10 years of Linux and Red Hat Linux 9 (Shrike) is the best OS i have ever used
jerrymannel.com
jerrymannel.com
I certainly don't. Are you sure this isn't just rosy retrospection?[1]
There's a reason why apt and yum exist today, and it's because most people want their primary OS to "just work". You only have to play this game once to get it. The second time the configure && make && make install doesn't change much, except for needing a flag here or a utility there.
I wonder if a lot more people would be using nixes on PCs today if something like a current Linux distro existed ten years ago and worked as well with the varying hardware in common PC laptops/desktops.
Sure , we would have had better support for commercial consumer apps and drivers etc.
But basically the situation would have become more like android, instead of people getting their distributions from debian or redhat every PC manufacturer would have created their own distro.
So you would have Dell Linux , HP Linux , hell maybe even Microsoft Linux.
Of course they would all have crap pre-installed from the vendor approved repos which would carry whatever software the vendor had struck a deal with, probably no GCC etc.
Fragmentation would also be an utter nightmare with many app vendors only supporting their apps on the most commonly used distros and home made PCs would have to run some "white label" type distro like debian which would have all the problems it does today.
Upvoted for a very intelligent reply and extremely insightful comment. The "Linux desktop -> Android" bit oddly resonates with the way things feel today.
Is this really worse though? Distros themselves technically work as the vendors in this case with "crap pre-installed" (Unity, anyone?) , depending on how cynical you want to be and your choice of distro. Install Fedora Core 9 and Ubuntu 11.10 side-by-side to see that difference in play.
Having this controlled instead by OEMs run by MBAs who are more interested in kickbacks and splashing their logo on everything could be a worse experience.
GNU/Linux has a great deal of flexibility which is great for hackers, but is also great for those who would seek to abuse it.
When I was at uni , if I had been given "strict instructions" about what to install on my own PC I would frankly have told them where to go.
Edit:
His entire argument in this article was that he liked RH9 because the usability sucked.
People go on checking windows 8 rumors and iPad rumors. And they buy the tablets and electronics gadgets immediately when they are available thinking that the product will save their life in a new way. After windows 8 gets released, people will start running for windows 9 news, as Apple fans are looking for the new iPhone and next new iPad.
Even though the author projects his past, the notion that he misses long hours of tweaking red hat is wonderful. Most of the people miss their childhood, not long hours in front of the computer. It needs more energy for a person to miss it.
I love his writing more than the time when hacker news front page flooded with the death news of Steve Jobs. People started weeping for the person who has already gone. He was in constant work to make something perfect in the future, which is never possible.
And people won't go to Steve before his death. They won't go to him, talk something and make him happy. They jump out of their bed and run to the funeral in a good dress, looking in the mirror in their way - only to see the person who has already died.
It's a nice story but void of significant meaning. Good on you but not sure how this made the front page.