Explaining Free Software - good examples

[xdrudis]

El Sat, Jul 22, 2006 at 01:29:09AM +1000, Ben Finney deia:
> 
> Fortunately, there's an immediate, understandable benefit that comes
> to every user of free software whether they modify it or not: not that
> *they personally* can modify the software, but that *anyone* is
> allowed to.
> 

Yes, the other day I thought of an example while having a nightmare 
imagining what if I had to install Windows on my laptop and mantain it
(must be something bad I ate).

The audience may not be develeopers, but they may, to some extend mantain
their own system, better or worse, larger or smaller, with more or less 
success. With propietary software it is really difficult (well, I don't 
really know, I don't do that, but I suspect it is). You have different 
programs and you have to track how to configure each one and where to
check for updates or fixes, it's a lot of uncoordinated work. If you 
use debian, then you simply pick your branch, and regularly update 
your software at once. If you need to change configuration, you trust 
it's somewhere in /etc, if you want to know what's installed, etc. you 
have easy interfaces. And this is not just for one program, but for thousands.
Of course this is thanks to the generous efforts of many debian developers,
but it is also because they work on free software, that they can adapt 
to the debian policy, they can bring to harmony with each other and
they can integrate. You enjoy a coherent system not because the original
programs are magically coherent, but because anyone is free to adapt them
to create a coherent distribution. THe original authors made a good program,
but that is only so good. They made it free too, and it was great, because
it enabled the distribution authors to integrate it for the user's comfort.

One thing that usually impresses is the ease of updating a debian system 
(not only debian, it's an example), or installing some complex piece
of software in one command line or one click. You could show that and 
compare it to how difficult it would be with different propietary pieces
of software. Or you could even compare with how relatively more difficult
it would be to build it from pristine sources (or install from pristine binaries)
if you could not use the work of the distribution authors. 

I'm not sure it is really easy to explain, but I think it is one of the 
most obvious benefits for users who don't think of modifiying software
but find free software easier because of its freedom and the work of 
others in it. Explain the step between freedom and the resulting ease 
for users may be more or less easy.

Note: debian is just an example, there are many more distributions and
the whole point of having distributions is that they are very convenient
for users, compare with just unintegrated freeware or shareware compilations.



-- 
Xavi Drudis Ferran
xdrudis at tinet.cat