[wellylug] Asus is anti-linux?

[Jamie Dobbs]

Damon Lynch wrote:

>So you laugh at all the hardware manufacturers who *do* work closely
>with organisations / people who put together operating systems?  When
>GNU/Linux reaches 10% of the usage, manufacturers will be much more
>likely to work with the free software community with similar vigour as
>they do with Microsoft.  Especially if they wish to remain a successful
>organisation.
>
>  
>
I think that once again you have totally missed my point - this is just 
you trying to start a chicken and egg argument which I am not in the 
least bit interested in. My initial statement that operating systems 
need to be written to support the hardware and not the reverse still stands.
This 10% usage you are talking about has nothing to do with my point, it 
is not usage that drives uptake it is profit, we do live in a capatalist 
society after all.
Also as Microsoft have the vast majority of the market (and will do so 
for the forseeable future) then it makes sense for hardware vendors to 
work with them.
In many ways Linux's biggest advantage (diversity) is also its biggest 
weekness and is lacks standardisation.

>Impossible to do when they don't release specs and it cannot be reverse
>engineered.  
>
>  
>
EVERYTHING can be reverse engineered if analysed closely enough. Over 
the years the entire Mac ROMs were reverse engineered, if some people 
can do this then surely they can sit down with some hardware and work 
out how to get an OS/driver/whatever to talk to it.
After all I remember doing things like this in my first year at 
Polytech, its not that difficult if you have access to basic analysis tools.

[opinion] I still maintain that until Linux loses the 'hippy' image it 
can't be expected to be taken seriously. [/opinion]

(hippy image equates to wanting everything for nothing, and believing 
that it is your right to have access to things that others have spent a 
lot of money in developing and you have no real right to)

[/me dons his flame proof suit and skulks out of the building]