well it seems to me that on well behaved hardware, including an easy to get working modem, linux will vbe set up quite nicely thank you on many distros.
Its the video hardware like "motivated"'s and the winmodems and the bizarre chipset problems that lead "my parents" to have problems. apple of course take that out of the equation with a very tight proprietary hardware spec. On Mon, 29 Nov 2004 14:28:48 +1300 Hugo Vincent <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Derek, > > On 29/11/2004, at 1:22 PM, Derek Smithies wrote: > > However, (in my defense) I note a certain sadness. > > We read often of comments, "linux is ready for the desktop" and the > > like. > > > > Yet, if people on the linux list are advocating that "my parents" > > get a mac, then clearly > > those comments on the readiness of linux are wrong > > linux has to improve its usability. > > > > Indeed, watching the recent spate of emails from our Hari Krishna > > friend, > > I have to agree with you Hugo. > > Linux is not ready for "my parents" to use > > > I think that Linux on the desktop is quite usable and intuitive in > general, but it is setting it all up, and fixing problems that needs > MAJOR improvement. I sometimes struggle with setting things up under > linux (e.g. the Synaptics touchpad driver on my PC laptop - builds > fine, manually installs fine, edit XFConfig manually fine, reboot. > crashes. whoops forgot to modprobe evdev in the init scripts...) > > An eMac will arrive from the factory completely set up, they just have > to plug in power, keyboard, mouse and maybe a modem/phone line, and > turn it on. > > Although they would probably never have any problems with a Mac, if > they did, > a) the error messages are a lot more helpfull, and > b) there is an 0800 helpline they could call. > > They will never have any problems with hardware or drivers, because > basically if its not built in its not supported :) > > To install software, they just drag the its icon on the CD to the hard > drive. > > To set up the ISP they just type in the phone number, user name and > password when asked during the first start-up/welcome/run-once program > that comes up. > > Regards, > Hugo. -- Nick Rout <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
