Originally Posted by Anakha As an example, how much cost goes into the development of the average Computer Game? There's programming, Modelling, Actors for the voice overs and motion capture, yet more for the FMV, online gaming servers to put up, advertising, licensing of the music. A cost of millions by the time all is said and done. Yet how much does a game cost, retail? £30? £40? Yet something similar, original input cost wise (Say, Adobe Photoshop CS) will set you back 100x that amount! It's patently ludicrous.
Not to disagree with your whole post, but this point doesn't quite stick. Assume that both Game A and 3D Modelling Program A cost $5M to produce. The game may sell 150,000 copies at $50 each, giving everyone involved a nice profit. Game company then turns round a year later and releases the sequel, and people buy that. They don't make a massive amount per product but volume adds up.
3d Modeller A, on the other hand, is unlikely to be usurped by it's successors nearly as easily. Sure, next year's version may have a spangly new interface but for the vast majority of users there will be nothing new for them - they can use if for three, four or more years without a problem. Although a similar number of engineers etc may buy the product, they won't buy another one in a year's time so the company has to get three or four year's worth of profit out of each item.
Hope that makes sense but I'm a bit too tired to read it all again.
Originally Posted by Fod goddamn. GIMP is the worst piece of software, ever. don't even BEGIN to try and convince me otherwise. it's HORRIBLE.
Id agree with that. I tried it and absolutely hated it, its SO not user friendly at all, its really, really roundabout and stupid. It seems like the GUI was designed by a programmer, not a pc user/ergonomic specialist.
For anyone developing relatively complex software, PLEASE, for the love of god, think about how people are going to use it, make it as intuitive as possible... It doesnt have to be crazily perfect, it just needs to make sense to the average user of the OS its on...
there are still too many "IF" to use all those free software. they look good but when i use them i _always_ have problems!
the only one i use everyday it's Thunderbird.
i also agree with the gimp's unfriendly user interface, i think they only wanted it to be "different" from photoshop...i use paint.NET 2.6 (it's free, and do something...)
last time i used office was almost an year ago, i think..
and i think i'm going to buy Vista...OEM sure :)
To me free softwares must tried twice as hard to gain recognition as one car rental company motto 'we are not the first so we tried the best'. Using my Sony Ericsson T610, the included software from Sony Ericsson dubbed Download Sony Ericsson Communications Suite is only gave me HELL. It installed some drivers and can only sync with MS Outlook. Lucky for me there is Float's Mobile Agent which is freeware and I can assure you all the SE users out there, there's another reason to have a SE phone, its the Float's Mobile Agent
Only... what is an alternative download manager for Pete?
Good article but you could have gone further. I've used these free alternatives for a while now with no problems:
Open Office (Abiword is also great) instead of Office. CDBurnerXP Pro 3 instead of Nero. TUGZip instead of winzip, winrar or/and winace. Free Download Manager as my download manager. Netmeter to monitor my net usage.
I own an old version of PaintShop Pro (6 I think) so I use it for my image needs, however if I didn't have it I'd use Gimpshop. Which, as you can guess by the name, is GIMP edited to resemble the interface of Photoshop. http://plasticbugs.com/?page_id=294
Only thing stopping me from switching to my work setup (FC3) are the games needing Windows. bah.
Originally Posted by AlexB I would use Linux, if it could read (and write) to my 200gb's of NTFS data. :/
This is the problem I have with my external HDD. I only use nix here but there are times I need it to be read/written to from a windows box (and do not have the ability to install one of the various ext2 drivers that exist), it's FAT32 atm.... :(
I find many free software come with alot of crap like spyware and so on. You need to watch what you download if its free. Also need to watch what you download even if its a normal software.
Tomm:Seashore is basically the GIMP rewritten to use cocoa.
I use Inkscape for vector, Paint.NET for bitmaps and Blender for 3D regularly. I find they all work well espescially Blender and Inkscape. I don't use paint.NET for much besides resizing and compression right now. I also have a computer set up to dual boot XP and Ubuntu.
Don't forget though that generally, OEM licenses are not transferrable between machines. So to remain legal, that OEM copy of XP that you've just bought needs to be sold along with the machine (or scrapped with it).
Upgrading your PC is fine, but changing the mobo makes it a 'new' PC and you should junk your OEM license and buy yourself a new one.
The same goes for moving XP licenses between laptops and desktops. You're not supposed to do it.
If you're going to suggest people buy OEM software, it wouldn't hurt to mention this in the article.
You can also use it to download your Hotmail messages.
You mention this in the Thunderbird section, yet in the FAQ on the site here, it states that it doesn't support it. I tried using it but gave up when I found out it wouldn't handle my hotmail either.
Free (as in beer) software only includes spyware if your not careful and download from disreputeable locations. This is why I like free (as in Speech) software. You can usually trust it since many people can go through the code and make a bunch of noise if it's spyware.
We talk about industry standards alot on bit-tech and we had an industry standard on CD's, floppies, wireless ect and you all probably know about the battle of the next gen HD DVD and blue ray DVD fighting to become the industry standard in high capacity DVD's.
The problem is that all these flavors of OS's are not industry standard, if they all worked in roughtly the same way, then the stability of linux or the power of macs might start to make a huge dent into windows. But linux and mac cant ever do that, so windows will be the main one to use for "average" people.
Although with vista coming soon I am starting to see the gap between functions shrink a little smaller. maybe microsoft are starting to dig their own grave by making each successive OS a little bit more like macs and linux.
The statement that Outlook does not support saved searches of mails filtered by rules is 100% wrong.
Thats what Search Folders are. You can even see in the screenshot you post of outlook that Search Folders are there.
And you can create new ones with a plethora of rules.
If youre replacing outlook and you actually use outlook or even 60% of outlook there arent many good alternatives. Evolution is one that is free and runs on Linux, but Linux sucks ass on the desktop anyway.
Id recommend that people purchase the OEM software with their PC if they couldnt pirate and fund that with buying a less powerful PC. Youll still do more with legal software than with free software for that $300 bones, rather than having a faster Linux box that cant play most games and runs software that virtually no one else runs.
Besides you should point out one can get a Dell with XP Home and Office basic and an LCD monitor for less than $600 usually.
GIMP is possibly a user replacement for photoshop but most consumers need something similar to PS elements or Expose, not Gimp / Full blown photoshop. I haven't seen a good free one yet for linux.
Here's a free one for windows:
Adobe Photoshop Album Starter, it's not time limited, just feature limited but easy to use and migrate to elements.
Originally Posted by customholle I HIGHLY recommend you cease and desist with all talk of warez, otherwise you WILL have a ban.
I do agree with you on the fact that something requires a learning curve and i know the ins and outs of xp though.
????
Bit of an overreaction, that is the subject of the article.
TBH, I always find the discussion of warez vs legitimate free software quite funny. Unless you're an active developer giving away your hardwork for free then i don't see that you're morally justified in using any other software for free, legit or not. Just becasue the developer says you can use it doesn't mean you really deserve to.
I personally would much rather have competing products that you actually pay (less) for with companies that are dedicated to producing and improving that product. Rather than all this open source stuff that, as a lot of people have already pointed out, tends to be inferior to the commercial product. Imagine if Linux were just a single product from one developer that was just a cheaper direct competitor to Windows. There would be better support from all the hardware and software developers because they have a single product to aim for.
I definetly agree with another point that someone made earlier, and it's something i've said before. Microsoft should release a barebones version of Windows without all the integrated crap and just allow the market to become more open and competitive (i know, wishful thinking). They would still be the major players with windows and office dominating but it would allow FF to charge for FF because IE would also be an extra cost. So the user has more choice of legit paid for software.
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Not to disagree with your whole post, but this point doesn't quite stick. Assume that both Game A and 3D Modelling Program A cost $5M to produce. The game may sell 150,000 copies at $50 each, giving everyone involved a nice profit. Game company then turns round a year later and releases the sequel, and people buy that. They don't make a massive amount per product but volume adds up.
3d Modeller A, on the other hand, is unlikely to be usurped by it's successors nearly as easily. Sure, next year's version may have a spangly new interface but for the vast majority of users there will be nothing new for them - they can use if for three, four or more years without a problem. Although a similar number of engineers etc may buy the product, they won't buy another one in a year's time so the company has to get three or four year's worth of profit out of each item.
Hope that makes sense but I'm a bit too tired to read it all again.
Id agree with that. I tried it and absolutely hated it, its SO not user friendly at all, its really, really roundabout and stupid. It seems like the GUI was designed by a programmer, not a pc user/ergonomic specialist.
For anyone developing relatively complex software, PLEASE, for the love of god, think about how people are going to use it, make it as intuitive as possible... It doesnt have to be crazily perfect, it just needs to make sense to the average user of the OS its on...
the only one i use everyday it's Thunderbird.
i also agree with the gimp's unfriendly user interface, i think they only wanted it to be "different" from photoshop...i use paint.NET 2.6 (it's free, and do something...)
last time i used office was almost an year ago, i think..
and i think i'm going to buy Vista...OEM sure :)
Only... what is an alternative download manager for Pete?
Open Office (Abiword is also great) instead of Office. CDBurnerXP Pro 3 instead of Nero. TUGZip instead of winzip, winrar or/and winace. Free Download Manager as my download manager. Netmeter to monitor my net usage.
And so on, http://www.nedwolf.com/ is a good place to start and then searching http://www.sourceforge.net/ for whatever else.
I own an old version of PaintShop Pro (6 I think) so I use it for my image needs, however if I didn't have it I'd use Gimpshop. Which, as you can guess by the name, is GIMP edited to resemble the interface of Photoshop. http://plasticbugs.com/?page_id=294
Only thing stopping me from switching to my work setup (FC3) are the games needing Windows. bah.
This is the problem I have with my external HDD. I only use nix here but there are times I need it to be read/written to from a windows box (and do not have the ability to install one of the various ext2 drivers that exist), it's FAT32 atm.... :(
I use Inkscape for vector, Paint.NET for bitmaps and Blender for 3D regularly. I find they all work well espescially Blender and Inkscape. I don't use paint.NET for much besides resizing and compression right now. I also have a computer set up to dual boot XP and Ubuntu.
Personally i use leechget, and find it to be reliable + fully featured. I definitely recommend it.
Upgrading your PC is fine, but changing the mobo makes it a 'new' PC and you should junk your OEM license and buy yourself a new one.
The same goes for moving XP licenses between laptops and desktops. You're not supposed to do it.
If you're going to suggest people buy OEM software, it wouldn't hurt to mention this in the article.
EDIT:Apprently 80% discounts on M$ products at the mo, for students.
http://store.digitalriver.com/DRHM/servlet/ControllerServlet?Action=DisplayHomePage&SiteID=msft&Locale=en_GB
Check out AROS. They're trying to make AmigaOS on x86 a reality.
You mention this in the Thunderbird section, yet in the FAQ on the site here, it states that it doesn't support it. I tried using it but gave up when I found out it wouldn't handle my hotmail either.
The problem is that all these flavors of OS's are not industry standard, if they all worked in roughtly the same way, then the stability of linux or the power of macs might start to make a huge dent into windows. But linux and mac cant ever do that, so windows will be the main one to use for "average" people.
Although with vista coming soon I am starting to see the gap between functions shrink a little smaller. maybe microsoft are starting to dig their own grave by making each successive OS a little bit more like macs and linux.
Thats what Search Folders are. You can even see in the screenshot you post of outlook that Search Folders are there.
And you can create new ones with a plethora of rules.
If youre replacing outlook and you actually use outlook or even 60% of outlook there arent many good alternatives. Evolution is one that is free and runs on Linux, but Linux sucks ass on the desktop anyway.
Id recommend that people purchase the OEM software with their PC if they couldnt pirate and fund that with buying a less powerful PC. Youll still do more with legal software than with free software for that $300 bones, rather than having a faster Linux box that cant play most games and runs software that virtually no one else runs.
Besides you should point out one can get a Dell with XP Home and Office basic and an LCD monitor for less than $600 usually.
Here's a free one for windows:
Adobe Photoshop Album Starter, it's not time limited, just feature limited but easy to use and migrate to elements.
http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshopalbum/starter.html
????
Bit of an overreaction, that is the subject of the article.
I personally would much rather have competing products that you actually pay (less) for with companies that are dedicated to producing and improving that product. Rather than all this open source stuff that, as a lot of people have already pointed out, tends to be inferior to the commercial product. Imagine if Linux were just a single product from one developer that was just a cheaper direct competitor to Windows. There would be better support from all the hardware and software developers because they have a single product to aim for.
I definetly agree with another point that someone made earlier, and it's something i've said before. Microsoft should release a barebones version of Windows without all the integrated crap and just allow the market to become more open and competitive (i know, wishful thinking). They would still be the major players with windows and office dominating but it would allow FF to charge for FF because IE would also be an extra cost. So the user has more choice of legit paid for software.