I’ve been seeing recently, well actually over quite some time actually, articles which basically talk about the “reasons” which basically tell you to install Linux on your desktop. Besides that I’ve seen distributions that basically center themselves in making the graphical interface look like Windows XP or Windows Vista. Well this is my rant about all of that.
One of the reasons, there are many I know, that the Windows operating system is a preferred target is because is the most used OS in the computers around the world. I also know that the system has it’s many flaws and so does Linux, but they are somewhat different. One of my predictions is that if Linux becomes more and more widespread, not to mention the creation of less secure tools, then it will become a more interesting target for those people that want to exploit the systems for their own benefit.
At this point I would like to remind the population that Linux is not virus free, like some people think, recently there was a virus that was affecting Linux. Sure, this wasn’t as widespread as the ones that Windows has and it also had a requirement that you had to run the actual virus as root for it to really affect you, well that is if I recall correctly. One of my predictions is that if Linux becomes mainstream like Windows it would start getting attacked more and more by viruses and other forms of attacks.
Linux has been getting more and more popularity because it has been getting more and more end-user friendly every day. There are pros and cons to this behavior, one pro that I can think of is that this allows for easier installations and certain tools are actually quite useful, when I began using Linux back in 2000 it was quite hard to get somethings working not to mention the installation of applications was quite difficult as well, nowadays installing an application in Linux is as simple as running applications such as Synaptics or running a command like aptitude or pacman. One con that I see in this user-friendliness is that as applications have a tendency to hide the process which they use to load files or automatically run applications or load files without the user interfering with the execution of the application, this could potentially be exploited in a way that allows for a malicious program to execute without the user’s consent.
After all Linux is not for everyone, despite the constant attempt to make Linux into a mainstream operating system like Windows is, not all the applications you use in one operating system work in another operating system. From my point of view, Windows is an operating system mostly designed for the end-user who just wishes to use his computer for writing the school paper or similar and also for gaming, where Linux was mostly designed as an enthusiast OS where you really had control of the OS, for most of the end-users out there they don’t really care to have control of their machine and would just like to open their document without having to type a command or the like. Windows allows for that to occur where Linux can do the same it does it differently and that is what scares users since they have worked most of their lives with the Windows OS and have never seen the console, not that you are forced to use it when running Linux.
One thing that has always annoyed me from all of the different projects that attempt to make users change from Windows to Linux is those projects that try to make the graphical interface of Linux look like a Windows clone. If you want users to change from Windows to Linux stop trying to make Linux look like Windows it’s just plain annoying. So my only recommendation to all of those projects STOP DOING THAT!!!!1 I not only find it stupid but I also find it annoying. I don’t use such “distributions” or themes because I don’t like the interface of Windows anyways.
My suggestion here, if you so desire to make Linux so mainstream, is to begin from the bottom like Windows does…ok, let me explain before you go all crazy on me. Most schools around the world teach their students how to “use” a computer with Windows, there are some others which teach using the MacOS, or at least that’s what I saw when I was in Elementary School back in the US. Until recently there have been schools where they teach their students how to “use” a computer with Linux and I applaud that and this is what I meant with begin from the bottom and move. If you teach them what Linux is and a general idea of how it works, without making Linux look like Windows, the students will get interested in this and will begin using Linux more and more.
Basically this rant and post was created after I’ve been seeing numerous posts on Digg about the “reasons” which prove that everyone should move to Linux, seeing more and more projects where they try to make Linux look like Windows and the fact that my girlfriend told me that she was using a distribution called “Linux XP”. Finally got her to switch to a better distro.
In conclusion Linux is still and never will be for everyone, simply because of the way it is, everything on this world is not made for everyone and it’s only made for a group of people and that’s how things are. Windows is not for everyone either, it’s just for a group of people and for some tasks. You can’t expect to create a magical software which does everything that everyone and every application needs.
-LM
Well, I often thought about this topic myself. Especially as there are many collegues of mine asking me, how to switch to Linux. But all they want is an OS, that works out of the box. There’s nothing left of the enthusiasm as you wrote.
To tell you the truth, I don’t like all those guys who only want to use Linux, because they don’t have to pay for it. I use it, because it rocks. I like entering cryptic commands at the terminal. An X-Session is just a manager for all the open terminals :-).
Maybe it will the problems with all the software my level up between Windows and Linux as more and more people are using Linx as a “typwriter”…