On 2/7/06, Debarshi 'Rishi' Ray debarshi.ray@gmail.com wrote: [snip]
do not spoil the fresh air. As one of the members have pointed out, I can do some hacking on Gaim by downloading its source code, etc.. I am already on my way my dear friend! And by the way I had tried contacting Google long time back but to no avail. I definitely find your patronosing attitude exteremely disgusting.
Some unsolicited advice about posting. Rule # 1 for a mailing list: Be careful of what you say. What you say is archived and searchable. You may have to eat your words and whats worse that too in public. The web have a way of outliving people. Rule # 2 There is no Rule # 2. Read Rule #1 again.
But do you realise that there are scores of people who do not give a damn about hacking Gaim, who would love to use GNU/Linux if only they had an easy way to solve some of their problems.
Linux is not for everyone. Computer are not specific purpose devices like toasters or microwaves (Who am I kidding? Even these have become increasingly complicated and ship with manuals. Anyways I digress). A computer is not an appliance which when switched on does the work you want. Learning about computers requires quite a bit of time and effort. For information about programming I may point you to Peter Norvigs excellent essay about programming. http://www.norvig.com/21-days.html There will be times when any OS/App will not solve my problem. Eg. No matter how hard I try I can never get some applications to work on Windoze properly. Since I do not have the source I cannot tweak them. Linux gives me that choice and I do it judiciously. If some people see this as a problem there are other OSes which can give them better (hopefully) solutions.
Someone also pointed out that Mark had asked us to leave the WIndows users alone, and concentrate on new users. Interesting point, but can you tell me how you would keep the 'new' user 'glued' to GNU/Linux after they find that they can not use their favourite IM service from behind the proxy? Not everyone has the energy to scour the net and hack around to arrive at a solution. I have the time to do it, but hardly any one else has.
As I said Linux is not for everyone. Learning requires some effort. Besides so many app don't work out-of-the-box even on windows. Also as someone pointed out earlier this problem has already been solved. On Windoze, a lot of time and effort is also spent on keeping malware out.
So Mr. Philip, Mr. Joshi, and the others, if you can not stand some healthy tips, do not stand them, but do not spoil the atmosphere by your raves and rants!
Well I followed the thread and both of them have volunteered some excellent information which you have probably did not care to read. I haven't encountered this problem yet but now I can refer to the earlier thread and get some useful pointers.
--> Vinayak H