Poll (was Re: [SGVLUG] Possible "Cool Tools" topic)

[Dustin]

On Thu, 3 Nov 2005, Michael Proctor-Smith wrote:

> The reson it is not set better is that only artist really care and
> they spend the money for hardware that allows them to tune extactly.

I don't agree.  Part of what prompted this surge of research on my part is
Teresa's remark that our photos didn't look as good under Linux as on her
MS-Windows box at work (they looked too dark), and she has never tweaked
it there.  I had tweaked gamma before, but I've switched distros on this
box enough that I got out of the habit, and it was obvious to her.

The point is, nobody has ever tried to sell non-experts on *just plain
unix* before, but parts of the Linux crowd are doing it now.  Also, people
are putting photos on their boxes now, which makes people notice smaller
things.  I think the crucial group is not expert enough to do it on their
own, but also able to see the difference on their own digital photos.  
For desktop use, frankly, Microsoft and Apple are better at making these
choices than we are and we'd do well to learn.  I don't think it would
hurt anyone to just put Gamma 1.2 into xorg.conf during the initial
install, and we'd have fewer people who get the impression that X just
doesn't do as well for picture rendering as those other OSes.

Not everybody cares about giving a Linux desktop to the masses, but those 
who do should probably deal with details such as this.  I'd be interested 
to know if the commercial, supposedly super-friendly distros already do, 
like Xandros, Linspire, etc.

Dustin