RE: Octave's goals and motivations (Re: GUI)

[Schirmacher, Rolf]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: address@hidden
> [mailto:address@hidden Behalf Of Carnë Draug
> Sent: Thursday, September 29, 2011 1:39 PM
> To: tilas
> Cc: Jordi Gutiérrez Hermoso; address@hidden
> Subject: Re: Octave's goals and motivations (Re: GUI)
> 
> 
> 2011/9/29 Jordi Gutiérrez Hermoso <address@hidden>:
> > On 28 September 2011 18:40, tilas <address@hidden> wrote:
> >> 2. consider this simple fact of life: between 80%-90% of all
> >> desktops are windows vs about 1%-5% linux
> > [...] Most
> > of the world's computers use Windows. But that doesn't mean 
> we should
> > accept any of these facts of life nor not attempt to improve them.
> 
> Just would like to point out that the group 'all desktops' is of no
> interest. The group 'desktops of people who have a use for octave'
> maybe is and I'm guessing the 2 linux/windows populations in that
> group will be very different.
> 
> Carnë
> 

Please let me add my 2 ct:

First, my desktop at home is linux; at the office, it is windows (as typically 
found in commercial environments). 
Honestly, I have more of a use for octave at the office than at home.

We probably have to accept that for quite some times now windows became a 
reasonable stable and commercially supportable working environment and thus is 
the preferred option in many commercial environments.

So, I would still expect that there is a large number of (potential) users who 
are required to operate under windows and within an environment where 
dual-boot, etc. is not really a realistic option. Most of them are probably 
more users than developers, so they would probably not show up that strongly in 
the development community (but see the SF downloads as an indication). But in 
addition, here is some hen and egg problem as well: The simple availability for 
windows lacks clearly behind linux (i.e. 3.2.4 vs. 3.4.2), so windows users 
might be de-motivated to use octave, so ...

So, please do not forget about us windows users!

Thanks,

Rolf