<html xmlns:o="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" xmlns:w="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:word" xmlns="http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-html40"> <head> <META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=us-ascii"> <meta name=ProgId content=Word.Document> <meta name=Generator content="Microsoft Word 10"> <meta name=Originator content="Microsoft Word 10"> <link rel=File-List href="cid:filelist.xml@01C408F5.4B18E930">  <style>  </style>  </head> <body lang=EN-US link=blue vlink=purple style='tab-interval:.5in'> <div class=Section1> I’m quite sure that I am far from the first to suggest this but….<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> With the advent of KDE 3.2 and the latest gnome, the x-based user interface system has reached a level of usability that would be possible to use by the average user while still maintaining access to the powerful Linux command line. Further, improvements in the 2.6 kernel make the Linux operating system more robust than ever, offering wide-ranging support for hardware, platforms, and user-needs.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Still, Linux has not really gone mainstream. The features are there, but the operating system is still intimidating. Besides the traditional challenge posed by change, in and of itself, you start your computer and are assailed by a hundred lines of gibberish (at least to the average end user) from the kernel loading. Fedora has certainly taken a stride in the right direction, offering a GUI screen with a progress bar for those who would like it. Still, kernel loading is accomplished by lines upon lines of intimidating text. Further, not enough time has been put into building good looking themes and so forth to be included with KDE, leaving first time users with an impression that the GUI is bland, etc.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> So what can be done about it? Is it really worth addressing these points? While for the average developer here, we just don’t care. I use my fedora boxes more than I do my windows machines. At this point, I have worked with Solaris, RHEL, FC1, FC2T1, and I don’t even notice anymore the lack of polish.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Each time I start a workstation-configured machine for a client demonstration on console, I am harshly brought back to the realization that users aren’t used to this level of output. They practically recoil when they see the kernel load and it gives them a bad impression right off the bat. An impression that the operating system would be overly complicated to use, that employees would have trouble training for it. Once a first impression is made, its rather difficult to break as for most clients it tends to color their analysis of the rest of the system. <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Please keep in mind that although I do programming, I have virtually no experience working with the Linux kernel besides loading modules and so forth. How hard would it be to add perhaps a parameter to grub as to whether or not to suppress that initial text pre-gui? Perhaps offering two modes, one spitting out everything that it does now, the other perhaps offering more simplified (5 or 8 lines instead of 100):<o:p></o:p> “Loading Fedora Core 1…”<o:p></o:p> “…Init Run Level 1”<o:p></o:p> “…Starting [big subsystem]”<o:p></o:p> “…Starting [big subsystem]”<o:p></o:p> “…Init Run Level 5<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> Is this something that OSDL would have to look at? Certainly the OS-related art content is not beyond the scope of the Fedora Project.<o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> --===============--<o:p></o:p> Wayne S. Frazee<o:p></o:p> <o:p></o:p> "If debugging is the process of removing software bugs, then programming must be the process of putting them in."<o:p></o:p> <o:p></o:p> <o:p> </o:p> </div> </body> </html>