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Some distributions used to also distribute ABI compatibility, back when commercial software targeted Sco/Unixware/Xenix etc and ignored Linux. See here for example. These days, I expect it is the other way around - anyone left still shipping traditional Unix on x86 (or even other architectures) needs to provide a Linux ABI if they want to ensure that proprietary software will run on their platform.

The 'DOS Ain't Done 'til Lotus Won't Run' Myth

So I tunneled through that discussion and found this link: http://aplawrence.com/Blog/B555.html It's a simple fact: your own reference contains a reference that disagrees with your assertion. Now fuck off, person whose parents didn't love them enough to give them a name.

Have people lost the ability to Google for answers before pestering other people? After about 5 seconds I found this:

http://aplawrence.com/SCOFAQ/FAQ_scotec1linuxfs.html

You're welcome. =P

Yes, it was you, but no, it is still not legitimate for you to assume you know what I was trying to say, when obviously you don't. You are saying that it is legitimate for you to try to read my mind, and tell me what I meant? I don't think so.

I’m actually quite confused as to what you’re trying to say, so I’m falling back to explaining what I was saying, under the assumption that you misunderstood me, or don’t understand BCD, or both.

Your BCD above is fine if you are referring to simple unsigned BCD, but packed BCD uses the lowest nibble to indicate sign, not to contain a number value. If you don't believe me, read about it here

That entire section is in severe need of a [Citation needed]. Everything I did in college with BCD referred to “packed” BCD as 2 digits per byte with no sign nibble of any sort, and “unpacked” BCD as 1 digit per byte.

If you want to allow for signed packed BCD, fine, but don’t tell me that my unsigned form of packed BCD isn’t packed BCD! Look at any of the google results other than that one Wikipedia article:

Here, here, here, here (pdf), here.

This gem is even entitled “Packed BCD to 16 bit binary conversion”... when of course I’m sure they meant “2’s complement”, not “binary”, since that was the whole problem from the beginning of this discussion! You should e-mail them and tell them to fix it!

What I was writing about was your confusing way of trying to explain it.

You seem to be one of a very small group of people who thought it was confusing. Is that my fault?

But here is what I was talking about: if you input 0x36 into a C program or most other languages that support that number format, and do not do any explicit conversion, that number will be interpreted as 54 decimal, NOT as 0011 0110 (BCD) or 36 decimal. That was my point. You might prefer to write that BCD number as 0x36, but that is not how a compiler will interpret it.

The compiler doesn’t “interpret” anything. The programmer does. The compiler just creates a binary executable that does whatever the programmer designed it to do.

And for that matter, unless you explicitly label that in code as some kind of BCD representation, any programmer to come along later will also assume it is hexadecimal. So you are introducing confusion into the issue.

Yes, which is why we have standards to tell programmers how stuff is supposed to be written.

0x10 is a HEXADECIMAL representation of the decimal number 16.

It is also a BCD representation of the decimal number 36.

I have nothing more to say to you. I have explained this more than once and in about 3 different ways. As Wikipedia (and other sources if you would care to look them up) clearly show, you have been wrong about some of these things. If you still don't understand the rest, I don't feel like spending more time to help you.

And the Wikipedia warrior throws up his hands!

I, on the other hand, didn’t learn everything I know from Wikipedia.

Service contracts and customer lists. There are a stack of fiscal and paperwork handling companies that used OpenServer for relatively inexpensive x86 based servers, for years, and wrote very important in-house toolkits on which their companies are founded. I had a long chat with a corporate partner 3 years ago about exactly this, because SCO hardware compatibility seriously lagged anything that wasn't in bankruptcy. They chose to stay with their existing software environment rather than do a complete database migration in a ruch, and have been engaged in a very careful and cautious code cleanup, to get their toolchain under source control and virtualization, so that they can retain access to old data and old environments, while they build a new environment. With that careful toolchain migration and cleanup, they're _much_ better off than they would have been migrating in one giant leap 3 years ago, and are ready to select their next major OS, whether that be OpenServer or Solaris or any other OS that's obviously about to go out of business.

OK, I'm kidding, but they remain unconvinced that any Linux OS is stable enough. And they've got a point with Linux's eagerness to embrace new toolkits and utilities. For companies with 30 year mortgages, database stability rules over database performance and new features.

There is apparently some actual compoetent open source work for SCO systems, over at http://aplawrence.com/cgi-bin/indexget.pl?OSR5. This site was an important resource for their cleanup work, especially the notes on VMware and on getting open source tools like gcc and SSH and HTTPD to work properly. Mr. Lawrence is real open source and freeware champion doing very difficult work and deserves all the paying work and support we can send his way. (I had a harsh argument with my corporate partner friend, saying that he should be cutting Mr. Lawrence a _big_ check.)

Because then their damned Lexmark printers don't work and I go out of business? Until linux can run Windows games with a "clicky clicky,next next next" installer,and I can install those damned Lexmark all-in-ones that everyone seems to have there is just no way i can survive selling Linux boxes. i tried and ended up having to reformat them and put Windows because folks didn't want them. You can talk about how much safer Linux is to a customer all day long,but if it doesn't work with their hardware and they can't easily install and play their games,it is no sale.

And as for flamebait? Has nobody seen the massive amounts of JavaScript exploits hitting the net lately? If this was an article touting an increased speed for ActiveX would we all be cheering? JavaScript is the script kiddies tool of choice ATM,and it is just getting worse. Don't believe me? Just go here or here and look for yourself. Or type "JavaScript Exploit Firefox" into Google and see how many hits you get. I counted over 702,000! We need to be increasing the security of JavaScript,not the speed. Who cares how fast it'll render if you are afraid to allow your users to have it on for fear of being hacked? But as always this is my 02c,YMMV

So the same feature that first appeared on Windows Server in 2003 and then on Vista is considered a security risk, especially because it is too 'easy' to use. [...] And now the same freaking feature in OS X is considered a 'security feature', and they claim it is even 'easier' to use than Vista's version?

after 4 years, she still couldn't manage to upload things [via] FTP or figure out her local IP address (and I couldn't help her either since OSX, while trying to be Unix, lacks most of the key parts).

Its not so much the errors. Its the results that are stupid.

For example. After getting Live to work I asked it this question.

"Which is better windows or linux?"

The first result is
"Linux sucks..." - Written in 2001.
http://aplawrence.com/Bofcusm/873.html

I tried the same on google.
"Windows vs Linux comparison" - Last updated 2006.
http://www.michaelhorowitz.com/Linux.vs.Windows.ht ml

Swapping Windows + Linux gets different results however Google appeared to understand what I was searching for and more up to date and relevent.

Also live wouldn't let me center mouse click for tabs.

...author James Wallace, who wrote the 1993 book Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire, which presents an apparently direct quote from a "Microsoft programmer" who worked on DOS 2.x and made the claim. I don't have the book and the informant isn't attributed by name in the little excerpt I read online, so I recognize that it could be sloppy reportage/sensationalism on Wallace's part. But is he still around and has anyone asked for comment from him?

One of the excerpts I've found online is here: http://aplawrence.com/Blog/B555.html

James Wallace's 1993(92?) book Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire references it.

According to one Microsoft programmer, a few of the key people working on DOS 2.0 had a saying at the time that "DOS isn't done until Lotus won't run." They managed to code a few hidden bugs into DOS 2.0 that caused Lotus 1-2-3 to breakdown when it was loaded. "There were as few as three or four people who knew this was being done," the employee said. He felt the highly competitive Gates was the ringleader.

Quote found at: http://aplawrence.com/Blog/B555.html

I don't have the book and it would be quite interesting to see how author Wallace would respond. I do quite vividly recall the phrase going around in the early 90's, particularly among several of my clients who were running Lotus products.

gif doesn't have fricking transparency

I'm not sure about the "fricking" type of transparency. But GIF89s have had transparency for a while.

Why not just mod me up instead? I provide links!

"Another situation, where the free market may not operate in the best interest of society is in a monopoly situation. A monopoly is a situation where the free market ultimately led to dominance by one large firm either through luck, innovation, and savvy or illegal business practices. It has been determined by economists that a monopoly will create a situation in which we are operating at a point on the supply-demand curve that is sub-optimal. More specifically, it is at a point above equilibrium. At this point, prices for products or services are higher than they would be in a perfectly competitive economy; fewer goods are being produced; and the monopolistic firm is enjoying above normal profits (Case and Fair). All of this happens at the expense to society. Without Government intervention, the monopoly would continue to enjoy its dominant position for as long as the factor that brought it to dominance continues to exist. The Government can intervene by ordering the firm to take specific actions or a bide by certain rules to improve competition in the industry. Microsoft is a well-known example of such a case where it was ordered by the Government to take specific steps to allow others in the industry to have a better chance to compete."
-- The Two Sides of the Invisible Hand

Depends on the logs. IMHO you should have syslog set up to forward to a more secure system so if your desktop's compromised, you may still have logs that aren't.

Microsoft has some interesting pages on Configuring UNIX Computers to Forward Syslog Messages .

And here's a doc on how to How to Monitor Windows NT from Unix

(I don't know enough about msft, but I assume they can also remotelly log their own events).

Tony has been involved with Unix, mostly SCO for years. Take the time to read about what he does, and more importantly, what he claims to be: http://aplawrence.com/wiz.html

He does not make decisions for SCO, and just because he has been making a living helping people out who have been on SCO for years, is no reason to think he is part of "the evil empire". Take some time to see how much Unix/Linux information is available on his site, and how much he has given back to the community.

Be a little kinder...

Show of hands: who believes that Tony's business probably runs on pirated Microsoft products?

From his web site we learn that he's a SCO reseller. This makes what he said one of the more interesting twists taken on the SCO-apologist soapbox, IMO.

http://www.aplawrence.com/Bofcusm/2228.html
Here's one persons take on it...