[wplug] If I were a Linux consultant...

[Alex Birch]

> On Thu, 18 Sep 2003, Alex Birch wrote:
>> I've read many books on GNU/Linux and it's been my _ONLY_ OS for the
>> past
>> 3 years.
>>
>> It's just done some of these things to help chemist do chemistry and not
>> worry about GNU/Linux.

> Eh?  I don't follow.  If you've used it solely for three years, you should
> be comfortable with the filesystem structure.  If not, as others said, go
> ahead and create your sym links but don't expect to find them on any other
> system.

I guess I've been ambiguious on this list. I feel great with it. It's just
when I try to bring others over to Linux. I did these sym links and the
graduate students left me alone. That's a win-win situtation.

The other reason why I started this post is because someone said that the
TCO isn't higher with Linux. That is why I'm bringing up why linux may
need to change before the average user can switch over.

For myself, I'll continue to use mutt not matter what Ximian dreams up. I
like my Debian. I'm thinking of Gentoo, but that's who I am. Not my
sister-in-law nor the chemistry people who now use Linux.


> Or until people become less fixated on MS Office compatibility.  This may
> just be when hell freezes over too.  My wife and daughter (windows users)
> could care less if they're using Windows or Linux... until it comes time
> to do some work in Excel, or Word... or until my daughter tries to play
> her latest Harry Potter game.  Steps have been made to remedy this but I
> don't know if OpenOffice or StarOffice will every be fully, 100%,
> compatible with MS Office.  If there's the slightest chance that my
> wife's boss won't be able to properly open her spreadsheet, she doesn't
> want to risk using OpenOffice (understandably).
OpenOffice.org will never be compatible with M$ Office because M$ XP isn't
100% compatible with

But I believe crossover office works well on Linux.

> I hope they have some success but Sun has failed miserably in this
> department in the past so I'm not holding my breath.

Sun is fickle. They used to ship their hardware with linux but switched
back to Solaris.

Cheers,
Alex