Why Linux?

[kamper]

Thank you. That "if it wants..." is all I've been arguing for.

Now I'll throw in my two cents about "what linux needs to do", with the "if it wants..." qualifier as well Attacking the workstation market could work well. Generally (hopefully), more informed people are making those decisions. People who don't need a brand shoved down their throats to understand. Of course, branding still matters, but RedHat and Suse are going after that market. Starting with it on developers machines, it can be moved to less technical people's machines as kinks get worked out. Once people get the idea, they will be more open to it at home. It doesn't even have to be the same brand/interface. Simply the idea that there's more than one interface in the world will go a long way.

That said, although I've never been put in front of a linux workstation in a work environment, I'm not sure I'd like it all that much. I like *nix when I can have complete control over the environment and generally prefer community style distros. Oh well, as long as I could have reasonable requests for package installations filled quickly, I'm sure I could cope.

 

[ivwshane]

The workplace desktop is definitely a real and achievable avenue the "successful desktop OS" developers can promote linux through.

 

[drag]

It's already happenning for a lot of workstations.

'Workstation' type things, at least as it seems to me, has always been Unix. Windows stability and performance has been utter crap until the past few years. Everything except CAD sorta stuff... Usually it's much much easier to go from propriatory Unix to Linux. It's advanced as far as Linux has virtually killed off things like Irix.

There are lots of interesting things going on.
http://linuxmovies.org/

We're an association of over 300 technologists advancing Linux motion picture technology. Linux is the dominant software technology in feature film animation and visual effects, used in practically every blockbuster movie in theaters today.

 

[Nothinman]

If you, as the linux user and developer, don't want linux to be a successful desktop OS then we should close this thread and end the discussion.

But that's part of the point, it doesn't really matter what any 1 developer or even group of developers want. The source code is open and anyone can take it and do what they want with it. Just because RedHat doesn't think the desktop is important right now doesn't mean anything, Ubuntu is still free to take the same code and package it up how they see fit. Unlike in the closed source world where if a company like MS doesn't think you're worth supporting you're screwed, in the OSS world you have options like taking the code and fixing it yourself or paying someone else to do it for you.

The last really dramatic change was Win3.1->Win95 (at least IMO). Win98 was nearly identical. WinNT/Win2K had some minor changes, but works pretty much the same as Win95/98. I don't have too much experience with WinME, but it looks a lot like Win98 on the surface.

WinXP tweaked a bunch of things, but with the new graphical stuff turned off is pretty damn close to Win2K. I'm not crazy about everything they did, but some people like it, and it takes all of about three mouse clicks to revert back to the old mode if you don't. That's about as convenient as you can make it while still making substantial changes.

XP moved a lot of stuff around for no reason. But I wasn't even really thinking about Windows, look at Office, VS and WMP, they get a brand new UI (of which none are consistent with MS' UI guidelines) with virtually every release.

The Internet is popular because of it's chaotic and open roots. If it was a closed project littered with patents and companies fighting for control it would have died before anyone outside of the colleges and DARPA heard about it. Imagine if MS had created, patented and charged licensing fees to use HTTP, do you have any idea how much software would have never been created?

 

[ivwshane]

But that's part of the point, it doesn't really matter what any 1 developer or even group of developers want. The source code is open and anyone can take it and do what they want with it. Just because RedHat doesn't think the desktop is important right now doesn't mean anything, Ubuntu is still free to take the same code and package it up how they see fit. Unlike in the closed source world where if a company like MS doesn't think you're worth supporting you're screwed, in the OSS world you have options like taking the code and fixing it yourself or paying someone else to do it for you.

But that's what I'm saying, someone (as in developer) needs to step up and make the linux desktop their goal and if no one wants to do that then fine but then there is no point in having a discussion about having linux be a successful desktop OS.

It's like talking about how MS can make their products successful in the open source community, MS has no intentions of making their products open source therefore there is no point in having such a discussion.

I keep hearing users (maybe not the same type of user you are) asking, hoping for a linux desktop that is better than windows and I find it hard to believe that no developer wants to tackle that or cater to that user, I don't understand why developers wouldn't want to go after the average joe. The market is huge and there is money to be made (and I know there are developers that want to make money).


And let's not bash MS because if there is one thing we can be thankful for it's the fact that their products united, maybe even created the computer industry we have today. If MS weren't around I believe we would be in the stranglehold of a true monopoly, where not only the software is closed source but the hardware is too!

 

[Fish11]

And let's not bash MS because if there is one thing we can be thankful for it's the fact that their products united, maybe even created the computer industry we have today. If MS weren't around I believe we would be in the stranglehold of a true monopoly, where not only the software is closed source but the hardware is too!

I do agree with you that because of MS we are in the computer industry that we have today but I don't know if that's a good thing or not. A couple of quotes that I totally agree with...

"Microsoft's biggest and most dangerous contribution to the software industry may be the degree to which it has lowered user expectations." -ESTHER SCHINDLER, OS/2 Magazine

"The idea that Bill Gates has appeared like a knight in shining armour to lead all customers out of a mire of technological chaos neatly ignores the fact that it was he who, by peddling second-rate technology, led them into it in the first place." -DOUGLAS ADAMS, Author, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

"... Microsoft has taken a perfectly good standard, broken it, and then told us that we have to buy expensive programs that support the broken interface rather than use the free ones that come with all operating systems in the world except Microsoft operating systems."-ALLEN HOLUB, Programmer and Columnis

"I totally agree that Microsoft products are not the best products."-PRASANNA R. PRABHU, Microsoft

"If you can't make it good, make it look good." -BILL GATES, 1995

MS is known for stealing idea, implementing them into their OS and then squshing any competition. So I think it's safer to say that we would all be better off without MS as far as technology goes. I don't know as much as you guys do by any means but that's my .02.

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: ivwshane

But that's part of the point, it doesn't really matter what any 1 developer or even group of developers want. The source code is open and anyone can take it and do what they want with it. Just because RedHat doesn't think the desktop is important right now doesn't mean anything, Ubuntu is still free to take the same code and package it up how they see fit. Unlike in the closed source world where if a company like MS doesn't think you're worth supporting you're screwed, in the OSS world you have options like taking the code and fixing it yourself or paying someone else to do it for you.

But that's what I'm saying, someone (as in developer) needs to step up and make the linux desktop their goal and if no one wants to do that then fine but then there is no point in having a discussion about having linux be a successful desktop OS.

http://www.novell.com/
http://www.novell.com/products/desktop/?sourceidint=productsmenu_nld_bottom
http://www.betterdesktop.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main
http://en.opensuse.org/Welcome_to_openSUSE.org
http://www.novell.com/products/apparmor/

http://usability.kde.org/
http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gup/ut1_report/report_main.html

http://www.ubuntu.com/
http://www.canonical.com/

http://fedora.redhat.com/projects/stateless/
https://www.redhat.com/apps/isv_catalog/results.html?platform_code=100

http://freedesktop.org/wiki/
http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Portland

http://www.osdl.org/lab_activities/desktop_linux
http://software.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=05/12/06/1741244&from=rss
http://kegel.com/osdl/da05.html
http://kegel.com/wine/isv/

etc etc etc etc.

 

[ivwshane]

MS is known for stealing idea, implementing them into their OS and then squshing any competition. So I think it's safer to say that we would all be better off without MS as far as technology goes.

Yes maybe better off now (which I don't agree with, less competition is almost always bad) but not necessarily better off without them in the past.

 

[ivwshane]

Originally posted by: drag

Originally posted by: ivwshane

But that's part of the point, it doesn't really matter what any 1 developer or even group of developers want. The source code is open and anyone can take it and do what they want with it. Just because RedHat doesn't think the desktop is important right now doesn't mean anything, Ubuntu is still free to take the same code and package it up how they see fit. Unlike in the closed source world where if a company like MS doesn't think you're worth supporting you're screwed, in the OSS world you have options like taking the code and fixing it yourself or paying someone else to do it for you.

But that's what I'm saying, someone (as in developer) needs to step up and make the linux desktop their goal and if no one wants to do that then fine but then there is no point in having a discussion about having linux be a successful desktop OS.

http://www.novell.com/
http://www.novell.com/products/desktop/?sourceidint=productsmenu_nld_bottom
http://www.betterdesktop.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main
http://en.opensuse.org/Welcome_to_openSUSE.org
http://www.novell.com/products/apparmor/

http://usability.kde.org/
http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gup/ut1_report/report_main.html

http://www.ubuntu.com/
http://www.canonical.com/

http://fedora.redhat.com/projects/stateless/
<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="https://www.redhat.com/apps/isv_catalog/results.html?platform_code=100">https://www.redhat.com/apps/isv_catalog/results.html?platform_code=100</a>

http://freedesktop.org/wiki/
http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Portland

http://www.osdl.org/lab_activities/desktop_linux
http://software.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=05/12/06/1741244&from=rss
http://kegel.com/osdl/da05.html
http://kegel.com/wine/isv/

etc etc etc etc.

That's great but it's still not a single identity your average joe can grasp. But it's good to know that the developers are out there with the goal of creating a good desktop does exist. It will be just a matter of time before someone is able to stand out from the crowd.

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: ivwshane

Originally posted by: drag

Originally posted by: ivwshane

But that's part of the point, it doesn't really matter what any 1 developer or even group of developers want. The source code is open and anyone can take it and do what they want with it. Just because RedHat doesn't think the desktop is important right now doesn't mean anything, Ubuntu is still free to take the same code and package it up how they see fit. Unlike in the closed source world where if a company like MS doesn't think you're worth supporting you're screwed, in the OSS world you have options like taking the code and fixing it yourself or paying someone else to do it for you.

But that's what I'm saying, someone (as in developer) needs to step up and make the linux desktop their goal and if no one wants to do that then fine but then there is no point in having a discussion about having linux be a successful desktop OS.

http://www.novell.com/
http://www.novell.com/products/desktop/?sourceidint=productsmenu_nld_bottom
http://www.betterdesktop.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main
http://en.opensuse.org/Welcome_to_openSUSE.org
http://www.novell.com/products/apparmor/

http://usability.kde.org/
http://developer.gnome.org/projects/gup/ut1_report/report_main.html

http://www.ubuntu.com/
http://www.canonical.com/

http://fedora.redhat.com/projects/stateless/
<a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="https://www.redhat.com/apps/isv_catalog/results.html?platform_code=100"><a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="https://www.redhat.com/apps/isv_catalog/results.html?platform_code=100"><a target=_blank class=ftalternatingbarlinklarge href="https://www.redhat.com/apps/isv_catalog/results.html?platform_code=100">https://www.redhat.com/apps/isv_cata......lts.html?platform_code=100</a></a></a>

http://freedesktop.org/wiki/
http://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Portland

http://www.osdl.org/lab_activities/desktop_linux
http://software.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=05/12/06/1741244&from=rss
http://kegel.com/osdl/da05.html
http://kegel.com/wine/isv/

etc etc etc etc.

That's great but it's still not a single identity your average joe can grasp. But it's good to know that the developers are out there with the goal of creating a good desktop does exist. It will be just a matter of time before someone is able to stand out from the crowd.

I don't know were your coming from with this 'single identity' stuff. I don't think it's relevent or important at all.

edit:
I don't think that it is required for Linux desktop success for one or another company to drive others out of business. As long as the software is compatable, which is what everybody wants right now, one Linux version or another is irrelevent as far as requirements.. It's just a matter of choice.

I do think that eventually one company will be the 'big' company. Novell is most likely right now for Linux desktop. They have the support options, developers, and experiance that should help them be successfull in supporting businesses.

I don't think that there ever will be a solo 'big' company for Linux like Microsoft. There will always be alternatives. The days of selling software for 300% profit like MS does is going to come to a end. Nobody wants another monopoly.

 

[konakona]

I am all for going hardcore with learning and educating myself, spending some time to figure things out, but FC4 has given me enough trouble to think twice about installing it on an entertainment rig. Few things I have noticed :

1) There are still plenty of hardware that are not supported; the sad part is, they all happen to be superior to more popular competition
a)none of the EMU cards are supported
b)713x tuners seem to be a major PITA to get working according to some discussions I found through googling. My Kworld pvr-7131 still doesnt work with tvtime
c)It was painful enough to install the newest version of ALSA multiple times just to get AV710 working. Still doesnt sound quite right compared to winXP.

2)Perhaps its just fedora/GNOME or my inability to optimize things in linux, but the computer seems to be very sluggish compared to tweaked up WinXP on my P3-866/512 machine. Is 512 too lacking for FC4? I was hoping to uninstall some components to free up some hdd space, but it wants installation CDs just to remove the files I never knew I would regret getting the DVD version of the installation ISO instead...

3)I am trying to get asterisk/gnophone working so it could replace stanaphone, but it looks like an awful lot of work and I have no clue where to start. VLC is decent, but quite lacking compared to gomplayer IMO. Is mplayer any better? Wine couldnt run half of the programs I gave a shot at with different options.

4)There is some oddball glitch (according to some fedora forum links) that cripples iocharset and codepage options in conjunction with user options in fstab. The result - I get invalid encoding all over with mounted remote drives. The easy way out would have been using "Windows Network" under network, but computers only show up half of the time (though I heard this is more of windows' problem), and I cant even open files when accessing folders works flawlessly. I attempted to seek the solution to this problem in another thread, but no one provided direct answer to it; as such, I assume samba is inherently flawed or not 100% compatible with windows network. Feel free to prove me wrong and fix my crap

5)Just recently, my FC4 has been acting very weird. Namely, it started seeking the hdd like every 3 seconds, literally! Both of my rigs are very quite and I havnt been exposed to this kind of noise in a very long while. This is bothering my so much I am contemplating if I should go back to windows, and try installing something supposedely lighter like slackware on our community rig in the living room. My original intent was to take up on learning linux and use it for my secondary entertainment rig while at it, but I guess that was a mistake. Again, I dont mind putting some effort to make things to work (otherwise I wouldnt have spent days just to google on ALSA and saa713x ), but its frustrating to see how none of my priority tasks (VoIP, TV, remote video viewing, some gaming) could be done at a satisfactory level.

 

[ivwshane]

Originally posted by: drag

I don't know were your coming from with this 'single identity' stuff. I don't think it's relevent or important at all.

It's important because it gives the consumer (average joe, who happens to be the majority of desktop users) something they can grab on to or associate with.

When someone asks for a kleenex what do you do? You give them a tissue. Kleenex is a brand but everyone associates it with tissues. By creating an identity like that for linux you are helping joe smoes to associate computers with linux instead of computers with microsoft. Look at the mp3 player, the term ipod is becoming synonymous with mp3's. Sure there are better mp3 players out there but people aren't associating them with mp3's and therefore when they go to buy their mp3 player they automatically look at ipods.

I don't think that there ever will be a solo 'big' company for Linux like Microsoft. There will always be alternatives. The days of selling software for 300% profit like MS does is going to come to a end. Nobody wants another monopoly.

Nobody may want a monopoly but unless other players step up nothing will change. Apple has a chance to grab some market share and there is no reason why linux couldn't do it either.
Alternatives are great but nobody (in significant numbers) is going to switch just because alternatives exist.

 

[Nothinman]

It's important because it gives the consumer (average joe, who happens to be the majority of desktop users) something they can grab on to or associate with.

On one hand you keep talking about how good and healthy competition is, but on the other you keep saying that there needs to only be 1 Linux distribution. Which is it?

 

[ivwshane]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

It's important because it gives the consumer (average joe, who happens to be the majority of desktop users) something they can grab on to or associate with.

On one hand you keep talking about how good and healthy competition is, but on the other you keep saying that there needs to only be 1 Linux distribution. Which is it?

No you are completely misunderstanding me. I never said there should be only one linux distribution only that there should be one identity for the average joe to get familar with and associate with linux (or whatever brand name it's given). I keep calling for one developer to produce a distribution to create that identity and step up to the challenge but that doesn't mean only one developer can do it.

Multiple distributions are fine but if they are all geared towards the same user (assuming many developers create the average joe desktop), confusion will be created. If joe smoe is confused he will not switch from windows or if he looks into linux he will soon give up due to the shear number of choices.

It's imperative that you understand that my point of view is from the view of the average consumer, different users, such as those on this board do not fall into that category and their needs are completely different than joe smoes.

What goes on in the development world of linux the average joe could care less about so they (the developers) should continue on with their projects.


Maybe my point would be easier to understand if I give this mystical developer a name, just for name sake. I'll call it novell since it seems they are the most likely to achieve this goal.

In order for novell to get their linux desktop OS (we'll call it LNDOS) on a good portion of consumer pc's and cut into MS's market share they will need to create a brand (in this case LNDOS) and market and target the average joe with it. They will need to make LNDOS easy to use, more secure, more compatible, and better looking than windows. They can help their adoption by getting LNDOS on more and more company desktops by virtue of it's superiority but at the same time they need to keep associating LNDOS with a secure better performing computer as opposed to windows and an unsecure slow performing computer, or some easy message average joes can understand.

With my example, all linux developers still exist, different distros still exist nothing has changed in the linux world but now we have one linux desktop OS that consumers are familar with and relate to good computing, we have one linux OS that fits the needs of the average joe.

Now consumers have two "real" OS options, windows and LNDOS.

You can claim that users already have that option and even more options now with all the linux distros out there but they aren't feasible options to the average joe for reasons I stated in my first post.

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: VanillaH
I was hoping to uninstall some components to free up some hdd space, but it wants installation CDs just to remove the files I never knew I would regret getting the DVD version of the installation ISO instead...

The software (un)installation gui in fedora is messed and really should never have been included. Much better to use yum, as it will do things via the internet so you don't need install media and you always get the latest when you're installing stuff. I believe a proper networked graphical package manager interface is coming in fc5 soon.

 

[AkumaBao]

All I see is "Linux is Free". Sure, it's free if your time is worthless. I can tell you right now, it's not the best solution for everyone. I prefer UNIX/Linux based OSes, but mainly because it does everything I need it to do. Gamers this would not be a solution. Yes there is Cedega, but I doubt a hardcore gamer wants to wait 3 months for it to be stable enough to play on Linux. You know what happens when you give Linux to a new user? Nothing good. I'll tell you that now. They expect EVERYTHING to work the same. We tried pushing Linux as a home-based solution for Generic computer users, and it only came back to bite us. People continued to break things, and then having to special order parts for the distro we were using so that everything worked (avoiding D945, and nVidia SATA. In other words, changing our hardware stock completely). Don't get me wrong, I love Linux and BSD, but NEVER would I push it on anyone. No matter how much of a silver-lined GUI Wheelchair you have on the DE, there is always going to be a steap learning curve. Enthusiasts shoud seek it out themselves, and professionals will continue to use them as servers.

 

[nweaver]

Originally posted by: AkumaBao
All I see is "Linux is Free". Sure, it's free if your time is worthless. I can tell you right now, it's not the best solution for everyone. I prefer UNIX/Linux based OSes, but mainly because it does everything I need it to do. Gamers this would not be a solution. Yes there is Cedega, but I doubt a hardcore gamer wants to wait 3 months for it to be stable enough to play on Linux. You know what happens when you give Linux to a new user? Nothing good. I'll tell you that now. They expect EVERYTHING to work the same. We tried pushing Linux as a home-based solution for Generic computer users, and it only came back to bite us. People continued to break things, and then having to special order parts for the distro we were using so that everything worked (avoiding D945, and nVidia SATA. In other words, changing our hardware stock completely). Don't get me wrong, I love Linux and BSD, but NEVER would I push it on anyone. No matter how much of a silver-lined GUI Wheelchair you have on the DE, there is always going to be a steap learning curve. Enthusiasts shoud seek it out themselves, and professionals will continue to use them as servers.

My sister in law didn't even know she was using linux. I moved her from an older box with pirated XP (my other bro in law) to a slightly upgraded box running xfce4, showed her "this is internet, this is email, this is word, here is where you change your desktop picture..." and left her alone. No more calling because someone sent spyware, or they visited the wrong web page and got a virus. No more worrying about them getting windows updated over dialup. This "just works" because it's an oem type setup. When we start to get major OEM's offering linux in a supported hardware configuration, then we will start to see more usage. It's already rolling out in an organized fashion in the enterprise, in the way of high end workstations. With better (yes, go back and read it again) hardware support for 90% of stuff then windows (aka you don't have to install a driver for almost everything) and lack of issues like virii and spyware, I think you will see a slow creep on the desktop for less savvy users who just want web and email, like my <insert pretty much all my relatives but one gamer here>.

 

[gsellis]

BTW, thanks Drag for adding to the thread

 

[konakona]

Originally posted by: kamper

Originally posted by: VanillaH
I was hoping to uninstall some components to free up some hdd space, but it wants installation CDs just to remove the files I never knew I would regret getting the DVD version of the installation ISO instead...

The software (un)installation gui in fedora is messed and really should never have been included. Much better to use yum, as it will do things via the internet so you don't need install media and you always get the latest when you're installing stuff. I believe a proper networked graphical package manager interface is coming in fc5 soon.

can I still use yum everytime a rpm package asks for the installation CD? that would be one less problem to deal with, though I would really want to find out whats making my FC4 access hdd every 3 seconds before anything else

 

[Chosonman]

Most people who never used Linux are 'a-scared' of it.

 

[Seeruk]

Originally posted by: Chosonman
Most people who never used Linux are 'a-scared' of it.

Christ :roll:

 

[Nothinman]

No you are completely misunderstanding me. I never said there should be only one linux distribution only that there should be one identity for the average joe to get familar with and associate with linux (or whatever brand name it's given). I keep calling for one developer to produce a distribution to create that identity and step up to the challenge but that doesn't mean only one developer can do it.

And right now that's Ubuntu. Novell might be throwing their hat into that ring as well, but it seems their primary focus is still IT workstation and server systems.

Multiple distributions are fine but if they are all geared towards the same user (assuming many developers create the average joe desktop), confusion will be created. If joe smoe is confused he will not switch from windows or if he looks into linux he will soon give up due to the shear number of choices.

The number of distributions is irrelevant, Joe will just use whatever Dell or HP or eMachines gives him. Until some OEM agreements can be setup to sell Linux on regular consumer desktops, it doesn't matter if there's 1 or 1 million distributions out there.

It's imperative that you understand that my point of view is from the view of the average consumer, different users, such as those on this board do not fall into that category and their needs are completely different than joe smoes.

You say that as if you have some magical insight that we lack.

In order for novell to get their linux desktop OS (we'll call it LNDOS) on a good portion of consumer pc's and cut into MS's market share they will need to create a brand (in this case LNDOS) and market and target the average joe with it. They will need to make LNDOS easy to use, more secure, more compatible, and better looking than windows. They can help their adoption by getting LNDOS on more and more company desktops by virtue of it's superiority but at the same time they need to keep associating LNDOS with a secure better performing computer as opposed to windows and an unsecure slow performing computer, or some easy message average joes can understand.

They call their desktop distribution NLD (Novell Linux Desktop) AFAIK. And if you think you know how to make their product better and more palettable to the general public then work with them. File bug reports, tell them what's ugly and complicated, etc.

All I see is "Linux is Free". Sure, it's free if your time is worthless.

Windows has caused me to lose much more time than Linux ever has and on top of that I had to pay for it, now that's a deal!

Yes there is Cedega, but I doubt a hardcore gamer wants to wait 3 months for it to be stable enough to play on Linux

They have to do that anyway, todays games are crap and you end up waiting for 3-4 patches to be released before the game actually performs as intended.

 

[Chosonman]

Originally posted by: Seeruk

Originally posted by: Chosonman
Most people who never used Linux are 'a-scared' of it.

Christ :roll:

You obviously have nothing better to do than troll. What a bitter life you must have.

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: VanillaH
can I still use yum everytime a rpm package asks for the installation CD? that would be one less problem to deal with, though I would really want to find out whats making my FC4 access hdd every 3 seconds before anything else

Why are you even installing from regular rpms? It's been a long time since I've needed anything that wasn't in a repository. If you are installing something that you can only get the plain rpm for and it requests the cd you could write down the names of the packages it needs, use yum to install them seperately, then try with the rpm again.

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: Chosonman

Originally posted by: Seeruk

Originally posted by: Chosonman
Most people who never used Linux are 'a-scared' of it.

Christ :roll:

You obviously have nothing better to do than troll. What a bitter life you must have.

I bet he feels pretty fulfilled. People like you keep him busy!