On Thu, Jul 23, 2015 at 03:13:34PM -0400, Alec Ten Harmsel wrote
> New software could be:
>
> * more efficient
> * technically better (i.e. GPT is technically better than MBR)
> * have new features that you don't think you need but come in handy
>
> If your system works, why do you update it? Unless you actively need
> the update, you're just wasting cycles.
Security fixes. Unfortunately, the security-fixed version depends on
updated libraries, which depend on other updated libraries, etc, etc.
> See above. Also, "teh shiney" is a valid reason. This is how software
> (and everything in general) moves forward. Couple examples:
>
> * linux: The very definition of "teh shiney." Started by a university
> student for fun. snowballed into the beautiful thingy we all use every
> day.
As opposed to "real unix" which cost hundreds/thousands of dollars for
licencing, and was tied to exotic "workstations". I was a Canadian
federal employee in the 1990's when we got hit with massive budget cuts.
You're a manager in a science department on a reduced budget. You need
a new "workstation". Your choices were...
* a $100,000 IBM RX1000(sp?) "workstation", plus a $5,000/year AIX
software licence
* a loaded Compaq for $5,000 and free linux, and you can accomplish the
same FORTRAN number-crunching
And how many home hobbyists were running "real UNIX" before linux?
> * ruby: Started because Matz could not find a language that was perfect
> for him. Now it powers loads of websites.
"New-and-improved" stuff like Ruby gets in via the back door...
* Some Ruby fanboi, who's in the WebkitGTK upstream, makes Ruby a
hard-coded dependancy of Webkit.
* Lennart Poetering sends an email begging the GNOME people to make
systemd a hard-coded dependancy for GNOME and it happens.
* Skype now requires Pulseaudio as a hard-coded dependancy
Three pieces of software that were getting nowhere until they became
hard-coded dependancies of other, more-commonly-used software.
--
Walter Dnes <[email protected]>
I don't run "desktop environments"; I run useful applications
