Lucid Lynx, indeed...

Odd that. I was researching today getting one. As a 'cat-person' I wanted to buy a lynx (Finnish: ilves) as a pet (smaller than a tiger*, but just as vicious. They can give you a nasty nip on the ankle. Or throat) as they're becoming more easy to obtain here.

http://www.yle.fi/uutiset/news/2010/01/lynxes_seeking_prey_closer_to_human_habitation_1373011.html

Bit more research suggests otherwise....Think I'll just download some more Karmic 'brownware' instead....

* Bit like if you can't get a Pit-bull, go for a Jack Russell. Same bloodied effect, but the latter's legal.

Defaults matter

The default look and feel is how the OS presents itself to the world. Not saying it's the way it should be, but it's the way it is. Looking nice out of the box leaves a big impression on the tech illiterate and semi-literate. As does packaging, ease of configuration, etc. Saying 'you can change it' is nice, but it doesn't go back in time and fix their first impression.

And try not to forget that there are many people for whom going a few levels deep into menus to find new themes might as well be necromancy (no doubt you have a parent, uncle or somesuch that qualifies here). It's easy for you and you tend to lose sight of how much other people would rather not fiddle, but letting yourself get out of touch like that is just making whatever you're trying to present seem that much more arcane by association. It's a big disservice to yourself. Try and put yourself in the shoes of the truly average user and see their experience before making just snide comments.

I din't 'slate' him..

I just took the piss a bit. Hence, the ref. to T(w)inky-Winky and his handbag.

Oh, mine's brown. So is the background in my Ubuntu installations. I can stll write letters, read e-mail, write this drivel, etc. I couldn't give a flying fuc*k what colour the wallpaper is.

Pub 'puter is now running Ubuntu. Bet you can't guess the background colour? Mr. Brown, take a bow.

We got sick of some perv. watching porn on the machine, and going to the toilet for a quick '5-knuckle-shuffle' with it still running. The sound really upset some folks. Those folks who really upset me by singing Karaoke, when I'm trying to watch...er, er...-So, we 'hosed' windows and stuck Jaunty (9.04) on it. Said perv hasn't been back. (Keyboard disinfected, natch)

well said

thanks Original Steve. Well said indeed

Every time I've stuck a toe into the Linux waters and asked newbie questions on places like the Ubuntu forums I've been shot down and insulted (and don't even mention that you need to keep Windows around or they try to come round your house to burn it down!)

My general impression of desktop Linux formed by these interactions is that it's not ready for prime-time and it's defended by very insecure social inadequates ... which I know is a long way from the truth but as they take it upon themselves to represent the otherwise silent community they're not actually doing Linux adoption any good.

As Windows 7 just gets better, and OSX goes from leaps to bounds the competing desktop Linux flavours really do need to align themselves better and focus on out-of-the-box user friendliness and some good community leaders or it'll never get past the LiveCD stage to actually live on a real partition