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*sigh* 10..9..8..7..6..5..4..3..2..1

Look we're talking about 501 organizations, aka charities.

Here's Microsoft's Open Charity program.

Here's the Open Charity pricing list.

Windows XP professional is $79.00 Not $200.00. Also the resellers have flexability so it pays to shop around.

*sigh* 10..9..8..7..6..5..4..3..2..1

Look we're talking about 501 organizations, aka charities.

Here's Microsoft's Open Charity program.

Here's the Open Charity pricing list.

Windows XP professional is $79.00 Not $200.00. Also the resellers have flexability so it pays to shop around.

Can a blind person install and configure windows, iis, SQL server, exchange, and active directory?

Once your favorite OSS tool is installed can a blind person use them?

To their credit, Microsoft have spent time and resources in making Windows more accessible to users with disabilities. Their efforts may not be perfect but they're not ignoring the issue. For quite some time, they were ahead of Apple in this respect, although Apple too are now addressing this issue (no doubt partly because of government legislation).

As for your suggestion that we design for users who aren't disabled first and then look at other users - surely this is the reason why so many of the current solutions feel clunky? They are bolted on top of a design that works well for one group of users, but not for others. But this raises another question: can one over-arching OS design accommodate all needs? I don't know the answer for certain, but I'm guessing that a solution would require a rethink of our current (out-dated?) desktop metaphor. For some idea of an OS design that can work well with both sighted and blind users, see Jef Raskin's book The Humane Interface.

>Can a blind person install and configure windows, iis, SQL server, exchange, and active directory?

Except for the OS install, the answer is yes. All of the text and other elements in an ordinary window are automatically hooked into the standard OS-wide accessibility API. Screen readers like JAWS can then pull out the text without any problem.

>It seems to me that you have to draw the line someplace. If somebody wants to put forth the effort then great but honestly why don't we concentrate on getting the documentation so that a reasonably intelligent non disabled person can use it first.

There are a couple of little things like the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 508 that you might want to consider. Similar requirements exist for state goverments as well as other national and provincial governments across the world.

Without support for accessibility at least as good as other commercial OSes and software, OSS is going to have a harder time getting a foothold in goverment and industry. Not supporting accessibility is not an option.

>Then we can worry about the blind.

Given the rise in age-related diseases that cause vision degeneration, I sincerely hope those words never come back to haunt you.

I must have messed up my html on the above post.
This is the page for Windows XP

And Microsoft's own page for Office

I did exagerate by two dollars.

Guidelines exist for software as well but are rarely used for some reason. A few examples that would help all users:

• Apple Human Interface Guidelines
• Windows UX guidelines
• Authoring tools accessibility guidelines - a must if you are developing an open source content management system.

I believe that following these and other specifications would make life much better for all users. These guidelines will make sure your software works with most assistive technologies as well.

There are also a lot of open source developer tools to help you test your applications. E.g.:

• [shameless plug]Fangs - the Firefox screen reader emulator extension[/shameless plug].
• The W3C HTML validator

It seems to me that you have to draw the line someplace.

Of course this setup I described will never be used in Vista...

...either that or you would never bother to check.

One of those statements is true, I leave it to the reader to decide which. http://msdn.microsoft.com/windowsvista/security/

All you have to do is compare "Windows Defender" (aka Microsoft Anti-Spyware) to Sunbelt Software's Counterspy and you'll see that Microsoft doesnt consider alot of things a risk that the end-user does. This is more than likely because Microsoft isn't about to put their customers out of business and please tell me you dont believe that the majority of spyware companies run everything on Linux. Both of the above products are built on the Giant Anti-Spyware engine. They are identical, however, Microsoft declares certain products as no-threat or low-threat that Counterspy shows them for what they are. There will always be a need for anti-spyware software because most won't agree with what Microsoft declares as spyware.

I've recently downloaded MS Defender, which I take it is the new moniker for their antispyware programme. Cross checking MS antispyware against LavaSoft has caught only one piece of spyware MS antispyware missed.

So, as infrequently as I say it, Good on you MicroSoft!

From what I've read, the XP drivers for the onboard graphics call the video bios

http://wiki.onmac.net/index.php/Drivers

      The drivers expect the ATI Bios to be present in order to initialize the chip. Things like clock frequencies, memory
      frequencies, power management, all the is done through the video bios. The macpro video chip only supports EFI, it has the
      old BIOS completely stripped out. Thus I find it very doubtfull any video drivers work out of the box. As I see it there
      are a couple of possible solutions, from easiest to hardest.
      1. Flash the onboard chip with the bios from a PC version and hope to god it has the EFI support as well.
      2. Have the custom bootloader load the bios from a PC version into RAM and map all BIOS calls to that.
      3. Have the custom bootloader load the video EFI driver, and a thin BIOS layer that reroutes all BIOS calls into the
      corresponding EFI calls.
      4. Try to duplicate all the video BIOS functionality.

You can certainly do this in an NT driver, IIRC it's discouraged because the kernel has to disable interrupts, switch to v86 mode, call the bios, and then switch back. xom.efi (presumably - I've never seen the source code) handles int 13 calls to read the disk, but it can't handle the custom int 10 calls that the XP driver makes to the video bios.

Interestingly, it's not possible in Vista

http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/system/platform/firm ware/lddm_bios.mspx

Contempt of what? Are you arguing that Microsoft was under court order to not make any comments? Or are you arguing that it's ok for the judge in an active trial to abandon his duties when one party in the case voices its displeasure in a public manner?

The judge didn't just make a few offhand comments to a random reporter. He spent hours with several reporters. In once instance, there was a 10 hour taped interview!

The court of appeals didn't take Microsoft's out of court comments into consideration because it was wholly irrelevant. The fact that the judge was unable to restrain himself and had to "get his side out" merely demonstrates that he felt that public opinion about HIM was more important than a fair and just outcome at trial. By granting the closed doors interviews he, in effect, justified Microsoft comments!

Go here: http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/legal/06-28opin ion.mspx

Scroll down to section 6, titled "Judicial Misconduct". Enlighten yourself. Some choice quotes below:

"Canon 3A(6) of the Code of Conduct for United States Judges requires federal judges to "avoid public comment on the merits of [ ] pending or impending" cases. Canon 2 tells judges to "avoid impropriety and the appearance of impropriety in all activities," on the bench and off. Canon 3A(4) forbids judges to initiate or consider ex parte communications on the merits of pending or impending proceedings. Section 455(a) of the Judicial Code requires judges to recuse themselves when their "impartiality might reasonably be questioned." 28 U.S.C. s 455(a).

All indications are that the District Judge violated each of these ethical precepts by talking about the case with reporters. The violations were deliberate, repeated, egregious, and flagrant."

"Far from mitigating his conduct, the District Judge's insistence on secrecy--his embargo--made matters worse. Concealment of the interviews suggests knowledge of their impropriety. Concealment also prevented the parties from nipping his improprieties in the bud. Without any knowledge of the interviews, neither the plaintiffs nor the defendant had a chance to object or to seek the Judge's removal before he issued his Final Judgment."

"The public comments were not only improper, but also would lead a reasonable, informed observer to question the District Judge's impartiality. Public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the judiciary is seriously jeopardized when judges secretly share their thoughts about the merits of pending cases with the press. Judges who covet publicity, or convey the appearance that they do, lead any objective observer to wonder whether their judgments are being influenced by the prospect of favorable coverage in the media. Discreet and limited public comments may not compromise a judge's apparent impartiality, but we have little doubt that the District Judge's conduct had that effect."

"The problem here is not just what the District Judge said, but to whom he said it and when. His crude characterizations of Microsoft, his frequent denigrations of Bill Gates, his mule trainer analogy as a reason for his remedy--all of these remarks and others might not have given rise to a violation of the Canons or of s 455(a) had he uttered them from the bench. See Liteky, 510 U.S. at 555-56; Code of Conduct Canon 3A(6) (exception to prohibition on public comments for "statements made in the course of the judge's official duties"). But then Microsoft would have had an opportunity to object, perhaps even to persuade, and the Judge would have made a record for review on appeal. It is an altogether different matter when the statements are made outside the courtroom, in private meetings unknown to the parties, in anticipation that ultimately the Judge's remarks would be reported. Rather than manifesting neutrality and impartiality, the reports of the interviews with the District Judge convey the impression of a judge posturing for

Any chance at you releasing the unfinished grease monkey control to the community for further development?

No need. Somebody else already did that, though development seems to have stalled for some time now. But their source is available, and it's written in C++ rather than the C# I used (mine was a proof of concept, so I didn't care about performance or extra requirements like having the .NET framework installed). I'm not a big fan of the direction they went with Turnabout (split basic/advanced installations with no ability to change basic to advanced without reinstalling, requiring a toolbar), but that's fixable by anyone who wants to take the time. The core functionality works well enough, though it has problems with framed pages (who uses framed pages anymore, anyway?), and the source is under a BSD-ish license so you could do a closed-source binary release if you really wanted to.

I stopped using Turnabout for two reasons

1. The toolbar interaction of Turnabout exposed an unfortunate design flaw in IE where you can no longer save pages as archives (it's not a bug because apparently it's working as designed). Worse, that same flaw causes javascript errors to disregard the "do not show error dialog" option, resulting in a bunch of annoying javascript error dialogs on every single page. You'd be surprised at the number of popular pages with broken javascript (usually ad-related scripts).
2. IE's tendency to leak memory resulted in the iexplore.exe process eating up 200-300MB of RAM after only an hour or two of usage. You could solve that with carefully-written scripts, but when you're trying to reuse scripts from the Greasemonkey community that were targetted to Firefox (which is less leaky) you don't reeally get that level of control.

If Turnabout were to ever resume development (or someone were to fork the code), and IE7 were to solve most of IE's leakiness, I'd very likely revisit using a Greasemonkey-like extension.

Just as a start, notice that the headline talks about what Microsoft announce

• d

1. Reading the actual article they linked to
2. Going to Microsoft's Mix06 website and actually reading the dates.

IE7 shows warning messages for 'Reported Phishing Websites.'

Maybe this will finally catch the 'big one that got away.'

Try RunAs instead.
What do you think?
http://www.microsoft.com/resources/documentation/w indows/xp/all/proddocs/en-us/runas.mspx

You can create a realtivly silent gaming PC for under a grand. I built an amd 3400+, 1gig ram, ATI 9800 pro video, and a silent case for not that much money over a year ago (def under a grand), and using MS' game machine analyzer it rates in the top 3% of gaming PCs.

You mean the Windows Game Advisor, right? Warning - IE required.

I scored in the top 1%. Pbbbbbbtttt. :-)

AMD X2 3800+, 2GB OCZ PC3200 RAM, Seagate 7200.9 (SATA2) 120GB, Abit Fatal1ty AN8 SLI, GeForce 7800GT

There are thousands of libraries out there that specifically deal with either mitgating the risk over buffer overflows or detecting them such as this one and this one . Anyhow my point was that you can accomplish adequet protection against buffer overflow in C++ with the right code, and a consistent approach. Buffer overflows needn't be a factor in your choice of development language. I'm sure those architecting Vista are well aware of these issues and would have some very sophisticated C++ libraries and tools that do the job alot better than any freeware product you'll find on the net.

My original point was that you actually have no clue as to the architectural choices that have been made, and the approach taken by the developers of Vista and that your original post was based on complete speculation.

This would fit fairly nicely with the "Evidence based security" that MS is talking about, and it would include not giving evidence of higher trust than is absolutely needed for each piece.

As for your imaginings about the suitability of using .NET Code Access Security to deal with your least privilege mantra. As I have been repeatedly trying to say with little success, I understand it quite well, and NO IT DOES NOT FIT NICELY at all.... It's evidence based security that MS talks about is specifically designed to deal with the problem of how to allow untrusted applications loaded FROM A LOCATION OTHER THAN YOUR LOCAL COMPUTER, to run in a partially trusted context. It simply doesn't do what you imagine it might do.... it has no constructs that could be utilised to accomplish what you're talking about, which is the segmentation of an OS's internal components.

I will pre-empt your reply, which most undoubtedly will be... oh well then... what a hopeless job of security they've done in .NET then....

It is simplistic for a very good reason, it's purpose is singular and that is to quote my original comment...

....its part of a larger strategy which aims to see a decline of a html based applications on the internet, in favour of Microsoft .NET applications, which is probably quite similiar to Sun's vision of client side Java, and Macromedia's vision of flash. I think it's only a few years away and you'll come across web sites which may at first glance look like like old school html with a bit of flash, but are in fact XAML... a windows application.

I can hear you all saying... but Java and Flash are cross platform. Like Java and Flash, .NET to some is going to increasingly become more cross platform, it's been designed that way from the outset. But at the end of the day you can bet it will always be more fully functioned on Windows than it will ever be on Linux or Mac or some other OS. For Microsoft I think they'll be hoping this will lead to a continuing dominance the desktop market.

So basically you should really avoid critizing someone for not using a tool that you have no understanding of to tackle an objective within an architecture that no-one except those who would be bound by non-disclosure agreements would have an authority to talk about.

In short... cut the crap.

Could MS actually be taking security seriously?

Naaahh...

I think Microsoft takes anything seriously that they can make money off, especially if it involves charging you for protection against the results of Microsoft's own cockups.

Or play games that aren't combat or sports simulations. Okay, there are some, but there's really nothing on the 360 to woo (for example) RPG fans.
 
oblivion.
 
  Because it isn't one. To do much of anything home-entertainmenty with it besides playing games or watching DVDs, you need a $1500 Media Center PC for the 360 to stream content from.
 
wrong, almost all 360 owners are using it just fine without a media center pc. http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia/devi ces/wmconnect/default.aspx

It no longer has a 64k file size restriction and now lets you have extensions that are not .txt.

I think Java is all but buried as a client side technology, and Microsoft is currently handing out the spades to bury flash.

And I say bring it on... I've always hated flash and always will.... Microsoft's Expression suite will totally kick ass over flash, hooking in the power of Direct-X and C#, into an idiot proof suite of tools.

I think Java is all but buried as a client side technology, and Microsoft is currently handing out the spades to bury flash.

And I say bring it on... I've always hated flash and always will.... Microsoft's Expression suite will totally kick ass over flash, hooking in the power of Direct-X and C#, into an idiot proof suite of tools.

I think Java is all but buried as a client side technology, and Microsoft is currently handing out the spades to bury flash.

And I say bring it on... I've always hated flash and always will.... Microsoft's Expression suite will totally kick ass over flash, hooking in the power of Direct-X and C#, into an idiot proof suite of tools.

No need to worry there. Been there, done that, got the source code.

See eg. reference to the UK in http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2004/sep0 4/09-19OfficeGSPPR.mspx

This was the first result on google for uk government windows source license

I agree with you.

I like notepad.exe in the same way I like pbrush.exe. MS Paint may be a very basic product, it may not have multiple layers or whatever else but it is designed as that, as a straight forward easy to use drawing program.

One of the things for what I use Paint for example is to transform something to an image (like text or powerpoint drawings. It is so easy to CTRL+A CTRL+C CTRL+TAB CTRL+V and you have an Image.

Also, it is a great program to make kids spend time, it is very easy to use for them, I mean, even after comparing tuxpain with MS Paint I find the Linux alternative quite confusing or at least overwhelming.

Notepad is the same, it is great for text buffers, or to write emails (or slashdot comments) before pasting them to the web form.

As someone else kind of pointed out, Microsoft could "update" any of these two programs but they would not be Notepad or Pbrush anymore, they would be other programs. And, as everybody has noted there are tons and tons of programs available already, so why bother?

I'm sorry, I thought I heard you say that Vista does not provide any new applications. Well that's just plain wrong. How about the sidebar, sync center, photo gallery or even the calendar. Based on this link there will also be some new games.

And besides I don't think the problem with Microsoft not porting their software to .NET is the lack of trust into this platform. I think it is in lack of integration with Vista itself. I do not know who .NET is progressing with Vista style controls, buttons, lists, new interfaces and shell styles that are fairly new to the OS market. .NET is not yet equipped to handle them correctly, or its not tested. And besides, we know that Microsoft wants things to look nice. And the controls they developed for Office (p.s.: it's been changed!) or Vista are not developed in .NET and it takes considerable effort to replicate them convicingly (own experience).

IMHO, Microsoft believes firmly in .NET and among other things they have their corporate website to prove it. I also bet that they will develop more and more applications in it, but I also believe that they do not require to do any more convincing. They have a large user base, that's all they need -- the development will be pushed on by this user base.

I'm sorry, I thought I heard you say that Vista does not provide any new applications. Well that's just plain wrong. How about the sidebar, sync center, photo gallery or even the calendar. Based on this link there will also be some new games.

And besides I don't think the problem with Microsoft not porting their software to .NET is the lack of trust into this platform. I think it is in lack of integration with Vista itself. I do not know who .NET is progressing with Vista style controls, buttons, lists, new interfaces and shell styles that are fairly new to the OS market. .NET is not yet equipped to handle them correctly, or its not tested. And besides, we know that Microsoft wants things to look nice. And the controls they developed for Office (p.s.: it's been changed!) or Vista are not developed in .NET and it takes considerable effort to replicate them convicingly (own experience).

IMHO, Microsoft believes firmly in .NET and among other things they have their corporate website to prove it. I also bet that they will develop more and more applications in it, but I also believe that they do not require to do any more convincing. They have a large user base, that's all they need -- the development will be pushed on by this user base.

I'm sorry, I thought I heard you say that Vista does not provide any new applications. Well that's just plain wrong. How about the sidebar, sync center, photo gallery or even the calendar. Based on this link there will also be some new games.

And besides I don't think the problem with Microsoft not porting their software to .NET is the lack of trust into this platform. I think it is in lack of integration with Vista itself. I do not know who .NET is progressing with Vista style controls, buttons, lists, new interfaces and shell styles that are fairly new to the OS market. .NET is not yet equipped to handle them correctly, or its not tested. And besides, we know that Microsoft wants things to look nice. And the controls they developed for Office (p.s.: it's been changed!) or Vista are not developed in .NET and it takes considerable effort to replicate them convicingly (own experience).

IMHO, Microsoft believes firmly in .NET and among other things they have their corporate website to prove it. I also bet that they will develop more and more applications in it, but I also believe that they do not require to do any more convincing. They have a large user base, that's all they need -- the development will be pushed on by this user base.

I'm sorry, I thought I heard you say that Vista does not provide any new applications. Well that's just plain wrong. How about the sidebar, sync center, photo gallery or even the calendar. Based on this link there will also be some new games.

And besides I don't think the problem with Microsoft not porting their software to .NET is the lack of trust into this platform. I think it is in lack of integration with Vista itself. I do not know who .NET is progressing with Vista style controls, buttons, lists, new interfaces and shell styles that are fairly new to the OS market. .NET is not yet equipped to handle them correctly, or its not tested. And besides, we know that Microsoft wants things to look nice. And the controls they developed for Office (p.s.: it's been changed!) or Vista are not developed in .NET and it takes considerable effort to replicate them convicingly (own experience).

IMHO, Microsoft believes firmly in .NET and among other things they have their corporate website to prove it. I also bet that they will develop more and more applications in it, but I also believe that they do not require to do any more convincing. They have a large user base, that's all they need -- the development will be pushed on by this user base.

I'm sorry, I thought I heard you say that Vista does not provide any new applications. Well that's just plain wrong. How about the sidebar, sync center, photo gallery or even the calendar. Based on this link there will also be some new games.

And besides I don't think the problem with Microsoft not porting their software to .NET is the lack of trust into this platform. I think it is in lack of integration with Vista itself. I do not know who .NET is progressing with Vista style controls, buttons, lists, new interfaces and shell styles that are fairly new to the OS market. .NET is not yet equipped to handle them correctly, or its not tested. And besides, we know that Microsoft wants things to look nice. And the controls they developed for Office (p.s.: it's been changed!) or Vista are not developed in .NET and it takes considerable effort to replicate them convicingly (own experience).

IMHO, Microsoft believes firmly in .NET and among other things they have their corporate website to prove it. I also bet that they will develop more and more applications in it, but I also believe that they do not require to do any more convincing. They have a large user base, that's all they need -- the development will be pushed on by this user base.

I'm sorry, I thought I heard you say that Vista does not provide any new applications. Well that's just plain wrong. How about the sidebar, sync center, photo gallery or even the calendar. Based on this link there will also be some new games.

And besides I don't think the problem with Microsoft not porting their software to .NET is the lack of trust into this platform. I think it is in lack of integration with Vista itself. I do not know who .NET is progressing with Vista style controls, buttons, lists, new interfaces and shell styles that are fairly new to the OS market. .NET is not yet equipped to handle them correctly, or its not tested. And besides, we know that Microsoft wants things to look nice. And the controls they developed for Office (p.s.: it's been changed!) or Vista are not developed in .NET and it takes considerable effort to replicate them convicingly (own experience).

IMHO, Microsoft believes firmly in .NET and among other things they have their corporate website to prove it. I also bet that they will develop more and more applications in it, but I also believe that they do not require to do any more convincing. They have a large user base, that's all they need -- the development will be pushed on by this user base.

"Vista does not provide any new applications though."

What about Windows Mail, Windows Calendar, and Windows Photo Gallery?

These seem like prime candidates to show off .Net to me...

"Vista does not provide any new applications though."

What about Windows Mail, Windows Calendar, and Windows Photo Gallery?

These seem like prime candidates to show off .Net to me...

"Vista does not provide any new applications though."

What about Windows Mail, Windows Calendar, and Windows Photo Gallery?

These seem like prime candidates to show off .Net to me...

I don't think anyone is expecting MS to rewrite the kernel in C# or managed C++.

Interestingly the people at MS research are expecting just that - they are writing Singularity in what is essentially C# with extensions (extensions mostly in the form of formal specification semantics to allow more complete static checking). The upside to doing this is that, when combined with a better ground up approach to security as is being used in Singularity, you get a remarkably robust and secure kernel for an operating system.

Of course this is a project at MS research - I wouldn't expect it to ever see the light of day in an actual product released by MS. It's nice to know that some people set their expectations suitably high though.

Jedidiah.

I see nothing in that EULA that prohibits benchmarks against Java.

Bullshit, and this pisses me off to no end.

My link and several others: http://www.msdnaa.net/EULA/EMEA/English.aspx


2.6 Benchmark Testing. You may not disclose the results of any benchmark test of Server Software (as defined below in Section 4.1) or the .NET Framework component of the Software to any third party without Microsoft's prior written approval. The foregoing does not, however, apply to the Server Software for Windows Server or Exchange Server.


Your Link has stipulations:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url= /library/en-us/dnnetdep/html/redisteula.asp

*You may conduct internal benchmark testing of the .NET Framework component of the OS Components (".NET Component"). You may disclose the results of any benchmark test of the .NET Component, provided that you comply with the following terms: (1)


Go read the compliance of terms.
Enjoy,

http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url= /library/en-us/dnnetdep/html/redisteula.asp

I see nothing in that EULA that prohibits benchmarks against Java.

People are missing the point anyway. The purpose of managed code is to make DRM unbreakable. Someday soon you will need explicit permission to generate machine code, enforced through the PKI mechanism they already have in place. To flip that "unsafe" switch you'll need a signed certificate, which Microsoft will only sign when you agree to their terms. If you want to see the future of "Trusted Computing", just look to the mobile space, already well on its way to that state of affairs.

.NET has excellent reflection support. Consequently, .NET assemblies are easily decompiled. And there are numerous freely available tools to do this.

Sure, there's obfuscation. Doubtlessly, MS already uses obfuscation extensively in every one of its published .NET assemblies.

But obfuscation will only get you so far. Your garden-variety reverse engineer will have an easier time working with obfuscated .NET code than traditional assemblies.

I concur!

And there is the potential for future optimizations. For example: the CLR could conceivably do profile-guided optimization automatically.

Oh wait, do you mean .NET? :-) And while you are downloading the "free" IDE, you can also pick up one of several
visual code profilers out there.

Actually, with the solution that AT+T has chosen, there is barely any lag between changing channels. The Microsoft TV solution (see brochure has a concept called "Instant Channel Change". I can't tell you how it works, but I can tell you i've seen it, used it and it does work, and its pretty damn fast.

Oobvious you haven't looked at SQL Sever or DB2 pricing. Oracle is the MOST expensive of all 3!

Oracle VS SQL Server licensing comparison:
http://www.microsoft.com/sql/prodinfo/compare/orac le/pricecomparison.mspx

SQL Server Enterprise Ed is 20k/CPU;
Oracle with all the features included in SQL Server Enterprise is 40k/CPU.

SQL Server Standard is 5k/CPU;
Oracle standard (way less features than SQL Server standard i.e. management tools, advanced security features, and business intelligence features), and cost 5 or 15k/CPU - same or 3x as much depending (for a inferior product).

Keep in mind Oracle is also the ONLY of the 3 charging per CPU CORE! So if you're using dual-core Opterons or something, you're effectively doubling Oracle prices' VS everybody else (Standard Ed at 3x becomes 6x as much as SQL Server if running on Dual Core Opterons!)

And that's just where it starts! Senior Oracle DBAs also cost WAY more than any SQL Server (and most likely DB2) DBA gets paid with same competences/knowledge. It typically costs WAY more in maintenance. SQL Server typically had better tools (no need to buy TOAD or such - and TOAD isn't cheap either).

Quite honestly, it's about the very LAST DB I would ever recommend to a customer.

You haven't seen the latest version. Go to http://www.microsoft.com/technet/technetmag/issues /2005/05/InterOp/default.aspx and look for "symbolic link". You'll see that they are supported for the POSIX subsystem (called Interix). Vista will add Win32 support for symlinks.

For the very first day of its design, Windows NT was to be POSIX compliant because it was an important requirement for many government contracts. Of course, POSIX includes a significant amount of optional behavior, and most of it was left out. It didn't really matter though, because most people didn't need POSIX.

POSIX was a requirement because each hardware vendor had their own proprietary UNIX and writing a POSIX-compliant app was supposed to allow you to buy your hardware from SUN, SGI, DEC, IBM, HP, or anybody else because they all were slightly incompatible (hence GNU autoconf). Since WinNT would run on anybody's hardware it didn't matter that your code wasn't portable to another OS because your code was automatically portable to any other hardware without so much as a recompile (unless you changed CPU).

Lots of UNIX vendors bitched about NT getting contracts with its bogus POSIX compliance, but the truth was that the POSIX requirement was bogus in the first place. Obviously the minimal POSIX subsystem wouldn't be useful for porting most apps to it, but it didn't matter because Microsoft wanted to win contracts for new software.

There was still a need for a full POSIX implementation on NT, though, and Softway Systems created it. MS bought them a few years ago, and now it is upgraded and fully integrated into Windows Server. This subsystem has full support for networking, X11, symlinks, Perl, Python, etc.

dom

A quick search finds a remote desktop client for Mac. Or do you mean a server or something?

Hell, you can do this for free using the OS X Remote Desktop Connection client. Just connect to the other machine, set it for fullscreen and you're done.

Le éminence grise ?

I never said it was good POSIX support. Yes, it's Microsoft's limited version of POSIX, whose hooks I promptly delete/disable from any version of OS I install that has it included. Neither the above article nor MSoft's web site on R2 states that it will be Real or Full POSIX support. MSoft just talks about Interoperability Components, which already exist, and thus isn't real news. If they are putting in Real POSIX support, they are not publicizing it well or supporting the contention that it is a fully compliant version of POSIX that can be used. Cygwin/MinGW still remains the better solution.