Hi Allangen and macxi,
It is great to see both of you here. I am grateful that there are now translation tools so that each of us can view messages in our native languages, and yet still communicate with enough accuracy to at least get our point across, and certainly to exchange warm greetings.
From 1995 until 1998, I worked in the operating system engineering group of Digital UNIX, and my area of expertise was Internationalization and Localization. I had, from time to time, worked with people from other countries before, but in that job, for the first time, that was my PRIMARY role, and I enjoyed it TREMENDOUSLY! There is nothing more rewarding, interesting, and fun, than to explore one another's cultural experiences and values, to enjoy and celebrate the differences - AND to chuckle and laugh as each of us stumble in each other's language and culture, which are foreign to us. To me, it is a great joy to learn about people that are different than I am. So when I have to learn a few words of French, Japanese, Chinese, Korean, whatever it may be, I stumble and struggle, but hopefully we all laugh together, show patience as we learn and appreciate the ways in another part of the world.
I know when it comes to tools, applications, desktops, everyone has their preference. Same for our native countries. Each of us has a place that we want to be, and most of the time, we like our way the best. But for me, even though I like my brand of computer, my desktop, my operating system, my browser, my editor... and on goes the list, I understand and appreciate that each one of us has preferences that differ; some we may share in common, but others are complete opposites.
A great International Distribution like Mageia can be a wonderful place where we can use the system in a great many different ways, yet have something in common.
I remember when Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder, both great song writers and singers, got together, and they wrote "Ebony and Ivory". They commented in their song that the Ebony keys and the Ivory keys get along in perfect harmony on their piano keyboard, and they asked, "Then why can't we?"
Some things in cultures have, indeed, caused a lot of repair, and there is more cross cultural, cross national, and diversity of work and collaboration than ever before. I can't say that I will agree with what everyone does everywhere, but even when I don't agree, as long as their is no physical or emotional harm and damage taking place between individuals, even if we sharply disagree in one or more ideology, when it comes to this stuff, we can be best of friends, and even have fun.
I hope we have a LOT of that here. Believe me, it can be fun - even funny.
For example, one day, I was trying to say some words in Japanese, based on something in the Calendar. I know that several of the Asian languages derived from or loosely related to Chinese have the notion of "Idea-cons" - word pictures instead of letters and numbers used in the Roman-based alphabet. I mispronounced one of these "words", and my Japanese friend, Toshiki, came running, saying, "Where, where?" Apparently instead of saying "6 moons and 18 suns" or something like that to describe June 18 or some date on the calendar, my pronunciation suggested something like there was a picture of an attractive nude woman - which of course I did not intend to say... so we got a good laugh out of it, and then Toshiki "coached" me on how to say it right - that was years ago; all I remember is the funny story today!
I greatly enjoy the mannerisms of my European and Asian friends especially, and I hope we can grow many new friendships here as this fine distribution gets off the ground.
Enough for now, but I urge us: let's have some fun here!