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List:       kde-devel
Subject:    Re: QT for Windows released under GPL
From:       Jason Keirstead <jason () keirstead ! org>
Date:       2005-02-07 23:11:05
Message-ID: 200502071911.05760.jason () keirstead ! org
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On Monday 07 February 2005 6:56 pm, Richard Smith wrote:
> Myself and all my work colleagues run Windows on our workstations not
> because we want to, but because we have to (for MS Outlook and MS Office,
> basically). If KDE apps were available natively, I'd expect quite a few of
> us would run it (I already do, via X-forwarding, which is painfully slow at
> times).
>
> But I think that Aaron's right, in a sense: I would be less likely to
> switch from Win32 to Linux on my workstation if KDE ran over the top of
> Windows. 

See, this is what I mean. These paragraphs are contradictory. If the reason 
you can't switch to Linux is because certain apps are only available for 
Windows, then having other UNIX-like apps available on Windows does not 
hinder Linux in any way. You would *not* in fact be any less likely to switch 
to Linux, since you are stuck on Windows regardless - therefore your risk was 
always 0.

To quote Aaron from another thread:
> if the win32 ports are used as migration tools, great. but if they are used 
> like cygwin often is ("make my windows machine more like UNIX, please") ...

See, how does this harm Linux in any way? The people who are using these apps 
want their Windows to behave like Linux for only one reason - *they would 
rather be on Linux* - but they are prevented from doing so by some external 
means.

No normal Win32 user is ever going to see Cygwin as the wave of the future and 
start running it, its only real purpose in life is to help UNIX people cope 
in a Windows environment.

It is a simmilar thing with KDE on Win32 - KDE is not an enabling technology 
for Linux. The enabling technologies are stuff like OpenOffice, Kontact (if 
it ever gets true Exchange support), Firefox, etc. If people get too used to 
those apps being "Windows Only", you could have a problem. But in reality, 
all they are doing is decreasing the amount of a stranglehold the Windows OS 
has on it's users - the applications.

Users and companies don't care what OS the applications run on - as long as 
they have the applications, the OS could for the most part be swapped out 
right from under them and they woudln't notice or care, as long as the 
applications did their job.


-- 
If you wait by the river long enough, eventually
you will see the bodies of all your enemies float by.
    - Sun Tzu
 
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