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Linux is Window Manager's Product of the Year
brokeninside writes "Infoworld's 'Windows Manager' Columnist Bob Livingston named Linux his 1999 product of the year in his most recent column. I especially enjoyed his assertion that Microsoft was 'playing catchup' with Windows 2000. He said, '...Microsoft is catching up with Linux, not setting a higher standard.'"
That's quite a difference...
Wow. For the first time, someone in the journalistic community has said that Windows is playing catchup with Linux!!! Whod'a thought that a year ago?? I for one think this is great.
Doesn't mean there's not a long way to go, though, still...
If you can't figure out how to mail me, don't.
For linux tips: http://www.linuxtipsblog.com
Microsoft IS playing catchup with Win2k. Why?
;p
First of all, you wouldn't believe the number of interns where I work that get their hands on a Linux workstation for the first time, and then, upon managing to screw up something, reboot. Microsoft products have been so dependant on the reboot, it's been ingrained in the minds of people without enough luck to have gotten some experience with something better.
Not only that, but Win2k is Microsoft's attempt to make NT a usefull OS - meaning you can play games on it. =) And now it seems like they're chickening out on being able to offer a product that can do both by promising Windows Millenium, which I betaed, much to my own sorrow. It seems to me that the only way they can keep the OS stable is to prevent it from doing things - using easily written video card drivers for instance.
But... but... you'll be hearing MORE about it? Perhaps Livingston's been reading his own publication too much. Last time I checked, Linux was gaining buzzword status - it's almost up there with 'intranet' now... =)
Plus, Microsoft is now REALLY playing catchup, because, after all, once the DOJ gets through with them, they might be open source.
There is no sig.
"Linux isn't perfect. Support is still an issue. And fixes add up to patches, although you can use automated installation utilities."
..."
:-)
At this point, the list of people not supporting Linux is likely shorter than the list of people who are. I think he's confusing support with "double click to add SP9 to your system" ease-of-fixing.
"You will like our integration. Microsoft's decision to make Internet Explorer a hard-to-remove feature of Windows 98 -- in direct defiance of an earlier order by Judge Jackson -- has
I don't think there were earlier rulings by Mr. Jackson about not integrating Explorer in Win98. Perhaps he means another judge.
However, there are many interesting bits:
"icrosoft got away with this because its legal counsel convinced two out of three judges on an appeals court that Windows 98 "isn't an upgrade of Windows 95" and therefore was in compliance with the previous order. You know a company's in trouble when legal hairsplitting replaces common sense."
Can you sense the bitterness here? I can understand why the man doesn't like Microsoft: how can they sleep at night knowing they were selling IE 4 + the upgrade equivalence of a service pack to the public, for the same price as a full operating system?
It sounds like he's really cluefull about how Linux is starting to make MS sit up and take notice. Since Linux has passed the "embrace and extend," and FUD litmus tests, MS is starting to realise that they have to compete on merits. They obviously thought they could set up Linux as a nice straw men for their DoJ hearing, and later take the community down a few pegs.. But now the result is an actual form of competition, if not full out market share battles
---
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Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
Does anyone here, even for a second, believe that Windows 2000 will not be a major software release and developers will scramble to support it? Ignore the technical issues: The "windows phenomenon" has nothing to do with technology, it has to do with marketing, the perception of reality, and human nature.
This article is paying lip-service to the community. Given ZD Net's track record I wouldn't be suprised if it was written specifically to get posted to slashdot (like many other articles like this which seem to make it to the front page). Don't buy it.
Linux is a versatile OS but it has many shortcomings which the pundits and many linux enthusiasts want to ignore - the hardware drivers are not on par with their NT counterparts, nor is the support infrastructure there. There are some drivers which are rock solid under linux, but the majority of them have quirks, bugs, and I'd say upwards of 50% are in "perma-beta". Further, the tcp/ip lock-spin problem as surfaced in the mindcraft testing seems to prove that linux does what it was designed to do: run well on *well supported* commodity hardware, do so with good stability, and makes an excellent server for home / small business use. However, for mega corporations and so-called "e-commerce" - it's lacking. This is called Solaris Country - big iron and massively redundant servers. the BSD's also do better in this arena (although, like Wendy's, they make superior burgers but everybody thinks McDonalds is better). The above paragraph is mainly here as a reality-check: linux is not perfect. It has shortcomings. The sooner we accept them (and then work to shore them up), the sooner we stop worrying about "beating microsoft" and start building superior code, that's the same day we win the war. If you want historical proof: japanese samauri(sp?) - they held the belief that by not concerning themselves with the outcome of battle they would win. And they did. Atleast until we dropped the bomb on them.
But, I digress. Mistrust articles like these: these little "opinion" columns are just paying lip service to whatever hype happens to the popular one at the moment. Go back and search for "push technology", or even earlier to the Macintosh and the windows 3.0 days... it's all the same: the pundits say what their readers want them to say. Just like slashdot likes to moderate and post people who agree with it's values and beliefs. Boil it all away and you're left with one thing - and it isn't the truth.
Kind of like the on-line textbook dealer whose slogan is: "We promise not to rip you off...as much..."
J
So stop complaing.
If you where the one complaing, that is.
When I read the article, I was surprised how direct and to the point the writer was. He comes across as neither a linux zealot nor a MS fanatic, which is what many articles that sing the praises of either product do. Here, we have a clear analysis of the good things and the flaws in both products (and of microsoft's business strategy), which is a refreshing change from many "propaganda" pieces.
... we'll see its products make big strides in usability and stability". Competition is a good thing for consumers :)
But what I liked most was the last paragraph: "When microsoft is forced to compete on equal footing
De gustibus et coloribus non est disputandum
One of which is his statement that "support is still an issue." This is simply not true. With newsgroups, IRC, and the myriad "Linux help" sites that have been popping up all over the place, Linux has, at least in my experience, much more support than Windows. I think that Linux can more more supported and better supported because of it's open nature. When someone is giving tech support for Linux, they can know exactly what's going on with the inner workings. Every problem that users experience can be explained satisfactorily. This is certainly not the case for Windows.
One way which I believe would help people (and the press, who influence the average user greatly) would see how much support Linux has is if makers of distributions would place more prominently the many tech support sites or accesses which people can use as well as exactly how to get there and make good use of the resources. Alas, many of the distros get their money from support and would almost certainly be reluctant to do this.
Chris Hagar
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." - Thomas Jefferson
My first reaction, as a happy linux user who thinks open source will eventually conquer all inferior methods, was to think "No there's not! Linux is perfect! Bow before the kernel!"
Of course, Linux isn't perfect. Nothing's perfect, after all. But the difference is that, once we admit we have faults, it doesn't take long for open source to fix them. As a result, my second reaction was to think "Well, what are these criticisms, so I can fix them?"
I think it's that kind of attitude (the second) which will make the reporter's vision of a linux-on-even-footing(financially, not innovationwise)-with-Microsoft come true.
-Denor
One of the first points made in this article is that linux is a competitor. That begs the question: is linux and its potential competition in the x86 market good for Windows and its users? Will it mean Microsoft has to actually put out a good product in order to properly compete?
icqqm [ICQ:11952102]
Ok, here I go...
Some would say that the major development in Windows2000 was the Active Directory, and that remainder of the issues he cites (security, stability, horsepower) were only fulfillments of a longstanding promise.
Now, if Win2k came out only with those improvements in implementation and no changes in underlying architecture, then he would be justified in saying that M$ was playing catchup to Linux. But again, there is the AD, which is the major marketing point and really quite a massive overhaul of the way many organizations currently function. For that feature alone (there are others but I don't understand them very well) it seems unjustified to call M$ a bunch of copycats when it comes to Win2k.
Just a viewpoint to consider.
-konstant
Yes! We are all individuals! I'm not!
-konstant
Yes! We are all individuals! I'm not!
At this point, the list of people not supporting Linux is likely shorter than the list of people who are. I think he's confusing support with "double click to add SP9 to your system" ease-of-fixing.
Are you trying to tell me that you wouldn't mind having a point-and-click kernel recompile with a snazzy interface that autodetects the optimal configuration for your system and then installs it automatically and asks you "would you like to reboot?" when it's done? Hey, linux isn't perfect. Support *really is* still an issue. And so's having a decent GUI. I don't care what the linux enthusiasts on /. say - gnome and kde are not on par with Windows. They're useful, sure. They even look sexier than windows (not hard, really). I use gnome and enlightenment every day. But it took me 2 years of constant work under linux to get to this point and I cannot and will not expect a columnist and the average joes out there to do the same. We're not there yet.
You know a company's in trouble when legal hairsplitting replaces common sense."
Gee, and I thought that's what every corporation does when they get into a legal dispute... but I must be mistaken - maybe they all try to go as fast as possible and generate as little paperwork as they can. Afterall, lawyers like to go home at 5:00 too, right? Even if according to the bill they worked 60 hours today...
Can you sense the bitterness here?
No.
how can they sleep at night knowing they were selling IE 4 + the upgrade equivalence of a service pack to the public, for the same price as a full operating system?
Maybe because the average consumer either a) didn't know any better b) didn't care or c) was the only thing they knew how to use and hence had to upgrade. Ignorance is a difficult thing to combat.. and it's routinely exploited. Just head over to a new car dealership for an example. I'm sure Bill and millions of other capitalists around the world will be sleeping soundly tonight. With their pillows filled with cash.
Because some idiot had moderator points.
As previously stated, this has nothing to do with window managers.
I was beginning to think InfoWorld was a lost cause. This is the same magazine that employs that visionary Bob Metcalfe. You'll remember him as the knucklehead who knocked Linux because it's based on "30 year old technology". I tried to call Bob to complain but I guess he doesn't use phones for similar reasons.
Hates people who have stupid little sigs
MS quits the OS business, adopts Linux and release MS Linux 2002. W2K becomes WinGames, an optimized OS for Games only using OpenGL. Sex...God's biggest mistake.
Mode (3) smart-aleck mode. Press * to return to main menu.
Is it just me, or is the timestamp on this posting way off?
as i sit here drinking my glass of red wine (for my high cholesterol), smoking a cigarette (to replenish that coating of tar that was lost when i had to abstain from smoking due to my earth-scorching case of bronchitis) and browsing through alt.binaries.nospam.teenfem while waiting for the slashdot pages to load, i can't help but to chuckle at all of this.
did our neanderthal cousin have such difficulties? do you think he gave a rat's ass about some piece of meaningless software? do you think he gave two shits about windows 2000?
hell no!
why? because he was getting laid!
let's assume our dear old friend is lounging against a large rock, half-asleep after having devoured a large tapir. suddenly, something arouses him. a musky, alluring scent carried by the light, spring breeze. he looks up and notices a hot young actress walking by!
what does he do?! debate the relative merits of linux over windows 2000? upgrade his linux kernel? bitch about the amount of fud in the press regarding linux? go club the leader of the tribe to death?
hell no!
he bends her over and loves the shit out of her right then and there!
so, drop back to the shell, if you're not there already, and enter "shutdown -h 0". go outside and wait for a nice breeze and jump on the first thing that smells like it needs to be jumped on!
i promise, your os problems will go away immediately!
thank you.
fat-time vs the soul collector!!
Active Directory is a cleverly disguised marketing ploy from Microsoft, where we haven't met a standard we didn't think we could improve.
Of course, you can note Active Directory ONLY works if Microsoft is your name server. No one in their right mind is currently using Microsoft products for name serving.
So, to summarize the Active Directory stance.
1) Make some great new client technology, push it HUGELY in marketing
2) Oh yeah. You see that FreeBSD box in the closet running named that hasn't been rebooted in years and never drops a request. It has to go. Otherwise this great new thing, Active Directory, is no more than the Windows Explorer all over again.
Microsoft is trying to change client technology in ways that will force Microsoft's server technology down your throat. That is your innovation.
The plain truth is that monopolists have no incentive to innovate. Microsoft changes things only to extend its dominance. I don't think I will recommend changing domain name services to Microsoft ANYTIME soon.
Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale,
A tale of a Linux trip
That started from this Slashdot site
Aboard this Livingston ship.
The mate was a mighty Inforworld guy,
The product brave and sure.
Most votes made for Linux that day
For a free sourcin' tour, a free sourcin' tour.
The product race started getting rough,
The Win2K was tossed,
If not for the zelots of the slashdot site
The honor would be lost, the honor would be lost.
The code won praise from the home of this honest journalist
With Openness
The Kernel too,
The best OS and superior,
The Red Hat guys
The Taco and Roblimo,
Here on open source Isle.
So this is the thread of the product race,
We've beat Redmond one more time,
We'll have to make the best of things,
It's an uphill climb.
The Livingston and the public too,
Have recognized the very best,
To help Linux get some press,
With the product of the year.
No cost, no Bill and open sorece,
Not a single blue screen,
Like Robinson Crusoe,
As primative as can be.
So join us here each release my freinds,
You're sure to get a smile,
Linux got product of the year
Here on open source' Isle."
You know a company's in trouble when legal hairsplitting replaces common sense."
;-)
Was quoted from the original article.. Bad siggy
I was commenting on, if not the bitterness, and least the not-liking this Windows reporter felt for the MS marketting tactics.
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Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
M$ is renowned for thier 'catch-up' methods - it's called copying followed by intensive marketing, and market capturing - making the market totally reliant on M$ at exorbitant prices.
Hence the lure of Linux, and it's new buzz-word status - there is a viable alternative to M$ which has been around for some time, big business is finally starting to recognise that fact.
If M$ wants to stop this trend, there's one sure fire way to do it - cut the cost of thier OS's dramatically - in fact, make them free for non-profit use - and release certain sections of code as open source.
I don't see this ever happening, however.
Are you trying to tell me that you wouldn't mind having a point-and-click kernel recompile with a snazzy interface that autodetects the optimal configuration for your system and then installs it automatically and asks you "would you like to reboot?" when it's done?
"Linux has detected a newer version of the kernel exists. Please wait while a convienent program download unknown files from a remote server to install on your machine without asking, which later may or may not work and may require several reboost and maybe even a reinstall."
"Linux has not been shut down properly. Please wait while Linux scans all of your data and may attempt to fix data it interpretes as corrupt which may or may not make it work or contain essential files."
"Linux has detected a new monitor. Please wait while Linux scans your entire harddrive, updates random files, creates directories in weird places, calls the CIA, and assasinates Jimmy Hoffa."
Uh... nothanks.
I agree. The point of the article seems to be that Linux will be good for Windows because given the way M!crosoft now focus on litigation and marketing, their software standards are slipping. He thinks that the existence of Linux will provide the kind of competition that will turn M!crosoft into a company that produces reliable, stable, user-friendly, high-powered, value-adding software (enough with the buzzwords, I know) that actually lives up to it's marketing hype.
He's right. The more successful Linux is, the more likely it is to provoke it's competitors into raising their standard and evolving their software into something far better than 3.1, 95 or 98. Win2000 (although I know very little about it) seems to be the first step in that direction. Linux will have to become more user friendly, and will have to support more hardware etc etc etc, because the better it gets, the more it's competitors will try to compete with it.
Every strength that Linux has, from stability to the versatility of it's X-Windows GUI, is probably already the focus of a Windows project team deciding how to best surpass that particular feature in Windows 2001. No matter what you think of M!crosoft, they're a powerful company that's used to competing on a difficult playing field. Their tactics aren't always totally above the belt, but don't let that lull you into believing that they can't produce some very good products when provoked into proper competition. They're not nice, but they're not incompetent either.
Salocin.com
HP has a clone that emulates _all_ the functionallity of echange server. The location of the site is here.
And there is even an offer of 50 free licenses! And the web based mail interface looks awesome.
I liked the article. Brian Livingstone was fair to both Microsoft and Linux. He basically pointed out that consumers want stability and security, two features that Microsoft fails to deliver and that Linux does deliver.
He wants Microsoft to improve their products and sees Linux as pointing the way to a better computer platform, one that has stability, security, and ease of use.
But Mr. Livingstone is still missing the big picture. The reason that Linux is gaining such a big share is that Linux uses open standards. Linux works and plays well with others. Linux doesn't want to be the only choice. Linux wants to be one of many choices.
And Linux runs on just about every computer platform right now that will support a multitasking OS. Everything from palmtops, to routers, to the desktop, to servers, all the way up to the most powerful supercomputers in the world.
Most of the software that runs on Linux also runs on a dozen other OSes. If your samba server under Linux doesn't have enough power, put in a Sun Enterprise server in its place, also running samba.
In contrast, Microsoft makes proprietary every standard that they touch. They can't seem to help themself. Everyone uses sendmail, they use exchange. Everyone uses java, they use j++. They are even trying to pervert perl right now by adding windows only extentions to the language. Microsoft does want to be your only choice.
Microsoft runs only on one platform. The x86. Given that there is a wide range of power in this venerable processor and the IA64 is coming, but even then you don't have much choice of vendors.
Microsoft only writes applications for one platform. Yes, they have done a little work with the macs, but only as an after thought.
I think that Linux is the tip of a new way of doing things that gives the consumer maximum choice.
I think that Bill is just now realizing that. Microsoft will need to change and change radically to keep any of their marketshare. You may not even recognize MS in a few years.
-- Never make a general statement.
That's different. The key word here is "point-and-click" - meaning the user is in control.
Female Prison Rape in NY
Some people that are registered with MSDN have it. And any warez kiddie worth his salt already has the ISO.
Stop telling people it is not available, when it is. You may not be able to run down to CompUSA or BestBuy and get a copy, but the RTM version is definitely available.
Diggs
If guns are so evil, how come Sarah Brady can hold one and not turn into a raving lunatic?? Oh yeah, she is one already.
However, if I were to talk about "big iron", I might think of IRIX as well. But IRIX is being dropped, in favor of? Linux, I believe. If SGI puts resources into extending Linux at the higher levels, I'll be pretty happy.
Heck, if I were to talk about "big iron", I would think of the Crays' mighty-ass UNICOS, not the comparatively flimsy IRIX, which is optimized for - of all things - graphics work! Ever been around a T90? The damn thing screams big iron.
Just a random thought.
To the editors: your English is as bad as your Perl. Please go back to grade school.
This article is rather misleading, He doesn't actually say that Windows 2000 is playing catchup with Linux as a whole. He says that in certain areas (specifically security and BSOD) Windows is trying to catch up. I'm sure there are areas in which each is trying to catch up with the other.
11.0010010000111111011010101000100010000101101000
MS Office 2000 clone? 100% word compatibility?
StarOffice does the thing for me. I've been doing schoolwork with my Linux box running StarOffice and it's easy to export/import to/from Word to make the other people in the group also be able to read the stuff. It's got spreadsheet, presentation thingy and whatnot. And it's gratis. I can imagine people could use it in a business environment also. The export/import does not do 100% accurate conversions, but I'd say it's like 97%, which is good for me. Hopefully Sun will improve StarOffice even further.
japanese samauri(sp?)
"Samurai".
Im about to get a new graphics cards for my PC, and once i've gotten it i will much likely erase Linux from my harddrive, simply because downloading a new version of the already crappy XFree86, then manually tune the configuration file is nothing i look forward to... when XFree can enter a decent graphicsmode without the need for a specialized driver i might install linux again. But then i expect to see a dialogbox saying "Do you wish to install the gfx card drivers?" [OK][CANCEL] when i pop in the gfx card CD for the first time.
C'mon, gang. You all know how good you are.
You all know how good Linux is, and that from a technical standpoint it's superior.
So, why is it that this little cult needs to stop the productive work it's doing to pat itself on the back every 5 minutes?
Think about it this way, and I realize right now this is COMPLETELY unscientific, for entertainment purposes only:
Figure that if 5,000 productive Linux contributors (code) read a typical "We rule!" story on Slashdot, spending, oh, 10 minutes on the self-congratulation, and read, oh, let's say, 3 such stories a week on here, that means on an average week the practice of Slashdot self-righteousness costs the Linux development effort 2,500 HOURS of time that could otherwise be spent on improving Linux! Now, let's be fair and not assume ALL of these coders would spend ANY time not reading Slashdot/sleeping/eating on developing for Linux. Let's be REAL conservative and say that only 10 PERCENT of that time would be spent otherwise on coding.
That's still 250 HOURS per month lost!
Just a thought (chuckles).
The man is a gimp. I've never read a factual article by him. The only other "columnist" I've read thats worse is Jon Katz.
This guy wrote this article to get hits. Thats basically what he does. He once wrote an article about Windows 98 titled "Windows98 disables competitors software" on CNN. In the article he made his pathetic argument, when in fact the only result was that Win98 fubars a couple drivers made by manufacturers because they bundled regressed versions instead of up to date ones. I wrote an email to CNN about it, and I haven't seen his articles on their site since then.
This guy has probably never used Linux for more than 20 minutes in his whole life. In fact, naming Linux as the best "Window Manager" is just wrong. Linux is the kernel. Maybe he could get away with naming XFree86 or AccelX or some other server.
All my client desktops are NT4 and use Outlook. ALl of them connect to Sendmail on Linux and do that nifty name-checking thing via Open LDAP. If I wanted groupware crap there's Open Source Linux answers for that too.
As far as naming Linux a "window manager" - He did nothing of the sort. "Window Manager" is just a meaningless catchy name for a column in a Windows magazine that has NOTHING to do with the Unix concept of window managers.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Hah, you've got to be kidding, that's got to be one of the worst support sites I've ever seen. It has yet to give me the solution to any of my problems that I've had.
Free phone call? Um, since when did MS have free tech support. Last time I checked, you got one or two free phone calls, and after that it was something like $50-70 per incident!
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Thats like watching the adverts, rather than seeing what else is on, making a tea, going to the toilet etc...very strange.
I vouch for the "catching up" theory also.
Microsoft are indeed engineering the Active Directory, but NetWare has had NDS (Novell Directory Services) in its server software since 1996.
Microsoft delivers a directory service four years later. I can call that catch-up. Microsoft has never innovated. They have always taken ideas from the competition and have rendered them user-friendly, at the cost of major security. But when user-friendliness VS. security is the point, most people choose user-friendliness.
Because we are lazy. We don't want to learn. Learning is way too much work!
Maybe in other places, but, here in Middle America, I've yet to find a SINGLE person who isn't a computer programmer/sysadmin, or makes a living in the computer industry somehow who knows what Linux is. I've yet to have a single client ask about it, etc. Even among people I know who are fairly into computers and stuff (I mean not programmers, but people who at least use a computer at home and aren't on AOL) don't know what it is.
This is not meant as a slam or flamebait, just a valid point to counter the "linux is hip and wow" buzz I see posted over and over and over on Slashdot. I've posted this here before, no one's bothered to respond.
DO NOT DISTURB THE SE
I am from the great lakes area. I moved here recently from the west coast. I was actually very surprised when I got here because I was plagued with a number of requests for people to help me install Linux on their computers. Word had gotten around, people had heard it was 'cool' and wanted to try it out. These are normal people I am talking about, AOL junkies who just figured out how to operate ICQ. I actually had to turn one person down because I knew that this person would not have a clue in the Linux environment.
:)
There are alot of people here that know what it is, and when I say that I am a Linux geek they usually respond with a, 'Whoa that is cool, I have been wanting to get into that." Since I have moved here I have helped to convert 3 people.
Now, it may help that I am about 5 minutes from a University. It isn't a technical University, but sometimes that can make a whole lot of difference.
Incidentally the University just switched over all of their old Sun servers to Linux machines.
V
GEOS was my first GUI; it booted from a 5.25" disk on my Commodore 64. It had an interface similar to MacOS with AtEase (not sure what it looks like now). It would be cool to have that interface to play with again, even if it were just that.
I do think that we ought to start treating mobile computers more like PDAs and less like desktops that you can carry. Personally, I run Linux on mine for stability, and also so that I can "code on the road". I would say that Linux is OK for laptops (has good power-saving features), but that you have to know what you're doing (eg, don't be running a bunch of processes you don't need, run XFCE instead of KDE, get enough memory so that you don't use swap space, etc.)
WMBC freeform/independent online radio.
AD does not use kerberos. They would like you to think it does, but really, it doesn't. MS, in their typical fashion, was not content to leave a great standard unmodified, and have added a bunch of proprietary junk to kerberos--which, of course, can only be exchanged between NT machines. If you're talking to a machine with REAL kerberos, you'll be "missing some information".
:) Debian, anyone?
Also, I'm sure Novell would like to rule the world, just as MS and Sun would--along with all the other corporations, who, as my Econ teacher puts it, are dirty profit maximizers
WMBC freeform/independent online radio.
Hmm.. banner ad things? You talking about this blank patch at the top of the page? Ads suck. Ad filters rock. :) Get a filter and save yourself a little bandwidth.. especially on a mostly-text site like slashdot.
We already have that; it's called "xconfig". I use it myself. What I take exception to is the suggestion that it "autodetect" your "optimal configuration", which would probably work about as well as Microsoft's Plug-and-Play and "Detect New Hardware". It's an attempt to replace human intelligence with automated procedures, which doesn't work very well, especially when we're trying to tell the machine how it should be working in the first place.
(Most companies know, only too well, that different versions of Office are incompatiable. Replacing EACH AND EVERY FILE on their corporate fileserver, to ensure everything is up-to-date is a pain, expensive, and takes people away from Real Work. You know, the stuff that earns the company money. An offer of an alternative that would take them off this financially ruinous roundabout would appeal to the execs and accountants alike, not to mention the poor plebs who do the typing.)
Ok, so we've dealt with 100% Word compatiability. The answer is YES. We've also dealt with Office compatibility - it's irrelevent, as Office 2000 won't be compatiable with any other version anyway, and the corps know that. What does that leave? Marketing and human nature.
Ok, marketing. Yes, true, Microsoft has TV ads and billboards. So did IBM, when they released OS/2. That really doesn't capture the degree of mindshare that advertising agencies would have you believe. Otherwise, there'd be a whole different meaning to Blue Screen of Death.
So, what does count? Mindshare. Plain and simple. Linux is getting column inches in the technical, educational and financial columns, sometimes even in the main sections, with such stories as European Governments switching to Linux, and rumours of China doing the same. The financial press has been in a feeding frenzy, with such stories as Red Hat going from $14/share to over $250/share, in only a few months, and VA Linux rocketing from $22/share to nearly $300/share in half a week. Sorry, but that grabs attention in a way very little else does.
Then, there's the educational sector to consider. Mexico and Britain will be churning out Linux coders, not Visual Basic wannabes. Do you -think- financial departments -like- paying more than they have to for software licences, tech support that isn't, etc? And here's a ready supply of willing Linux nerds, who won't need multi-billion support contracts or software that costs more to keep running than the entire Apollo program!
Ok, now let's look at drivers. Linux vs NT, The Battle Of The Giant. Sorry, no plural, NT has far fewer drivers: no PnP support, no USB support, no Firewire support, fewer networking protocols, fewer graphics modes, earlier ActiveX (it's possible to get ActiveX 6 for Linux, but why you'd want to is beyond me - either way, NT's still on version 3), fewer printers, fewer Ethernet cards, fewer sound cards, fewer graphics cards, incomplete multicasting support, no routing support, no QoS support, poorer RAID support, no software watchdog support and poorer driver handling.
Before critisizing Linux for being "worse" than NT over drivers, I'd say "take a step back", because I honestly can't see a single way in which NT can claim superiority over Linux, with regards to drivers. And even if one or two cases were found, that's all they'd be. The overall picture would still be that Linux was superior. To convince me otherwise, you'd have to answer EACH AND EVERY point above, OR for those points you can't disagree on, find AT LEAST ONE way in which NT was superior to Linux. And even then, you'd only have gotten to the point of showing they were equal. You would have to exceed even this very ambitious goal with a significant number of additional points to show NT's overall superiority.
Let's take the supposed beta-ness of Linux' drivers. Have you -used- 50% of Linux' drivers? Has anyone? If not, then you are relying on heresay, not personal observation. How do -you- know that the person was using the latest drivers?
(eg: Ethernet cards - many make use of the Tulip code, but the "standard" kernel used a very old version of this for some time, due to a disagreement over patch philosophy.)
Then, how do you know what options or compiler the person was using? eg: Linux was rather sensitive to pgcc for a while, and only fools like me use -O6 in the Makefile.
Do you know that the hardware used was reliable, and non-defective? If a chip is flaky at the upper end of it's specs, or if the computer's fan is broken, then you -can- actually get more faults with GOOD drivers than badly-written ones. The badly-written ones might, potentially, keep the hardware slow enough to operate, whilst bug-free, well-written drivers might push things a bit too hard.
If you don't know the quality of hardware, don't assume the fault -has- to be in software. It could just as easily be in hardware, or in the interaction between the two, even when a line-by-line check of the driver shows it to be 100% absolutely perfect and utterly bug-free.
A good example of what I mean is in the docs for CPUBurn, where it states that this will push the CPU and the rest of the motherboard to the limits, for Linux, but that a Windows version is proving a problem because Windows is too inefficient for the program to push the system.
Does that mean Linux is defective, because it works better? Nope! It means that you need more work-arounds for bad hardware than Windows does, certainly, but it's still ultimately a hardware bug not a software one.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
His favourite platform has cracks. And they're showing. (Actually, it's had cracks ever since the days of DOS--he just didn't realize how nasty they were. And how ugly is the company that's responsible for the thing.)
I wouldn't put too awful much stock in this particular column.
Just the other day, I was at Borders (the brick and mortar version) looking at nothing in particular. Mostly Java books. I had been trying the get NT at home to do something useful, and had gotten pretty frustrated with it. (Not unusual)
:) )
:)
My girlfriend walked up with a RedHat Linux (6.5 I think) box, and said that she thought I might be interested in this Linux. (I think she initially picked it up because of the cute penguin on the box.
I told her I wouldn't be buying it, since it's free and I can get it, and a slew of applications for it, without spending a dime. The confused look I got in response to the 'free operating system' phrase prompted me to skip the 'free beer vs free speach' diatribe.
Instead, we went out for Tacos.
There's a huge amount of confusion among the 'general public' regarding 'free software'. People just can't seem to get their head around the idea of getting something for nothing. Or the benefits of freely contributing to a community. I think this is mostly an American phenomenon, since here 'there is no free lunch'.
It's like Larry Wall said: (paraphrase) It's like we're doing Windows users a favor by charging them for something they can get for free. It keeps them from getting confused.
-- What you do today will cost you a day of your life.
That you don't know what you're doing. Life must be so hard.
.6...it's not so hard to keep up-to-date with software that's free, is it? Especially such a major component of your system. If you're using an out-of-date version of Windows, expect to have a few downloads as well for any modern card. If you use Win95, you're going to need the USB patch (don't ask why! OBEY!) and AGP GART drivers, at least. Oh, and I hope you don't have Win95 A, because then you have to go out and BUY a new version of Windows. Or steal one. But either is probably going to take more time than getting a recent version of X...and let's just forget about the time difference in upgrading Windows vs. simply replacing a few X packages.
I'm not sure why buying a new video card would require you to get a new version of XFree86, unless you were using one like 3.3.3, which is completely out of date. You should already have 3.3.5 anyway, if not
Also, I wonder what magical OS it is to which you refer that doesn't need a "specialized driver" to get to a "decent graphics mode". X will do 640x480 in 16-color with nearly any video card, just like...hey, just like Windows! Be makes it a bit more interesting: their driver does 256 shades of grey.
Also, hand-edit? Sure, you have to do that in some cases, but ever use xf86config? Since that's still text-based, which you seem to hate so much, your distro probably has a nice GUI tool to configure X.
WMBC freeform/independent online radio.
Wow, who let the 12 year old moderate this to flamebait?
If you can't understand sarcasm yourself, you have NO RIGHT TO TELL OTHER PEOPLE NOT TO. You do have a right to quit moderating though. And you should.
Reverse the sarcasm, and you'll see everything in that post was true.
You're such a rebel!
It's not a file system.
"Directory" in this case has a different meaning than what Unix-heads are used to. Think "Telephone Directory", not "Present Working Directory".
A more accurate term would be "Lookup Service", but someone decided to go with "Directory". It amounts to a database optimized for fast read access. It is usually accessed with a (more or less) standardized protocol such as LDAP or X.500.
What's it good for? It pretty much started as a cool computerized way to look up the phone number of someone in your Big-Ass Company, Inc. Nowadays, it has been expanded to look up information on users (hence the "single logon" buzzword), program components, and anything else that someone wants to make "findable" in an organization.
DNS is a simple directory service. Imagine being able to do a DNS-style lookup for every person, printer, program, "object" in a company. That's what people are excited about.
Save the whales. Feed the hungry. Free the mallocs.
Stability wise, speed wise, there is no doubt Linux outperforms Win2k... but as for the interface and ease of use, you can't compare it. Less than 10% of people would be able to compile anything.
http://www.logient.com
The claim will be made when the US vs. MS trial reopens that the judge's "finding of fact" is already out of date and that Linux is now a serious competitor to Windows. This column is one of the things that MS will point to in making that point.
Mr. Livingston is still firmly in MS' pocket. That he has conformed nicely to the party line is just further evidence of that.
I have discovered a truly marvelous sig, unfortunately the sig limit is too small to contain i
I've been running Linux on my laptop since '96 (Hitachi M120D - P120/16M/1.4G/Int CD/Ext Floppy). I haven't seen anything quite so stable. In terms of stability, it rocks... recently, mind you, it's been my web server, tethered to the cable at home (a job which it performs admirably - built in UPS with the battery and all...) I understand there are problems with some laptops. I've seen systems next to impossible to get X up on. Eventually, however, everyone will start to have a similar experience to what I've had...
Now, in comparison to NT... Let's talk about hot-swapping PCMCIA cards (oh. NT doesn't support that? ok.)
Let's talk about a situation many users with docking stations have. Consider that I have a docking station with a built in ethernet adapter. This is in my office/cube/whatever. I want to be able to drop my laptop into the station, not hook any cables up or whatever. Now consider that I have a PCMCIA ethernet card. I want to roam somewhere else on the *same network segment* to do a presentation, work with a coworker, etc. without bringing my docking station. I would under Linux, drop the docking station interface, undock, carry it where I need, and bring up the PCMCIA interface. Problem is, under NT, there's no easy way to drop an interface, and even if the device doesn't exist, the routes to it do, so there's no easy way to deal with the situation of two interfaces configured for the same network segment, one of which is up, and one of which is down at any given time...
> Not only that, but Win2k is Microsoft's attempt to make NT a usefull OS - meaning you can play games on it. =)
They COULD of done it with NT 4 ! Proof: They included DirectPlay 6.1a in ServicePack5 without telling anyone ! Also, remember the nt4dx5 hack ? Microsoft REFUSED to supported hardware acceleration Direct3D under NT, but it DID work.
Thank God for a) OpenGL and b) Carmack showing customers & developers that NT was a capable game machine. (Quake running under Win95 and WinNT was within one frame per second difference.)
Look at MS laughing all the way to the bank, with all the suckers^H^H^H^H^H^H^H customers willing to be nickled and dimed to death just to play the latest games.
i.e.
Win95,
Win96 (aka 95 OSR 1),
Win 98,
Win 99 (aka 98SE)
As a game developer I get slightly annoyed when all my co-workers (artists and programmers) use NT for game development, but marketing say the game only works under 95/98. Argh.
I'll be happy with Win2K ships, that means us few game developers that needed Win9X (for Direct3D) can finally ditch it for a stable OS. Still not as stable as Linux mind you, but NT does the job.
Cheers
I'm in the hugely technical city of Tulsa, Oklahoma. (Yes, that's sarcasm) Granted, a lot of the Linux users I know are computer geeks, but not all. I've converted 5 or so myself, and I know there are more around here.
Not to mention, BestBuy and CompUSA have their Linux racks in the very front of the stores. I think even non-technical people are seeing it.
Where Livinston says, "...Microsoft is catching up with Linux..." he is referring to one specific aspect of the operating system: stability. From what I've read here on /. it appears that everyone is interpreting it as an across-the-board condemnation of W2K. For ghod's sake, people, please go out and read the article in its entirety.
Weblogging Considered Harmful:
Jesse Berst goes all over the map on every subject you can imagine, not just Linux. One week he's anti-Linux, next week he's pro-Linux. So what? I've seen him flip-flop on nearly every subject in the industry: Java, network computers, cheap PC's, operating systems, Microsoft/DOJ, etc. Either Jesse Berst has Multiple Personality disorder, or "Jesse Berst" is a pen name used by a different writer every day.
Weblogging Considered Harmful:
He's written several books on how to get Windows to work right.
He knows Windows extremely well.
That means he knows the cracks.
He's documented several workarounds to common problems.
He knows Linux is better at alot of things.
When Linux hits 50% marketshare in the desktop market, I think you'll see him moving to a more Linux-centric view.
very strength that Linux has, from stability to the versatility of it's X-Windows GUI, is probably already the focus of a Windows project team deciding how to best surpass that particular feature in Windows 2001. No matter what you think of M!crosoft, they're a powerful company that's used to competing on a difficult playing field. Their tactics aren't always totally above the belt, but don't let that lull you into believing that they can't produce some very good products when provoked into proper competition. They're not nice, but they're not incompetent either.
I agree--we'll all do well to keep that in mind. I have a couple days worth of Win2k experience to back up your point. A quick run-through:
GOOD: It's noticably faster than NT or 98. It generally has a lot less of that bloated feeling. In fact, most basic operations from the desktop are FASTER than what I experience with Enlightenment/Gnome. Definately has a nice feel to it.
GOOD: Win2k doesn't seem to waste memory as badly as NT 4 did. I don't seem to want to use all available memory until it needs it--though Linux still seems to be a little better at this.
GOOD: Unreal TE loads and runs MUCH faster for my in 2k than it did in Win98.
BAD: Win2k installation would not complete normally for me without forcing it to boot into VGA only mode. As far as I can tell the TNT2 drivers that come with it were completely unusable. I was able to download some beta drivers for it to get it working (somewhat.)
BAD: Win2k would knock my SCSI CD-RW offline on bootup (only powering off would make it usuable again at all.) I had to download new drivers from Tekram for my scsi card to get it to work properly.
BAD: Win2k is locking up constantly. I'm sure that some of it has to do with the beta video drivers. However it's been getting noticibly worse after only being installed 4 or 5 days.
SUMMARY: From my experience so far it seems that Microsoft has put a lot of effort into making the end-user-on-a-preinstalled-system experience much nicer. It's prettier. It's faster. Installation was no less of a hassle than RedHat 6.1. But let me put it this way: If I knew nothing about computers and walked into a computer store and compared a Linux/E/Gnome box to the Win2k box, I'd probably be going home with the Win2k machine. (I haven't used WM or KDE enough to know how they'd stack up.)
BTW, it's the Win2k Professional OEM multi-proc version.
numb
Geeks generally are bad at marketing and usability. This is why Linux started as a server system, not a desktop. Companies however, are generally good at this point. This is why Linux (and possibly other OSS) will end to be usable and marketed, once it has reached some point of maturity.
;-)
Meanwhile, we can try to add these features ourselves, as we always did. Good thing.
Anyway, Linux is a buzz-word, and generally it is used for more than just the kernel. Best example: mkLinux doesn't even use the kernel, but is still called Linux.
We have got loads of perfect open source software: for the developer, for server use, as well as for the end user. Still, we do lack a complete desktop-oriented piece of software that even Granny can use.
Didn't read anything new here? OK.
Just wanted to state that OSS WILL be recognized one day for its benefits and that it WILL be adopted by companies. Meanwhile, every commercial product has to face the comparision with Linux, which provides us of two things, already now: choice and quality.
Quality: it is already explained here that Linux is (perpetual) competition for commercial products, and competition will lead to product quality.
Choice: Very often Linux is compared with Windows. Very often Windows is chosen best. Very often people feel the need to defend themselves when they step back from Linux to Windows. Don't defend yourself! It is the choice that matters, and Linux is also not God! Instead, it is freedom of religion we talk about
(Just note for sure that MY choice of the moment is Linux, though...)
Meanwhile, OSS has inspired Apple (though yet only server software), Amiga (although you might know that at the moment all they can make is beautiful plans for the future, and open source is not yet fully considered), and many others. Many of these people, individuals as well as companies, also see the need of usability.
So my conclusion: we might not have the best OSS user-friendly system, but Linux did win many souls for OSS, and it is only a matter of time. While waiting (or working on it), there are plenty of (non-)free choices that you can make for your computer use.
It's... It's...
"We can confirm that Debian does *not* ship the version with the trojan horse. Our version predates it." [CA-2002-28]
I'm the one who injected the "point-and-click" phrase, because it's quite appropriate.
.config, recompiling, and (the hardest part for newbies) updating lilo, would go a long way towards fixing some of the "ease-of-use" things that newbies think exist.
.exe -- fwoom. The fix is installed, and you are asked to reboot. One step, vs 4 steps. Heck, if you're using the IE integration in MS, it'll even point out & suggest upgrades for you. The PHBs love that kind of thing.
;).
In Linux, when I upgrade the kernel to deal with some erratum, it's a simple process to me. However, it's not simple to other people. To design a script to automate backing up the old kernel source and untar the new, copying the
Compare to how it is on OS/2 or NT (or even 9x): to fix a problem fairly easily, you just double click on the
What I'm not talking about here are the mindless auto-detect or plug & play routines of the various MS OSes. What I am talking about is a way for a user to fix a known problem easily, ie: without having to become an almost kernel developer. A big, shiny, red button "upgrade to Kernel 2.2.14" would be nifty for people new to Linux. They'd feel they were in control, instead of being just confused by a different interface. If they're in control, they like it, and are more likely to experiment and learn.
Debian's apt and the *BSDs ports tree is closest to what could be used to easily fix general userland problems, and with a nice program to deal with keeping the kernel and lilo up to date, you'd have a lot of what the general populace needs. After that, you'd want to look at something like Win2k's Add/Remove program panel, which monitors what's used and what's not, as well as simplifies installing and removing in the eyes of PHBs everywhere (I love Slackwares installpkg/removepkg myself
Just a thought.
---
--
Internet Explorer (n): Another bug -- that is, a feature that can't be turned off -- in Windows.
And herein lies the difference between unix geeks
and normal users (i.e. the majority of people that
use computers as a tool, not a lifestyle).
You're confusing what you don't want with what
Linux needs... oh well. MacOS X and BeOS will
gladly fill the end-user roll when Windows falls
by the wayside.
-thomas
People not blinded by Linux hype really do exist on slashdot!
"My first reaction, as a happy linux user who thinks open source will eventually conquer all inferior methods..."
... it's free, after all."
Are these the same "inferior methods" that generated kick-ass products like BeOS, PhotoShop, Alias|Wavefront, Maui, Doom1/2, Quake1/2/3, WinAMP, ICQ, 3DMax, etc? My point is that rarely
have I seen any kick-ass programs come from an
open source environment. Not to say there aren't
some, but they usually lack "polish," vision, or
both. This is, IMO, because those aforementioned
products took money, management, designers, and
even the lure of a payoff ($$) to be done as well
as they were. In the Open Source world, projects
seem to be controlled by [unix] geeks that are
out of touch with the end-user, don't have the
money or resources (or vision) to polish a product, or just care about something that "gets
the job done."
There's always this nagging feeling in
the back of your head -- "I don't have to finish (or polish, or go the extra mile on) this project, because someone else can
Of course I'm generalizing here. There are exceptions. Just not too many. Linux is a great
OS OS. And like most OS projects, it lacks polish.
"once we admit we have faults, it doesn't take long for open source to fix them."
I guess "long" is a subjective term. Or perhaps
it takes longer for Open Source projects to REALIZE they have problems. Otherwise, how can you
explain the absolutely horrid UI and installations
for Linux, even now, especially when compared to
BeOS and MacOS X? (Both created in a closed source
environment, remember.)
"As a result, my second reaction was to think "Well, what are these criticisms, so I can fix them?"
Hahahaha!
-thomas
"You will like our integration. Microsoft's decision to make Internet Explorer a hard-to-remove feature of Windows 98 -- in direct defiance of an earlier order by Judge Jackson -- has ..."
"I don't think there were earlier rulings by Mr. Jackson about not integrating Explorer in Win98. Perhaps he means another judge."
It seems what is referred to here is the 1995 consent decree between MS and the Department of Justice. The DOJ says that MS bundled their web browser with Windows, thereby leveraging their OS dominance to control the browser market. MS said that browsers are the future of the OS, and including them is just that natural evolution of the OS.
The dispute over whether or not the browser is an integral part of the OS is what started the whole anti-trust suit.
Don't forget that Friday is Hawaiian shirt day.
I mostly work with very small legal firms (3-10 client workstations, peer-to-peer or 1 server LANs), and they have found that having Exchange Server is like having legs on a snake.
Anyway, I'm going to test OpenMail and see if it works, but thanks for pointing it out! You RULE!
Free music from Jack Merlot.
Not that it's all that great;)
MS will sit on it's arse until someone else makes a better product that might make inroads into "their" territory. They were perfectly happy with DOS until apple came out with a GUI interface. Then they hyped the hell out of Windows for a couple years while they made an actual product.
They didn't even have a browser until long after Netscape had created that market. Then they went out and bought a browser, bundled it with their OS and worked on it until it was actually a decent product.
They haven't been improving Windows at all since '95 came out. (Who really believes Windows'98 was an improvement?)Maybe having Linux as a modifiable, virtually crash-proof OS, they will improve their product in those respects.
Until they do, they will continue to hype the crap out of their current, substandard products, so at least some people will think they already have.
Don't forget that Friday is Hawaiian shirt day.
Actually, you can upgrade the kernel via RPM, just like everything else. The only thing is, redhat only releases new packages for security holes or new redhat versions.
There is a nice script for recompiling the Linux kernel called buildkernel. Look for it on Freshmeat. I'm currently considering moving it to Perl/Gtk.
"Linux has not been shut down properly. Please wait while Linux scans all of your data and may attempt to fix data it interpretes as corrupt which may or may not make it work or contain essential files."
Uh... Linux DOES do this, ever hear of Fsck? On linux, however you are probably going to get corrupted files on a bad reboot, whereas in windows it probably won't happen (this is based on personal exsperance. Hundreds of windows reboots without a problem, only two in linux. One of the linux ones corruped some files)
"Suble Mind control? why do html buttons say submit?",
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
This guy has probably never used Linux for more than 20 minutes in his whole life. In fact, naming Linux as the best "Window Manager" is just wrong. Linux is the kernel.
Maybe you should learn how to read. He wasn't naming the best 'window manager' he was naming the product that he thought had the most impact on windows users.
"Suble Mind control? why do html buttons say submit?",
ReadThe ReflectionEngine, a cyberpunk style n
4 karma points for you sig, I bet you feel grand.
Wait, he may want to stay in the precipitate a little while longer.
Not really funny but neither are solutions. It's hard when you're under pressure. Please, don't over-react.
Brought to you by the bad pun man.
--
He lives in a world where those who do not run the client software of the omnipresent meme are unacceptable.
I'm wondering what ever happened to cascading the replies. I get comments and replies to those comments on one page. "Did _I_ do that?"
I never reboot my Psion 7 subnotebook, which runs EPOC32 Release 5. It has the same freaky-cool suspension feature as the Dell with Linux, except that even a deliberate reboot takes only 1 to 5 seconds. And it does all that a laptop should do, at 1/4 the weight, 1/4 the size, and 3x the battery life. Even Linux would have trouble duplicating this level of reliability*functionality. Just thought I'd throw in another OS to consider...