I've been reading this short story Entitled: "In the beginning was the command line" He's comparing the major OS'es to car dealers, on the same crosroad. And it actually is very nicely put analogy. Here's an excerpt: MGB's, Tanks and Batmobiles --------------------------- Imagine a crossroads where four competing auto dealerships are situated. One of them (Microsoft) is much, much bigger than the others. It started out years ago selling three-speed bicycles (MS-DOS); these were not perfect, but they worked, and when they broke you could easily fix them. There was a competing bicycle dealership next door (Apple) that one day began selling motorized vehicles--expensive but attractively styled cars with their innards hermetically sealed, so that how they worked was something of a mystery. The big dealership responded by rushing a moped upgrade kit (the original Windows) onto the market. This was a Rube Goldberg contraption that, when bolted onto a three-speed bicycle, enabled it to keep up, just barely, with Apple-cars. The users had to wear goggles and were always picking bugs out of their teeth while Apple owners sped along in hermetically sealed comfort, sneering out the windows. But the Micro-mopeds were cheap, and easy to fix compared with the Apple-cars, and their market share waxed. Eventually the big dealership came out with a full-fledged car: a colossal station wagon (Windows 95). It had all the aesthetic appeal of a Soviet worker housing block, it leaked oil and blew gaskets, and it was an enormous success. A little later, they also came out with a hulking off-road vehicle intended for industrial users (Windows NT) which was no more beautiful than the station wagon, and only a little more reliable. On the other side of the road are two competitors that have come along more recently. One of them (Be, Inc.) is selling fully operational Batmobiles (the BeOS). They are more beautiful and stylish even than the Euro-sedans, better designed, more technologically advanced, and at least as reliable as anything else on the market--and yet cheaper than the others. With one exception, that is: Linux, which is right next door, and which is not a business at all. It's a bunch of RVs, yurts, tepees, and geodesic domes set up in a field and organized by consensus. The people who live there are making tanks. These are not old-fashioned, cast-iron Soviet tanks; these are more like the M1 tanks of the U.S. Army, made of space-age materials and jammed with sophisticated technology from one end to the other. But they are better than Army tanks. They've been modified in such a way that they never, ever break down, are light and maneuverable enough to use on ordinary streets, and use no more fuel than a subcompact car. These tanks are being cranked out, on the spot, at a terrific pace, and a vast number of them are lined up along the edge of the road with keys in the ignition. Anyone who wants can simply climb into one and drive it away for free. Customers come to this crossroads in throngs, day and night. Ninety percent of them go straight to the biggest dealership and buy station wagons or off-road vehicles. They do not even look at the other dealerships. Of the remaining ten percent, most go and buy a sleek Euro-sedan, pausing only to turn up their noses at the philistines going to buy the station wagons and ORVs. If they even notice the people on the opposite side of the road, selling the cheaper, technically superior vehicles, these customers deride them cranks and half-wits. The Batmobile outlet sells a few vehicles to the occasional car nut who wants a second vehicle to go with his station wagon, but seems to accept, at least for now, that it's a fringe player. The group giving away the free tanks only stays alive because it is staffed by volunteers, who are lined up at the edge of the street with bullhorns, trying to draw customers' attention to this incredible situation. A typical conversation goes something like this: Hacker with bullhorn: "Save your money! Accept one of our free tanks! It is invulnerable, and can drive across rocks and swamps at ninety miles an hour while getting a hundred miles to the gallon!" Prospective station wagon buyer: "I know what you say is true...but...er...I don't know how to maintain a tank!" Bullhorn: "You don't know how to maintain a station wagon either!" Buyer: "But this dealership has mechanics on staff. If something goes wrong with my station wagon, I can take a day off work, bring it here, and pay them to work on it while I sit in the waiting room for hours, listening to elevator music." Bullhorn: "But if you accept one of our free tanks we will send volunteers to your house to fix it for free while you sleep!" Buyer: "Stay away from my house, you freak!" Bullhorn: "But..." Buyer: "Can't you see that everyone is buying station wagons?" You can find the rest of the story here: http://artlung.com/smorgasborg/C_R_Y_P_T_O_N_O_M_I_C_O_N.shtml On Fri, 12 Sep 2008, Thomas Van Parys wrote:

Kenny Billiau schreef:

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http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/geekend/?p=1280 ;)

(i'm guessing the begfun maillist isn't such a success?)

And these kind of nice commercials are the reason I have to wait in line in the store for people who want to buy a Mac but have no fucking clue what to do with a Mac or even with a computer in general! Get a calculator!

T.

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I've only read one more chapter after this one, and there he describes connecting to a mainframe uses paper teletypes in 1973. I'm guessing he is a little biased towards *nix systems ;) The point of the whole short is to describe the evolution of OS'es, or the lack thereof. And .. because linux still has poor driver support for energy-managing events, I don't think you be able to get that 100miles a gallon ;) But that's not our fault, that's the fault of closed source hardware drivers ;) But wouldn't you like to drive a tank? :) On Fri, 12 Sep 2008, Michiel Van Bel wrote:

very nice, but this excerpt raised my eyebrows a bit: (about the linux-tanks) They've been modified in such a way that they never, ever break down, are light and maneuverable enough to use on ordinary streets, and use no more fuel than a subcompact car.

linux NEVER crashes? who would have known :p

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Ow, I've got a nice pdf from the short story: http://www.psb.ugent.be/~kebil/InTheBeginningWasTheCommandLine.pdf just in case you want to print it in booklet form ;) On Fri, 12 Sep 2008, Thomas Van Parys wrote:

Kenny Billiau schreef:

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I've been reading this short story Entitled: "In the beginning was the command line"

Aah, the old car analogy! Slightly biased towards Linux as expected, but of course I agree.

I like this one the best:

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Prospective station wagon buyer: "I know what you say is true...but...er...I don't know how to maintain a tank!"

Bullhorn: "You don't know how to maintain a station wagon either!"

Happens all the time. In Windows/Linux discussions people alway mention that for running Linux, they'd have to ask for help all the time. And then they continue by asking me to install their new printer drivers on their Windows machine...

T.

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On Fri, 12 Sep 2008, Thomas Van Parys wrote:

...

Kenny Billiau schreef:

...

http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/geekend/?p=1280 ;)

(i'm guessing the begfun maillist isn't such a success?)

And these kind of nice commercials are the reason I have to wait in line in the store for people who want to buy a Mac but have no fucking clue what to do with a Mac or even with a computer in general! Get a calculator!

T.

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