[X-Newbies] Pre newbie curiosity

[W Lane]

Sorry, used the wrong email address first time so it didn't get through.

On Mar 14, 2005, at 02:00, Brian Durant wrote:

> Is OS X as
> unstable as some people make it out to be?


No. Rock steady in fact.

>  Programs can't be killed
> cleanly, etc?

Haven't heard that one.

>  I saw a demo G5 at a shop here in Jakarta where the tech
> guy in trying to find the terminal app crashed 4 programs running and
> couldn't kill them seperately, but had to reeboot 2 times!!!

NOT a 'tech guy' I would suggest. People with NO knowledge of X that I 
have convinced to switch from various flavors of Windoze have not even 
done that sort of thing. Therein, I think, is the one and only 'danger' 
of X. Because there is a command line interface readily available 
people who feel the urge to impress others read a bit about it, absorb 
even less of it and leap in. Imagine opening the hood on your Ferrari 
and beginning to 'tune it up' armed only with a hammer, vice grips and 
no manual.

> Not
> exactly an advertisement for OS X, but on the other hand I have seen a
> lot of weird stuff in XP (2K is usually more stable) as well. Any
> comments/advice to satisfy my pre newbie curiosity are greatly
> appreciated.

You'll be most pleased with it. Don't go messing about customizing the 
interface and such for at least the first while. That way, if you do 
run into trouble, you've got a stock system to trouble shoot. Some 
folks run right over to their favorite shareware site and install every 
doo-dad and zing-bang they can find. Then, when a problem creeps up, 
who knows what they've used to reset things.

-- 
William Lane
Calgary, Canada
via Mac OSX - Mail