freebsd-advocacy Digest, Vol 50, Issue 6

The Pyker pyka at bigpond.com
Sat Mar 13 19:45:24 PST 2004


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Today's Topics:

   1. Re: Installation - More user friendly (Lucas Czejgis)


----------------------------------------------------------------------

Message: 1
Date: Sat, 13 Mar 2004 16:27:18 +0100
From: Lucas Czejgis [6]<lucas at office.net.pl>
Subject: Re: Installation - More user friendly
To: [7]freebsd-advocacy at freebsd.org
Message-ID: [8]<200403131629.21662.lucas at office.net.pl>
Content-Type: text/plain;  charset="iso-8859-2"



Most non-technical people like GUI's because they neither want to know nor
should they need to know the gazillion command line entries and options.
That's the kind of thing that makes us "the pros" at what we do.  PC's
didn't become popular for home use until the advent of the GUI.  Apple,
despite many technical decisions that I can't agree with, are still with us
because of the wonderful user interface.  Windows, all bashing aside, is
not the most desirable operating system for a variety of TECHNICAL reasons,
but it still maintains it market share.  Why?  Because it offers two things
1) the comfort factor that comes with familiarity and 2) the "wizards" to
accomplish fairly complex tasks by making selections in a GUI.  This alone
should point out that the user interface is NOT a technical issue.

I think that the ultimate flaw in much of the logic I see here is in
assuming that we, being the programmers, system administrators, hackers,
etc., that we all are on list, know what end users want.  We soooooo are
NOT the average end user.  I think I can safely say that we left being end
users ourselves behind so long ago that we've forgotten what it's like.
Think about what your Mother (or at least mine :)) would want to use.
Actually having to go to the command line, when you've been trained by
decades of M$ products that this a very bad thing to do, and type stuff in
terrifies her. She's always certain that she's going to make a mistake and
blow things up.


2 cents,

Jimi


I agree with you in 100%. I remember when I first tried to install FreeBSD. It
was simply a Horror! After about three times, I decided that this is not the
day, when I install FreeBSD. Propably, the reason why I decided to let it go,
is that I was used to Mandrake's way of installing a OS.
Now, I thing that sysinstall is simply great. I could install FreeBSD with my
eyes closed. But then...
I thing that the FreeBSD need to decide, if:
a) FreeBSD is a OS for everyone = make a GUI installer
b) FreeBSD is a OS for those, who know more, that a "ordinary" user knows =
stay with sysinstall or something similar
The decision must me made, sooner or later (propably sooner)...


Lucas Czejgis



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End of freebsd-advocacy Digest, Vol 50, Issue 6
***********************************************



   Maybe this could be an option? GUI interface or sysinstall. I really
   like sysinstall, reading the documentation before installing FreeBSD
   made everything a breeze. But, I didn't do a terrific job of
   partitioning!
   I don't seriously think there is a need for a sysinstall replacement.
   Maybe sysinstall needs to be re-designed?
   -Wilyarti Howard

References

   1. mailto:freebsd-advocacy-request at freebsd.org
   2. mailto:freebsd-advocacy at freebsd.org
   3. http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-advocacy
   4. mailto:freebsd-advocacy-request at freebsd.org
   5. mailto:freebsd-advocacy-owner at freebsd.org
   6. mailto:lucas at office.net.pl
   7. mailto:freebsd-advocacy at freebsd.org
   8. mailto:200403131629.21662.lucas at office.net.pl
   9. mailto:freebsd-advocacy at freebsd.org
  10. http://lists.freebsd.org/mailman/listinfo/freebsd-advocacy
  11. mailto:freebsd-advocacy-unsubscribe at freebsd.org


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