I happen to own half a laptop... My sister and I share the hardware, so the following anecdote contains strictly privileged information!
A throwback from my days as a Graphic Designer, I tend to flit back and forth between my Windows-based laptop and my enormous eMac, depending on what kind of computing work I have scheduled. Other platform double-agents and moonlighters among you will be familiar with the annoying (if temporary) disorientation that comes with going to sleep with Apple Safari and waking up with Internet Explorer. Given my frustration with the Mac-Windows operating system dichotomy and the brand affiliations software developers tend to make with one of these giant corporations, I welcomed the opportunity to give a third party software source a spin: I chose to trial Mozilla Firefox as my first tentative (conscious) experience with open source software.
In brief, my verdict is in favour of Mozilla Firefox. Less briefly, the software itself was, in my opinion, more aesthetically pleasing than either Internet Explorer or Safari: the general layout is uncluttered, and the choice of customised 'skins' impressive. Secondly, I was pleased to find that I was not regularly pestered to change my default home page or search engine to one affiliated with Apple or Windows: I was given the option to set the default when I first opened the program and haven't had to protect that decision since. Thirdly, the program works. Not only does it work, Firefox does its job smoothly and with no need for troubleshooting... so far, at least.
I've most likely maxed out my family's monthly downloads completing this TuteSpark. Nonetheless, I feel that the cost of downloading this particular 'freeware' specimen has been well worth it, and certainly cheaper than purchasing 'kosher' copyright software via the legal channels. The most significant part of this learning curve has been simply trying open source software for the first time. In doing so, I feel I am far more likely to seek out and make a permanent transition to freeware. While 'traditional' software has always seemed to me to be the safe and legal choice, I have since learned Open Source software and Portable Apps can be just as professional; just as reliable; just as user-friendly as any Microsoft or Apple product... without the extravagant expense and the constant plague of pop-ups reminding me to update the software, check the internet for troubleshooting tips, send an error report to the manufacturer, or learn more about the fact the software is not genuine.
They say the proof is in the pudding: in this case the 'pudding' is my graduation from a freeware browser to an entire Portable Apps office suite which I am currently trialling using my USB as the portable drive to take my computing history and works from home to university and back again.
See 'Matrix Runs on Windows XP' by CollegeHumour on YouTube for an illustration of the kinds of glitches that characterise Windows and Apple Mac operating systems. The Matrix theme also links to next week's lecture response about Virtual Philosophy.
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