Go to any Linux forum, and ask someone how to accomplish something, and some well-intentioned but utterly moronic science geek will spew out an answer that the person asking will quickly brush aside as useless.
Why is the answer useless?
Because the user wanted to push a button, click with the mouse, drag and drop, and get a result quickly. However, the typical Linux expert is a computer science nerd who thinks a graphical interface is for children, so he thinks he is being helpful by teaching us all how to use the command line and type in complicated commands that look like code out of a Hollywood movie.
Every someone writes in response to a new Ubuntu user, "That's easily done. Just open a terminal and..." the glazed over lack of interest on the part of the target audience is almost audible through the network cable.
Guys: NO COMMAND LINE. NONE. EVER. NADA. If you have to drop to the command line in an OS, the OS is doomed to being used by scientists and programmers only. The goal for Ubuntu is to reach a wider audience: Your grandparents, small children, artists, and people who DO NOT LIKE COMPUTERS.
Everything must be accessible via the GUI. It should be possible to run Ubuntu with total effectiveness without even knowing what a terminal window is.
If you think the terminal window must be opened to solve a problem, you are missing the point. The need to even have a terminal window IS THE PROBLEM.
Eliminate it and banish it to the background. Experts will always be able to find it and configure it to be reachable. The rest of us refuse to use it, as we get paid to work on things other than our computer.
Monday, February 25, 2008
Banish the Damn Command Line!
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1 comment:
I fully agree-- one of the smartest things Microsoft did was the GUI/mouse with no need for the average windows user to access a command line.
If desktop Linux could keep moving that way, and reserve a "hidden" command line for techies, it would be great.
When I recently installed Ubuntu 7.10 Gutsy Gibbon to dual boot with XP, it would only boot about every 12 tries. I finally found a Linux reference to a bug which had a workaround involving stopping the boot and using "e" to edit the boot line by adding "irqpoll."
It worked. But to make it a permanent change, I had to figure out how to become "root" and use the terminal and Gedit add this in the Grub boot line.
This should be corrected ASAP by the Linux ppl. At the time I had not seen the reference to changing SATA ports, which should not be necessary anyway, in my opinion.
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