About a year ago, I mentioned Mark Pilgrim’s switch to Linux in a post.
This last weekend, he posted a progress update, framed around a response to a particularly snobbish comment he received from the operating system community he was leaving behind.
The comment:
What exactly do you think you will be doing with Linux when you install it on that fancy ThinkCentre? You’ll be tweaking MORE, configuring MORE, installing MORE because NOTHING is as packaged and polished. … Enjoy your time with Linux, and when the endless Google searches to fix some miniscule package dependancy version problems finally drive you away, you will of course be welcomed back.
His update, one year later: (excerpts)
I am happy to report that that has not been my experience. I have spent some time tweaking, but only by choice — not to make things work, but to try some radically different ideas about workspaces and workflow that quite frankly would have been impossible to accomplish on a Mac.
…
In fact, none of the usual complaints about Linux (hardware drivers, X configuration, package dependencies) have affected me in any significant way. … On the contrary, working on a Linux system has made the weaknesses of other operating systems more painful to deal with.
He goes into quite a bit of detail about how keeping a system up do date is a hassle on the other “big two” operating systems, whereas in Linux (for most people) it is a simple one line script that can be scheduled to run without manual intervention at all.
Finally…
One year later, I look back on comments like this, and I just laugh. Sorry, Anonymous Commenter, you couldn’t have been more wrong. You got it exactly backwards. When your operating system finally comes with a package management system that is both comprehensive and extensible, you will of course be welcomed… to the 1990s. In the meantime, I’ll continue to enjoy my time with Linux.