On the note of a central software repository for all distros, why not? Yeah it would take some work, well ok, writing the OS was no walk in the park right? Maybe start with something a little more broad reaching. An all in one repo, for RPM based distros. Set up nothin but arch independent software, that has all the needed metadata, to tell each distro, basically, hey this is what you need. Isn’t that one of the reasons for RPM in the first place? The ease of software installation?

Why not work on making a software installer that is standardized at the kernel level, (security, stability, yeah I know.) I don’t mean put an installer “in” the kernel, that would probably take security and throw it out the window, (no I’m not trying to dog MS here). Write an installer, that ships with the kernel. I know that not everyone would go for it, but maybe it’s something to consider for the non-techie people. Make the gui for it part of xorg, that would set a standard method across all distros.

As far as the comments about techie people not making software for the non-techie people, anyone who has ever talked with a programmer or an engineer knows that is about as far from the truth as you can get. I have never met a geek, who was in it for the money. (Yes it’s a plus). Geeks love to share there knowledge, and they will do it however they can. Linux, like the internet, became a great place for geeks to get together and show what they could do.

Quick parting thought. The command will not likely dissapear until computers run internally at the speed of light. Lest face it, no matter what the OS, the majority of the worlds server machines, don’t run a GUI.

I like Linux for what it is, and not as the alternate to Windows (or for a shortsighted hate of Microsoft). Linux is special in so many ways.
Like quite a few people mentioned above, I have also had a few dabbles (actually a bit more than that, starting in 1997) with various Linux distros.

Linux has had tremendous improvement over the last few years. Supporting Open Source initiatives is only now really coming to the fore in stability (innovation was pretty much a given). Having its roots as a hard-core techie OS it is now slowly starting to take the form of a maintainable desktop environment to those less hard-core.

My issues with Linux however are:
More often than not, you will find that hardware vendors support Linux ‘badly’ or not at all. This isn’t helped by a myriad of Linux distros and a kernel release schedule that is very hard to quality assure and target software against.
The innovation and choice in the Open Source associated with Linux tend to do just as much damage to its reputation as it is doing good. I have had numerous encounters with programs that reacts funny, hang etc; this extend to high quality Open Source like Open Office. This reminds me of the earlier years of Windows and may constitute maturity/growing pains in Linux? Following is a generalisation but in my sphere of work using Windows, I find unexplainable failure to be less than rare. Windows present these issues to me in a consistent way, leaving me feeling safe with my work performed/performance and the functionality around it.

However, when I started out with Linux, I was sitting on the internet 24/7 to read threads on fixing, deploying, patching, and updating specific things that I needed to get a functional system. This, for somebody who has a life other than computers is unattainable. Module version dependency between kernel modules and packages still has me quivering.
Even companies generally associated with Linux and Open Source make better work of deployment and configuration of their software in Windows than in Linux! May I name a few…
And… when I run Linux, I do not want the source code; I want to implement the driver or software without having to build it – regardless of how easy or how difficult it is to build. Just let it work!
This goes with my opinion that I do not want to be an expert in make, gcc, kernel modules etc to get my WiFi card to work!

To sum up:
Linux needs more strict and central governing. End-user, especially the stupid ones like me, experience should be eased by getting some kind of consistent configuration up and running… and then I am not talking about the Setup of this and the Whatever of that, I am talking about a setup that is similar in interface between different Linux distros! Dare I say, like Control Panel Applets?
Application and systems software should be forced into having easy-to-find 90% complete or better configuration utilities.
Application programmers should use the look-and-feel of the theme implemented at the OS level. This goes for Windows as well. Some programs make a desktop look like a badly decorated Christmas tree.
Linux need to be taken seriously by hardware vendors and more seriously by software vendors.

Killer

November 13th, 2006 at 4:15 am
Linux will never really end up surpassing Windows because of the simple fact that most people run Windows.

People talk about Windows as if it were a shining example of software excellence. Come on now - back to the real world.

Linux will end up surpassing Windows simply because Windows is really not actually that good and not that difficult to surpass. The fact that a bunch of volunteers working in their spare time for a laugh (mostly) have been able to get so far in a fraction of the time Microsoft has taken to get Windows where it is now (after millions of man hours and billions of dollars) is surely a testimony to how good Windows really is.

The open source people are much better motivated, have better aims and goals, and are not as hampered by top heavy bureacracy nor bogged down by politics as those people working in corporations are.

November 10th, 2006 at 4:52 am
Re: stolennomenclature

Regardless of all your comments re techy people, it is absolutely clear that “techy” people are working at getting Linux to be able to be used by non-techy people. You seeming assertion that no one cares is not true. Companies that use Linux for a business such as Red Hat know that there is tons of money to be made by making Linux into a mainstream operating system, and are working hard at it. They have not succeeded yet but the time will come.

Your comment re people picking the distro which suits them is really often on the same level as people who pick a car by its colour. All the modern distros do more of less the same thing. They have the same kernel, use the same productivity apps, have the same drivers, etc. Where they differ is only by which particular bits of the distro have been stuffed up and dont work properly, and by the colour scheme.

They use different package managers but they are all me-too clones that do more or less the same thing. The main difference with Fedora’s package manager is that it does the same thing but much more slowly.

As to the comments re commercial software for non techies, I would like to point out that Windows facility with optical drives is not much better than Linux. None of it works properly either. To get optical drive support you have to install third party cripple ware like Nero InCd, whose main claim to fame is that it never ever works correctly.

In fact the worst and most bug ridden software I have ever used has been non open source software produced by commercial companies like Microsft, Nero, Pinnacle, etc.

Finally, I am actually a tecchy. I have been in the IT industry for most of my life as a software developer (nearly 40 years). I have seen it all from the inside. The reason I want to use a GUI is mainly for pleasure and convenience, not because I lack the skills to use a command line.

The reason Linux GUIs lack the required sophistication is really mainly about time, not about development philosophy.

November 10th, 2006 at 7:02 am
1/. COMPLETE GUI SUPPORT.
the function you seek is available in KDE

Never seen it. How does it work?

2/. SIMPLE DESKTOP ACCESS TO REMOVEABLE DRIVES.
the function you seek is available in KDE

Where and how?

3/. CENTRALISED PACKAGE MANAGEMENT.
the function you seek is available in smart (http://labix.org/smart)

I think not.

What is wrong with using a terminal window? the only diference is that is more usable than the current command prompt in windows (windows itself was a ms-dos program)

Easy support when something goes wrong is available everywhere in the net due to the open source nature of Linux, also there is an extensive testing before regular releases and continuous bug fixes.

In the case of games or any proprietary software, it all depends on who made it regardless of platform.

About Linux not having “safe mode” that is not true. Some Linux distributions even have “safe mode” as boot choice or you can just use “init (2 or 3)” in a terminal window and you got it, It doesn’t look as ugly as Windows safe mode but it is there.

Hardware support is one of the weak points of Linux but it is not exclusive to the platform. The problem is even worse with Windows 64bit edition. Where there is virtually no support for most hardware. In fact more hardware worked for me using a 64 bit edition of fedora than Windows 64 bit edition.