4 ms·

I don't agree. First there was, and there still is, CUPS for printing. Then Avahi came, and basically allowed your network printer to show up in the printing

by jraph 7y ago

I don't agree. First there was, and there still is, CUPS for printing. Then Avahi came, and basically allowed your network printer to show up in the printing dialog without doing anything. Still printing using CUPS, but discoverable without configuration thanks to Avahi. Net gain for the user. I can't actually see a drawback here. Now say I have a machine called serv on the network I want to ssh to. I just need to type ssh serv.local and it will work. I don't need to set up a fixed IP address anymore, nor remember it. I want to play a sound on another device in the network? It's a drag and drop, thanks to Avahi and PulseAudio. I want to make a new network service usable by other computers in my domestic network? I'll just register to Avahi and boom, it's usable without configuration everywhere. No need to reinvent a service discovery wheel. I have not actually done that but I'm sure it's a relatively easy thing to do. And it just works. It's there without me installing or configuring anything. To my knowledge, you don't have those features without Avahi on GNU/Linux. And Avahi is yet another example of something you can easily uninstall if you don't like it. And this is compatible with Apple machines thanks to Lennart reusing an existing protocol. If anything, I miss it on Android.

jacquesm 7y ago
I've used Linux 'on the desktop' since retiring my Windows machine in 2003 and the one thing I have never had is problems to print. Just hook up to the local print server and go. But lately, since all this new goodness came along suddenly there are printers - and scanners, let't not forget about those - that no longer work that worked just fine before. If you're one of the lucky ones for which all this new stuff solved problems that you had then good for you. But try to understand that what holds for you does not hold for everybody and that your gain in this particular case is my loss. Compatibility with Apple machines is something that matters to me a lot, especially because one of the first things I do when I get my hands on that nice hardware is wipe it and install Linux on it ;) But I don't need their protocols on my network.
- jraph 7y ago
  Actually, compatibility with macOS and iOS is just something I see that could ease adoption (and if somebody brings their Apple device, I can hope for some interoperability). I’m not sure I’m particularly lucky, I would rather think (hope!) that those things made stuff easier for many (most?) people besides me and this is the reason number one I like them. When I set up a GNU/Linux system on someone else’s computer, they make my and the user's life much easier. I've not conducted or read a study about this though and if it actually broke many users it would definitely be concerning. As a direct consequence of these considerations, no offense to you, but I actually hope that you are unlucky :-) (and I wish you luck for the future and that what broke on your side will get fixed!)

by jraph 7y ago

jacquesm 7y ago

I've used Linux 'on the desktop' since retiring my Windows machine in 2003 and the one thing I have never had is problems to print. Just hook up to the local print server and go. But lately, since all this new goodness came along suddenly there are printers - and scanners, let't not forget about those - that no longer work that worked just fine before. If you're one of the lucky ones for which all this new stuff solved problems that you had then good for you. But try to understand that what holds for you does not hold for everybody and that your gain in this particular case is my loss. Compatibility with Apple machines is something that matters to me a lot, especially because one of the first things I do when I get my hands on that nice hardware is wipe it and install Linux on it ;) But I don't need their protocols on my network.

jraph 7y ago
Actually, compatibility with macOS and iOS is just something I see that could ease adoption (and if somebody brings their Apple device, I can hope for some interoperability). I’m not sure I’m particularly lucky, I would rather think (hope!) that those things made stuff easier for many (most?) people besides me and this is the reason number one I like them. When I set up a GNU/Linux system on someone else’s computer, they make my and the user's life much easier. I've not conducted or read a study about this though and if it actually broke many users it would definitely be concerning. As a direct consequence of these considerations, no offense to you, but I actually hope that you are unlucky :-) (and I wish you luck for the future and that what broke on your side will get fixed!)