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The hip fellow in the trendy outfit appears on the
television screen. Hi, I'm a Mac. I am way cool.
A chunky, awkward guy in an ill-fitting suit comes in.
You're also arrogant, pretentious and condescending. I'm
a PC. I do the work of the world.
Mac ponders for a moment, then asks Want to see the
neat home movie I made?
PC shakes his head. Want to see my insightful
analysis of the company's third-quarter sales and how they
relate to marketing and media expenditures, broken down by
region?
Mac shakes his head. Who'd ever want to read
something like that?
Surprised you even think of reading, Mac.
PC
vents a little more. Reading is so linear and so
old-fashioned that it's not even retro these days, and I'd
heard you were seriously into integrated multi-media, lots
of big sounds and moving pictures to save people the
trouble of thinking.
Now who's condescending and arrogant?
Mac asks.
By the way, did you ever find that updated driver
software for that hot video card you got for playing
games?
PC blushes, then stammers a bit as he responds. It
wasn't for that. I needed it so I could be ready for
Windows Vista.
The upgrade that's been five years in the making?
Mac has a supercilious tone. That doesn't have a lot of
features that were promised at first? Which Vista are you
getting, anyway? Starter, Home Basic, Home Premium,
Business, Enterprise, or Ultimate?
A sigh emerges from PC. At least I will have a lot of
choices for an operating system. With you, it's just OS/X.
And yet you act like you're so free and have so many
options.
Mac changes the subject. Since it's the holiday
season, I thought I'd give you this book of pictures of our
meetings through the year.
PC smiles. Why, thank you. That must have been a lot
of work.
Mac smirks. Just a few clicks of the mouse, that's
all.
PC holds up a copy of GUI Programming in C++
with
a red bow on it, then turns to Mac. And I want to give
you this book.
Mac grimaces, as though he'd just tasted fruitcake. But
he tries to be polite. What's this all about?
A disembodied voice resonates around them. It's about
how to program for a graphical user interface in C Plus
Plus, which is based on C, a computer language developed at
Bell Labs more than 30 years ago.
Both PC and Mac look around, trying to find the source
of the voice. Where are you? Who are you?
they
ask.
I'm GNU Linux,
the voice replies.
PC looks relieved. Finally, I know how to pronounce
Linux. It rhymes with cynics. But what's the GNU stand
for?
Gnu's Not Unix,
Linux replies. Unix is
proprietary, and I'm not into that. But I do enjoy
recursive acronyms.
Mac speaks up. I bet you're hiding because you don't
want us to see you, homely geek that you are. You're scared
we'll make fun of your pocket protector and your bizarre
command-line stuff like 'cat' and 'ls'.
Linux laughs, but it sounds menacing. Hey Mac, at
your heart, you're running BSD, which is a Unix-like
operating system, just like me. But to most people, it's as
invisible as I am.
PC keeps looking around for the source of the voice.
You're just a tiny little cult, aren't you?
Linux responds. PC, that little wireless router you
use to connect to the Internet runs a variety of Linux.
When you search with Google, you're dealing with a Linux
cluster. Most web servers run Linux. I'm in a lot of
places. If I shut down, both of you guys would be in a
world of hurt.
But you're not going to shut down, are you?
Mac
asks plaintively.
Not if you do what I ask,
Linux says.
And what's that?
Mac inquires.
Quit making fun of people that use programming books.
Somebody's got to design and build you guys, and keep you
running, and produce new software. And for all that, the
best you can do in return is mockery?
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