On Thu, 16 Jul 2020 at 22:35:33, T wrote:
On 2020-07-16 21:47, VanguardLH wrote:
[]
When schools are predominatly training students in an OS then the
market
penetration goes up. The students take with them what they learned.
Microsoft learned that long ago. So did Apple. With so many Linux

And, before that, Bell labs with UNIX; when I was at uni., it was pretty
universal on the mainframes (this was around 1980, when home computers,
inasmuch as they existed, were all incompatible, mostly running
[incompatible versions of] BASIC); I understood that Bell let academic
institutions for a peppercorn fee, for that very reason.

variants and only a few commercial vendors (e.g., Redhat), free is not a
sufficient reason for mass migration to Linux. Get a gradually larger

For the vast majority of home users (including a large proportion of
those who use their computer in their profession), Windows is seen as
"free" anyway - in that it comes with the computer. Sure, it's an
element of the price, but I've not seen it listed separately since the
days when people had their PC made to their spec. - which for the (vast
I think) majority of users, is decades ago. [The same applies to other
OSs - Apple, Chrome, etc.; the price of the OS is not shown, any more
than that of the case, mobo, HD (or SSD), memory ... in _most_ of the
places people buy computers these days.]

I'm speaking of the UK, but I _think_ it's the same in the USA. Here,
the main "High Street" (US: Main Street) or mall places where computers
are on sale are the larger supermarket branches, and specialist shops -
and of the latter, we sadly only have one now.
[]
For well-rounded computer eduction, students should really be
exposed to
multiple operating systems. Learn 'em, and let 'em choose.

Ideally, yes. In practice, even if hardware/licensing etc. weren't a
problem, time is. (As well as all the other pressures on a teacher.)

However, businesses and even schools need support from the OS
vendor.
Free doesn't include technical support. Those institutions don't look
firstly at the cost of a license. They look for support and its cost.

There, of course, the fact that Windows _isn't_ free makes the
difference: MS provides support to schools (in both the UK and US
meaning of "schools"), whereas "Linux" doesn't (for both cost reasons
and that it isn't a single entity).

Not having robust support is costly. In-house training still has costs
and adds delay to acquire expertise. Like buying a printer, you figure
the Cost of Ownership is in the rate of use of the consumables (paper,
ink), and lastly consider the cost of the printer. The cost of OS

You _should_, but looking at what people buy, I think few do! (Not
helped by most stores _not_ showing the cost of a set of cartridges by
each printer.) [Not to mention the recent abomination - IMO - of "ink as
a service".]
[]
died off. Same for Fortran nowadays ($80K/year average base salary).

[Where do I sign up? Though I imagine my skills - Fortran IV, send off a
coding form and get back a pile of punched cards and some printout,
1970s - are a bit rusty ... (-:]
[]
I have a sneaking suspicion that Microsoft is planning a migration
to a
Linux/Windows hybrid kernel with a Windows GUI. After all, Windows NT,

You might be right.

and up, which had an NT-based kernel still carried along the familiar
desktop GUI from the 9x/DOS frankenjob GUI. First it was Linux in their

I remember when NT gradually took over: NT4 had the 9x/XP GUI, but
NT3.51 had (more or less) the Windows 3.1 (or 3.11) GUI, and held on for
quite a while: at my employers, NT3.51 systems were not replaced by NT4
as a matter of course.

[Long chunk that's beyond me here. (I'm sure mostly correct.)]
[]
And my current experience with small business I have
constantly tried to figure out how to get folks on
Linux. It is virtually impossible, as the apps they
need only run in Windows.

It is the apps the customer cares about. They could
care less if they were run int Flying Zucchini OS, if
it ran their apps.

Indeed. Same for a lot of home users: as long as it does browsing,
email, and (mostly via the browser) social media, and in some cases word
processing, they don't care (or in a _few_ cases even _know_) what OS
they have. And this is _not_ a put-down of such users - they can be
quite intelligent, just not _interested_. The car analogy is imperfect
but relevant.
[]
Also, the recent computer science grads I have come
across make my head spin. They know virtually nothing
about computers or programming. Seriously, they barely
know what a mouse is. And they are in debt up to the
asses with student loans.

I feel the same (more in next post), though to be fair they probably
_do_ know more about _some_ things than you (and I) do. The fact that
_we_ may consider those things less important is of (endlessly arguable
and probably not productively so) relevance.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)Ar@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf

"... all your hard work in the hands of twelve people too stupid to get off jury
duty." CSI, 200x