I think that what lacks on the linux community as a whole is the “education”. What i mean is, the way Linux aproach a Windows user (not necessarly Windows, just an example of some1 who never used UNIX – but Windows users are the majority of computer users in the world) and tryes to ‘convert’ him/her to Linux and open Source softwares.
Even thought it might not seem, i’m making a point here, and its somehow related to the topic of this thread:
I’m gonna tell you my story: I first started using Linux when i saw amazing screenshots at lynucs.org and thought “OMG, thats awsome!!”. My interest to Linux was, at first, simply graphical. The eye-candy was something i had never experienced before. Of course that, as time went by, i realized Linux was simply a great OS for any type of application i might use and whatever i needed to do. I loved the way things looked and ‘made sense’, and, i can say, i experienced computing in a way i had never done.
That is the nice story, the ‘Grimms brothers’ story.
Now, the other part of the story is the grinding. What i mean is, what do you need to put up with, to get what you want. I am a young guy, at the verge of my life, and, being so, i didnt give up on Linux at the first complication, but i must confess i wanted to, after a while. The drivers problems, the whole editing and file changing routine, the libraries dependencies problems, the ‘command not found’ logs, that is something not every non-unix user is willing to put up with.
I’m not blaiming Linux and Open Source programmers. Not their fault the Microsoft monopolium will make it difficult for companies to make linux drivers (god damn, how great it would be if hotplug worked every time down!). I’m not blaming it on the ‘UNIX concept’ either. I do believe that the passive way Microsoft implies us to use computers is not the way to go. I would love to see the general public educated in computing and editing whatever files they want, and 70 year old Grandmothers using Linux and loving it. But that isnt happening, not just yet at least. You see, somewhere down the line, i believe, we forgot that people who migrate to Linux are used to ‘the easy way’.
Dont get me wrong, i dont think ‘the easy way’ is the right way. What i’m saying is, we have to educate people on how to use Linux in a way the transition goes smoothly. I believe that the only reason that the end user dont migrate to Linux is the apparent complex look of it. Apparent, but somehow true.
The GNOME and KDE DE’s are doing some of that. The problem is that they are adapting themselves to Windows users, when they should be adapting users to themselves. The whole GUI thing helps a lot of users and does give them a usable enviroment to work on, however, it doesnt give them control of their software. But the problem is how to go from that, to a FVWM. There isnt a transition between the two programs (but that goes for every type of program, like, going from Xchat to BitchX or goin from Amarok to command-line xmms, you get the point). Normal computer users are not used to the whole configuration thing. There wasnt a teching period that thought them the ways of Linux computing.
My point is (finally), we think small. Right now only a small part of the market share is achievable. Only the intersted geeks, or the day-to-day hacker, or the computer tech are a reality. The soccer mom, the 4th grade kid, the ‘normal’ user, are not.
Thats one reason why FVWM is not the most common WM around. People werent yet ‘educated’. The ones that use Fluxbox (wich are, in the poll, the majority) would love to use FVWM (wich is, by the way, much superior to fluxbox) if they only knew how to start. But the thing is, only the really intersted ones do. Only they have the heart to go through the grinding and ‘googling’ to achieve their goals. You wont see a common user going through the pain of studying config files and editing stuff. FVWM is an entusiast’s WM, only the ones that really want the control on their hands use it. But if you think of the Linux community as a whole, it is devided in ‘the hacker ones’ and ‘the ones that are bound to use just some of the things Linux offers’.
The aproach is somewhat wrong, in my opinion. It still seems that only a small part of the market is confortable with Linux. I dont know how to fix it, i just know that thats what i think of it. The day Linux becomes more user-friendly (i mean common users) and doesnt looses its main characteristics (meaning dont go “Windows”) it will become a impactating force on the Desktop market. The day people start assimilating the UNIX computing filosofy, you’ll see more FVWM users. The day we educate people and they realize that FVWM is a software made for them and ‘by’ them (meaning, they configurate it how they want it), that stupid poll wont have to be made.
well, thats a man’s opinion. If you got one of yourself, lets have the debate, coz there is nothing better than a constructive debate.
PS: As for me, i’m the ‘hacker’ type, i like to go to the core of the software and adapt it to my likes and thus create a new software of my own. Thats why i’m loving FVWM and Linux for that matter.