Re: Free as in beer

Thus quoth Matthew King on Fri, Aug 22, 2003 at 09:40:56PM +0100:
> The distinction between admin, developer and user (and luser, which is
> something else) has become blurred over the past few years. I hesitate
> to blame this [entirely] on Microsoft, but rather direct it to the
> industry as a whole.

In the old days, you had the mainframe computer, which was operated by a team
of specialists, cost millions but served thousands of users. Programmers wrote
Cobol applications with pencil and paper and the data-entry typists didn't 
need a PhD. One of the ideas behind Multics was to create a kind of proto-
internet with a mainframe in every city and a terminal in every home. 

Then Intel started selling microprocessor chips, and sophisticated amateurs
bought these and soldered them into computers, which Intel hadn't intended. 
Advanced electronics skills were required until companies like Heathkit
started selling easy-to-assemble kits. Now the hardest part was writing the
software. Most microcomputer software was freely shared, but then a young
man named Bill Gates argued that you should sell your software. By 1981 IBM
introduced a micro called the 'Personal Computer', creating was is sometimes
called the PC revolution.

The whole point of the PC is to give the users control over their machine 
so they wouldn't be bossed around system administrators. Linux was preceeded
by Minix, and the Minix reference manual clearly states that 'Since MINIX 
is in principle a multiuser timesharing system, not unlike wat large 
computer centers run, you will have to learn how to administrator your 
system. Fortunately, this is not difficult. ...' 

Then came the Macintosh, which purported to dumb-down the computer to make
it easy to use for non-technical users, later succeeded by the Newton that
would fit into your pocket. If the application was simple enough, the 
'Graphical User Interface' would be easy to use, but for any non-trivial 
task the MS-DOS operating system proved much more powerful and flexible. 
The hardware of the PC had 8 slots into which the user could insert 
peripheral boards for many different purposes, whereas the Macintosh was 
a closed box. You couldn't even attach a colour monitor. (a clear step
back from the Apple ][, which also had 8 expannsion slots, colour graphics
and a simple Operating System.)  

Twenty years later we find that end-users need professional help to use 
their PC', but supporting a large number of desktop PC's is more work 
than running a single mainframe, and the hard- and software of a hundred
PC's, which have to be replaced every three years, is also more expensive. 
Since all computers are networked, system administrators are needed anyhow.
And then all those end-users need to be trained on their word processors,
spreadsheet, database and accounting packages.

Does it surprise that Scott MacNealy argues for a return to the mainframe
mode of automation ('server-based computing')? Steve Ballmer is arguing
on similar lines, except he would sell graphical terminals with an Intel
processor and a version of Windows instead of Java. 

Maybe someday Sony will invent a home computer that will let your granny
watch TV, tape her favourite show, play her records, play games, and even 
surf the World-Wild-Web. It might have Linux inside, but she wouldn't be
using vi.

Kind regards,


Daniel C. von Asmuth

-- 
	wat heb je nodig bij een uitzichtloos leven? euthanasie?
	nee, windows.
	van microsoft?
	nee, van glas.