[nflug] RE: Burning a CD-R

Cyber Source peter at thecybersource.com
Fri Dec 23 13:39:10 EST 2005


Ken Smith wrote:

>On Thu, 2005-12-22 at 13:03 -0800, Ron Maggio wrote:
>  
>
>>Hi, all
>>Thanks for all the suggestion, but this beats the whole purpose of
>>getting away from Windows. If I or anyone else has to jump through
>>hoops of fire, then Linux has a long way to go! In order for Linux to
>>meet or beat Windows for the desktop it must be able to work right out
>>of the box with no number of great ordeals along the way.
>>I thought, I was able to get use my I/O Magic a standard cd-burner.
>>But from my experience, I've found nothing but! I'm not going to
>>purchase special hardware that Linux will work with, so if you want a
>>good deal on books and software about Linux and Unix email me.
>>    
>>
>
>Just a humble observation...
>
>You're missing one of the fine points about the Open Source Development
>model.  As much as many Linux advocates say it would be nice for Linux
>to replace Windows on the desktop there is a big difference between the
>*talkers* and the *doers*.
>
>The *doers* are typically people who somehow managed to get well know
>enough to become one of the major Linux distribution *programmers* (e.g.
>they are actively contributing to Fedora Core, or actively contributing
>to Ubuntu, or ...) and they are doing it, typically, FOR FREE.  They get
>something out of it - personal satisfaction of some type and/or it does
>something they need it to do.  But *very* few people involved in Open
>Source projects are getting any money for it.  There is also, typically,
>not any specific company that lets say a CD burner vendor could talk to
>in order to have their product supported by the Open Source project.
>The project is usually a loosely coupled group of hackers.
>
>So...  If a piece of hardware is "generic enough" (think disk drive that
>follows the IDE/ATAPI standards) lots of people have that sort of
>hardware and support for it comes real fast.  But if the hardware is
>even slightly exotic the only way it's going to become supported by any
>given Open Source project is if one of the developers has that piece of
>hardware and wants it to work.
>
>And, again typically speaking, the *developers* know full well what this
>development model is like and what its strengths/weaknesses are.  Many
>of them do what they do because they found other Operating Systems
>lacking what they wanted in one form or another, and it would be fine
>with them if the project they were working on really did become good
>enough to replace lets say Windows.  But given the limitations of this
>development model most of the developers don't feel obliged to spend
>their time or their own money working to produce something that everyone
>could use instead of Windows.  They're content spending their time and
>perhaps some of their money working to produce something that works well
>enough *for them* and, perhaps, remove some of the roughest edges so
>that some other people can share in the fun (keep in mind most of these
>folks are doing it for their *recreation* - it's not their *job*).
>
>There are companies out there that take the results of Open Source
>development and make a product of it (e.g. RedHat, Mandrake, etc).
>Those outfits are much more likely to be what you are looking for given
>the above statements.  They have paid programmers who do what their
>managers tell them, the managers do to some extent what the
>salescritters tell them needs to be done in order to increase sales, and
>companies who want their CD-burner board to work with Linux have someone
>they can go talk to (e.g. the RedHat management folks) to have the
>appropriate drivers written (or existing drivers tweaked or whatever it
>happens to take).  But guess what - you don't get RedHat for free
>(because they need to fund the paychecks for their programmers, etc).
>
>  
>
I was going to say something along these exact lines, well put Ken! 
Couldn't have said it better myself!
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