Joseph Dal Molin wrote:
> Put on your rubber boots, watch for Microsoft's FUD attack on open source
> today.....thanks to our friends on the freesw listserver for the advance
> notice.
>
> http://www.nytimes.com/2001/05/03/technology/03SOFT.html
>
> The New York times article give a taste of what's to come as well as an
> short reaction from IBM.....
>
> So.....on this note what do the folks on this list think the most
> significant arguements against open source still are?
>
> Joseph
>
> -------
> Joseph Dal Molin
> Minoru Development Corporation/Minoru Development SARL
Personal perception is that documentation is of varying quality and that the
last mile user-interface and user experience wise is sometimes lacking.
Example, try to figure out the tar command from the man page. All that would
be needed is a two line example in the man page:
tar -xvf foo.tar unpacks file foo.tar
tar -cvf foo.tar bar packs file bar into foo.tar
Great command, but trying to figure it out from man page is horrendous.
There's about 20 switches listed on the man page. Next is the obvious giving
up of some control of a work which many un-enlightened corporations, or ones
that have a monopoly are loathe to do. From the article, the MS exec is
playing to corporations, they don't seem interested in the end user with this
current gambit. Open source for MS is a big problem: a 300 pound
marshmallow, with no head to cut off. They are worried and should be.
-- IV
