Hodgins Family wrote:
Something that has been running through many of the exchanges under this thread is an apparent assumption of homogeneity among university types. In my experience, university cultures are quite diverse (heterogeneous) with quite a bit of diversity even among departments at the same university. The one thing university professorates have most in common is the same thing drives the diversity and competitiveness characteristic of univesity faculty and staff - EGO!Good afternoon!
And when we do have money for software, we chemistry folks want
new instruments and don't much care about the operating system or the
application vendor as long as the OS and applications can talk to the instruments.
One problem we face with Linux is lack of this specialty software. We
have to have some Windows boxes simply because the Linuc boxes we have
won't talk to the instruments.
I was wondering when this point would rear it's head. Specialty
software. Yes, specialty software can be a pig. And it is a joyous
occasion when a vendor actually provides software that CAN talk to our
hardware reliably, isn't it? It is a wonderful feeling to know that the
vendor-supplied software isn't simply a beta for us to trouble-shoot
before the vendor takes the hardware/software package out to sell to
industry.
However, the OP wasn't asking about vendor or specialty software. He was looking for set of "Desktop applications".
2) The professoriate are also subject to "ego". I would argue that it is
more important to the academic class to be seen using an expensive
application (for show-value) instead of a cheaper (or free) application
that might imply that their work/research grants don't merit a higher
level of funding. And ego amongst our academics is as vital a force as
peer pressure.
Unless you're talking about comp sci professors, that statement probably doesn't carry much weight. We chemists, for instance, are more impressed with a nice LC/MS setup than an expensive spreadsheet. :)
Oh, Dr. Taylor! Ouch! Somebody in comp sci gonna bite 'cha fer that!
:) Rob ;)
It is true that the original thread op was talking about applications. But, a good many desktop users don't see a great deal of difference between one type of application and another and something that drives a piece of equipment they need/want/find useful may very well look like, sound like, and walk like an app to them.
Professors are bright, motivated people, by and large, who want (and need) to spend their time in pursuit of their chosen academic disciplines. Computers and computer software are a means to an end. University administrative computing needs differ from the needs of the professorates. The less time spent on computer system intracacies (and exposure to professional risk) a user group faces in selecting a particular computer system relative to available alternatives the more likely they will pick the particular system.
The power availability of specialty software has on selection of computer system can not be overestimated.
