He really doesn't understand linux users
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| theboomboomcars Dec 11, 2007 12:50 PM EDT |
From Article: Quoting:At least part of the reason for the need to refresh Windows machines stems from a desire to upgrade to the latest and greatest (XP instead of 2000; Vista instead of XP (or not)). Linux adoption doesn't follow the same frenzy to stay current. It's a bit more pragmatic, I suspect. From what I've noticed is linux users are upgrading to the lastest and greatest all the time. I've had my laptop for a year and a half and have gone through 3 OS upgrades on it, all of which brought better functionality and more features. All the while still responding faster and acting more responsive than the core2duo laptop I used at work over the summer. This is a celeron M 1.5ghz, so nothing compared to one of those new dual core wonder chips. I like being able to upgrade when something breaks or the new stuff is really that much cooler than what I have, and not because MS says it is time to upgrade. Ahh, freedom. |
| hkwint Dec 11, 2007 1:33 PM EDT |
The problem is in the definition of 'upgrading' and 'improvement': Most Windows users think perfection is reached if nothing more can be added - so their updates are aimed at adding stuff, while a lot of other people think perfection is reached if nothing can be left away, which means their upgrades might as well mean the size of the software 'shrinks' (like KDE4 in comparison with KDE3 I understand). |
| Bob_Robertson Dec 11, 2007 5:02 PM EDT |
Well, let's face it. I "chase the cutting edge" as much as a chronic Windows user might, but because of the hardware frugality of Linux I don't have to chase the cutting edge of hardware at the same time. My 4-year old laptop will run the latest kernel, the latest of all software, Beryl (or whatever it's called right now) for the latest in graphical desktop, the latest media encodings. To keep up with the "latest and greatest" in Windows requires also chasing the latest hardware. Maybe the author just didn't make that leap when he sees Linux users _not_ upgrading their hardware, and thereby assumed that Linux users don't chase the leading edge of software either. Just a thought. |
| hkwint Dec 12, 2007 11:50 AM EDT |
Indeed Bob, the 'cutting edge' confusion reminds me of some comment I wrote before, when we were discussing power supplies for CPU's. My favourite Dutch computer website stated a 700W supply was cutting edge, though a user replied 1200W would be more like cutting edge thee days. That'd be because the newest & greatest NVidia cards needed 230W+ to run, so an overclocked SLI configuration with an overclocked quadcore, all with proper cooling - which really was cutting edge - would need far more than 1000 W to run. Here was what my reply boiled down to: "What's more cutting edge, the 5,2 Litler engine of the Ford F150 delivering 400 horsepower, or Volkswagens 1.4 Liter TSI engine delivering 170 horsepower? Notice: The Volkswagen delivers two times the number of horsepowers per liter compared to the Ford engine" |
| azerthoth Dec 12, 2007 12:10 PM EDT |
hk what though is the power to weight ratio instead of the power to displacement ratio? |
| Steven_Rosenber Dec 12, 2007 12:36 PM EDT |
Users must be free to swap out distros every day if they want, or every five years or more if they don't want. The span between Windows 2000 and Windows XP couldn't have been more than a year, but it was six or so years between XP and Vista. And Apple doesn't re-release OS X more than every year and a half, at least. The whole idea of having a separate /home partition and interchangeable OSes is totally foreign to 99.99 percent of the users out there (i.e. those who aren't Linux geeks). People need choices along the range from total stability and little change (Red Hat) all the way to distros with new non-upgradeable releases every month or so (and we all know a few distros in that camp). |
| theboomboomcars Dec 12, 2007 12:39 PM EDT |
Quoting:"What's more cutting edge, the 5,2 Litler engine of the Ford F150 delivering 400 horsepower, or Volkswagens 1.4 Liter TSI engine delivering 170 horsepower? Notice: The Volkswagen delivers two times the number of horsepowers per liter compared to the Ford engine" Neither they are both using 100+ year old technology, only slightly improved by technology. When you look at the energy release by the combustion process to the energy used to move the vehicle it's sickening how much is wasted. With computers we have gone from like 20% to 30% effecient. Sad, sad sad. |
| Steven_Rosenber Dec 12, 2007 2:05 PM EDT |
And cars don't get regular OS upgrades, even if they do have computers running them. |
| hkwint Dec 12, 2007 2:10 PM EDT |
Quoting:hk what though is the power to weight ratio instead of the power to displacement ratio? Depends on what you mean, I think the F150 engine is two times as heavy as Volkswagens engine, though the F150 itself is little less than two times as heavy as a typical Golf. Why you're asking? Quoting:Neither they are both using 100+ year old technology Then anything Linux wouldn't be cutting edge either, since it's all written in C and largely based on Multics / UNIX ideas, which itself is 40 year old technology. By the way, Volkswagen sold '3L' cars for a while that run 100 km on 3 litres, which equals 78 mpg (can't call that 100+ year old technology!), so seems there is some progress. |
| theboomboomcars Dec 13, 2007 10:48 AM EDT |
Quoting:By the way, Volkswagen sold '3L' cars for a while that run 100 km on 3 litres, which equals 78 mpg (can't call that 100+ year old technology!), so seems there is some progress. I am not sure about that. In the early 1900s 20s and 30s they had electric cars. The model T got better than 30 mpg, and it was a big heavy brick compared to the Volkswagen. There have been some improvements, I even mentioned that in my previous post, engine efficiency has increased about 10% over the life of the internal combustion engine, and with that efficiency came more power at the same mpg. My Chrysler 300 gets pretty much the same fuel economy as a model T with twice the power, so can't complain about that. But with the advancements in every other part of the car being as great as they have been, it seems there should have been greater advancements in the power train. I am not suggesting any conspiracy theories here, just that we haven't expected anything more so we haven't gotten any more. I also think that hybrids are a joke, a typical transmission is about 75-80% efficient so bumping that up to 90% isn't going to help much, the biggest advantages for hybirds are being able to run without the engine going some of the time, keeping the engine at a constant speed some of the time, and regenerative breaking. Add those all together and you get what about a 20-30% increase in fuel economy, whereas getting an extra 10% efficiency out of the engine increase fuel economy by 100%, ie able to get the same gas mileage with twice the power. The only new technology in a cars engine is the computer controls, and they only simplified diagnostics for the cars we buy. Which is really sad, if you look at racing each cylinder is turned individually. The air/fuel mixture, ignition timing, etc. are all specifically calibrated and dynamically controlled, allowing those naturally aspirated 3.5l engines to produce 700hp. Though we don't see anything like that at the local dealership. Whereas with linux, it has the same base (more or less) as the unix of 40 years ago, it has improved and does much more. It has more features and abilities. It just seems to me that the auto industry is more like MS that the open source world, so it takes a long time to see any improvement in the products. And all the really cool features that get promised are always delayed or axed because they couldn't figure out a way to implement them. So what we need is open source car manufacturing and development. |
| hkwint Dec 16, 2007 12:12 PM EDT |
OK, I was going offtopic, back to open-source: Here: http://www.theoscarproject.org/ and here: http://www.autoindetoekomst.nl/website/ you can find two "open source car-development" efforts, though they're far from manufacturing. The second site is the most interesting in my opinion, though it doesn't seem to be in English. Nonetheless, you can click around the flash-tour to get an idea. It's a 'virtual' car developed by the three Dutch technical universities, and almost all techniques used in this virtual concept-car have been available already. The car is made of plastic (one of the universities has a good plastics-research institute). Seats are developed so you can sit in a 'circle' with three persons, like in a cooperative manner. One of the concepts is four hydrogen engines inside the four wheels based on fuel-cells, or the other concept could be used, I believe it's a hydrogen boxer-motor. Coincidentally, it seems the worlds largest hydrogen-manufacturing plants are in Rotterdam, NL, so there should be a market one suggest. The main problem is finding investors I believe. Back to open source again, one of the devs of the car said: "The vehicle’s technical drawings and blueprints are freely available online, and everyone is invited to add their own ideas and modifications, provided of course that these are shared again with the community." |
| Bob_Robertson Dec 16, 2007 12:46 PM EDT |
> "The vehicle’s technical drawings and blueprints are freely available online, and everyone is invited to add their own ideas and modifications, provided of course that these are shared again with the community." Reads just like the GPLv2. |
| theboomboomcars Dec 17, 2007 8:40 AM EDT |
Thanks for those links, there are some pretty cool ideas being thrown around in there. |
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