I really would like to keep the flaming down to a minimum. Ideas usually begin small, but have the potential to do great things. If you poke holes in something you should have the integrity to provide a useful and constructive comment. If you find that all you do is persecute people for challenging your religion (Linux), then you should get from behind your computer, read a book about the Spanish Inquisition, go to a party, get drunk, get a girlfriend/boyfriend – something other than hating free thought. Dismissing an idea without even attempting to see its merit is very similar to the prosecution of Galileo.

With that said:

Linux is a great operating system because:
1. It is highly customizable
2. It does not cost too much
3. It is stable
4. It is secure; it does not get viruses often
5. It does everything Microsoft Windows can
6. It runs the Space Shuttle (imagine the Blue Screen of Death on re-entry)

Although Linux can do everything and can be installed on practically any computer, it does not have what Microsoft Windows does: 90% of the world’s computers and 90% of the world’s software developers.

Why is Microsoft so strong? Have many people given this much thought? I hear many Linux people talking about how Microsoft is such an evil corporation because it has such a Monopoly (and that is the only reason stated), in a sense they do have a monopoly, but it is not as big as people think, the Linux user is proof that there are alternatives. Alternatives are one thing choice is another and the world has chosen Microsoft because:

1. Most Windows software will not work on Linux and if it does it is very hard to get it to work. There is no point and click. Consumers don't have either the time or money to learn how to get their windows programs working on Linux
2. Intel and Microsoft give computer makers healthy rebates for OEM packages, making computers cheaper. Notice how a new computer has Windows on it? Why not Linux?
3. Most new software products are for sale and Linux makes it difficult to keep secrets. Therefore developers for pay use Windows because they are assured that the average user can not reverse engineer their work.
4. Microsoft has Bill Gates (a leader) who along with his team sets standards for the operating system and how the product will be marketed, again, MARKETED.
5. Almost anybody can install Windows and install programs. Some Linux distros are easy to install, but compiling source code applications can defeat even the more than average computer user. Wouldn’t it be proper to develop application packaging standards? Why one package for Red Hat, Another for Mandrake and yet another for Debian? The consumer does not really care about the technical why, but the “Why can’t it be done” type of why.

The question is: What will make the world want to use Linux?

Although Linux is intended to be very flexible and allow the user to control aspects of the OS, the consumer needs:
1. Easy installation of both the OS and APPLICATIONS. Easy in the sense of the Add/Remove installer that Windows has. Yes some distros have this capability, but it is still difficult for the average user to understand. The application installers may be easy for most of the users on this website, but remember the "average" computer user. Can they understand most of the application installers?
2. Seamless Integration of the "MONO PROJECT" into the OS so that .NET applications can be used. This will attract many developers to using .NET and will allow the consumer to use their applications on both Windows and Linux.
3. Integration of WINE or some other Virtual Machine that can have the option of being point and click or technical (as most current Linux users like). Again consumers can use their Windows programs.
4. Intuitive interface that can encapsulate the operation of the OS without resorting to the command line. I know that this item is currently the way most Linux distros work, i.e. KDE and GNOME. Linux users have the option of using other means of manipulating the OS. Keep it this way
5. Linux needs to be attractive to the computer makers. It needs to be machine specific in some cases, but mostly it needs to be cost effective for the maker and something that the consumer will buy. Marketing, Marketing, Marketing.
6. Hardware NEEDS to work! And if it doesn’t the drivers need to be easy to get and INSTALL. Yeah in a perfect world, hardware vendors will help Linux out, but it is not a perfect world. New drivers need to be developed faster and published faster. Ensure that hardware can be used quicker. Who wants a computer that will not run their printer or scanner? As more and more people switch to Linux vendors will produce the drivers for us.
7. KEEP IT CHEAP! Companies that develop Linux and sell their development should keep their costs down. This is currently the case. I can get SuSe and RedHat much cheaper then Windows, but will that be the case when either gets more market share? Or will they be like Microsoft? In any case every time Microsoft has a TV, Radio or Internet commercial, Linux needs to have one as well.
8. Use more "Wizards!" If a person can be walked through a complicated process, they are much more likely to be satisfied.

As for the eye candy.....Give me a break, Linux LOOKS GREAT in fact I think it looks better in most cases than Windows. Not much work needs to be done there.

To be fair the reasons why I HATE Microsoft:
1. Too many bugs on initial release.
2. Too many viruses.
3. Security sucks and you can not manage it as well as Linux.
4. Before .Net software development required a lot of BLOAT in order to handle errors and manage memory.
5. IT COSTS TOO DAMN MUCH and is too restrictive. Why don’t I own what I paid for? Its my money, my computer, stop telling me what to do with it.
6. OS prior to XP was not memory independent and if one process crashed the whole computer crashed. In fact even XP has some processes that crash the whole system. Processes are not very resilient. And even with .Net managed code, memory leaks happen!

Although lists of good and bad can be compiled on both sides that go on forever, the lesson is very simple:
Look at what Microsoft did right, use those ideas, look at their mistakes and avoid them. If you have a wheel in front of you why do you have to re-invent it? Bill Gates did it to Apple and IBM, let’s do it to him.

i think gentoo, with a GUI installer (coming out) will be the "perfect distro"
i heard they are coming out with a GUI installer for it, that is quite easy to use and comes with stuff like fluxbox and xchat and gaim.
it should be perdy cool.

"eye candy":
once you have a working gentoo system (which isnt too hard, even easier with the installer prolly) you can download fluxbox, gkrellm, xmms, and gtk themes and make all the "eye candy" you want.
http://tuxxman.homelinux.net/pics/sc...pt-15-2005.jpg
that took me just about 10 minutes to make it all perdy.

functionality:
once one has stuff like networking, video, fstab, ect working there are a lot of addons for a gentoo system using portage
there are many drivers for loads of devices in portage. i installed the spca50x drivers for my webcam just by going:
and watching it go. im not saying you couldnt use the drivers in other distros, its just much easier to use portage than do it manually. and for the noob there is a GUI portage app called porthole to make it even easier.

ease of use:
im sure that the gentoo installer will make the system much more noob friendly, but for the above-average linux user like myself it is very "easy" to do just about anything.

i am now writing and helping write scripts to make gentoo easier for my friends, and as soon as i do i will post them and let them grow and expand.

I think it's a great thread. I wanted to start a similar thread but never got round to it. Too bad no one, except a few actually came with something constructive to say. Aysiu et al. claim Linspire is the perfect linux system. Good for them. I would really want people to give some examples of what is a perfect linux system to them.
For example:
Do you want linux to be slow?
No, of course not. Gentoo is fast, but installing a program takes ages, so unless you install something it is fast. The fastest system I used was SLAX copied to ram. The whole system is compressed to less than 200 MB so it can fit to your ram easily.
For a perfect system it would be a good idea to copy the entire operating system to the ram during boot-up, or at least vital parts. Now that ram can exceed 2GB even windows XP would fit. So if linux is small enough there will be space left in the ram for user operations.

Should it be bloated or minimalistic?
More minimalistic than bloated. A nice set of standard packages like in ubuntu. I think it should contain packages so that you can compile from source out of the box. Only my gentoo based systems had this.

Faster boot up! I heard that Mandriva 2006 is very fast and initng is being developed.

Vidalinux is my favorite dist at the moment. It is a stage 3 gentoo with an Anaconda installer from FC4. It has taken the best from two worlds. I think that's how a perfect linux should be developed. Steal the best from everyone.

Portage works great but it's too slow and uses huge amounts of space. Apt is in my opinion of a perfect installer. The frontend could be more user friendly. An idea is to have more categories than now and to hide libraries and apps that are very unlikely to be installed. The way it works now you get a list of hundreds of programs and libs and its pretty hard to find what you want. It would be nice to click cd-burner and get 5 alternatives. That is a reasonable amount. In command line you just type "apt-get install 'your program'". Pretty easy too but a newbie won't know what program to type.

The windows way:
Google for your program... Find it... Shareware?... Download... Locate it... Double click...OK...Next...Yes...Next...Next...Next...Next...Finish... This is a 30 day trial...You have 30 days left... Click to purchase... Some features will be disabled in this trial version... Damn!

I guess that what I left out of my quite lengthy discertation was what I think would be a perfect linux system. What I would love to see:

1. Easy installation of the OS, applications, hardware, etc.

2. Integration of the .Net Framework via the Mono Project and something similar to Sharp Develop (an open source IDE)
a. This allows windows developers and future linux .Net developers to create applications platform independent.
b. Allows the option for developers to either develop for open source or pay. Attracting professional development projects.

3. Integration of a "stable" Virtual Machine.
a. Attracts current windows users by allowing them to continue using applications in linux

4. Standardization of package management and installation. Easier source code compilation and installation.

5. Intuitive GUIs

6. More wizards to help with complicated configurations and operations.

7. Better hardware driver support. More accurate auto detection.

These issues need to be addressed and standardized if Linux wants to be considered either perfect or wants to take over the desktop market.

What I don't understand is the un-willingness of some linux folks to do things certian ways "just because Microsoft does it that way". If Microsoft does something good use it. If Mac does it better, forget MS and do it Macs way. If Linux has a unique way of doing it that is EASIER and BETTER, then by all means do it the Linux way. If Linux does not make the computing experience easier and more productive, then people will not use it. Who wants to use something that makes life more dificult? (Forget that I asked that last question. I am sure some Linux Cult somewhere wants to do things the hard way.)

I do SO agree..

if anyone read my posts, do anyone wanna make a team (with me ofcause) to make this Uber-distro which is talking about ??

I'm on it.. I want linux to be a superb replacement for ms-win

I would very much like to make a superdistro. The trouble is that so many people want to do the same thing. There are already more than enough distros. What we could do is to have a discussion forum about what should be in the perfect linux. The way Terfy started the thread (by saying linux should concur the world and that it should be made easier and steal the good things from windows) made a lot of people start flaming him. I agree with Terfy. Linux should steal ideas from windows and linux can really frustrating because it is so hard to get things that just work in windows to work in linux. I hate windows because they rule the world and I would like linux to take over. This would force hardware manufacturers to make linux drivers for all hardware. There's really no point to pay for an operating system when you can get it for free. Still the majority of computer owners pay a lot of money to get windows on their computer. Just because they don't know better. Whenever you post these kinds of opinions people start saying that linux is not a replacement for windows, linux doesn't need to rule the world, linux is good for some things and windows for some - leave it that way, linux should not become windows, linux is about having total control of your computer, linux is not for everybody, Linspire is the distro that all windows users would love.

Once people get started with these kind of opinions you will miss the point.

To start a good discussion the thread should state something along these lines:
Linux has so many good distros out there and each one has many benefits. This is good since everyone will be able to find a distro suitable for them. This thread is about discussing what is best in each distro and perhaps end up with creating a monster linux better than ever before, or we could end up really confused because there are too many opinions. We could therefore divide the discussion into two separate parts: One distro for geeks and one 'easy to use distro'. Linux has been evolving rapidly lately. An important part of the discussion should also be. How should linux be improved in the future?

I can start:
Gentoo for speed and portage
Debian for apt
Fedora for anaconda installer
Mandriva for easy to use control panel
Slax since it is so small and fast when the entire system is copied to ram
Slackware for its stability

Linux should also steal ideas from BSD, windows and Mac OS.

Pretty satisfied with that post!
E

Please read my previous two posts in this forum. It would appear that you had missed the boat when all you got out of it was "steal good things from Windows". It is all about putting together a system that will be useful to the consumer and not just the "Linux Geek". If you want to create an OS that will rival Windows, you need to consider who makes all the programs: SOFTWARE DEVELOPERS, who uses the OS: CONSUMERS, and how you can ensure that each has what they need.

Also it is more to do with marketing than anything else. Marketing in the sense of advertisement, corporate deals (MS and Dell for example), and a growth strategy. Everyone forgets that any OS or any computer product MUST BE used by a mass consumer base for it to be widely accepted as standard. Even if you are giving away a product, you need to get the word out in order to attract the most users and establish an industry (in this case a Linux product) standard. Whether or not you are selling your distro or giving it away, you need a consumer base.

Please, if anyone is serious about making a Distribution that will take the best of everything and incorporate it into the OS, please, please, do your homework and be a little more analytical. Also if in your attempts you try to "steal" anything from a giant corporation (such as copyrighted material or ideas) you will soon find your endeavor quickly halted by the courts. In some cases this can be very expensive and will be a tremendous setback for Linux.

Instead of stealing, try to approach it from the standpoint of analyzing the successes and failures of previous endeavors to build "The Perfect OS". Look at things at the most basic of levels, such as language runtime enviroments (Java, .Net, etc.) and standardized packages. Look at what worked and what didn't. Don't just take parts of one thing and slap it together with another, look more at the process and the core of what it does. If no one has come up with a good way to do something (because they are to busy stealing and not using their imaginations) then invent a new way to do it. Example: RPM, APT, YaST, etc are all distro specific and do not apply to Linux other than their own lineage. There has got to be a way to reliably install all those packages easily along with source.

If this post sounds like a flame, I am sorry. I encourage all good ideas, but please think about what you are saying before saying it.

Thank you.

You are right that in order to make linux compete with windows you need to get more software working on linux. But linux software is not so bad. My philosophy has always been to use free software as much as possible. Even in windows I use freeware. I have found that normally a free program is just as good or even better than a non-free program. In linux almost everything is free. Most users just use Word and Excel and they won't suffer from using open-office instead. I have heard that CAD-programs are significantly better in windows, but scientific programs like Matlab or Maple have linux versions.

I don't know how many of the users out there really need other programs than the ones in the openoffice package (apart from email and web browser). To me it seems that in windows most programs are for system stability, firewalls, virus and spyware. What software do computer users actually use?

Linux is really superior to windows in the way it handles software. When you install windows you need 5-10 cd:s to get operating system, drivers, antivirus, firewall and software installed. Then you have to download whatever additional software you want. You have to run windows-update emediately or you will be hacked instantly.
With linux you just pop in a cd or dvd, follow the easy instructions and you're done. Sometimes you decide which software to install as you install the system, but normally a good selection of packages are already included. If you use a net install you will get the newest version of all packages as you install. It should be easy for a computer technician at a work place to make a linux install cd with the programs needed at that particular work place. That is time saving!

You shouldn't steal, but rather borrow or adapt ideas to fit your needs. As for marketing, you can't really compete with a corporation that makes billions and billions of dollars if what you sell is for free. Most linux distributions are made by people who volunteer for their own pleasure. You just have to make the best operating system possible and rely on that the word is passed on mouth to mouth.

But I agree with your points. It would be interesting if a linux distribution that could really compete with windows and if someone could finance it so that it could be marketed properly. Also if some pc manufacturer would sell pc:s with linux preinstalled. I guess linspire is almost there, but it would be cool if a free version of linux would get there and go even further.
E

Hey Terfy.
I am glad that people do find the time for undertakings such as you have described.
Your goals are ambitious, I wish you best luck on your endeavours.

I myself wanted to create the perfect linux distribution, but I only wanted to do so for me,
not for everyone. I gave up due to a) lack of time b) lack of knowledge. These two points
are correlated, because if I would know more, I wouldnt have to invest so much
time googling, browsing forums, sitting on IRC (it can be fun too, but frustrating as well).

Anyway, back to the point, I find it good that people attempt to better a situation.

I find all the guys that flame ideas just for the sake of flaming as time wasters.

It happened to someone else I know, and it killed a lot of his motivation to pursue
on his project. (And it already goes slowly.)

We should accept that people have DIFFERENT opinions. We CAN continue to
elaborate WHY opinions are good or bad but its a bad idea to attempt enforce
your own ideas onto others. If its good for you, then you are happy already.

There is no need to flame.

Back to your last post:

"I do SO agree.."

- That was about Microsoft and the point that if Microsoft uses something that is
good, why not use it as well?

Everyone who ever said "its bad because MS does it" must think again.
I will tell you the truth - if an idea is good, then it is good, no matter who
had it.

About Microsoft itself, its a corporation that needs to generate profit.
Thats totally different from a community of developers that do something
in their free time, for example. I think we want to create something
that is perfect. We dont have to worry about creating an inferior system
that allows viruses and trojans to hijack your computer, monitor
your behaviour, and just be a pain in the ass by avoiding to accept
standards that do make sense (such as OpenDocuments).

"if anyone read my posts, do anyone wanna make a team (with me ofcause) to
make this Uber-distro which is talking about ??"

I am already on another distribution. So I cant help with it as
developer/"guy-that-invests-a-lot-of-time-in-this".
BUT I am willing to help out whenever there need be problem solved.

"I'm on it.. I want linux to be a superb replacement for ms-win"

Ambitious, as said. My personal philosophy is that I would like to have
a perfect system that is perfect at all the things I need (which is a lot).
But I digress, do you use a forum or wiki to centralize concepts?

The only one flaming here is you. If you go back and read this thread from the beginning, no one was flaming. We were expressing our different opinions, which you say should be accepted (but instead of accepting them, you're calling them flames). Some people think that there are already Linux distros that are "perfect" in the way that Terfy wants them to be. We have a right to disagree.

Before you embark on a new project, you should at least understand what's out there already. Otherwise, you're just duplicating other people's efforts.

There are so many types of software that windows users need that Linux does not have a good alternative to. Small businesses often pay thousands of dollars for software that will help them run thier business that they can not just up and switch to Linux because those types of programs just are not available in Linux. I work with a mortgage company that has software based upon the .Net Framework. They purchased it for about $5,000 USD. It does not make sense moving to another OS because of the cost of this software.

Most people are thinking of Linux in the Home environment, not the small business environment. To assume that most computer users are as computer illiterate as my Mother is a false assumption, especially if the user was successful in installing Linux. Users usually need something more than just Email, Word Processing and Internet. We need the tools specific to our trades! Most serious computing takes place in Small Businesses and applications are specific to the type of business conducted. True Linux would be a great alternative, but these useres are reluctantly stuck using windows.

What I am trying to say is:

You can not count on Linux having a viable alternative to software used by all people. True there are a lot of good software programs out there, but most people rely on windows for some software packages. Personally, if I had a good Virtual Machine, .Net integration and a realistic version of Wine, I would never have to use Windows ever again.

Free those imprisoned by windows by letting them use windows products on Linux. That is really the biggest bump for those wanting to switch.

Who is flaming? I thought I was in a previous post, but I appologized.

Issues to be addressed in order to free the enslaved windows people:

1. Integration of .Net
2. Integration of Virtual Machines
3. Reliable Wine
4. Good technical help

If you attract software developers, you will win the battle against MS. In fact MS knows it is going to loose a lot of market share as evidenced by:

1. Creation of the .Net Framework that can be platform independent. For those who don't know, .Net is a way to combine multiple progamming languages into a Common Runtime Environment. One could assume that MS is attempting to extend its influence into the software development market. Fortunately for us the folks at Mono Project are already porting the Framework over to Linux. www.mono-project.com .


2. MS has implemented a "Genuine Windows" authentication check that will deny updates to Pirated copies of Windows. In addition they are limiting the number of times you can install windows on a single machine. Yesterday my Windows Pro license key was locked out. Apparently I scrubbed my system too many times (naturally because of viruses). THANK YOU SuSE FOR COMMING TO MY RESCUE!!!!!!

3. The way developers create new programs will change yet again with the release of Vista. More consolidation of code. Developers soon will not be able to program C and will not have access to windows APIs.

The reason why I am pushing so hard on getting windows programs to work reliably in Linux is because I am stuck with certain programs that I can find no alternative to as are millions of computer users. There are so many different Linux Distributions with diferent flavors, but none of them are reliable with respect to running these programs, not even Linspire. People really do not have an alternative when necessary and vital applications are protected by MS and its Copyrights. If MS looses its strangle hold on these applications, then Linux will find itself in massive demand. I envision a day when MS will become so powerful that they will start to dictate what I can do with my computer and when (already a reality if you have ever read the EULA). Linux can do everything, except totally free me from MS at this point. If there is anything I can do to help just let me know.

Just wanted to say something about installers:

I have tried several distros, but so far my favorite is SuSE 9.3. YaST is a great installer for RPM packages. My second favorite is the Synaptic Installer from Ubuntu.

YaST:

YaST will execute when you download an RPM package and install it on your system similar to a Setup.EXE from windows. This is good because it checks package integrity before installing. It also sets the Applications Menu for you, sometimes it doesn't, but it makes it easy to find out where something was installed to so you can do it manually.

Synaptic:

Synaptic is similar to YaST in that it will auto install packages, but you need to download from one of Synaptic's sources. Downloading packages seperate from Synaptic and then installing is a little more dificult than YaST. The greatest benefit is that you can set your sources up to check the "Universe" and get a larger assortment of applications to install.

It would be good to have an installer that will take the simplicity of YaST and the versitility of Synaptic (being able to set up media and sources) and combine the two. With YaST it would be easier if there was a setting that would only show the program you want to uninstall and not all the other dependencies. It might be that I am new to YaST, but it appears a little cluttered. I am sure that I will learn more things about it in the near future.

Also as a side note:
The distros that I have tried lately do not install NVidia drivers by default. This really sucked as it was dificult to install in Debian and Ubuntu. Mandrake when installed on my system did not work all that well. SuSE gave the option to update during setup process and installed the NVidia driver for me, that was really great. I know that not including NVidia in your distro is to prevent stepping on NVidia's proprietary rights, but SuSE made it easy to get the driver and install it by downloading it. NVidia is a huge Video Card manufacturer, generic drivers are not as good as the proprietary ones. In short all distros should make it easy to get the driver if it is not part of the Distro. Not having the driver is like not having a proper IDE controler. Without both your Linux experience will be limited and ultimately unsatisfing.

You can't have every single thing that every single different user wants. You just can't have it all, its impossible. It's all about tradeoffs. For example, say you use Gentoo's portage... it installs things slow as hell, but (if you know how to tweak for your system without breaking things) once the program is compiled, it is very streamlined and very fast. On the other hand, you take some precompiled rpm's for redhat... they install very fast (compared to gentoo), but the software it's self runs relativly slower because it probably was not optimized for your system, and had added bloat for maximum compatability for every other possible thing you might want to run along side it. It's just about tradeoffs. Hell, nearly any distro of linux can potentially have nearly anything on it, given the right tinkering... so you might be able to buy computers in stores with Gentoo preinstalled... but what the hell kind of normal user is going to want to screw with portage all the time? So then they want one that does every single little thing for you... but then you get into the area were they wont learn jack about how the machine works (which is fine with them), but then something will break, and it's probably going to be relativly more difficult to fix, it being linux, then if it were windows... where they would have probably just had to uninstall the program they had installed and then reinstall it, and if everything is done for the user, if its all automated, then that basically just turns it into a windows clone, like Linspire and all those. Is that really bad? No, I dont suppose it's inherintly bad, but personally I just think that defeats the pourpose of using linux... by my outlook anyway. I suppose one could argue that there are innumerable points as to why various people use linux, and that he or she uses it because they want to, peroid, and who cares why. The average person doesn't care what the operating system on their computer is, as long as the stuff on it works, and its reasonably fast. I've noticed that a good portion of non-geek people dont even know what operating system they run on their computer at home. I'll ask them what operating system they use, and they're like "um, i donno, Dell?" and I'm like "do you have a start bar? etc. But basically, I think the only way linux will really be adopted by a vast number of "average" computer users is if microsoft bites the dust. And to be honest, I doubt linux is going to be teh cause of microsoft biting the dust. I think they will eventually, I cant say when, but in any case, I think that's probably linux' only chance of actaully getting a major number of "average" people to use it. I think right now, microsoft is just too big, too widespread, they're everywehre. Until they somehow get taken out of the running, linux, nor anything else for that matter (including OSX) is going to be able to get a large enough foothold to take the rest of the OS market.

Marshall

P.S. Sorry about the rant, I sorta got side tracked for a while, heh.

Sounds as if someone needs to try Mepis.