6 ms·

Joy of using linux

73 points by minhajuddin 15y ago

roel_v 15y ago
I like Linux as much as the next guy, but his argument is basically 'Linux couldn't open a file that everybody else could, but by dicking around with random half-assed documented tools we could do it anyway!'. Basically, 'we managed to do something that is absolutely trivial for everybody else by jumping through hoops and spending a bunch of time on it to do it the convoluted way.'. Hmm right, not exactly a compelling argument for Linux's superiority.
- motters 15y ago
  I think this is primarily about finding a hack which is a short-cut to doing something in the officially recommended way (with Windows and Access)
  - chrisjsmith 15y ago
    And the resulting way is far simpler and didn't require paying for anything.
  - pistacchio 15y ago
    > And the resulting way is far simpler and didn't require paying for anything. because, of course, time is free.
    - minhajuddin 15y ago
      Exporting the file to a csv format (using microsoft access) wouldn't have taken any less time than me finding the right tool on linux and doing it, that is if I had Microsoft Access.
- waterhouse 15y ago
  How about this story? "Something goes wrong and shit doesn't work. At this point, we would expect to be completely stymied. But no, instead, we manage with a bit of googling and dicking around to fix it!" The comparison isn't with opening this particular file on different operating systems; it's with how you can recover when shit goes wrong (which does happen now and then on all operating systems).
  - raghava 15y ago
    Yes. I recollect a similar situation when I volunteered for a Linux fest. (http://wiki.sampada.net/GNU_Linux_Install_Fest http://wiki.sampada.net/GNU_Linux_Install_Fest) The venue could only accommodate 50 odd people but > 300 had registered on the eve. We needed to update all that after 10:30 am seats may be full and we might not be able to accommodate all, at 10 pm. Me and another friend of mine wrote a simple script to fetch mobile numbers of registrants, and another silly one to use gnokii and send an SMS to the fetched numbers. (http://wiki.gnokii.org/index.php/User%27s_Guide#SMS_Sending_and_Receiving http://wiki.gnokii.org/index.php/User%27s_Guide#SMS_Sending_...) Linux is fun.
    - roel_v 15y ago
      Again, not an example of any form of superiority of Linux. 30 seconds of google shows us http://www.oreillynet.com/wireless/2003/10/10/sms.html http://www.oreillynet.com/wireless/2003/10/10/sms.html , allowing you to (with a free tool from Microsoft) do the same. Oh, and you can do it over Bluetooth and infrared, in 2003. Have you ever tried to get infrared data connections to work on Linux? I have, and I can tell you that it takes many, many times longer on Linux just to figure out how it should work (in my case, infinitely longer, since I never did get it to work). I'm not here to say that one is better than the other, just that the examples here do not prove one or the other, or not even give a hint in the direction. They're all completely trivial things that can be done by a competent user on any OS.
      - raghava 15y ago
        Not to nitpick, but the above linked post says that the author of Windows XP Unwired too could not get smssender.exe to work in command line mode, to send messages in a batch.
  - roel_v 15y ago
    From that story one doesn't draw the conclusion 'Linux is awesome'. At best, it would be 'Google is so cool, I allows me to fix things'. Let's face it, this 'article' was utter fanboyism, and does not exhibit any form of proof that Linux is better than whatever. (I've run Linux since 1998 and I do prefer it for some tasks, like server tasks. I have many years of experience and am well aware of its strengths and weaknesses. Interoperability with the files that 'regular' computer users use is not one of those strengths).
- wisty 15y ago
  mdb files are not easy to open, unless you have MS Access. Lots of Windows computers lack MS Access. Now, you can still open mdb files on Windows, using the Jet Engine and something like ADO, ADO.net or ODBC, but the details of that are a bit too gory for the mild mannered command line junkies here.
  - roel_v 15y ago
    Sure, and for a reason - they contain a lot more information than a csv file can. It contains metadata on the table columns, relationships, etc. We don't complain that MySql or Postgresql files are binary, so using 'it's binary' as an argument against mdb is bollocks. Of course, maybe the source of the data was wrong in choosing mdb as the format, and a csv would have sufficed. I don't know, that's not the point here. The point is that mdb is the easiest way to get 'database-like' information that is more complex that just a flat list of records into the hands of 'regular' users, as much as that may dismay those for whose platforms nobody has written software to open them.
    - palebluedot 15y ago
      You are correct in that a database file may contain more rich data that CSV. I think it is open to debate, however, whether a closed format like MDB is easier for the end user, over something open like SQLite.
      - roel_v 15y ago
        I'd estimate that 90% of the Windows computers out there that are used for 'everyday' work have Access on them. For those users, opening the file is basically double-clicking it. For that to work with sqlite databases, one still needs to install a GUI tool first, hope that it associates the right extension with the sqlite file you have, and then get over the database-centric user interface that all of them have. Look, I'm not saying that mdb is better than sqlite. But I am saying that the notion that the 'openness' of sqlite somehow makes it easier for regular users to open them is a crock. Or maybe we can talk about if using sqlite databases in simple, 'script-like' applications is easier than doing the same with mdb/Access databases. That is more nuanced and depends on what environment you want to talk from etc. But that goes far beyond the definition of a 'user' as in the use case of the OP (a large student body to whom exam results need to be communicated).
- edoloughlin 15y ago
  He managed to find free, command-line tools to read a proprietary data format. This means he could potentially wrap a simple script around them and automate the process if he needed to do it on a regular basis. Would this be free & scriptable on Windows? It's been a while since I had to do anything comparable on Win, but I think he would have had to buy MS Office (Pro?) with VB or Visual C++ to do it.
  - binarymax 15y ago
    You could probably script it with Powershell and a bit of .NET
  - roel_v 15y ago
    It would be completely trivial on Windows since mdb files are accessed with the Jet database engine, one would set up a database connection string just like when accessing an Oracle or SQL Server database through ODBC and then use whatever database api is available in one's language of choice (vbscript, javascript (both of them available as 'standard' cscript engines on any installation of Windows since 2001), powershell, visual basic, C++, ...) to extract the data. Or, one would google for 10 seconds like I just did and find for example http://timothychenallen.blogspot.com/2007/08/vb-convert-any-access-table-to-csv.html http://timothychenallen.blogspot.com/2007/08/vb-convert-any-... which does that for you and converts the file into a csv file, and then process it like other csv files. No Office or Visual Basic required. So his claim 'this would have taken a couple of hours' (about converting the mdb to csv on Windows) is a load of bollocks and FUD. He didn't even search for it I'd wager, and let his ideologically myopic view cloud his pragmatic judgement. I'm not sure why people are defending this sort of juvenile fanboyism, it's drivel like this that makes the rest of us serious users who propose Linux in situations where it actually is better than the alternatives look like nutcases.
  - dagw 15y ago
    All the dev tools (C++,C#,VB,ASP etc.) are free on Windows via Visual Studio Express. And although I've never tried I'm pretty sure the database drivers needed to read and write .mdb files are included with Visual Studio Express. So no need to buy anything.
- danieldk 15y ago
  Well, except that Access is not well-suited for typical pipeline use. My objection is that the article is not Linux specific. The same program can probably be installed easily on OS X or FreeBSD. "The Joy of people who make their software available" would be a more appropriate title.
- raghava 15y ago
  >> his argument is basically 'Linux couldn't open a file that everybody else could, but by dicking around with random half-assed documented tools we could do it anyway!'. May be one could even interpret it like 'there are a lot of software vendors who force their users into proprietary solutions and formats but with Linux at hand, limitations could be worked around to get things done'. Perspective, isn't it?
  - roel_v 15y ago
    No, one couldn't, or at least not from the situation presented here. Look, there are two situations in the example in the OP: - 1. User has 'regular' Windows PC with Office. User downloads file from website, double-clicks file, is on his merry way. - 2. User has Linux PC and an ideological axe to grind so doesn't want to use anything else. User needs to hunt internet for software, turns out not be be so easy, spends hours and finds intense satisfaction in accomplishing something that is considered trivial by other people. User then proceeds to write blog post proclaiming, totally and utterly non sequitur, superiority of Linux because he managed to accomplish said trivial task. The only 'limitation' here is a self-imposed one - the guy refuses to use anything but Linux to convert his data on. That's like saying 'I ran a marathon with a rope of 30 cm tied between my ankles'. Impressive (in a certain way), sure - but why? Why not just run the more efficient way like everybody else, with no rope? If you're going to defend your OS by cherry-picking tasks that are somehow easier or more elegantly done by it, go ahead - the internet is full of them, but hey what do I care, everybody is free to do whatever they want in this regard. But this 'example' doesn't make any sense and confirms the general notion that Linux is for people who like technology for technology's sake and revel in finding convoluted, over-engineered solutions to the most menial tasks. And in that sense, it affects us normal people who just want to get stuff done too, because it causes a negative image for Linux, rather than what I'm sure the author thought would be a positive one; hindering its uptake in contexts where it is superior or appropriate. I'm not saying this guy single-handedly destroyed Linux, I'm just really desperate with seeing this toxic single-mindedness still being so pervasive, after all those years.
- kahawe 15y ago
  I don't see how this has anything to do with "Linux" - if anything, it shows how powerful google/the internet and the open source community is since nowadays you can expect to be spoon-fed a solution for almost every problem you can come up with. And I think "Linux IS great!" articles at this day and age are pretty much unnecessary - this battle has been fought (rather) long ago.
- generalk 15y ago
  No need to shit on the guy. TFA boils down to: "I was emailed a proprietary format for an application that doesn't exist on my platform. I was able to find and install a third-party utility to convert it to something usable." An astonishing tale of Linux superiority it's not, but I wouldn't say they jumped through hoops or spent hours researching anything here. > [..] we managed to do something that is > absolutely trivial for everybody else [...] Where everybody else means anyone with a copy of Microsoft Access. Take it for what it is: guy's excited that he was able to use free tools to perform a task 1) that he thought would be much harder, and 2) potentially faster than his colleagues with the official tool. So what his conclusion's a bit of a leap?
skbohra123 15y ago
neat, but not worth being on front page.
pistacchio 15y ago
my joy of using linux gone away long ago when i realized that i was spending more time searching forums, hacking drivers, trying solutions, paying more for compatible hardware, not having my laptop extra buttons work or trying to speed up a virtual machine just to have a usable photoshop than actually _using_ it. i'm a happy mac user now (user, not fanboy) that enjoys having a posix compliant terminal in a window and photoshop in another, all working out-of-the-box. i'm happy to pay for this.
- Wickk 15y ago
  You're just proving the point that linux ( and this can be said for ANY os ) is not for everyone. For the past 6 years, I've been much happier with my experience using Linux and the several distro's I've tried my hand at while no it night be perfect I've learned a lot and have been generally more please. I don't require or use Photoshop, however you do so your wants and needs are different than mine. I can list problems I've had with windows, that had me run into driver issues, searching through forums and the many many mishaps ( not virus/malware related ) that I've run into. But in the end it would just boil down to my bad experience vs the millions of windows users who would protest to the contrary.
mironathetin 15y ago
Well, this is also my experience with linux: many things you want to do just don't work out of the box. There is always (nearly) a way to do things, though. But if you really want to do work and not always fight against your tool of choice, linux is not the thing to use. For coding, I replaced it with Mac OS. This saves me 98% of the problems I had on linux. To be fair: I wouldn't know an out-of-the-box way to convert a MS Access file to csv on the Mac either.
- Newky 15y ago
  I'm not trying to start an argument, but in regards to coding, I take your point completely if your talking about iOS development or something specific to Mac Programming, but if not, what exactly were the obstacles for development in Linux. I use Linux mainly because of its ease of use in terms of development. I would be interested in hearing your arguments for the Mac. My friend recently got a Mac, and unbeknown to himself was forced to download a 2.something GB download for the developer pack just so he could get GCC, Now I know there are better ways to achieve this, but this to me seems counter productive.
  - Derbasti 15y ago
    You know, he could have inserted his installation DVD and installed it from there. Also, Ubuntu ships without make, Ruby or Python, too, so I can't really see that Linux is at an advantage there. After that, both Linux and Mac are Unix systems and have package managers that can install stuff (third party on Mac). Personally, I spend most of my time in Chrome, a terminal and Vim. On OSX. Because I like it that way. But I could certainly replicate that same development process in some Linux distro. Also, many Linux applications work just fine on OSX but not the other way around. So there is some argument for choosing OSX. Also, all that basic stuff like connecting to networks, having MS Office, etc. just plain works better on OSX. But to each his own.
    - Wickk 15y ago
      >Ubuntu ships without make, Ruby or Python Since when does Ubuntu ship without make and python? Python 2.X has been included in standard installations for quite a few releases now. I also can't remember the last time I had to manually install make.
Joakal 15y ago
Wouldn't using the synaptic package manager work better? I've heard it touted as one of the reasons for Linux being superior than Windows and Mac (except for App store) by having a central repository of many programs. Want Gimp? sudo apt-get install gimp or mark Gimp in the package manager and it'll download and install all the related packages and dependencies. My only gripe is that the search is not good but Google spoiled me.
- brown9-2 15y ago
  Isn't Synaptic just a GUI front end to apt-get?
  - roel_v 15y ago
    Yes it is.
  - mbubb 15y ago
    Yes somewhat and apt is a wrapper on top of dpkg ... So on a Debian/Ubuntu or related system your common options are: * dpkg * apt-get and apt-cache * aptitude * synaptic All the apt-based programs use the same /etc/apt/ files. There is a lot of overlap but specific reasons I might use one or the other. I use aptitude to do global updates as in: aptitude update && aptitude safe-upgrade Apt-get has the most commandline options. I have not figured out how to do the following two on aptitude - so just use apt-get: "apt-get dist-upgrade" "apt-get -f" (which is not to say it doesnt - just havent found it in 'the fine manual') Synaptic is fun to browse. almost like an android app store. I use it looking for a fun new game for my kid to play on my laptop, etc. And dpkg is useful for local installs (dpkg -i) and also for dpkg-reconfigure when you have to change something in the config of an installed package. I also deal with yum/rpm (which is a similar pairing as apt/dpkg). I first learned on Debian so I have a fondness for apt. In my experience it is pretty stable and easy to use. When I read the OP I thought the 'actually this shows how cool apt or yum can be to use'.
- mbubb 15y ago
  The search is not an internet based search. It is looking though the repositories that you have selected (cached on your system). If you don't have the right repos you will not find what you need.
flocial 15y ago
Linux users are mostly lost without Google, myself included. It gets you into a yak-shaving mindset. Ditto with Emacs. If I can stop fiddling I'm sure I'll be more productive.
- Hawramani 15y ago
  "The same technology that simplifies life by providing more functions in each device also complicates life by making the device harder to learn, harder to use. This is the paradox of technology." -Donald A. Norman, The Design of Everyday Things.
alopes 15y ago
as they say "Linux is only free if your time has no value".
imojito 15y ago
Or use best of both worlds http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/gentoo-alt/prefix/bootstrap-macos.xml http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/gentoo-alt/prefix/bootstrap-ma...
- lloeki 15y ago
  Or MacPorts [1], or Homebrew [2] [1] http://www.macports.org/ http://www.macports.org/ [2] http://mxcl.github.com/homebrew/ http://mxcl.github.com/homebrew/
  - imojito 15y ago
    Quite not the same (full distro repository vs small amount of ported apps). Easier and useful, though.
    - lloeki 15y ago
      Small is not quite exact. MacPorts has 8,000+ ports. Homebrew has 1600+ formulae but this is an awful metric due to the distributed nature of its development (2000+ forks, with some very specialized) and it is barely two years old! Take the package count for Debian as a reference: http://ftp-master.debian.org/users/joerg/pkg-nums http://ftp-master.debian.org/users/joerg/pkg-nums
deno 15y ago
My experience opening .mdb file on Linux: 0. Make sure Kexi is installed. 1. Click on it. It's numbered from 0, because Microsoft Access isn't a standard part of Windows either.
tomaszkubacki 15y ago
'but my mac is better' like comments when it comes to linux related links make me sick.
brown9-2 15y ago
I think this story speaks more to the joy of excellent package managers, something I am sorely missing in OS X.
- mnutt 15y ago
  While not integrated into the OS, Homebrew is an excellent package manager on OS X.
  - brown9-2 15y ago
    Thanks for the suggestion. I've had better luck with Macports so far, I just wish that a package manager was as seemlessly built-in as it is in Ubuntu or Fedora.
zwieback 15y ago
My main take away from this post is that you shouldn't make bad assumptions about data formats. However, my Linux experience is much like the author's: assume you'll get something to work, find out what's missing, apt-get to the rescue. The problem for me is when things go out of date. I try to install something and it triggers 250MB of seemingly unrelated updates. In all fairness, that usually happens when I build stuff from source, not when installing packages.
- mbubb 15y ago
  I hope for your sake that yo are not letting it get that much behind on security updates. I recommend that you do at least this: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AutomaticSecurityUpdates https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AutomaticSecurityUpdates The idea that Linux does not need to be updated is a dangerous one.
  - zwieback 15y ago
    I do try to stay up to date on my desktop systems. The embedded Linux systems are usually hopelessly out of date, though.
davidw 15y ago
The real joy of using Linux and open source software is that you realize that you are the only limitation, and that you can hack anything and everything. It's like a huge, enormous box of legos to play with:-)
- rjbond3rd 15y ago
  Right on. There are no secrets in Linux. You can drill all the way down and then some.
geoffreyvanwyk 15y ago
You mean GNU/Linux.
minhajuddin 15y ago
For guys who say it would be easier to do this on windows: I have worked on windows a lot but nothing on windows would stand against the simplicity of mdb-export myfile.mdb marks > marks.csv, this is obviously subjective.

73 points by minhajuddin 15y ago

I like Linux as much as the next guy, but his argument is basically 'Linux couldn't open a file that everybody else could, but by dicking around with random half-assed documented tools we could do it anyway!'. Basically, 'we managed to do something that is absolutely trivial for everybody else by jumping through hoops and spending a bunch of time on it to do it the convoluted way.'. Hmm right, not exactly a compelling argument for Linux's superiority.

motters 15y ago
I think this is primarily about finding a hack which is a short-cut to doing something in the officially recommended way (with Windows and Access)
- chrisjsmith 15y ago
  And the resulting way is far simpler and didn't require paying for anything.
- pistacchio 15y ago
  > And the resulting way is far simpler and didn't require paying for anything. because, of course, time is free.
  - minhajuddin 15y ago
    Exporting the file to a csv format (using microsoft access) wouldn't have taken any less time than me finding the right tool on linux and doing it, that is if I had Microsoft Access.
waterhouse 15y ago
How about this story? "Something goes wrong and shit doesn't work. At this point, we would expect to be completely stymied. But no, instead, we manage with a bit of googling and dicking around to fix it!" The comparison isn't with opening this particular file on different operating systems; it's with how you can recover when shit goes wrong (which does happen now and then on all operating systems).
- raghava 15y ago
  Yes. I recollect a similar situation when I volunteered for a Linux fest. (http://wiki.sampada.net/GNU_Linux_Install_Fest http://wiki.sampada.net/GNU_Linux_Install_Fest) The venue could only accommodate 50 odd people but > 300 had registered on the eve. We needed to update all that after 10:30 am seats may be full and we might not be able to accommodate all, at 10 pm. Me and another friend of mine wrote a simple script to fetch mobile numbers of registrants, and another silly one to use gnokii and send an SMS to the fetched numbers. (http://wiki.gnokii.org/index.php/User%27s_Guide#SMS_Sending_and_Receiving http://wiki.gnokii.org/index.php/User%27s_Guide#SMS_Sending_...) Linux is fun.
  - roel_v 15y ago
    Again, not an example of any form of superiority of Linux. 30 seconds of google shows us http://www.oreillynet.com/wireless/2003/10/10/sms.html http://www.oreillynet.com/wireless/2003/10/10/sms.html , allowing you to (with a free tool from Microsoft) do the same. Oh, and you can do it over Bluetooth and infrared, in 2003. Have you ever tried to get infrared data connections to work on Linux? I have, and I can tell you that it takes many, many times longer on Linux just to figure out how it should work (in my case, infinitely longer, since I never did get it to work). I'm not here to say that one is better than the other, just that the examples here do not prove one or the other, or not even give a hint in the direction. They're all completely trivial things that can be done by a competent user on any OS.
    - raghava 15y ago
      Not to nitpick, but the above linked post says that the author of Windows XP Unwired too could not get smssender.exe to work in command line mode, to send messages in a batch.
- roel_v 15y ago
  From that story one doesn't draw the conclusion 'Linux is awesome'. At best, it would be 'Google is so cool, I allows me to fix things'. Let's face it, this 'article' was utter fanboyism, and does not exhibit any form of proof that Linux is better than whatever. (I've run Linux since 1998 and I do prefer it for some tasks, like server tasks. I have many years of experience and am well aware of its strengths and weaknesses. Interoperability with the files that 'regular' computer users use is not one of those strengths).
wisty 15y ago
mdb files are not easy to open, unless you have MS Access. Lots of Windows computers lack MS Access. Now, you can still open mdb files on Windows, using the Jet Engine and something like ADO, ADO.net or ODBC, but the details of that are a bit too gory for the mild mannered command line junkies here.
- roel_v 15y ago
  Sure, and for a reason - they contain a lot more information than a csv file can. It contains metadata on the table columns, relationships, etc. We don't complain that MySql or Postgresql files are binary, so using 'it's binary' as an argument against mdb is bollocks. Of course, maybe the source of the data was wrong in choosing mdb as the format, and a csv would have sufficed. I don't know, that's not the point here. The point is that mdb is the easiest way to get 'database-like' information that is more complex that just a flat list of records into the hands of 'regular' users, as much as that may dismay those for whose platforms nobody has written software to open them.
  - palebluedot 15y ago
    You are correct in that a database file may contain more rich data that CSV. I think it is open to debate, however, whether a closed format like MDB is easier for the end user, over something open like SQLite.
    - roel_v 15y ago
      I'd estimate that 90% of the Windows computers out there that are used for 'everyday' work have Access on them. For those users, opening the file is basically double-clicking it. For that to work with sqlite databases, one still needs to install a GUI tool first, hope that it associates the right extension with the sqlite file you have, and then get over the database-centric user interface that all of them have. Look, I'm not saying that mdb is better than sqlite. But I am saying that the notion that the 'openness' of sqlite somehow makes it easier for regular users to open them is a crock. Or maybe we can talk about if using sqlite databases in simple, 'script-like' applications is easier than doing the same with mdb/Access databases. That is more nuanced and depends on what environment you want to talk from etc. But that goes far beyond the definition of a 'user' as in the use case of the OP (a large student body to whom exam results need to be communicated).
edoloughlin 15y ago
He managed to find free, command-line tools to read a proprietary data format. This means he could potentially wrap a simple script around them and automate the process if he needed to do it on a regular basis. Would this be free & scriptable on Windows? It's been a while since I had to do anything comparable on Win, but I think he would have had to buy MS Office (Pro?) with VB or Visual C++ to do it.
- binarymax 15y ago
  You could probably script it with Powershell and a bit of .NET
- roel_v 15y ago
  It would be completely trivial on Windows since mdb files are accessed with the Jet database engine, one would set up a database connection string just like when accessing an Oracle or SQL Server database through ODBC and then use whatever database api is available in one's language of choice (vbscript, javascript (both of them available as 'standard' cscript engines on any installation of Windows since 2001), powershell, visual basic, C++, ...) to extract the data. Or, one would google for 10 seconds like I just did and find for example http://timothychenallen.blogspot.com/2007/08/vb-convert-any-access-table-to-csv.html http://timothychenallen.blogspot.com/2007/08/vb-convert-any-... which does that for you and converts the file into a csv file, and then process it like other csv files. No Office or Visual Basic required. So his claim 'this would have taken a couple of hours' (about converting the mdb to csv on Windows) is a load of bollocks and FUD. He didn't even search for it I'd wager, and let his ideologically myopic view cloud his pragmatic judgement. I'm not sure why people are defending this sort of juvenile fanboyism, it's drivel like this that makes the rest of us serious users who propose Linux in situations where it actually is better than the alternatives look like nutcases.
- dagw 15y ago
  All the dev tools (C++,C#,VB,ASP etc.) are free on Windows via Visual Studio Express. And although I've never tried I'm pretty sure the database drivers needed to read and write .mdb files are included with Visual Studio Express. So no need to buy anything.
danieldk 15y ago
Well, except that Access is not well-suited for typical pipeline use. My objection is that the article is not Linux specific. The same program can probably be installed easily on OS X or FreeBSD. "The Joy of people who make their software available" would be a more appropriate title.
raghava 15y ago
>> his argument is basically 'Linux couldn't open a file that everybody else could, but by dicking around with random half-assed documented tools we could do it anyway!'. May be one could even interpret it like 'there are a lot of software vendors who force their users into proprietary solutions and formats but with Linux at hand, limitations could be worked around to get things done'. Perspective, isn't it?
- roel_v 15y ago
  No, one couldn't, or at least not from the situation presented here. Look, there are two situations in the example in the OP: - 1. User has 'regular' Windows PC with Office. User downloads file from website, double-clicks file, is on his merry way. - 2. User has Linux PC and an ideological axe to grind so doesn't want to use anything else. User needs to hunt internet for software, turns out not be be so easy, spends hours and finds intense satisfaction in accomplishing something that is considered trivial by other people. User then proceeds to write blog post proclaiming, totally and utterly non sequitur, superiority of Linux because he managed to accomplish said trivial task. The only 'limitation' here is a self-imposed one - the guy refuses to use anything but Linux to convert his data on. That's like saying 'I ran a marathon with a rope of 30 cm tied between my ankles'. Impressive (in a certain way), sure - but why? Why not just run the more efficient way like everybody else, with no rope? If you're going to defend your OS by cherry-picking tasks that are somehow easier or more elegantly done by it, go ahead - the internet is full of them, but hey what do I care, everybody is free to do whatever they want in this regard. But this 'example' doesn't make any sense and confirms the general notion that Linux is for people who like technology for technology's sake and revel in finding convoluted, over-engineered solutions to the most menial tasks. And in that sense, it affects us normal people who just want to get stuff done too, because it causes a negative image for Linux, rather than what I'm sure the author thought would be a positive one; hindering its uptake in contexts where it is superior or appropriate. I'm not saying this guy single-handedly destroyed Linux, I'm just really desperate with seeing this toxic single-mindedness still being so pervasive, after all those years.
kahawe 15y ago
I don't see how this has anything to do with "Linux" - if anything, it shows how powerful google/the internet and the open source community is since nowadays you can expect to be spoon-fed a solution for almost every problem you can come up with. And I think "Linux IS great!" articles at this day and age are pretty much unnecessary - this battle has been fought (rather) long ago.
generalk 15y ago
No need to shit on the guy. TFA boils down to: "I was emailed a proprietary format for an application that doesn't exist on my platform. I was able to find and install a third-party utility to convert it to something usable." An astonishing tale of Linux superiority it's not, but I wouldn't say they jumped through hoops or spent hours researching anything here. > [..] we managed to do something that is > absolutely trivial for everybody else [...] Where everybody else means anyone with a copy of Microsoft Access. Take it for what it is: guy's excited that he was able to use free tools to perform a task 1) that he thought would be much harder, and 2) potentially faster than his colleagues with the official tool. So what his conclusion's a bit of a leap?

skbohra123 15y ago

neat, but not worth being on front page.

pistacchio 15y ago

my joy of using linux gone away long ago when i realized that i was spending more time searching forums, hacking drivers, trying solutions, paying more for compatible hardware, not having my laptop extra buttons work or trying to speed up a virtual machine just to have a usable photoshop than actually _using_ it. i'm a happy mac user now (user, not fanboy) that enjoys having a posix compliant terminal in a window and photoshop in another, all working out-of-the-box. i'm happy to pay for this.

Wickk 15y ago
You're just proving the point that linux ( and this can be said for ANY os ) is not for everyone. For the past 6 years, I've been much happier with my experience using Linux and the several distro's I've tried my hand at while no it night be perfect I've learned a lot and have been generally more please. I don't require or use Photoshop, however you do so your wants and needs are different than mine. I can list problems I've had with windows, that had me run into driver issues, searching through forums and the many many mishaps ( not virus/malware related ) that I've run into. But in the end it would just boil down to my bad experience vs the millions of windows users who would protest to the contrary.

mironathetin 15y ago

Well, this is also my experience with linux: many things you want to do just don't work out of the box. There is always (nearly) a way to do things, though. But if you really want to do work and not always fight against your tool of choice, linux is not the thing to use. For coding, I replaced it with Mac OS. This saves me 98% of the problems I had on linux. To be fair: I wouldn't know an out-of-the-box way to convert a MS Access file to csv on the Mac either.

Newky 15y ago
I'm not trying to start an argument, but in regards to coding, I take your point completely if your talking about iOS development or something specific to Mac Programming, but if not, what exactly were the obstacles for development in Linux. I use Linux mainly because of its ease of use in terms of development. I would be interested in hearing your arguments for the Mac. My friend recently got a Mac, and unbeknown to himself was forced to download a 2.something GB download for the developer pack just so he could get GCC, Now I know there are better ways to achieve this, but this to me seems counter productive.
- Derbasti 15y ago
  You know, he could have inserted his installation DVD and installed it from there. Also, Ubuntu ships without make, Ruby or Python, too, so I can't really see that Linux is at an advantage there. After that, both Linux and Mac are Unix systems and have package managers that can install stuff (third party on Mac). Personally, I spend most of my time in Chrome, a terminal and Vim. On OSX. Because I like it that way. But I could certainly replicate that same development process in some Linux distro. Also, many Linux applications work just fine on OSX but not the other way around. So there is some argument for choosing OSX. Also, all that basic stuff like connecting to networks, having MS Office, etc. just plain works better on OSX. But to each his own.
  - Wickk 15y ago
    >Ubuntu ships without make, Ruby or Python Since when does Ubuntu ship without make and python? Python 2.X has been included in standard installations for quite a few releases now. I also can't remember the last time I had to manually install make.

Joakal 15y ago

Wouldn't using the synaptic package manager work better? I've heard it touted as one of the reasons for Linux being superior than Windows and Mac (except for App store) by having a central repository of many programs. Want Gimp? sudo apt-get install gimp or mark Gimp in the package manager and it'll download and install all the related packages and dependencies. My only gripe is that the search is not good but Google spoiled me.

brown9-2 15y ago
Isn't Synaptic just a GUI front end to apt-get?
- roel_v 15y ago
  Yes it is.
- mbubb 15y ago
  Yes somewhat and apt is a wrapper on top of dpkg ... So on a Debian/Ubuntu or related system your common options are: * dpkg * apt-get and apt-cache * aptitude * synaptic All the apt-based programs use the same /etc/apt/ files. There is a lot of overlap but specific reasons I might use one or the other. I use aptitude to do global updates as in: aptitude update && aptitude safe-upgrade Apt-get has the most commandline options. I have not figured out how to do the following two on aptitude - so just use apt-get: "apt-get dist-upgrade" "apt-get -f" (which is not to say it doesnt - just havent found it in 'the fine manual') Synaptic is fun to browse. almost like an android app store. I use it looking for a fun new game for my kid to play on my laptop, etc. And dpkg is useful for local installs (dpkg -i) and also for dpkg-reconfigure when you have to change something in the config of an installed package. I also deal with yum/rpm (which is a similar pairing as apt/dpkg). I first learned on Debian so I have a fondness for apt. In my experience it is pretty stable and easy to use. When I read the OP I thought the 'actually this shows how cool apt or yum can be to use'.
mbubb 15y ago
The search is not an internet based search. It is looking though the repositories that you have selected (cached on your system). If you don't have the right repos you will not find what you need.

flocial 15y ago

Linux users are mostly lost without Google, myself included. It gets you into a yak-shaving mindset. Ditto with Emacs. If I can stop fiddling I'm sure I'll be more productive.

Hawramani 15y ago
"The same technology that simplifies life by providing more functions in each device also complicates life by making the device harder to learn, harder to use. This is the paradox of technology." -Donald A. Norman, The Design of Everyday Things.

alopes 15y ago

as they say "Linux is only free if your time has no value".

imojito 15y ago

Or use best of both worlds http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/gentoo-alt/prefix/bootstrap-macos.xml http://www.gentoo.org/proj/en/gentoo-alt/prefix/bootstrap-ma...

lloeki 15y ago
Or MacPorts [1], or Homebrew [2] [1] http://www.macports.org/ http://www.macports.org/ [2] http://mxcl.github.com/homebrew/ http://mxcl.github.com/homebrew/
- imojito 15y ago
  Quite not the same (full distro repository vs small amount of ported apps). Easier and useful, though.
  - lloeki 15y ago
    Small is not quite exact. MacPorts has 8,000+ ports. Homebrew has 1600+ formulae but this is an awful metric due to the distributed nature of its development (2000+ forks, with some very specialized) and it is barely two years old! Take the package count for Debian as a reference: http://ftp-master.debian.org/users/joerg/pkg-nums http://ftp-master.debian.org/users/joerg/pkg-nums

deno 15y ago

My experience opening .mdb file on Linux: 0. Make sure Kexi is installed. 1. Click on it. It's numbered from 0, because Microsoft Access isn't a standard part of Windows either.

tomaszkubacki 15y ago

'but my mac is better' like comments when it comes to linux related links make me sick.

brown9-2 15y ago

I think this story speaks more to the joy of excellent package managers, something I am sorely missing in OS X.

mnutt 15y ago
While not integrated into the OS, Homebrew is an excellent package manager on OS X.
- brown9-2 15y ago
  Thanks for the suggestion. I've had better luck with Macports so far, I just wish that a package manager was as seemlessly built-in as it is in Ubuntu or Fedora.

zwieback 15y ago

My main take away from this post is that you shouldn't make bad assumptions about data formats. However, my Linux experience is much like the author's: assume you'll get something to work, find out what's missing, apt-get to the rescue. The problem for me is when things go out of date. I try to install something and it triggers 250MB of seemingly unrelated updates. In all fairness, that usually happens when I build stuff from source, not when installing packages.

mbubb 15y ago
I hope for your sake that yo are not letting it get that much behind on security updates. I recommend that you do at least this: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AutomaticSecurityUpdates https://help.ubuntu.com/community/AutomaticSecurityUpdates The idea that Linux does not need to be updated is a dangerous one.
- zwieback 15y ago
  I do try to stay up to date on my desktop systems. The embedded Linux systems are usually hopelessly out of date, though.

davidw 15y ago

The real joy of using Linux and open source software is that you realize that you are the only limitation, and that you can hack anything and everything. It's like a huge, enormous box of legos to play with:-)

rjbond3rd 15y ago
Right on. There are no secrets in Linux. You can drill all the way down and then some.

geoffreyvanwyk 15y ago

You mean GNU/Linux.

minhajuddin 15y ago

For guys who say it would be easier to do this on windows: I have worked on windows a lot but nothing on windows would stand against the simplicity of mdb-export myfile.mdb marks > marks.csv, this is obviously subjective.