rarity. It's true, that Linux distros that I know seem to be a bit harder than Windows, but I think that it's a good trade for stability and abilities.
trochej
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Isn't there a list somewhere of Guru meditation codes where it explains what each one means?
I think that would be how you find out what is wrong :-)
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No, AmigaOS is only a panacea in the mind of the few and the ignorant, and I mean that in the nicest possible way. They say "ignorance is bliss", and in this case it is most certainly true.
If the "ignorant" Amiga users are getting the things done with their Amigas that PC users who can only get work done if they're in front of a 3 GHz Pentium do, then the choice of the word ignorant is as poor as you can get. You may diss people who get work done with less. I've got nothing but respect for them. Having a faster computer doesn't make you a better person. A more arrogant person perhaps, but certainly not a better one.
I've always said, the less you know about computers, the faster they need to be. The only exception to this rule is the playing of games. I've worked with people who got more work done in a week on <20MHz processors (not Amigas) than many people with 3GHz systems will get done in a year. Which of those deserves more respect?
And, of course, I post this with only the nicest of intentions. :-D
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Roj wrote:
No, AmigaOS is only a panacea in the mind of the few and the ignorant, and I mean that in the nicest possible way. They say "ignorance is bliss", and in this case it is most certainly true.
If the "ignorant" Amiga users are getting the things done with their Amigas that PC users who can only get work done if they're in front of a 3 GHz Pentium do, then the choice of the word ignorant is as poor as you can get. You may diss people who get work done with less. I've got nothing but respect for them. Having a faster computer doesn't make you a better person. A more arrogant person perhaps, but certainly not a better one.
I've always said, the less you know about computers, the faster they need to be. The only exception to this rule is the playing of games. I've worked with people who got more work done in a week on <20MHz processors (not Amigas) than many people with 3GHz systems will get done in a year. Which of those deserves more respect?
And, of course, I post this with only the nicest of intentions. :-D
I've been waiting for something like that to be said, and now you said it! :-D
I would of but I would of phrased it badly.
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@HopperJF yeah but many of them don't make sense, or are difficult to figure out from the lists I've seen :/
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@Roj wrote:
If the "ignorant" Amiga users are getting the things done with their Amigas that PC users who can only get work done if they're in front of a 3 GHz Pentium do, then the choice of the word ignorant is as poor as you can get.
Like what? Hmm? What do Amiga users do that PC users need 3 GHz for?
You may diss people who get work done with less. I've got nothing but respect for them. Having a faster computer doesn't make you a better person. A more arrogant person perhaps, but certainly not a better one.
I diss people who talk BS. Spreading ignorance and myths to make themselves appear smarter or more savvy than your average user. I don't diss people who do more with less, but judgung by this thread what you have is people who diss other operating systems on the basis of their own prejudice and ignorance.
I've always said, the less you know about computers, the faster they need to be.
Really? How does that match up with the general ignorance of many Amiga users? They may know a lot about AmigaOS and Amigas, but they know nothing about anything else.
The only exception to this rule is the playing of games. I've worked with people who got more work done in a week on <20MHz processors (not Amigas) than many people with 3GHz systems will get done in a year. Which of those deserves more respect?
Neither. It has to do with their familiarity with their tools, not with the quality of what they are using.
Sure, a 3GHz processor won't make for a much better text editor, but you won't get much rendering or modelling done on that 20MHz processor. See?
And, of course, I post this with only the nicest of intentions. :-D
I'm sure you do. I'm not against efficient systems, or people who know how to use them. What I object to is people taking advantage of ignorance to spread a load of FUD and outright BS.
AmigaOS is small and efficient. It is also primitive by modern standards and does a lot of things very badly indeed, if at all.
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AmigaOS is small and efficient. It is also primitive by modern standards and does a lot of things very badly indeed, if at all.
Because the latest version available came out in 2000, and wasnt much of an update over 3.1 (10 years ago).
Give us a break!
Don't expect a limping donkey (Amiga) to compete with the industry leaders at the drop of a hat, these things take time.
Amigas as they are, are small fast and efficient. If they dont do what the user wants, the user sticks around and makes do or switches to Windows/Mac/Linux.
For what Amiga users are still here for, the Amiga suits them fine clearly.
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Like what? Hmm? What do Amiga users do that PC users need 3 GHz for?
Based on the frequency with which I hear PC users chuckle, slack and otherwise pass off anything that's not as fast as their 3GHz systems, apparently it starts at the flip of the power switch. I've run into a lot of people who believe they need that much speed to get any work done at all. They seem to have a mental block that keeps them from being productive if they're not using what they perceive to be at least the minimum acceptable processor speed. It's like tortoisephobia or something.
I diss people who talk BS. Spreading ignorance and myths to make themselves appear smarter or more savvy than your average user. I don't diss people who do more with less, but judgung by this thread what you have is people who diss other operating systems on the basis of their own prejudice and ignorance.
Everybody seems to be talking from their own experiences. Linux doesn't lend itself to the uninitiated very well. We all know that. Drumming that up to intentionally spreading myths and then immediately talking down about them only makes it look like it's being turned into an out-savvy contest. To a greater or lesser extent, everybody disses other operating systems based on their own prejudices and ignorance. Nothing's going to change that. It's just confliction of opinion.
Really? How does that match up with the general ignorance of many Amiga users? They may know a lot about AmigaOS and Amigas, but they know nothing about anything else.
There's some serious courage behind that statement. Amiga users have a general ignorance about other operating systems? Wow, I don't think I've got the intestinal fortitude to spread a myth like that. Well done!
There's a reason only "nerds" bothered with computers and the mainstream wanted nothing to do with them back before the MHz/GHz craze started. Computers were simply too slow for people who didn't understand them. Anybody who refers to that older hardware as "ancient" probably wouldn't know the first thing about squeezing anything out of those pre-WIMP systems, or even systems that shortly followed. They worked fine back then. You just had to know how. If people of my generation had the attitude a lot of today's computer users do, computers would never have gotten out of the "stone age". Nobody could've been bothered to use the damn things long enough to figure out how to make them do anything.
Sure, a 3GHz processor won't make for a much better text editor, but you won't get much rendering or modelling done on that 20MHz processor. See?
No, I don't see. Creative people get rendering done on slower systems. Five years from now, people will be spewing the same crap about today's systems that were used to create Gollum, saying how unusable they suddenly are because the then-modern systems will somehow seem to change the older systems in "the enlightened" people's minds and have them believing they're totally worthless, unusable, and they need to throw good money after bad on the next best thing with a big, bright "NEW!" slapped on the side.
I suppose we all could've scrapped our library database toils to make a feature-length movie on our <20MHz processors, but our bosses would make us stay late and we'd never get to see it in the theater. In all honesty, if the computers of today were available back then, it wouldn't have made a hill of beans of a difference. We got an awful lot of records processed on our "ancient" equipment, but the time it took to write the software to do it still took much longer than it took for those processors to chew through all that data. Creative people (the ignorant, apparently) find a way to get it done. I'm just not willing to get caught up in the need to buy new hardware every year when the slower stuff does just as well for the most part. I don't come away stupider from those slower machines, as you seem to want to imply. If anything I'm better prepared to put the faster hardware to good use. It's the necessity of that that's in question. More often than not, it isn't.
AmigaOS is small and efficient. It is also primitive by modern standards and does a lot of things very badly indeed, if at all.
Some people prefer to dig a ditch with a bulldozer. I do it with a primitive shovel. I get a good tan, stay in shape, and ulimately have more control over where the ditch actually goes. If by modern standards you mean where Microsoft seems to want to take me, I'll just stick with primitive.
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@Roj
[..snip..]
I thought you might have come up with some concrete arguments, but instead it's all soundbytes. All this stuff about "creative people do more with less" is meaningless. Creativity is not linked to resources. Creative people will get better results with more resources than they will with less. Non-creative people will do very little no matter what they use.
I can only assume that you are one of those people who wear blinkers stamped with the slogan "Amiga = Good; Anything else = Bad".
Yes, I am saying that a lot of Amiga users have no understanding of other systems. They don't want to understand other systems because they assume even before they start that no other system could possibly be as good as an Amiga anyway. Read this thread properly: people complaining that the Linux UI is not user-friendly... Huh? People complaining that a default Mandrake 10.0 installation is not responsive on their PII/350. Doh! There are other distros, aimed at low resource systems. Use those, or customise the Mandrake install to suit the resources.
You know what? AmigaOS4 won't even run on an A500. Geez, that must make it really bad, eh? How many people kept saying they wouldn't touch MUI applications because they ran too slow on their 680020/2MB/AGA systems? That makes MUI bad too, right?
This isn't about what Microsoft want or don't want, nor is it about philosophy. Progress means technology advances all the time. Better technology means one can do more. It has nothing to do with creativity and everything to do with productivity. A creative person will do more if his render takes 5 hours than if it takes two weeks. If you're suggesting differently then you have a set of values that is beyond my (and I would guess, 99.9% of the rest of world's population) comprehension.
This isn't about digging a ditch with a shovel rather than a bulldozer. It's more like doing it with a teaspoon. In frozen ground.
My point is that there are a number of things AmigaOS is not good at, and that this is not a quality. Equally, trying to pretend that nothing has changed in the last ten years, and that AmigaOS compares as well today in relation to its rivals as it did then is simply not going to enhance anyone's credibility, because it simply isn't true.
Any system that fails to recognise its deficiencies cannot evolve.
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If you can't think for yourself about what can and can't be done with that older hardware then I really can't help ya. Are you telling me you make movies for a living? I can certainly understand Cecilia wanting as fast a machine as she can get hold of, but by the same token I'm not about to minimize her past work by saying those old, outdated machines she used before are worthless and unusable. I won't even touch on whether or not she can handle other operating systems. Feel free though. You've already got that foot half in your mouth. If she can make do with that stuff for all that time, I certainly can find a way to be productive with them, although I'm certainly not a professional videographer. I'd just be playing.
Other than games, what won't run on those slightly older, or as you put it, ancient, PCs, Macs, or whatever? Why do you _need_ high-end hardware to run Linux? What are you having trouble running that others aren't? I'm _not_ having trouble running anything. Why would I give examples of software I'm not having trouble with? Why don't you list some software that doesn't run well for you on slower hardware and we'll see where that takes it.
As far as Amiga = Good, Anything else = Bad, I can say the same for you. Bill Hoggett's preferred OS = Good, Anything else = Bad. If the shoe fits... Personally I've learned and subsequently forgotten how more systems worked than most kids these days can even list. And actually your assumption is wrong. My first choice is an old DEC VaxStation for getting my work done, but at times I prefer my Amiga. I've reworked much of it to work like my Vax anyway.
As much as AmigaOS4 won't run on an A500, so much that runs on an A500 won't run on an AmigaOne. Does that fact alone qualify either system? If you say yes you're not too bright. It just means that someone hasn't taken the time to rebuild for one system or the other. It's how it performs on those systems that qualifies them. On my system, my software runs as well as it would on other systems. I use PageStream on the Amiga. I've bought a copy for Windows, but guess what. It doesn't perform to such a degree higher on Windows that makes me stop using the Amiga version.
Shovel, spoon, half full, half empty, blah blah blah. My point is, you don't _need_ the latest and greatest to make a computer useful unless you don't know enough to get use out of them. Computers are as useful as the users can make them. People who know less about computers need more from the computer to get anywhere. I'll admit that I use A PC for certain games. But for work, real work, people who know more don't need as much to get to the same place. Clearly your computers need to be high-end for you to get your stuff done. That's not a bad thing, necessarily. But don't be all high-and-mighty toward people who don't have that requirement.
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I'd also argue fast machines are only needed for difficult operations. 3D rendering, Compiling big stuff, and video editing are the first to come to mind. Also super data processing like running a database for thousands, or running a couple hundred terminals. Obivously an Amiga isn't great at those tasks. But for text editing, web browsing, with a DSP any kind of audio playback, heck even 3D modeling (not rendering, oh god that's too slow on this machine) or linear video editing. But some tasks simply require that you handle huge unwieldy cuhnks of data. Also some need multi-user enviroments. Amiga can't do that, but it can do what most need. Oh well, anyhow. Enough of the flame wars.
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Some people prefer to dig a ditch with a bulldozer. I do it with a primitive shovel. I get a good tan, stay in shape, and ulimately have more control over where the ditch actually goes. If by modern standards you mean where Microsoft seems to want to take me, I'll just stick with primitive
Good analogy, I was digging up old drains today with my Dad, I said 'this'd be easier with a mini-JCB' and he just replied 'yeah, but we'd cut right through all the old pipework and end up with twice as much work'.
A while back I mentioned to someone about 'best fit' - namely I used to run a Novell 4.11 network over a WAN with around 100 workstations, a 100MHz P1 server with 486 workstations using Windows 3.1, it did MS Office, email, web browsing, and linked in nicely with an AIX database system using terminal emulators and file links.
Now the company now has dual P4 servers with Server 2003, and P4 workstations with Windows XP - guess what it gets used for? It gave them hell on earth trying to link in with the AIX database, though!
Also Terminator 2 was rendered on 40MHz PCs, that doesn't mean I'll stop enjoying watching it! Yes there are uses for atom-splitting super-computers, 99% of everything doesn't really require that. A Pegasos can do everything I want to do with a home computer, which is why I'll be getting one when I can ... it's efficient, too!