why umsdos?

Rick Hohensee (humbubba@raptor.cqi.com)
Sat, 7 Nov 1998 16:40:11 -0500 (EST)

There have been a couple posts questioning the usefulness of umsdos.
If you already use Linux umsdos is pretty lame. There are some 200 million
PC users out there that don't already use Linux. Most of them have DOS FAT
partitions of some flavor, and a umsdos distribution in most cases doesn't
install, it merely unpacks. umsdos is an important bridge. The contest
between M$ and the rest of the world will hinge largely on how fast Linux
becomes easier to use, IMO. On the desktop anyway. This seems to be a
common view, although I have a very different take on what constitutes
user-friendly than the big distros do.

That's why my cLIeNUX mini-distro is umsdos. umsdos allows the curious a
taste of excellence without re-partitioning. A small umsdos mini-distro
can be moved to an ext2 partition in minutes. Think of umsdos as an
install utility for a real Linux. And a crucial piece of Linux outreach.

As Linux use continues to explode, get smug with the UDI types perhaps,
other unices perhaps, the press perhaps. Please do not get smug with those
200 million innocent victims.

untfs wouldn't be bad either. Meanwhile, I wait eagerly for a umsdos boot
to work on my PS2 with 2.1.

Rick Hohensee http://cqi.com/~humbubba
colorg on EFnet IRC #linux chanop
cLIeNUX xart kandinski cycluphonics ratioles Md., USA
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Any questions?

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