Choose (open source) software means handing – Computerworld.nl

Opinion – If you choose an OS, you have three flavors: one that you can work with them directly, one that much time is required or one that is completely free . The crux: you can always just two flavors to choose for your personal approach

As I wrote about my move from a MacBook Pro to. a Chromebook, I was of course criticism from some ideologues. I received responses from people who saw it as a switch to a proprietary system like I took Windows

Windows on the side

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I would be very happy with a full open source solution, but one of my main requirements is that I no new full-time hobby after it have to keep in order to work with it. When I was almost 10 years ago put Windows on the side, it was mostly because I was spending too much time with updates, malware protection and repair of drivers after my children had used the PC for gaming.

I’ve always critically re-examined the use of GNU / Linux for my daily use. At every review I found that it was easy to install (it is becoming even easier) and easy to add applications. I’ve never had problems with malware, but somewhere in the life of the platform you’ll be causing a problem against which at best discomfort (sleep mode cuts) or in the worst case by the system boot problems.

From Ubuntu to Chromebook

I wanted pure open source software, so I took earlier this year Linux on my laptop. I bought a Samsung S5 Ultrabook, deleted Windows (Office as prohibited since 2005 in this house) and installed Ubuntu LTS 14:04. It worked fine, apart from the fact that the system was awakened by itself as I opened it. This laptop was suitable for tasks that are normally easily on a PC.

But mostly I just like the browser used, so I might as well have used a Chromebook. When upgrading to Ubunu 14:10 I brickte the device and I could not boot to an environment that I could restore the OS. After that I never went back.

Freedom of Choice

Free software is important. It gives you the assurance that you can choose technological solutions, rather than a producer or government makes that choice for you. But the fact remains that if you choose free software (which you should do) every technological solution requires you somewhere on hand in.

If you spend a lot of time and energy in learning a system can you almost get everything to work. But on the other hand, a solution that “just works” is a good choice. This often means that you curtail software freedom. Any technological decision comes ultimately amount that is optimized for one of the three points on this triangle. The time you have to spend on it, usability of the system and optimal freedom of software

Experience has taught me that I usually two points of this triangle can choose and the third has to offer. I choose to compromise with the time spent, and software freedom and practicality make important. The more I can towards free software, the better. But what does that mean in practice? There are three factors in optimal free software:

• How much of the source code available? I can build the system and replaced, but in a way that it remains useful?
  
• How often the system is improved? Be bugs and added improvements?
  
• Are there alternatives to the ecosystem that are an option for me? If something is wrong and is not resolved, is migrating to an alternative possible?

Again, you can choose a rule two. Every software user must conclude that a compromise somewhere for him or her is acceptable. The important thing is that you know where you have handed on and why, so that you can continue to improve.

How to trolls

When it comes to ideology, you can if you quarrel the compromises where another has come to criticize. That is always possible. You’ll almost always find that the compromise of the other party is worse than yours – even if you’re not aware that you have dropped off, as many of my critics. It is better to accept the compromises of the other and to learn the motives of others. Sometimes they even right!