Re: Advocacy report [part 1]

["Anthony E. Greene" <agreene pobox com>]

Danny Ho wrote:
> 
> On Tue, 26 Oct 1999, Paul G Cooper wrote:
> 
> Why would you want use GNOME.

Because it's a flexible, fast-developing desktop that runs on *nix. The
target audience includes UNIX folks.
 
> If you wanted to use GNOME etc in companies.
> 
> You will have to:-
> 
> 1)Document new procedures
> 2) Train the user on the system.

If the users are relative novices, setting them up with a Windows-like
environment will leverage most of what they already know (how to use a
mouse, menus, drag/drop, etc). My kids used Win31 a little and Win95 for
about a year. They have no trouble using KDE or GNOME. Their tasks are
generally limited to launching/exiting applications, and
creating/saving/printing documents. They don't do any file management, but I
think gmc and kfm are similar enough to Windows Explorer that someone that
uses Explorer to manage files could use the KDE and GNOME equivalents.

> 3) Train the support staff on how to support GNOME on Linux or BSD .

This is an issue. Whether it's worth it depends on what they were using
before.
 
> But I would use GNOME at home
> 
> Even though LInux, Freebsd,Macintosh OS 8 is better than NT. I will never
> endorse companies to use the above OS.

I disagree. There are situations where it would be a good idea right now.
What about an environment where PC support is expensive and users only use a
few applications which have equivalents on Linux? The built-in ability to
preconfigure user desktops, easily limit what they can do, and remotely
administer the machine are strengths. It is true that if you buy enough
software, you can get some of this functionality with Windows PCs, but you
would be fighting the system. GNOME and KDE operate in an environment where
such controls are assumed in the design and are supported natively. Then
there's the ability to easily have users keep the same desktop no matter
where they login. A central home directory on an NFS mount or using cheap
PCs as XTerminals (or a combination of both) allows users to login from any
of multiple machines and still have the same environment. 

I use an old P60 as an XTerminal at home, and I love the fact that I only
have one set of applications to worry about, only one set of user files, one
set of config files, etc. I like the fact that I can sit down at either
machine and have the same environment. I sometimes have to use other
Winboxes at work and always end up looking around to find things because the
desktop is machine-dependent instead of user-dependent. NT changes this to
an extent, but there are still things like setting the application that runs
when you double-click on a file. This is still machine-dependent and not
user-dependent on Winboxes.

As KDE and GNOME become more stable and powerful, there will be more
situations where deploying them makes sense.
 
> But you should have standards. Even though using Freebsd, Linux or a Mac
> might be better. Why make your job differcult by not complying with
> standards :)

He's creating new standards within his organization. Many people did the
same when upgrading from DOS to Win31, and from Win31 to Win95, then to
Win98, and eventually to W2k. Standards change.

-- 
 Anthony E. Greene agreene@pobox.com
 Homepage & PGP Key http://www.pobox.com/~agreene/
 If it's too good to be true, it's probably Linux.