Linux is not Windows, never will be....

[SomeGuyDude]

Even windows has a lot of things that make sense and could be emulated, it pisses me off when people say "Linux isn't Windows, deal with it."

Sometimes it's valid, such as when someone complains about something in Linux that is a good feature, but is just different and the person doesn't like being introduced to something new (Synaptic, command line, whatever).

Sometimes, though, there IS a good feature that Linux would do well to take a look at. One that springs to mind is how nice it would be if I didn't have to spend a while digging around for dependencies in order to install things, and end up installing a whole block of 60 packages just to make sure I have everything I need. Annoying as hell.

[greymongrey]

Sometimes, though, there IS a good feature that Linux would do well to take a look at. One that springs to mind is how nice it would be if I didn't have to spend a while digging around for dependencies in order to install things, and end up installing a whole block of 60 packages just to make sure I have everything I need. Annoying as hell.

I know in the Window 98 days programers would alter a programs DLLs and then overwrite the system files in the case of bad programming and place them in the application folder in a few good cases.I've often wondered why the dependencies aren't included inside the programs since we are going to have to download them anyway. That way, you could download a program and it would run regardless of what version of Linux you ran.

And yes, I am aware of the dark side of this (bad programmers adding spyware/malware like they do in Windows). Still, there has to be a Linux way of making it work.

[Lord Illidan]

I know in the Window 98 days programers would alter a programs DLLs and then overwrite the system files in the case of bad programming and place them in the application folder in a few good cases.I've often wondered why the dependencies aren't included inside the programs since we are going to have to download them anyway. That way, you could download a program and it would run regardless of what version of Linux you ran.

And yes, I am aware of the dark side of this (bad programmers adding spyware/malware like they do in Windows). Still, there has to be a Linux way of making it work.

You mean static and dynamic libraries? http://www.yolinux.com/TUTORIALS/Lib...ndDynamic.html
http://www.learncpp.com/cpp-tutorial...mic-libraries/

Personally, I disagree. One very good advantage of dynamic libraries is that many programs can share the same library, for instance the gtk library, thus cutting down storage requirements on disk, and also in RAM.

As for the Linux becoming Windows discussion, I like the way that Ubuntu is taking in most places. What bruce89 is referring to is about Gnome's dumbing down, not neccessarily Ubuntu's fault. The way I see it, is that we all have the choice to run whatever distro we need, and each distro caters to different users, while remaining Linux internally.

That way, both power users and utter newbies can use Linux. The power users can use Gentoo, Slackware, Arch Linux, or whatever takes their fancy, and the newbies can use Ubuntu. I think there's also a sort of "graduation process", where a user starts using a very userfriendly Linux, then as he becomes more proficient, starts using a more powerful one. It happened with me, and I'm sure that it happened with other forum users.

There are other reasons why I believe Linux is better than Windows, and where it will never go into Windows domain - DRM being the primary reason. Thanks to its free software roots, I don't believe Linux will ever have DRM integrated into it, at least not when GPL 3 becomes the main license.

[days_of_ruin]

That's the direction I don't want to see. You can just install xscreensaver to get it although.

Wait you think the old screensaver app was bad?
It had more options.Or am I just reading your comment wrong?

[Lord Illidan]

Wait you think the old screensaver app was bad?
It had more options.Or am I just reading your comment wrong?

xscreensaver was the old screensaver.. I get what he's saying, namely that the Gnome devs are removing plenty of options in order to make it "simple", however, many of these options just get shoved into gconf-editor or a config file, thus it's harder to edit in the end.

Oh, and gconf-editor is something which I really don't like, in my opinion.

[aysiu]

gconf-editor is the worst of both worlds. It doesn't have the nice presentation of a proper GUI (think Gnome Control Center or KDE System Settings), but it also lacks the efficiency of the CLI.

[bruce89]

Wait you think the old screensaver app was bad?
It had more options.Or am I just reading your comment wrong?

Options aren't everything.

gconf-editor is the worst of both worlds. It doesn't have the nice presentation of a proper GUI (think Gnome Control Center or KDE System Settings), but it also lacks the efficiency of the CLI.

You've never heard of gconftool-2 then.

There is no need to turn this into a GNOME flamefest.

[aysiu]

You've never heard of gconftool-2 then.

There is no need to turn this into a GNOME flamefest.

I wasn't talking about gconftool-2, which I have heard of; I was talking about gconf-editor. And I am not flaming Gnome by pointing out that gconf-editor is a terrible interface. I compared it to Gnome Control Center, which is a part of Gnome as well.

[bruce89]

I wasn't talking about gconftool-2, which I have heard of; I was talking about gconf-editor. And I am not flaming Gnome by pointing out that gconf-editor is a terrible interface. I compared it to Gnome Control Center, which is a part of Gnome as well.

I'm not sure what a better way of displaying a hierarchy like that would be.

[zugu]

Still, there has to be a Linux way of making it work.

Actually, if you can bear KDE, I suggest you check out PC-BSD. They have a system of managing dependencies just like Windows or OS X, called PBI.

Except this is not a Linux way of making it work, it's a BSD way.