LinuxVillage welcome > The bistro!
User abuse
djohnston:
It is the subject of an article posted on the Open For Business website. While I agree with some of it, I don't agree with all of it. In particular, I agree that:
--- Citer ---Very few Open Source project managers understand the concept of stability of a product and fixing the good features already included. Once users incorporate software into their work routine, they don't want significant changes. They aren't computer technicians. They cannot be techies if they are to accomplish anything else. It's enough work just getting used to computers as part of the routine; computers cannot become the whole routine. Wholesale replacement needs to be far better than the previous stuff with no substantial difference in how it works. Users don't care what constitutes techie habits. They want technology harnessed to their habits. They'll compromise some, but frequent wholesale changes are not compromise, they are user abuse.
--- Fin de citation ---
I found this part humorous:
--- Citer ---Open Source insiders don't understand that we'd like to use our computers, not have sex with them.
--- Fin de citation ---
What do you think? Do you agree with what the author says?
melodie:
Hi,
I agree with that part but not with the rest of the page. I have read a bit more than when I answered to you previously, and I have noticed that he has pointed to some of the programs which obviously are or were at a time the bad choices. I think even us, the first members of the LinuxVillage, would not advice any choice, any program, any specific distro and desktop without knowing what we are providing, having experience with it, in a way allowing us to help the users we will advice : this is likely to reduce the choice and therefore make it easier for final users who wouldn't know where to start.
There is a topic on which I am really not sure what to say is related to office suites. I am almost sure the actual Libreoffice versions must be really good ones, but I can only say "almost" because I am not a secretary, I don't know office suites more than typing a letter for my own use once a while, without any deep knowledge on how to do that in a sophisticated way, or even doing complex things with a calc sheet. So is he right about open source office suites versus ms office suites or is he wrong ? (apart from the fact free software suites are retro compatible, and ms office are not... )
djohnston:
--- Citation de: mélodie le 28 janvier 2013 à 01:18:44 ---I am almost sure the actual Libreoffice versions must be really good ones, ...
--- Fin de citation ---
In fact, they are. Many pundits cry that other office suites are not up to the "quality" of MS Office suite. Let's just look at one long standing problem with Excel. The page I'm linking to is a workaround solution for working with dates prior to 1900. He begins with this statement:
--- Citer ---Excel stores recent dates as a date serial number, which allows us to sort those dates and perform date arithmetic. Unfortunately, Excel's serial number begins on January 1, 1900; and negative serial numbers aren't recognized.
--- Fin de citation ---
That's not the only problem. You see, 1900 was not a leap year, but the Excel program treats it as one. No other spreadsheet programs I am aware of have this glaring error. Just do a search for "Excel 1900 leap year" and you'll get many, many matches.
melodie:
I had never heard of that. What do you do with years in spreadsheets ? And what happens in other office suites with real leap years ? :-[
Taco.22:
An interesting article, although I think that in the end the writer threw the baby out with the bath water - even I would take Ubuntu over Windows!! Open/Libre Office is pretty much up to speed and works well in the real world, and there are plenty of other examples of open-source that do a better job than their closed-source counterparts. However he did manage to hit a couple of big nails on the head.
I wear two hats when I do Linux. The first is as a hobbyist, a tinkerer, a hacker. I like to get under the bonnet, fiddle about, build systems, play with artwork, try out different things. My other hat is as a computer user, and as a user I want my system to be rock solid, stable and not messed about with. I like continuity, reliability and I tend to be conservative in my software choices.
Enough has been written about the cavalier attitudes of some developers - the KDE4, Gnome3, consolecrud and sudo debacles are well known. In the real world these projects would go bust or be redeveloped at the behest of the users. Do it or lose market share and go broke. Mind you, some companies like Google and Facebook have been known to treat their user base with utter contempt, probably based on the fact that they know the user doesn't have much choice in the matter. Interestingly within Linux the Openbox scene doesn't seem to suffer from this syndrome - maybe that's due to a strong female presence in the upper echelons, although that's no guarantee of ethics either.
However, I can see where the writer is coming from - I am a great believer in the adage "If it isn't broken, don't fix it". I am also a firm believer in accepting at times that something can't actually be improved - sometimes something just works so well that it doesn't need to be fiddled with. I know this must be particularly galling for developers, but that is one of the points this article is making. Is the product out there for the sake of the developer, or for the user?
If the product is out there for the user then the needs and wishes of the user have to be taken into account. In the real world computer users do a select number of things, using specific software that they have become used to, and almost automating tasks through repetition. I do research, upkeep three websites, do a weekly article for our local newspaper, do some graphic production, and build computer systems. I don't like my system unduly messed about with by bored and pushy developers. I don't want to keep relearning how things work. I don't want to have to keep changing the way I do things because somebody has decided there is a "better" way. The bottom line is that the computer is just a tool and I need it to be predictable, and I need the development base to be non-intrusive.
In the end though Open Source has to be the choice of thinking people. There are plenty of examples on both sides of less than friendly behaviour to the end user, but at least in the Open Source world you can participate. That may not suit the "typical" computer user that the article talks about, but then you have to decide whether you want to be part of the herd or to follow what you think is right. Neither is a particularly easy road - and neither is limited to computer systems either. There are many other things in life that require simliar decisions.
Navigation
[#] Page suivante
Utiliser la version classique