[arch-general] We have lost the desktop war. The reason? Windows 7.

[RedShift]

Stefan Erik Wilkens wrote:
> A general rule in life is that nothing is ever free. Perhaps a bold
> remark to use in an open-source mailing list, but cost doesn't have to
> be defined by money.
> 
> We simply pay for using Linux by coping with slightly lower
> performance in some (certainly not all) areas of the desktop
> experience, furthermore by dealing with a lack of certain features and
> compatabillity with the rest of the world (office and other indistry
> standard applications not being available to us, the open source
> counterparts not being up to par with the standard due to
> closed-source or licencing).
> 

I haven't thought about the money aspect and yes this world does revolve around "you get what you pay for". Though I see this in a different light, just because we chose to be Free, we have to settle for less?

> Though we try to stay on par, I think determining that we have lost
> implies that we must outperform other operating systems in every way
> to be considered a real alternative.
> 

This point has come up in the forums as well. Don't we want linux/Free software to succeed in all facets of computing? Certainly because the desktop is a big chunk.

> KDE 4.x is in active developement, GNOME is renewing the desktop
> experience (albeit slowly). Things are moving along in the open source
> desktop world. Thankfully, linux != just desktop
> 

Yes and KDE 4 has made huge improvements over the releases. But my peers do feel similar and the most common response is, how can the community be so unresponsible for doing flawed releases?


>> However, for me, the negatives unfortunatly outweigh the positives. For the most part, because they don't really enhance my productivity
> 
> Behind != different?
> 


I don't consider being "behind" as being "different"


Glenn