Re: What computer would you buy to replace your //* ?

[cust_ts@kruuna.Helsinki.FI (Tero Sand)]

In article <54646@sophia.inria.fr> glaurent@aye.inria.fr (Guillaume Laurent) writes:
>In article <2504n6$pdg@kruuna.Helsinki.FI>, cust_ts@kruuna.Helsinki.FI (Tero
>Sand) writes:
>
>> I'm curious as to what constitutes a closed system. Macs - depending on
>> the model - and PCs most definitely are not not closed in the 128K Mac
>> or //c sense of the word.
>
>What I mean by "closed" is that you can't customize it easily, you know nothing
>about the system unless you dig up in hundreds of pages of docs.

This is true of any complex system. Yes, Unix too.

>
>For example, Unix and X Windows (or the Amiga OS) is not "closed" : you have
>directories such as /dev, or /bin, you have a file that is executed each time
>you log in and that you can easily edit to suit your needs, you can change your
>defaults files to have any application look the way you like...
>

Standard directories? Like "System", "System/Drivers",
"System/Desk.Accs" etc.? Come on.

>You can understand a lot of things by just looking at the contents of system
>directories. On a mac, what you see with the Finder may have nothing to do with
>the real files, because Apple's policy is : "let's not tell the user he's
>sitting in front of a computer".Try to boot under anything else than the Finder
>on a mac, it a real pain to do...  

You are being totally unrealistic.  Throw a complete computer neophyte
in front of an Unix system and he won't be able to do anything.  The
same is probably true for a Mac, btw, regardless of what Apple says -
there might be differences in how much you have to explain, but that's a
different issue. 

Before you or anybody else replies: I'm not saying there aren't
differences/advantages in different platforms. But criticisms should be
*valid* - the practice of criticizing *everything* in systems you don't
use/like really bugs me. Regardless of which camp it is coming from.
-- 
Tero Sand, 2 kyu		! Science is a process of enlarging one's
				! ignorance to dizzying heights.
EMail: cust_ts@cc.helsinki.fi	!	- D.C.Lindsay in talk.origins
       custts@cc.helsinki.fi	!