[Ubuntu-ch] Ubuntu strengths [was: Re: OT: iPhone]

[Dirk Deimeke]

Hi,

>> uncritical info is the topic in the last weeks. I had some very
controverse
>> articles in my blog ... Apple devices are religious stuff :-)

just thinking about it. Free and open source software can be religious
stuff as well.

> Link?

It is in German, take a look at the comments.

http://www.deimeke.net/dirk/blog/index.php?/archives/1215-Will-it-blend.html
http://www.deimeke.net/dirk/blog/index.php?/archives/1205-iPhone-....html
http://www.deimeke.net/dirk/blog/index.php?/archives/1218-Fuenf-Gruende-das-iPhone-zu-vermeiden-....html

> However she never would have switched on her own. Most users need a 
> person really nearby to consider a migration.

Same for my wife. I agree in total.

That is the reason for having regional contact persons.

>> Where are other "typical" end users?
>> Why do you (or me) use Ubuntu?
>> What do we tell our neighbours, colleagues, ...?
> I think many of us like Ubuntu because it is fairly user-friendly and 
> with the power of Debian (e.g. package management). Still it could be be 
> more so, e.g. kcontrol isn't as comprehensive as SuSE's YaST. Newbies 
> like something which is popular already, so that it is well supported. 

Agreed.

> Ubuntu has reached that level and has relatively many community members 
> who also are mostly not extremely geeky. Ubuntu works fairly well. It 
> only takes one major-cockup to get some users to switch. E.g. I switched 
> from SuSE mainly because one release had many bugs with USB-storage. I 
> was happy with Debian but then preferred Ubuntu because I'm not really 
> that keen on administration via terminal or text-editor as my memory 
> isn't that terrific.

My point switching from Debian to Ubuntu was the WLAN-driver. I no longer
wanted to compile it for every kernel update.

Further points for me:

The package management system is the best available (in my opinion).

The community behind Ubuntu.

The philosophy behind Ubuntu.

> Regarding the papers: they do like human-interest stories. I.e. they are 
> far more likely to a story of a sympathetic student helping neighbours 
> with Linux that a review of a distribution release.

That is exactly my opinion.

Just think about these two ;-)

http://www.deimeke.net/dirk/blog/index.php?/archives/1203-Der-wahre-Grund-fuer-Linux-....html
http://anamazingmind.com/blog/2008/03/the-real-reason-we-use-linux/

Cheers

Dirk