"Canonical CEO Mark Shuttleworth talks why it may finally be time for Linux to out-innovate Apple and Microsoft on the desktop."

Personally, I have been using various flavors of Linux for 12 years now. Among the many variants that I have seen, Ubuntu does stand out. It has a fairly easy installation process, provides easy updates to the system, and has an excellent desktop setup with features that many novice Linux users would find easy to use. However, I would like to see how they, or any other Linux provider, can help improve documentation for their products. In particular, some of the Linux applications could definitely use major improvements to their documentation. Despite its many flaws, Windows does have an integrated help system for the OS and also provides the infrastructure for other application developers to create their own help systems. Linux applications, on the other hand, suffer from a lack of standards in producing documentation. Some are in HTML format that switch users to a browser window. Seriously, I would be hard-pressed trying to help my old aunt figure out a way of reading the help and then switching back to the application to use it. I clearly see this both as a challenge and an opportunity for someone to truly out-innovate the commercial OS vendors.

For example, I have recently been using InkScape, an excellent vector graphics package not unlike Corel Draw. However, InkScape's biggest disadvantage is its lack of documentation. Not even the InkScape website provides much help. In fact, for any users of InkScape who are looking for an excellent document regarding the software, get "A Guide to Inkscape" by Tavmjong Bah (real name Stephen Schrenk). This is an excellent book on InkScape. Perhaps the makers of Inkscape ought to either include it as part of their software or provide a link to the HTML version of the book. But one does not even see a mention of the book in the InkScape web site or user forums. What a pity! I must admit, though, that the book was probably written for an older version of the tool since many of the screenshots shown in the book do not resemble what appears in the version I am currently using (0.44).

The point I was trying to make, before I departed on my InkScape tangent, is that Linux and Open Source software, in general, really need to get organized on the customer experience, preferably by looking at software documentation to begin with. Create the infrastructure so that perhaps a "Tavmjong Bah" for AbiWord will emerge!