Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Windows and Me.

When someone sends me an exe file, or an ActiveX DLL, and asks me to help out with something software related...

I don't. I haven't run Windows for seven years, and hope I never have to again.

It's amusing when you detect incredulity on their end... they can't believe that someone just doesn't have Windows. Some people even get annoyed. I can tell.

It's not that I'm trying to be elitist, difficult or contrary, I just don't like Windows. I hate it. Windows abuses it's users. I get all tense and angry every time I have to use it (which is _only_ when helping out close friends). If I really had to solve a Windows problem, I'd simply pay someone else to do it.

Some people imagine that 'commercial reality' should dictate what I use, what services I provide. Well, your'e welcome to your own reality, I'll stay in mine thank you! That is why I use tools like Python, and Unity3D. Software isn't worth writing (or using!) unless it is cross platform. Of course, Unity3D is not _entirely_ cross platform, but that will change one day.

8 comments:

Sander van Rossen said...

... so what OS *are* you using then?

Joseph said...

How do you ensure your cross platform software works on all platforms without testing it on all of them?

As for the OS... I would be on Mac. There is just to much stuff which is annoying or impossible to setup on Linux to not have a "mainstream" OS on the side.

Pete said...

Has Unity made some indications of supporting Linux? It looks nice, but there's nothing I can download.

Jerry said...

Joseph: Really? The only thing I have found that needs a "mainstream" OS is games. Other than that, just some professional software for other professions (CAD, high-end photography and video, etc...) which doesn't matter if you are not of those very specific professions. For software development, Linux is hard to beat.

And note for all those categories, OS X is barely better than Linux (unless you're really into Blizzard or the casual games and absolutely nothing else, or photography on the professional side), so if you're going to bother to have an OS on the side, it might as well be Windows.

Agreed about the cross-platform testing though; VirtualBox works great for testing on Windows, and I just use my girlfriend's Mac when I need to test Mac compatibility for my personal projects.

Jim said...

When I get up from Linux and sit down at Windows it feels like someone took my thumbs away.

Joseph said...

The big one for me on Linux is Netflix and I also play the occasional Valve or Blizzard game.

Simon Wittber said...

I use OSX. If Unity3D was available on Linux, I'd be there straight away. Ubuntu is my favorite distro. Linux is hard to beat when it comes to development environments, IMO.

Will Unity3D come to linux? I'm not sure about the editor... however the player will arrive, courtesy of WebGL, I imagine. :-)

Beachman said...

Windows is superior in most of the categories. Like it or hate it. And people usually hate it when someone is seemingly smug of their different choice. As a Windows user I'm very happy. When I try to bend my head over Linux or Mac it hurts. Linux is too complicated under the hood (we all know what this means) and Mac is just too simple on the outside. I mean when I realized that there's no Insert key in Mac my head exploded. When I tried to change the GUI font in Mac my chest exploded... and the list goes on :D

Windows hits the sweet spot in my case and especially it does it in 7. Unity works just fine.

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