RE: Back to Windows

Device support is a big problem with Linux, but it’s wrong to blame Linux. (Before you start – I know you didn’t actually blame Linux, but many people do, and I’m addressing them, not you.)

Linux does have pretty good device support – most common hardware works well. But there’s a lot of stuff that just doesn’t have good support.

The real blame goes to the manufacturers, though. I do understand that they’re unwilling to take on the cost of supporting another OS that doesn’t have deep market penetration, but that shouldn’t preclude them from giving out enough information to allow open source developers to build drivers.

There’s a difference between support – which requires at least the attempt at well-written documentation, staff to answer questions, and usually some advertising and marketing efforts – and technical openness. Having one guy on staff who’s willing to answer questions in his off time would usually be enough – there are open-source drivers that have been built with far less than that.

Instead, companies treat their interfaces as if they’re state secrets. I’ve never understood the logic — the Linux market may not be huge, but it’s also not tiny. There are millions of us out here.