Linux è ottimo, ma non è un nuovo paradigma
Linux is great but is no new paradigm
Apr 2nd, 2008 by Ivo Quartiroli | 
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The Linux operating system and in general all the open source software are an important technical and social development as collaborative non-commercial projects.
Running apart from the Microsoft herd can allow one to be more creative and less commercial but it doesn’t make much difference if the direction is still the same. Linux looks more and more like Windows and I don’t see any substantial difference in how people approach and use a computer.
Still, the inner experience with Linux gives space for a more creative approach in the user experience, though limited mostly to the creativity of the attitudes which pertain to the linear and cause/effect paths to cognition.
I haven’t been into any technical or programming stuff since the early eighties when, as a first year student of computer science, I wrote a book in Italian about using the Unix operating system with two other authors.
Linux shares a lot with Unix. At that time, my goal was mainly to spread information to other students that was not easily available. There were still “ivory towers” that didn’t like people to have access to their knowledge and, as other students, I welcomed power given to the user as an important step in the democratization of the computer world. Still there was no Internet, no Microsoft Windows, no mouse, and very few personal computers. Can you imagine?
The Unix screen was zen-like, empty, and black. No windows on the screen but just command lines that could have been creatively built with the Unix shell language. Instead of just clicking at objects, this is for sure a more creative way to deal with a computer. Now Linux looks more and more like Windows. However, even with the zen-like screen and the command line approach, the basic paradigms embraced by Unix/Linux and Windows aren’t that much different.
Both Unix/Linux and Windows are based on similar models and similar mental outlooks. Both base their documents and files on a hierarchical file system structure, with directories, subdirectories and files. Both ground themselves in the same basic software principles that are used to build operating systems.
Linux is a very important phenomenon as a free, open and collaborative project. However, it doesn’t change much at all in the way we interact with a computer as it uses the same analytical, hierarchical mind and the same mental circuits of any other operating system, based on principles that are mostly unchanged since the seventies.
[...] Andrea Tj: All’epoca, il mio intento era soprattutto diffondere tra gli studenti informazioni altrimenti difficilmente reperibili. Esistevano ancora torri d’avorio che volevano impedire alla gente di accedere al sapere e, come molti altri studenti … [...]
hi, Ivo
How are things?
Right, the computer world needs a new paradigm! Intel China Research Center is working on Model-based Computing to optimize the use of its multi core microprocessor technology. Hence, the advent of virtual character OS could be seen as a future paradigm when tera-scale computers become mainstream. Inspiring post!
Abas
iel2.aimvotal.com