[ Thanks to Dave
for this link. ]
“A few days ago, I posted an article on how my mother uses
Linux. This article sparked a massive amount of feedback and
questions, mostly from people who wanted to know how they can
convince a casual computer user that Linux can serve them better
than Windows can. Convincing the casual user to run Linux can be
much more difficult than convincing a computer junkie, especially
if they’ve grown up on Microsoft products.”
“If you are trying to convince a software developer, you can
show them a collection of GNU utilities, or one of the new IDE’s.
Networking tinkerers can be swayed with Samba and Apache. You can
amaze hard-core gamers by playing Q3 Test, Civilization, and many
other games. But how how do you convince someone who just wants to
do “normal” computer tasks. Showing them that the tasks can be done
in Linux is not enough. If the same tasks can be done in Windows,
why should they switch? You should focus your attempt on the areas
where Linux excels as a desktop platform: Speed, Stability, Price,
and Ease of use. Yes, the last item did say “Ease of use”. Once
installed, Linux GUI’s, and KDE in particular, are remarkably
intuitive, and simple to adapt to.“