[KLUG Advocacy] Reactions to the Reuters article and related folly.

[Adam Williams]

>1. I thought the Reuters article was a rework of a lot of old cliches and
>   platitudes about Linux, mixed in with some newish quotes, many of which 

But a nice assembly of them.

>   were pretty weak IMO. It tends to reinforce my general view that a lot
>   of the media doesn't "get it", and their understanding of what is going 
>   on is at least 18 months out of date. If someone wants to quibble about
>   that number, I don't have a hard time upping it to 24 or 36 in this case.

I agree the number is about 18 months.  

However, it is hard to imagine that anyone tuned into the IT rags to any
degree could miss that there are several offerings of Linux
pre-installed.  There's even been court cases about Lindows.

> 2. This thread belongs here, although I certainly understand Bryans point
>    about this being a technical thread. I simply don't agree. Now, if you 
>    want to split the thread into technical and marketing/political/advocacy
>    subthreads, that's ok, it's not an all-or-nothing proposition. Both 
>    elements are vey much worth exploring.

I agree, I think it is actually a more political subject (the desktop)
than a technical one.  People, including me, need something that works. 
Linux does, at least for what I do.  If it didn't I'd probably go out
and buy a Mac.  For people who NEED to trade innumerable documents with
the ragged mass Linux (more specifically the applications) could be a
real frustration.

> 6. My own experience is that about 99.2% of the documents go into Star/Open
>    Office just fine from Office 97, and that I can generally ask people to 
>    send me stuff in some older format from the others (like Office 97 or
>    rtf, or even Word 6.0, I think). I have only encounter two problems on
>    occasion...
>      a) Word .docs with lots of text boxes in them do not render or hold
>         together well in SO/OO. The results vary from the amusing to the
>         irrecoverably messy.

Agree.  Word documents are not uncommonly troublesome.  I have had
excellent results in importing Excel documents, including very large and
complex ones.

>      b) There are sometimes interesting (from amusing to tedious, but not 
>         ever irrecoverable) problems with fonts in some spreadseets.

I've seen this as well.  Unfortunately the solution is usually to
install the M$ core fonts, which simple can't be included in a
distribution.

> 7. Use of Windows desktops in the non-Unix workstation market is pegged at
>    about 87-88%. This is a farily recent Gartner Group report. They report

That seems more in line with other numbers I've seen.

>    heavy bias towards the Macs in graphic arts departments (duh!) and rate

No really?!

> I would expect that no one will be shy about commenting on my impressions,
> opinions, or other comments. 

Of course not.