Hardy Heron Making Linux Ready for the Masses?

[jaarik]

So, start shipping PC's with Linux, and you'll soon see the masses use it

Totally agree. Good point. Linux shall dispel the fear of the unknown pertinent to the masses as soon it gets shipped to the masses pre-installed. 90% of the users will never bother to switch to Windows if they can play free-cell, type their documents in OpenOffice and surf the internet out of the box.

If they then ever learn to install an operation system themselves, they will realize that the one starting with W* is not what they really need.

 

[.Froot.]

I have moved through the Windows ages all the way from DOS to a short stay in Vista-land. Each time, however, I've found Linux a little closer to the heart. It has gone a long way since being non-user friendly (according to other people, I may mention) to what is now arguably a lot better than Vista could ever be. Hardy is pretty much the same as Gutsy- an upgrade to the previous version. That is what it is supposed to be. Imagine it to be a service pack to your favorite version of Windows (mine would have to be 2000 or XP, they have the least amount of crap inside of them), except that this service pack would be in a fully working condition (sorry M$ but your Vista SP is kind of in dire need of a scrapping and complete overhaul).

I reckon that Hardy would be a pretty good competitor to the resource-happy Vista when it is released. Yes, of course Linux is strange to the average guy that is used to Windows, but how long did it take any of us to get used to the new version of Windows, or the first time we even set our eyes upon it? You only judge Linux as a geek-os because you are used to the way Windows works and because M$ have the masses in their control... total world domination. Remember that the war is not won by the big lumpy giant army, but rather by the unsuspecting virus (except in this case it's actually a good virus ridding the world of the evil giant). Yeah, sure Linux is a lot more complex than Windows. But that's because it's actually a lot more powerful. Hence the reason of non-root administrators and the sudo command....

Final word... Ubuntu is a friendly OS that is easy and fun to use.

 

[jaarik]

I reckon that Hardy would be a pretty good competitor to the resource-happy Vista when it is released.

That's the secret, put just enough hype into the business (Microsoft has been doing it for decades), and Canonical can make "just another distro" look more competitive than others.

I don't mind. Some unified effort to promote a distro with greater power is bound to bear fruit eventually.

The same as some aspects of having to use sudo, good to and secure, well, but even though it's a pain in the as* sometimes, it is gracefully tolerated because of all the positive hype.

I like the Ubuntu hype, and even actively support it

 

[.Froot.]

The same as some aspects of having to use sudo, good to and secure, well, but even though it's a pain in the as* sometimes, it is gracefully tolerated because of all the positive hype.

I actually enabled root login and now I use the root account as my own. It is not recommended and I wouldn't recommend it to an inexperienced Linux user, but it is a lot nicer to use for someone using root commands and scripts almost every minute of the day.

 

[milomak]

why not just have a console running and do a sudo -i (i think that is the command) when you need to do root stuff?

 

[.Froot.]

i do a crap load of root stuff. and i need root for some of the specific settings I run.

 

[chiskop]

I actually enabled root login and now I use the root account as my own. It is not recommended and I wouldn't recommend it to an inexperienced Linux user, but it is a lot nicer to use for someone using root commands and scripts almost every minute of the day.

That's what you think until you make a mistake...

 

[.Froot.]

I've been using Linux for around 6 years now. I think I know better than to make a "mistake". Anyways, i reckon pretty much anything can be fixed in Linux.

 

[chiskop]

Why would you want/need to run as root almost every minute of the day?

 

[.Froot.]

apart from being completely free from the annoying sudo, its fun. I don't have to type in my mother of a password each time I change something in i.e. the System Settings.

 

[Beta]

Busy training for RHCE right now, logged in as root on a seperate Fedora box. If I had to "su" all these times, or worse more enable sudo, I think I would go crazy! I see his point, if he is real busy. Keep in mind using "su" to switch to root, you must "su" or "su -c '<command>'" every single time, including password entry, unlike the "sudo" grace period.

 

[chiskop]

Sure, but how often do you actually need to do that? (apart from when you're training for RHCE)

I can't remember the last time I needed sudo on this computer - once it's set up, it's set up.

 

[w1z4rd]

Busy training for RHCE right now, logged in as root on a seperate Fedora box. If I had to "su" all these times, or worse more enable sudo, I think I would go crazy! I see his point, if he is real busy. Keep in mind using "su" to switch to root, you must "su" or "su -c '<command>'" every single time, including password entry, unlike the "sudo" grace period.

or just type "sudo su" ... once.

Also, once you get used to using the command, it becomes second nature to type sudo... and I often find myself typing sudo when logged into root based systems.

Another thing.... why do you have to type sudo the sudo password everytime? If I open a terminal, it normally only asks me once.

 

[Beta]

w1z4rd- I was talking about Red hat based systems where "su" is employed and "sudo" is considered a security risk, hence "sudo" is not included by default in cent-os, Fedora or Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The risk being the grace period sudo allows to anybody who happens to walk up to the computer to execute commands as root, not good. So I assume the gentleman is talking about an rpm based system.

chiskop- you get some busy blokes out there.

 

[w1z4rd]

w1z4rd- was talking about Red hat based systems where "su" is employed and "sudo" is considered a security risk, hence "sudo" is not included by default in cent-os, Fedora or Red Hat Enterprise Linux. The risk being the grace period sudo allows to anybody who happens to walk up to the computer to execute as root, not good.

chiskop- you get some busy blokes out there.

I realized that too late. Sorry. I should be bed *puts beers away*

 

[Beta]

Now, before you blush too much, nmap'ing cia.gov? Was the for a laugh or what? Got me laughing.

 

[w1z4rd]

Now, before you blush too much, nmap'ing cia.gov? Was the for a laugh or what? Got me laughing.

For fun and the screenshot.

 

[Beta]

2 ports open, 80 and ssl... what more would you suspect I guess. Possibly a root shell on 666?
Anyways, fun stuff.

 

[nocilah]

People have to change in order for OSS to be embraced in in its entirety.

actually the OS needs to change for people to use it.

Ubuntu is widely used in my office by the tech heads who do real development with java etc Of course having M$ as a client we get to see the best and the worst of both worlds.

The biggest issue with Ubuntu is the badly designed GUI (Graphic User Interface) and take it from someone who makes money doing this, Ubuntu is childs play when compared to the likes of M$ and Apple.

Prob is like every other development project on earth. When you are done you start to realize 80% of most code is developed to deal with user stupidity, which is why Linux at the moment is the most streamlined OS on earth... cuz it has a tech savy user base. Once it has reached the stage where it is ready to be used by 90% of the computer literate population it WILL be as big, bloated,buggy and need of many patches as OSx and windows [insert windows version here]

 

[Kasyx]

actually the OS needs to change for people to use it.

Ubuntu is widely used in my office by the tech heads who do real development with java etc Of course having M$ as a client we get to see the best and the worst of both worlds.

The biggest issue with Ubuntu is the badly designed GUI (Graphic User Interface) and take it from someone who makes money doing this, Ubuntu is childs play when compared to the likes of M$ and Apple.

Prob is like every other development project on earth. When you are done you start to realize 80% of most code is developed to deal with user stupidity, which is why Linux at the moment is the most streamlined OS on earth... cuz it has a tech savy user base. Once it has reached the stage where it is ready to be used by 90% of the computer literate population it WILL be as big, bloated,buggy and need of many patches as OSx and windows [insert windows version here]

I'm sorry to point this out, but do you have any idea what you are talking about?

You do realise that Ubuntu doesn't have a set "GUI", right? One is able to choose different Window Managers, each of which give one a different "GUI" experience. Ubuntu wasn't part of the GUI design phase, it uses Window Managers currently available, many of which have been under development for quite some time (KDE was first released in 1996).

Clearly you are just pulling facts out of thin air and actually have no idea what you are talking about. Go read this article, and then you can come back once you have even the slightest idea of what the Ubuntu GUI actually is.