On Mon, Jan 16, 2006 at 04:34:44PM -0800, Warren DeLano wrote: > > Through extensive travel, contacts, and personal experiences over past > few years, I have come to understand just how poorly Linux is doing at > meeting the needs of the scientific visualization community. Despite my > unabashed pro-open-source stance, it would be unethical for me to > continue advocating the adoption of Linux as the general solution for > UNIX OpenGL visualization when in practice it is only effective for > those having strong system administration skills. >
Eh? OS X is that much better in regards to system administration? Try telling your average OS X user to install coot (and don't tell him what subversion of OS X he's using), and feel free to post back how simple it was for him/her. And for the record, setting up the nvidia drivers in linux (fedora, in my case) is three lines: rpm -ivh http://rpm.livna.org/livna-release4.rpm rpm --import http://rpm.livna.org/RPM-LIVNA-GPG-KEY yum install kernel-module-nvidia-$(uname -r) Then just restart X. Or you could read any of the 800,000 pages that come up when googling "linux nvidia howto." > This is primarily due to incessant complications with proprietary OpenGL > drivers. In my considered opinion, resolution of these issues is beyond > the reach of the open-source community, as no Linux vendor has > sufficient clout or motivation to effect the necessary and permanent > changes (i.e. shipping validated *proprietary* graphics drivers with all > common distributions of Linux). In this case, the open-source community > is (correctly?) putting free software ideology > (free-software/open-source drivers!) ahead of users' needs to simply get > work done now. Its not a motivation issue. Its that linux users don't want to ***depend*** on anyone. Not Apple, Microsoft or NVidia - I want, as they would say on the twilight zone, control over the horizontal as well as the vertical (I own the computer, after all). From what I understand, its the whole reason linux was written in the first place. > In time, this approach may yield the desired end-result, > but scientists, doctors, and engineers need a working solution today. > > Caught in the middle of all this, our obligation as a vendor is to > identify, advance, and promote solution which actually do work for our > customers today or very soon and not at some unspecified point in the > future. We need an alternative answer to OpenGL under Linux, and we > obviously believe that answer lies with Mac OS X. > <snip> > > Apple, in contrast, is fully committed to OpenGL -- an open standard > that runs on any platform. Furthermore, by switching to Intel > processors, Apple customers will now have even greater choice to run > one, two, or even three major operating systems on Apple hardware. > Simply put, Apple "gets it" when it comes to consumer choice, and over > the past several years they have made it a practice of synergizing with > Free Software and Open Source efforts (GCC, Darwin, KHTML, PyMOL, > etc). If the mailing list is meant as an infomercial, I'll start sending it to my spam folder. > Steve Jobs understands that open-source is transforming the software > industry, but he also apparently grasps the new role that proprietary > solution vendors must adopt in delivering extra value on top of what is > already both ubiquitous and free. That, in a nutshell, is the future of > the software industry. Proprietary and open-source solutions will > co-exist and complement one another to the benefit of consumers and > developers alike. > Aren't you just saying Apple's binary only drivers are better than NVidia's linux-based binary only driver? The argument presented above is simply hyperbole based on nvidia chipset support from different vendors. If thats the logic, can't I say "since the NVidia drivers for windows are more stable than the NVidia drivers for linux (SLI support, HDTV decompression, etc), everyone should go out and buy windows since its gets more support from vendors."? > > this blatant > > shilling contrasts jarringly with the open source context in > > which PyMOL is developed, distributed, and supported: PyMOL > > is attractive in part because it promises long-term, flexible > > access to the tools to do our work, without users falling > > into a vassal role with respect to one industry-dominant company. > > I apologize for excess enthusiasm -- it is perhaps an overreaction > to biased and premature dismissal of Mac OS X as a credible solution > by some members of the pharma/biotech IT & Informatics communities. I thought the mailing list was for discussions regarding the usage of a program, not a forum for polemicism. > > > Launching such a hyperbolic cheerleading campaign may belie > > the stability of the support one might expect from Apple for > > this technology, if one feels such campaigns are necessary to > > keep that support alive. > > But that is exactly my point: If potential customers such as yourself > do not show strong interest in these systems through purchases or > communicate to Apple (directly or through us) why they may have missed > the mark, then Apple would be correct and justified in concluding that > we are uninterested in Mac OS X-based solutions for scientific > visualization. > or I could find a development community that *IS* its user base, and therefore doesn't require my input/money/praises in order to understand why its necessary to support poor little ol' me. Which is linux/BSD! > So let me make clear: We are not saying, "Go Mac!" blindly and without > reservations. But you said: On Thu, Dec 08, 2005 at 11:58:40PM -0800, Warren DeLano wrote: > > To avoid Linux headaches -- my brutually honest advice is to buy > Macs instead. It's just that simple. > How is that not saying "Go Mac!"? Regards, Tim -- --------------------------------------------------------- Tim Fenn f...@stanford.edu Stanford University, School of Medicine James H. Clark Center 318 Campus Drive, Room E300 Stanford, CA 94305-5432 Phone: (650) 736-1714 FAX: (650) 736-1961 --------------------------------------------------------- -- --------------------------------------------------------- Tim Fenn f...@stanford.edu Stanford University, School of Medicine James H. Clark Center 318 Campus Drive, Room E300 Stanford, CA 94305-5432 Phone: (650) 736-1714 FAX: (650) 736-1961 ---------------------------------------------------------
