Strategy for fixing Bug #1

[Jan Claeys]

Op woensdag 27-12-2006 om 07:14 uur [tijdzone +0100], schreef mikecorn:
> Linux Problems
> - too many bugs and rough edges in applications
> - error messages are hidden in log files, incomprehensible, or do not
> exist
> - technical and user docs are often missing, erroneous, or outdated
> - docs are in chaos: man, info, http, text, websites, tar
> (or sometimes findable only with Google)
> - developer goals are not aligned with common user needs
> (FOSS is not customer or market-driven)
> - development is not managed (1000s of independent projects)
> - developers care about creative freedom, not about utility,
> standards, compatibility, fit and polish, quality documentation, etc.
> - app development is 90% overlapping, a huge waste

The above is also more or less true about a lot of Windows application
development & documentation.  And open source projects like Apache and
Python actually have better (free) documentation available than e.g.
Microsoft has in most cases.

> - Linux distros are diverging, making app portability and support too
> difficult for software providers. (Software I developed using Ubuntu
> runs unmodified on about half the other Gnome distros I have tried.
> Problems: package naming, file names and locations. KDE distros often
> fail for lack of Gnome libraries - a hurdle most users are not 
> willing/able to overcome.)

If you don't know how to package for all those distro, most likely there
will be someone else who wants to do it for you.  And I'm sure every
major distribution has experienced people who will make packages for a
(decent) fee, so this especially shouldn't be a problem for commercial
software vendors.

> - the LSD project is an attempt to create some useful standards and 
> cross-platform tools, but Mark Shuttleworth has stated he does not 
> believe in this.

Maybe because the LSB wants to standardise linux software on already 3
year old libraries/software for the next 4-6 years?

> - software providers want standards, so that installation and support
> does not have a different "gotcha" with each distro. MS Windows
> provides a single standard, which is more important than its
> weaknesses (viruses, etc.). 

Most viruses only exist *because* of that standardisation...  :-P

(And this whole "single Windows standard" is just a myth anyway;
Microsoft actually employs hundreds of developers who do nothing but
fixing third party software or adding special cases to Windows for
those--just to make them compatible with newer versions.)


-- 
Jan Claeys