[Discuss] an "Enterprise" Linux for desktop

[Matthew Gillen]

On 11/27/2011 11:28 AM, markw at mohawksoft.com wrote:
>>> From: markw at mohawksoft.com [mailto:markw at mohawksoft.com]
>>>
>>> Changing existing paradigms is usually a bad
>>> practice unless there is sufficient evidence a new paradigm is better.
>>
>> The same is true of everything that is being developed by anyone anywhere.
 >> ...
> I'm all for experimentation, it is, in the end, how we learn.
> However, "serious" work creates knowledge. Knowledge lasts and
> contributes to the whole. Haphazard work doesn't last and doesn't
> contribute, its a distraction.

There is a point worth considering here regarding exploring new 
directions.  Sometimes when you're trying something new you need time to 
develop it before it can really be judged on its merits the same way you 
might do with 'legacy' systems.  So I don't think it's fair to judge 
gnome3 on whether its paradigm is superior quite yet, even though I have 
no shortage of gripes about it myself (IMHO, the alt-tab behavior is 
atrocious for apps that use multiple windows like my mail-client, 
compounded by the lack of pager).

> Think about the QWERTY keyboard. The Dvorák proponents made their case and
> lost. QWERTY is no better or worse than Dvorák and thus, the prevailing
> paradigm won. Rightly so. That's the competition of ideas.

True, but you can buy dvorak keyboards, and every linux distro I've seen 
supports that layout even on standard QWERTY keyboards.  So QWERTY 
'won', but dvorak didn't die.

> With user interface, we are not getting a "vote" or a choice. They are
> changing it and we have to learn a new one. We are not letting the
> competition of ideas win, we are being forced to accept new paradigms by
> fiat. IMHO this is not how open source and free software should be
> working.

Except that no one is forcing you to go with gnome-shell or kde4.  I 
guarantee you that some group of people will be disgruntled enough with 
gnome3 that they will maintain gnome2 for years to come.  And every 
distro supports lots of other desktop options (the alternate desktop 
spins are the most popular variations of fedora).

The other point is that forks are crucial part of F/OSS; they are in 
essence your voting mechanism.  Don't like the cabal that is ruining 
your favorite project?  Take the good parts and start your own project.

There was a long standing feature request in openoffice that was enough 
to make me not use it or advocate using it 
(https://issues.apache.org/ooo/show_bug.cgi?id=43937; my comment is 
#14).  The people in charge didn't like the feature, so they refused to 
implement it.  When LibreOffice forked, implementing this feature was 
one of the first things I noticed different (besides the splash screen). 
  So sometimes forking is the best way to get progress...

(I will fully concede that it was not I that implemented the feature, so 
I'm not saying the typical 'fix it yourself'; rather I'm making the 
argument that you're likely not alone in things that irritate you and 
there will likely be someone motivated enough to do it, so do not 
despair :-) )

Matt