Which "sweeping judgements" did I pass on people who do not prefer Unix? All I've said in this article is that, given the choice between Windows and Unix, I prefer Unix. I went on to add points on why I like Unix, which admittedly is a little extraneous, but I never voiced any negative judgement on Windows. Many seem to infer that themselves.
Let's be honest, you were basically singing UNIX's praises for a little bit. While I agree with them, you have to admit that saying that "Unix encapsulates, and indeed was built on, many core principles of good software design" is a sidelong criticism of Windows which you imply is not built upon core principles of good software design. I imagine this could easily be construed as an insult.
Consider if a Windows user said he didn't want to work at a Unix shop because Windows is a better-designed operating system. Would you not consider this a judgement of Unix?
Good points. I agree that it's reasonable to construe what I was saying as a swipe at Windows.
What I really meant, and I guess I didn't do a sufficient job at getting this across, was that I know Unix is rock-solid; I don't know the same about Windows. Truth be told, I know very little about Windows since I haven't used it for 4 years. I was going for a positive point about Unix, not a negative one about Windows.
But you have a pretty good point about my praise of Unix being a vacuous swipe at Windows.
I only use Windows because I am always in too much of a rush to pass through the pain of adopting a new operating system on my desktop machine. We do deploy onto Linux.
I don't have any local Linux / Unix help.
Perhaps if you joined the team, many of the other developers would also have switched. I might have if I was from this company.
Consider if a Windows user said he didn't want to work at a Unix shop because Windows is a better-designed operating system. Would you not consider this a judgement of Unix?
Judgment of a platform and judgment of its users are separate issues.
