On Mon, Oct 26, 2009 at 10:31:06PM +0000, dennisjperkins@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote: > > > Well, I guess they try to 'integrate' again, all config in one place, > > but again only for their bubble. > > Isn't there already an OS with such a terrible, bloated and cryptical > all config in one place database called registry? > > And wasn't there a principle in Unix/Linux: "Everything is a file."? Indeed, this is one of the many appeals of Linux. What scares me about Windows is that I cannot fix anything that Microsoft didn't expect to go wrong - so pretty much everything ;) - because I need some program that understands whatever proprietary format they use. In addition, looking for a messed-up entry in the registry is like looking for a needle in a haystack because it's huge, not really documented, and the entry keys are cryptic. In old-fashioned Linux, you have a few well-defined text files that control the behaviour of an application. If they're messed up, I can go at them with a text editor, and their entries are usually well-documented in a man-page. This is a level of maintainability that is hard to beat. I see why desktop people want to have a centralized place to configure everything: the average user is probably not up to editing many text files and probably doesn't understand half of what's written in the man-pages explaining their contents. But then I think the way to go is to have a two-tier architecture with well-documented text files for the individual applications underneath and a unified GUI on top that manipulates (the most common options in) them. Cheers, Norbert
