JMZ schreef op 06-12-2016 18:14:
On 12/06/2016 10:21 AM, Jesse Steele wrote:
<snip>
As I understand, current Ubuntu users are sophisticated types like
super-geeks, engineers, and professors. They probably provide most
input for Ubuntu's knowledge base, but there is no reason Ubuntu can't
work for normal Taiwanese.
This perception you note is certainly the case in North America, and
likely in other cultures. Part of the difficulty of "selling" younger
adults on Linux is, in the main, bash. In the late 1980's I began
computing with my school's C64s and later 80286. A twentysomething
today likely didn't learn about computers through assembly code
projects etc. I acclimated quickly to bash given my past experiences.
Today, there is no past.
The past has been wiped out because Windows does not provide any easy
way to program the base system (writing device drivers or anything is an
enormous task) but Linux is no easier and is not a good environment for
learning to program because its scope is too big; there is too much you
can do at any given time to know how to find what you would want to do.
Back in MS-DOS the help system was very concise, all the commands were
listed and also the only directory that mattered was c:\dos.
There were basically only 4 files that were of importance outside of
C:\DOS and those were autoexec.bat, config.sys, io.sys and msdos.sys,
the latter two of which you never needed to touch, but use the sys.com
utility to create bootable floppies and the kind.
Anyone could easily start programming in QBasic and create executables
in that way, although perhaps you needed the QuickBasic compiler for
that, which was not supplied.
Doing system manipulation in MS-DOS (through QBasic I mean) was harder
but that's where Turbo Pascal came in. It provided an assembler and
could compile stuff easily to executables. At the same time there was
also Turbo C to provide the same experience for C users.
Access to the hardware was direct and there was no complexity involved
in getting started, all you needed was the (Turbo Pascal) environment
(or similar) and you were good to go.
Today people are STILL learning programming through the age-old Turbo
Pascal environment, but now in emulators.
I once spoke to a girl who was being taught programming at school. It
was a few years ago but they were using pascal.
So yes, agree completely. The past is lost.
I once ventured it would be a good idea to build an android-like toy
system where people could learn to program, a hardware device like the
old "Home Computers", but the only thing that comes close is the OLPC
(One Laptop Per Child).
Which is a Linux system, but scoped to make it easier for pupils and
children to learn the ropes, together with a guided system to learn the
ropes of programming and language.
It's fancy that those "poor people" have what our children don't.
Today the only thing that reminds me of coming near is the Arduino.
But it's not for computing, it's for electronics really, and that is
really not everyone's game, at every junction in their lives.
When I was in school (basic school, primary school) our computers would
have QBasic on them or even GW-Basic and it was possible to do something
with it. Today's computers have no programming environments and Bash or
Python or Ruby or Perl is not the same thing.
It's way too serious and way too difficult to do anything in that
doesn't impact the entire system that is already way too serious and way
too difficult, as a matter of saying, because I am sure many here
disagree.
I have long-standing project to recreate some of that 80s feeling but I
haven't been able to work on it.
Sorry ;-). But anyway.
If I would voice anything here then it is that the idea that ordinary
users should be able to use all of the tools that are provided is what
is holding Linux back. Ordinary users cannot use all the tools that are
provided.
They shouldn't be blamed for not knowing how to use the system. Take
some of the blame yourself, and make it easier for them.
That's all I can say.
Installing the required keyboard software for Taiwanese should not
require any effort or knowhow. That's all I can say.
Saying that it is "possible to configure it" is not good enough for an
ordinary user and also not good enough to make an inroad in some market.
That's all, bye.
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