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Comment by jrockway | Hacker News Reader

I disagree with this. Software is mostly a product of API flexibility rather than the number of potential users.

One thing that annoys me most about Windows is that I have to use a mouse to manage windows. There are tiling window managers, but none of them can hold a candle to Xmonad. Even though Linux has fewer users, it has better software.

Same goes for Android -- fewer users and less monitization opportunities. But more possibilities, so there are more interesting applications. (Locale, for example.)

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>I disagree with this. Software is mostly a product of API flexibility rather than the number of potential users.

I'm filling out a job application that is a Word Document that absolutely vomits when read in OpenOffice. If there were fewer people using Word, they wouldn't be able to get away with that. There's a part of me that doesn't want to work in that sort of shop, but I'm only a year out of college, and if I have to do C# to get a developer position, I'll take that, C# isn't a bad language.

That said, I can't get away with using Linux because of the potential users problem. Now I guess you could call the .doc format an API flexibility problem, but no API is sufficiently flexible that it runs anywhere without testing. There has to be enough of a userbase to justify testing.

You should try looking at many more linux and embedded shops. Many weren't hit that hard by the downturn. (But good luck finding a job wherever you seek).

As a programmer, you shouldn't be filling out Word documents. Get your recruiter to do it, or send an email to the company saying, "I wanted to apply for your job, but your Word document is unreadable on my machine."

There is a major shortage of competent programmers and industry is dying to get anyone with a clue. Use this to your advantage.

> One thing that annoys me most about Windows is that I have to use a mouse to manage windows. There are tiling window managers, but none of them can hold a candle to Xmonad. Even though Linux has fewer users, it has better software.

It's not XMonad by a long shot, but Windows 7 has much improved shortcuts for moving windows around and doing some basic tiling (left half/right half of a screen, as well as fullscreen and "normal" with the Win-arrows combinations)

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