The New Era of Computing

Quoting:Most Linux distributions have not abandoned the desktop metaphor, and have done very little to modernize the interface.[

Hmm, Unity, Gnome 3, and KDE Plasma Active don't ring a bell?

Where have this guy been or where does he come from?

I didn't think people living in Redmond world are so isolated from the rest of the world.

This guy really needs a 2x4 to wake him up.

Fettoosh -- You know, I was thinking the same thing. It's a pretty ridiculous article, but seeing the source, I'm just surprised that it wasn't Alastair Otter (unless he changed his name).

Quoting:but seeing the source, I'm just surprised that it wasn't Alastair Otter.

yeah, Tech. writers these days are "dime a dozen".

The thing is it seems that every technical writer and blogger has bought into this stupidity. The stupid idea that having a mobile phone UI on everything is a great, brilliant idea and an advancement in computing, and anyone who disagrees is a a dinosaur, an inflexible idiot stuck in the dark ages.

Sure, we will probably end up with every computer desktop sporting a mobile phone UI, but it's still a stupid idea.

But the thing that interests and amazes me is the general acceptance among the technical writers and bloggers of this world, that this paradigm shift is necessarily a good one. It's like they've all been infected simultaneously with some virus that makes people stupid. There seems to be no sense that any of them have ever questioned the idea, the meme seems to have simply settled in and made itself at home.

Not even all the efforts by independent developers to undo the worst of the mobile phone paradygm on your regular 20 + inch monitor seems to give them pause for thought.

Sometimes I wonder why I don't get myself an old Sun workstation and use the complete Open Look desktop on that (rather than just the few bits that were open sourced and ported to Linux). Pretty much all UI "innovation" since that has been downhill since then IMHO.

People dislike nonsensical change, except when some authority figure tells them the change is a good thing. People who don't care for authorities dislike nonsensical change, period.

I suppose tech writers like changes, nonsensical or not, when they're likely to be adopted by a large number of users. It gives them something to write about, in other words it gives them something to be paid for.

Quoting:Sometimes I wonder why I don't get myself an old Sun workstation

You might not be saying that if you had one.

I have one, a "pizza box." It's so old, it's a royal pain in the @$$ to fire up.

I have an old Sun box -- an Ultra 10 -- and I fire it up all the time.

@ta: Some relevant phrases and terms I can think of are "groupthink" and "jumping on the bandwagon".

The nice thing about Linux is that we always have choices, including the choice not to jump on the mobile UI bandwagon. The thing that this so-called writer doesn't know is that the new paradigm started in Linux for netbooks in 2007.

Quoting: I suppose tech writers like changes, nonsensical or not, when they're likely to be adopted by a large number of users. It gives them something to write about, in other words it gives them something to be paid for.

They would still get paid if they pointed out the stupidity of a phone/tablet UI on Hi res multi monitor rig, or even your traditional full size laptop, instead of the sycophantic writing we do get.

Quoting:They would still get paid if ...

True, they would still be paid alright, but not as handsomely from a rich monopoly to outrageously twist the facts.

@tbuitenh, you are in luck! Debian still packages OpenLookWindowManager, or if you want innovation, olvwm is available too!

Package olwm

lenny (oldstable) (x11): Open Look Window Manager 3.2p1.4-23: alpha arm armel hppa i386 mips mipsel powerpc s390 sparc squeeze (stable) (x11): Open Look Window Manager 3.2p1.4-25: armel i386 mips mipsel powerpc s390 sparc wheezy (testing) (x11): Open Look Window Manager 3.2p1.4-28: amd64 armel armhf i386 mips mipsel powerpc s390 sparc sid (unstable) (x11): Open Look Window Manager 3.2p1.4-28: alpha amd64 armel armhf i386 mips mipsel powerpc s390 sh4 sparc 3.2p1.4-25.1: hppa 3.2p1.4-23 [debports]: m68k