[Typo3] Typo3 and Linux (and "philosophical" problems with typo3 adoption)

[Mathias Schreiber [wmdb]]

seml at symbulos.com wrote:
> I think I was really trying to express a more general 
> discomfort with the fact that the whole of typo3 support 
> websites seem to be geared towards people using proprietary 
> technology, in particular MS Windows and MS Internet 
> Explorer.

This has several reasons.
a) much more people use windows operational systems so the target group 
is clearly windows users.
 From a commercial point of view you will understand that it does not 
make sense to spend the (unpaid) time on  writing docs for max. 5% of 
the users.
If TYPO3 was geared to windows you would not even see the website, 
because the Backend would lock you from using it without IE.
Plus you would need IIS6 and MS SQL Server to get it running.

b) the only thing that is "geared" towards IE is an old RichText Editor.
    Reaons for choosing this one over htmlArea or other Cross Platform 
RTEs is that it has been there at times where no other functional RTEs 
were available. As others already stated a new cross platform RTE will 
be released soon in the standard package.

> This issue is slowing down adoption of typo3 in our company 
> (and at our customers sites), and possibly stopping it 
> altogether. 

Interesting.
Why?

> We are indeed strongly conviced on the use of OS, which we 
> tend to use whenever possible both on server and desktop 
> side, marketing it also to our customers. So to see that 
> the recommended client is Internet Explorer 5+ on Windows 
> (seehttp://typo3.org/download/system-requirements/ ) or 
> that some of the features do not work if you do not have MS 
> Internet Explorer (RTE?), that the Getting started is 
> geared to Windows user, gives us a pretty creepy feeling. 
> unless the documentation is out of date.

See above.
Plus: Recommended and mandatory are two different things, right?

> I apologise, it is a constructive critique, because the 
> products looks pretty powerful and features-rich, but this 
> issue is particularly relevant. You can understand what we 
> do at www.symbulos.com, so you understand why the fact of 
> being OS geared is so relevant. I am not even saying that 
> the documentation / presentation must be only OS geared, 
> but that OS option and proprietary option should have the 
> same weight.

I see that, but please:
If you state constructive critisism, please also face world wide facts 
plus take critisism based on the product facts, not a tutorial.
Additionally (as others already mentioned) noone keeps you from writing 
a *nix dedicated "Getting started".

> I spent some time collecting information. I am trying to get 
> some more information to take with me to the next 
> shareholders meeting (next Monday), in order for the 
> assembly to be able to make a decision whether adopt it or 
> not. By the way, I am the managing director, but not a 
> shareholder, so I can only convince the shareholders (but I 
> have to be convinced myself before).

ok. Some quick facts that might help you:
- more than 130.000 installs
- fully cross platform (both server and client side)
- working RTE (cross platform) installable via extension (TYPO3 term for 
plugins, modules... whatever you like better)
- try google.com with "content management"
- stable project with a stable basis
- continuous development in regards of worldwide markets.

all the best
Mathias

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