Jeremy posted an entry last night responding to a comment on
Kasia's blog which pointed out that linux is a work in progress.
While I agree that several linux distributions are a work in progress, they are almost all hobbiest distributions. In her original entry Kasia says:
So what did I have a problem with? The RedHat (I installed Fedora core 1) up2date agent crashing on startup. Once again, I'm a geek, took me 2seconds to find a problem. Missing font! I installed all the default font packages, well it appears I missed some obscure Helvetica size whatever font. Give me a break guys. How do you expect Linux to ever make it as a desktop OS if an entire application silently (to the user not running this from a terminal it just disappears without a trace or an error message) fails because of a lack of a font!
My answer to her is that if you want a desktop linux OS, go buy one. There are several options for released, professionally managed, commercial linux distributions, that don't have this kind of problem. You could use
Linspire, or
SUSE for example. I'm sure that there are others out there as well, but I have less experience with them.
Fedora is,
according to it's website:
The Fedora Project is a Red-Hat-sponsored and community-supported open source project. It is also a proving ground for new technology that may eventually make its way into Red Hat products. It is not a supported product of Red Hat, Inc.
Does this sound like an OS that is supposed to be commercially deployed as a desktop alternative? It doesn't to me. Now let's look at the text on the SUSE website:
Your PC has more to offer than the market-leading operating system reveals - more stability, more reliability, and more variety. In several editions for various user groups and needs, SUSE LINUX provides more than a mere alternative to the Windows family. With an installation routine that even newcomers can easily master, and with all advantages of the Open Source world.
That sounds much more encouraging to me.
There is a basic system at work here that people don't seem to acknowledge. It goes along with the "You get what you pay for" adage. You get out of a linux system whatever you are willing to put into it. With Fedora, a system you download for free, you have to put a little more work into getting it installed and keeping it running. With Linspire you get a system that requires little or no intervention at install-time and very little work to keep it running, in this case you put in money to get that system.
In the end, nothing really comes for free. If you want a desktop unix system that is as easy to install as MS windows, then I suggest you look into Mac OS X. If you are really after the linux kernel, then look at Linspire or SUSE. If you want something that you only have to pay for with your time, then look at Fedora.
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