23 Jun
2003
23 Jun
'03
11:36 a.m.
if you assume what i'm saying two paragraphs up is
in some way
accurate, then it makes sense that you should make software so good
that it will make people want to switch (and once they switch to the
audio software and are happy, motivating a switch to linux is easy).
Well, that's what I am not so sure of. If they can use this better app x
on their OS which is not Linux, why switch? Just because it is "free" is
not good enough (at least not in my personal experience of teaching
Linux).
by the way what is your particular research bent/area?
it seems like
that would in the short term be the easiest and most likely way of
doing it (ie grants to fund development of a foundation and set of
applications which have much greater flexibility and appeal to more
users (than say Csound, et.al.) might without the high cost and
inflexibility of proprietary solutions).
I am a composer, but also a student (DMA -- soon to be done), hence my
sphere of influence is currently minimal. I am lucky enough that I got
the blessing from my department to start my own course "Linux &
Multimedia" and get some marginal funding for the computer equipment (I
did not get paid squat, I was doing it because I like teaching it and I
believe in it). This course came as a result of the fact that Linux,
after the advent of OS X and porting of the pertinent GPL'ed apps to it,
became (at least to the powers that be) a second-rate citizen in the
audio studios, so I decided to create a separate class that would expose
students to the power of Linux.
Csound et al. already run on OSX and that is why I started this whole
thread because I wanted to somehow find a way to shield the Linux and
GPL'ed software designed on it by restricting it to Linux and hence
encouraging use of Linux by others who might not be aware of its more
important advantages (or not value them enough to switch) over its
commercial alternatives.
Ico