linux = impossible? (no offense meant!)

[Keith Mastin]

<snip>
> There is another problem with unix, which I think is less legitimate:
> people are scared of the command line and following instructions.  Most
> people simply want to click a button and be done with it.  It doesn't
> matter if typing 'pkg_add some_package' is equivalent, because you
> actually have to follow an instruction to do this.  By following an
> instruction, I mean that the user is doing something other than running
> a program in the typical way.  (For many years, dragging an icon from a
> floppy diskette to the hard drive was the acceptable way to install
> Macintosh programs.  Even though it was mindnumbingly simple,
> installation programs caught on because most minds were too numb to
> handle copying files.)  Trying to tell people that our way is easy would
> be akin to telling Bush that killing people is generally a bad thing.
> You can do it, but they won't listen because they are completely
> irrational.

The command line does have a steep learning cliff. So does driving a car
in traffic for the first time, but they both get easier with practice.
Both are dangerous with just a little knowledge. Should people know how to
do both? If they want more out of their car that a trip to the curb and
back, then yes for the car. If they want more out of their computer than a
dummy interface, then yes for the computer.

I get a kick out of these 'server config gui thingies'... sysadmins using
webmin to configure something and never realizing that the thingy can only
unleash maybe 10% of the apps' potential. I'm not even gonna get into
ranting about the practice of putting a gui on a server to begin with...
some people are just much better off taking the bus.

-- 
Keith
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