Is the command line the only way to free software?

[Lim, Seung Chan]

Well, but is it really a conflict between the sophisticated VS unsophisticated?

Why is it that I can go to a beach, pick up a rock and start to draw on sand
and begin to understand how sand behaves in reaction to the rock? I would have
gotten a free physics lesson doing that, and my understanding of the world has
grown that much. What would it take to do something so unsophisticated
like that
on the computer. Why should it require so much more sophistication?

Perhaps it is an issue of scale? When I am programming in C or ASM,
I visualize myself as sort of a material engineer working with atoms
and molecules.

But there are times when I think I should move up a scale and work on the level
of nuts and bolts, yet I am still working at the atoms and molecules
level because
I am stuck programming in C or ASM. I suppose you can say scripting is
that nuts
and bolts level, and you'd have a good point. Except the syntax is
more-or-less the
same. The grammar of working with atoms and molecules are, at least to me, so
different from the grammar of working with nuts and bolts.... So I
have to wonder
what it would mean to implement that layer well.

I don't see Windows or Ubuntu's GUI as having much to do with giving
you the freedom. It is simply about trying to make things easier to
do, and it fails
at that just as much. I really don't think "easy" is the goal. Freedom
is. Once we have
freedom, we can layer "easy" on top of it, but I don't think we can
layer "freedom"
on top of "easy", because "easy" may mean the lack of freedom...

slim

On Wed, Mar 17, 2010 at 11:27 AM, Jerry Feldman <gaf-mNDKBlG2WHs at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> There is certainly a conflict between the needs of a relatively
> unsophisticated user community and the more sophisticated users. One of
> the features that Ubuntu (and derivatives) bring to the marketplace is
> that it targets the unsophisticated end user.  But, much of the
> traditional Linux community is more sophisticated to professional.
>
> One of the really nice things about Linux and Unix systems is that most
> of the system administration configuration is controlled by plain text
> files, and is very similar across distros and even different flavors of
> Unix. The GUI system admin tools differ by distros. For instance, Red
> Hat and Fedora use Python-based tools such as system-config-<name> when
> executed from the command line, where SuSE uses YAST, and Debian yet
> another.
>
> Basically, I don't think that Windows is so easy, but it is what most
> end users are familiar with. This is why Vista was a failure, because it
> mandated too much change from the popular XP. In context of my first
> paragraph, when people who are familiar with Windows come over to Linux,
> they are in a foreign world. This is the market that Ubuntu addresses.
> But, in making things easier and more intuitive for the unsophisticated
> user, it makes it more difficult for the more sophisticated user. David
> Kramer made a number of comments about this a while ago, especially in
> the change from an inittab-based system to an upstart. I don't want to
> get into the debate on init vs. upstart, but I go back to about 1980
> when we had /etc/ttys based init that did not have the intelligence to
> handle the Raytheon Data Systems terminals. The System V inittab
> introduced the concept of run levels. Before that there was single-user
> mode where nothing was mounted except for root, and no daemons were
> running. (Normally /usr was a mounted file system). Then you had
> multi-user mode. With inittab, we generally had run level 1 - single
> user mode, run level 2 - multi-user mode no external network, and
> run-level 3, full multi-user mode with network,and run level 5 added the
> GUI. But, not all Linux distros used the run levels in the same way. One
> of the real advantages of inittab is that virtually everything is script
> based. As the systems have grown, executing scripts becomes cumbersome.
> The ordering of the scripts is based on the directory sort order. First
> for each init script, each run level directory needs symlinks in the
> form of [SK][0-9][0-9]<name>. The K links are for killing daemons (or
> services) and the S links are for starting services. Originally, all the
> kill scripts in the current run level would be executed, then the start
> scripts in the new run level would be executed. We are more
> sophisticated today so that services common to both the old and new run
> level would not be changed. There are many good arguments in favor of
> changing the old inittab scheme, but sometimes change is difficult,
> especially when they are implemented in a single distro.
>
> On 03/17/2010 09:50 AM, jay-R5TnC2l8y5lBDgjK7y7TUQ at public.gmane.org wrote:
>> It sounds like your looking for a system similar to the lego mindstorm programing.  Basically drag and drop macros that allow the user to build and customize based on basic pieces.  I know there are languages and programs that are working on these types of systems.  However I have not found anything mainstream or ready for prime time.
>>
>> Overall modern desktop distros of linux have all the ease and functionality of windows or osx. The biggest problem the average user will run into is getting hardware to work, this is where often command line work is required.  These problems are less common on windows, because the manufactures cater to windows.  but they still happen a lot.  This is where tech support becomes important.
>>
>> In reality I think all the averag user really cares about is that it works and does so in an "intuiitive" naure.  Few really care about customizing and creating.  This is more a goal of the enthusiast market, and not the main stream.  This kind of thing is show in the gaming market.  Many games offer systems to make custome levels, but really few users ever dig into them.  I would wager more than 95% of the custom stuff is created by less than 5% of the user base. Just as it is in foss software.
>>
>
>
> --
> Jerry Feldman <gaf-mNDKBlG2WHs at public.gmane.org>
> Boston Linux and Unix
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>
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