[oclug] Looking for aquarium screen saver

[Bill Strosberg]

miden wrote:

>
> Eye Candy gets a bad rap - among many programmers, sysadmins, and
> serious techies. Among the other 99% or so of the population it is a
> major factor in the decision to use a particular product. This is why
> so much money is spent on product design and presentation.
>
> Any serious advocate will accept (if not embrace) this particular fact
> of life and see it not as 'functionally pointless' but as the valuable
> tool that it is.


Hmm. If you think that the primary future for Linux is use as a
replacement desktop for clerk/typist/home/recreational users, there is
some validity to this argument. Most paying commercial installations use
Linux for server applications, gateway/firewall applications and routing
applications. Eye candy, graphics in general, and user interfaces that
rely on console graphical interfaces cause exponential bloat growth,
decrease speed and generally make configuration and maintenance more
complicated and less reliable. 99%? - I think your numbers are suspect.
Linux owns an ever-increasing chunk of the server marketplace, but has
not made an appreciable dent in the desktop marketplace. The ¨kewl¨
factor does not impress corporate desktop purchasers - the ¨Ï do not
have to train people to use this¨ factor does.

In my calm response to the original flame-happy poster, I was referring
to ¨using the source¨ from the open source screensaver he did not like,
not the Windows version. The screensavers he was trashing were written
in the open source community, and I think of that community as people I
know, and people I respect. Hearing of someone´s freely contributed
efforts referred to as poor and of substandard quality always makes me
mad - he does not realize that he is cruely criticising the very people
who provided him the opportunity to use this stuff for free. Quality in
the open source world (and the commercial world) results responding to a
need better, not pointing out deficiencies in a brutal and unfeeling
way. I was attempting to outline that instead of complaining, he could
take the high road and fix his need - and that of other people who value
things of that nature.

I guess it comes down to values - I appreciate simplicity, speed,
security and reliability. Since I earn my living from installing and
maintaining server applications, I value stability and reliability over
appealing to desktop users (who are as a rule unwilling to pay). The
great thing about open source is that everyone is free to tailor their
installations to meet their own needs. Just about ever thing I value
from a revenue-generating open source system benefits from reduced
complexity, simpler interfaces and less cruft. Do I personally give a
bad rap to eye candy? I do not think so - it has it´s place.


--
Bill Strosberg