Paul Smith writes:
At 11:02 19/06/2005, Arnt Gulbrandsen wrote:
About 40-50% of the reviewed games require that. Now, isn't that ridiculous?
Yes - but that's not Windows fault, or Microsoft's fault... It's the
fault of the people who write the games software, and the users who
accept that state. Because 50-60% of the reviewed games DON'T require
administrator rights to play, it shows that it's not an OS problem,
as those 50-60% of game developers have been able to done the job
right with the same OS as those who haven't bothered.
Back when I wrote libraries for a living, if only 50-60% of my customers
were able to use the API without serious problems, I wouldn't say «oh,
our API is correct, half the API's users are in the wrong». I would
look for the the root cause in _our_ code or API. I'd talk to customers
and ask «what is it about the API that has led so many developers down
the wrong path?» (From experience, I can tell you that it's usually
easy to find the answer, but solving the problem without breaking
compatibility can be tricky).
So, yes I think it's Microsoft's fault.
I could easily write a Linux game which requires you to be logged in
as root to play it. That wouldn't be Mr Torvald's fault.
Agreed. But if Linus did such a poor job that half the game developers
chose to do that, most of the blame would be his.
This is my last post on this topic; it's not about IETF or SMTP any
more. I will say, though, that we all have a moral responsibility for
fixing any aspects of our protocols or software that lead half of _our_
customers to do stupid, wrong or harmful things.
Arnt