Re: Linux ease of use

David Blomber wrote:

>On Sat, 2003-10-25 at 12:51, John Andersen wrote:
>
>>
>>A popular misconception.
>>You can install software as a user into your own user space
>>~/bin.  And thats probably where most of the click-install
>>software should go.  At least it can't do harm to anyone
>>except that particular user.
>>
>>-- 
>>
>Actually nothing should be in /bin it should be in /usr/local/bin /bin
>gets killed during upgrades and should be distro software only. 
>secondly click and install is available in KDE (its a user space thing
>not a kernel one) the GUI lets you click on an RPM and it will run you
>through the install.  <most of us "geeks" just avoid using it but it is
>there. :)
>
Actually, he said "~/bin", not "/bin". There's a difference,
you know. By "~", that's a reference to the home-directory.
So, if your home directory is "/home/myself", then "~/bin" is
shorthand for "/home/myself/bin".

And the reason I avoid the double-click install think you're
talking about is because I have *both* an aversion to KDE
and to RPM.

I have disliked KDE ever since it crippled my machine the
one time I tried Corell Linux. A few years later, I gave
KDE a second chance while running RH-Linux, and I found
it to be unwieldy and limiting.

Yes, there are some people who like KDE, and if it
suits them that's fine with me. Honest! But there are
also those of us like me who can't stand it, and we're
just as valid as those of you who like KDE. So an
interface that limits users to KDE is not a valid
interface.

Of course, you could argue that the same solution in
*concept* applies to *all* and that due to the
different GUI environments the solution would have
to be implemented for one desktop at-a-time. That
may or may not be true (as I lack the expertise to
state one way or the other on this matter). But
then there's my *other* beef, which is against RPM.

RPM is just simply too darn inflexible for it to
work if for some reason (and yes, valid reasons *do*
exist) your directory structure is something other
than what some central-committee labels "standard".

For example, what if you're an individual-user trying
to install something into his/her own account? Or
what if you're the sys-admin, but you're the admin
of a whole *set* of machines, and your Network
Filesystem setup requires you to install something
in *one* place, while the package-developers expect
you to install it somewhere *else*? RPM is simply
too inflexible to handle things like this.
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