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Giant Linux Boost From Washington Post
You've seen Penguin Computing's "Tux stomps Microsoft HQ" ad, right? It's the one with the caption, "Good evening, Mr. Gates, I'll be your server today!" This morning, when I opened up my copy of the Washington Post, that ad, in full color, dominated the entire front page of the business section. Below it was a story headlined, Microsoft's Next Trials - Windows Case Could Open Doors for the Upstart Linux Operating System. This may be the most unabashed piece of journalistic Linux advocacy ever published in a major daily newspaper. The print edition, but apparently not the Post's Web site, also contained a sidebar story about how the article's author installed Corel Linux on his home desktop computer -- and found it fairly easy to do. Indeed, he says, the hardest part of his personal Linux foray was parting with the high-end Linux-loaded Latitude laptop Dell loaned him to test. "It will pain me to give it back," he said.
Hehe, I agree... To see Tux in a different light, check this out:
Linux Loving Sluts
Good clean fun!
Cheers
Costyn.
The Official Steve Ballmer Webpage
If the ad was on the ENTIRE front page, how was there a story below it?
This isn't hard to understand. Dominate implies more than one party is involved and the party in question is reigning supreme (or grabbing the most attention) amongst all parties. Loners can't Dominate -- they have no Domain to rule.
There is no "bug" in the story headline.
See: the definition:
dominate
v. dominated, dominating, dominates.
v. tr.
- To control, govern, or rule by superior authority or power: Successful leaders dominate events rather than react to them.
- To exert a supreme, guiding influence on or over: Ambition dominated their lives.
- To enjoy a commanding, controlling position in: a drug company that dominates the tranquilizer market.
- To overlook from a height: a view from the cliffside chalet that dominates the valley.
v. intr.- To have or exert strong authority or mastery.
- To be situated in or occupy a position that is more elevated or decidedly superior to others.
[Latin dominr, domint- to rule, from dominus, lord; see dem- in Indo-European Roots.]-- @rjamestaylor on Ello
Well, you do have to upgrade libraries if you're installing software that uses upgraded libraries - that's the whole point of including package dependencies in an RPM, right? Sure, there's no requirement that SuSe ship with the same library versions that RH does, but it is possible to upgrade the libraries if you are picking up software that requires later versions of them.
Since I installed Mandrake 6.1, 95% of the time that I go to download a package update I can find one that has been packaged by Mandrake - I've had zero problems with those. The remaining 5% I've had to install from tarballs, but even then I can't remember the last time that configure && make && make install didn't work correctly.
Sure, it's a little more work some times if you're mixing packages from different distributions, but I still don't know of software which would work on one distro and not another as long as the kernel and relevant libraries have correct versions.
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
Well your typical feminazi keeps harping on about men rating women by their good looks and how evil that is but they hang Chippendale calendars on their walls and whistle when a good looking man walks by and go to movies only because Brad Pitt is in it. I don't see any problem with those kind of pictures, after all no-one is forcing those girls to pose like that. To see a hypocrit is to know one, Miss (as in opposite of hit) Geek!
7:46pm up 22 days, 12:36, 3 users, load average: 0.39, 0.23, 0.11
that is with 2 netscape's open, netscape composer, xmms playing an mp3 (legal too), gaim, licq, 2 xterms, gqview, electric eyes and xchat running under gnome 1.2 with windowmaker 0.61.1... i'm experiencing no slow downs whatsoever. your stability argument, quite frankly, is untrue. win2k has better stability *than previous versions of windows*... it still does not beat a linux system. mine is used a good 10-14 hours every day, playing quake3 and mp3s and pushing it to the limit. 128 megs of ram. that's all. and it runs like a charm.
there are plenty of good reasons to switch. yeah, maybe we don't have ms office or visual c++, but linux is strong in other areas. anyone that argues otherwise is suffering from blatant ignorance. i experience better stability and speed from this box running linux than i ever did with windows (exact same hardware). all my software (except quake3 and unreal tournament) was *free* costwise, and most of it free in the sense that i can modify and distribute the source code. most people don't want to do that, but *i* do, and i'm not alone. furthermore, i like the ability to customize. when i used to use windows, i ran litestep because it offered me that, at least to an extent. with linux i'm able to switch window managers on the fly, even whole desktop environments. i can make my desktop look however i want. virtual window managing is far superior in linux desktop environments than its windows counterparts, and that helps me get done what i need to get done. i listed the current apps i have open - could you imagine all of that on a single desktop?
this is not to say that linux is for everyone. but your assertion that there is no reason to switch to linux is both silly and offensive.
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DeCSS source code!
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i read all replies to my comments
these tools pale in comparison to proprietary tools available on other platforms.
How so? Most proprietary tools available on other programs (not mentioning any names (Visual C++, Visual Basic) or anything) are severely broken in terms of supporting standards and proper syntax.
Those tools are good for slapping out broken, severely buggy bloatware quickly, but not much else. GNU development tools are cross-platform, based on open standards, and are extremely robust. For instance, I wouldn't trade gdb for the broken, crappy debugger built into VC++ any day.
My journal has hot
As somebody who has been repeatedly accused of being a paid agent of Microsoft, the RIAA or whoever the relevant boogeyman of the topic is, I'd like to respond:
/. was a little cousin of MacOS Rumors. The site used to be heavily biased towards programmers interested in new software and technologies. CmdrTaco was thrilled when new proprietary software was ported to Linux and repeatedly referred to RMS as a nut. Now, /. has been taken over by a bunch of loudmouths who can't code but think they're heroes for demanding that everything be given to them for free.
It's odd... the Slashdot readership seems to be changing. This site has always been pro free software and open standards, and anti proprietary software and closed standards.
On the contrary, I've been reading since
Incidentally, I looked at your user info, figuring I could ridicule you for a 6 digit id#. Instead, I'm wondering why you're linking to a Mac site if proprietary software is illegal.
So I wonder what draws all these trolling incoherently pro-MS people here, with their extremely thin arguments, and studied reluctance to ever engage an interlocutor by responding to a refutation.
Uh, yeah. Dismissing anyone who disagrees with you by declaring that they must be paid to do so, nothing thin about that argument. And, all what trolling pro-MS people? Where are they?
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
Why are we comparing the latest Linux distros to NT anyway. The latest Windows is 2000 folks. 2000 pretty much installs itself. It takes a hell of a long time but it's real easy. See how long it takes to setup DNS, DHCP, web server/ftp, and a directory service compared to *nix. People forget that MacOS and Windows were created to make using computers easier. The point was you shouldn't need to be a programmer to get them working. I like many OS' and Suse Linux is probably my favorite, but good GUI tools can save a lot of time and time is very important when running a business for instance. Linux is great for a person with a lot of time to tweak...
GodBrain http://www.godbrain.net http://www.alienfaktor.com http://www.tril0byte.com
s/illegal/unethical
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
It's not about stopping Microsoft (it even could be - even one more "murder" is one too much). It's about making them pay for the damage they've done. That's the whole point of a lawsuit, isn't it?
To the editors: your English is as bad as your Perl. Please go back to grade school.
This is not the real DavidTC!
-David T. C.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
Actually, that is not the point of the lawsuit. The remedy has to be done to restore competition in the marketplace. It is not meant to punish Microsoft.
As some commentators have pointed out, the split up might increase the worth of stockholders like it did during the AT&T breakup and might make Gates even wealthier. But it is irrelevant.
Which is why the government can't just fine Microsoft. If Microsoft is not willing to change its business practices, as they have repeatedly said they wouldn't, then DOJ had to come up with a way to force Microsoft to change.
The choices were to regulate Microsoft or break them up.
I feel like picking a fight with everyone who thinks they are right. - Rainmakers
At least they say that they are "working" when they come here. Then again maybe not as Pegorano seems to indicate.
My summer employer, a scientific research group, wants to set up Linux on a bunch of PCs for use as a workstation.
The distribution they chose: RedHat.
Now, I'm very familiar with Debian GNU/Linux. If I were left to choose, I'd have potato running on all these systems. However, this group relies, unfortunately, on some non-free software. The vendors of this software can only guarantee that it will run on RedHat, and the people in the lab are scared that things won't work properly on any other distribution. The result? I'm going to spend the next few months cursing RPM.
And you think fragmentation isn't a problem at all? [1]
Daniel
[1] of course, it mostly affects proprietary programs, so may not be particularly relevant unless you're unfortunate enough to have wedded yourself to one.
Hurry up and jump on the individualist bandwagon!
They complain that MS doesn't innovate, it just repeats what's already out there; at the same time they bristle in anger at the suggestion that linux doesn't innovate, that it just refines what's already there in unix and other systems.
They complain that MS products are difficult to use; at the same time they dismiss people who complain linux is difficult to use as "ignorant newbies", or simply "low IQ users".
They think they have brought MS to its knees, or are just about to crush it; at the same time they complain of MS having a monopoly.
They want linux to beat MS by being successful commercially; at the same time they ridicule any linux company that succeeds commercially for abandoning its free software, grass-roots principles.
They ridicule MS for only paying attention to something that makes money; at the same time they want MS to pay attention to linux as a serious competitor.
They reject the claim that linux supporters aren't responsive to the needs of average users; at the same time they reject the criticism of average users that linux is difficult to use, or that the community is insular and filled with zealotry and thus won't make it outside the geek base.
LL.
I'm the exact same way, and I have to agree with you, the Mandrake 7.1 install is *very* sweet.
WWJD? JWRTFM!!!
- Robin
Herbie, I've been running Linux for three years, and following
all the developments closely (I'm a professional programmer in
the Windows environment but where I work we are watching
Linux closely), and I can count on the fingers of one hand the
number of times I've read or heard someone recommending that
secrataries learn LaTex! In fact, I can only recall one such
recommendation, and that one was repeated several times through
linking. So it's not like such a recommendation is standard fare.
WPO2000 or WP8 or Applix or StarOffice are all fine commercial
products that have excellent office apps in them. Where I work,
our 500+ workers standarized on WP8. Soon be KOffice and KWord.
When we switch to Linux, and I have no doubt that we will,
they will not notice any difference execpt one....
"Why don't I get that Blue Screen any more?"
The tide is rolling... and I am bringing myself up to speed on
programming in the Linux environment as rapidly as I can.
KDevelop 1.1 is helping that process nicely. Very powerful!
Running with Linux for over 20 years!
I use both Windows and Linux. My next machine was going to be a laptop with Win 2000 preinstalled. That was before MS started holding back the CDs for the O/S. That action has really given me pause. I muck about with my configuration a lot (read "reinstall a lot"). Do I really want to be in the position of purchasing a second Win 2000 license just to be able to reinstall my o/s? No. Currently the only feasible alternative out there appears to be Linux, so I might end up buying a laptop and configuring it w/Linux. MS seems to be doing a good job at driving customers away.
In many local economies, installing a white elephant like Linux at a company is an excellent way to 'screw your customers by getting 'em by the yang.' Where are they going to go for support? You of course. Because You are the leeto sysadmin.
Linux is excellent for locking down companies and keeping them dependent on your $upport. The heritage of the 'machine room' of times unknown (nobody allowed to touch the computer except specially paid men in white coats).
I remember a Xenix sysadmin at a company I worked at in the late 80s. People by that time had started migrating to Microsoft Word on PCs, and a secretary wanted a mouse so she could easily highlight and modify sections of text. 'Secretaries don't need a mouse' the admin ranted. He was already a little sour that people were moving away from using the 'Lyrix' word processor across an RS-232 line on dumb terminals. His power base was shrinking. He was still able to trap a certain number of people by making them run certain apps in VT-100 terminals on their PCs, but times were definitely a-changing.
Some people even still use Linux 2.3! ;-) The version of the distro says nothing of the Linux version, you should look at the kernel version and the versions of the software packages that are installed. In fact Slackware jumped from 4.0 to 7.0 in one go. It is a marketing ploy (from the books of Microsoft, who went from Word 2 to 6) to look "newer" than the competitor.
Yes, you are right but we are talking about compatibility for the end user. One of the good things that Windows monopoly created was, well .. ... ( at least to much lesser extend.)
virtual monopoly of Windows OS. Situation like that means less problems for customers and less problems for developers. No need to to shit your code with endless ifdefs etc
Linux lacks that and it shows. One way to solve that would be to create some base standard but, as we have witenesed with old Unix world, companies won't follow that just to diffirentiate themselfs from competition. It is the same story all over again.
There are tons of issues that make Netscape real pain to use ( at least as compared to IE or even Opera.)
First of all it is slower than IE, second ( and this is specific to Unix lack of asynchronous hostname lookup routines) it hangs quite often doing DNS lokups. It is not fatal error or anything like that , just extremely annoying.
MOzilla is way better ( at least version for Windows ) so there is hope after all.
We're building a Linux embedded device. We think it's QUITE ready for the masses.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
On the desktop, people use applications, not operating systems, to get work done.
Until Linux gets some applications that are clearly superior to the ones in Windows, it will never get any significant penetration. People need a really good reason to switch, and there just isn't one when it comes to Linux -- but there are a whole slew of negatives.
I mean, what's the "killer app" in Linux for the desktop? There are no end-user apps that I can get that are better under Windows. With Win2K, Linux doesn't even have the stability advantage anymore.
This is so true.. Honestly, when I am reading mail and the web, I really dont care if I am booted into linux or win98. Furthermore, I dont even care what machine I am on.
The old amiga operating system from the 1000 days would probably be fine for 95% of todays computer users. The majority of people don't need a good OS, just a good set o widgets. That is why 90% of them are still using DOS.
I am sure that if people cared at all about OS, they would not be running DOS hidden under win98, and would cry out for a kernel based OS. The advantages of linux are simply unknown and unneeded by the average user. Most people dont have the time to learn perl, cron, the init scripts, regexps, bash, etc...and so never see the utility of linux.
On the other hand, I think that the 'killer app' will never come to linux, but instead the 'killer bonobo components' and 'killer containers' will eventually remove the need for giant monolithic apps, and greatly accelerate the development of desktop functionality. The GNOME people really have some good work in progress.
That that ad makes me think of making a quake-style game with tux (oh yeah "kill -9" weapon) running around in the microsoft hqs and shooting down windows servers ;) - Best free ad for linux anyone have seen thou
-Stskeeps, http://unrealircd.com
if it wasn't microsoft...it would have probably been IBM
My mistake...I thought you could only get to default 0 via negative karma, and that it took a bitchslapping to default to -1.
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due to the rush to ASP (application service providers) means that there will only be one application -- the browser.
Yeah, but at that point, there is no operating system, so who cares what you're running? Now, you could argue that this gives Linux the advantage because it's free. Still, there is a lot more to a development platform than just the kernel. If Microsoft continues to give excellent developer support (versus Linux where you're on your own), then the total costs will favor Microsoft.
In any case, I think we'll see some ASP-style business models have some success. But I don't think that it will replace the power of having native applications on a local machine.
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Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Please don't start the "cracker" versus "hacker" debate. The author does a fine job explaining what he means here. It's clear.
The development tools, right now today, are clearly superior to anything offered on any other platform.
Bzzzt! The Linux development tools are available on almost every other Freenix and/or commercial Unix out there. Many are ported to even Windows and OS/2.
You will also find a lot of developers who do not consider them 'superior to anything else', and I am not just talking about Visual Basic or Access 'developers.'
I think there are (at least) two schools of thought regarding ethics. One says that arguments about ethics merely rationalize our biologically (or otherwise) pre-determined gut feelings. A civilization which rests on this assumption about the relationship between reason and ethics is one in which action is valued more highly than words. Such societies will shoot first and ask questions later, so to speak.
The second type of view is one which holds that the justification for and consequences of ethical stances need to be clearly thought out. I think liberal democracies have traditionally tended towards the latter view of the ethical debate. In democracies, we (ideally) solve public problems by public debate rather than by civil war.
When you say something like "X is THE ethical (morally right) stance" you are saying, in effect, that such a position needs no argument in its defence. That is an approach that I'm sure won't be welcome in a forum like this which places great emphasis on vigorous debate over ethical issues. The very idea that there ought NOT to be differing viewpoints is frightening to many people. The analogy of the homicidal maniac differs from the MS vs. Linux debate in an important way. The unwillingness to listen to ethical debate and reason is the very definition of insanity, at least in legal terms. So the homicidal maniac story doesn't have another side PRECISELY BECAUSE the killer didn't have any justification for his actions. If he did, there certainly would be another side to his story.
What story is so antithetical to civil society that it should NOT be told? Denial of the Holocaust? Racist diatribes? How does it help the cause of Jews to silence critics like Ernst Zundel? It's not OK to hate people just because of their skin colour or religion, but it's also not OK to prevent people from speaking because their words might offend someone. Inciting violence or conspiring to do injury to someone is a criminal offense, so we already have laws that can protect citizens against physical threats. We don't need to limit speech any more than that.
This seems off topic, I know, and many people have said these things better than I. Still, the importance of free speech cannot be overstated. It only damages the cause of Free Software to limit debate about alternatives.
That being said, I'm a Linux user and advocate and I too disapprove of some of the things that MS has done. But to prevent alternatives from being discussed would be to steal a page from Microsoft's own playbook.
Spreading rumors about which you have almost zero real experience is a common practice in the computer sphere. It even has a name, derived from the way that it inspires Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt in people not aware of the true motive of the speaker.
...severely broken in terms of supporting standards...
... are good for slapping out broken, severely buggy bloatware quickly...
Heh. That's pretty funny. Try to do anything vaguely complex with templates in gcc, then we'll talk.
[VC++, etc.]
Irrelevant. Bloat is about the programmer, not the tools.
For instance, I wouldn't trade gdb for the broken, crappy debugger built into VC++ any day.
Well, you're entitled to your opinion, of course. I guess I just disagree, that's all. I know that Emacs supports inline debugging from gdb, but in my opinion it's not as nice as Visual Studio's integrated debugging. And what exactly is "broken" about VC++'s debugger?
It all boils down to opinions.
-- "I believe the human being and the fish can coexist peacefully." - George W. Bush, 29 September 2000
Bell Labs UNIX was originally simply a vehicle for running the roff formatter on. And that's nowhere near as nice as latex. Secretaries can and _did_ use early primitive text formatters to do useful work on. So what's happened in the meantime?
Software that's "so easy to use you don't need to train people", used by people who simply don't know how to use it through no fault of their own.
How many people have just had a guts-full of anti M$ BS? IMHO that Pengiun ad just makes us look lame....
--
Full plate and packing steel! -Minsc
You want to know who is really getting ripped off by Microsoft's quest to make money. The small businesses...
Believe it or not, they are starting to catch on. I'm starting to have people ask me out of the blue to help them convert. It's scary.
And law offices in particular have always tended to stay away from M$ Office and preferred WordPerfect and the like. Among other things, Office has had security problems way beyond the worms and VB scripts, like the way a single document file contains multiple drafts of a document... I've heard of law firms using that hole against people they negotiate with, to look at their first draft of a proposed contract. All that needs to be done to make sure Linux succeeds, IMHO, is to make sure they run into a friendlier version of Linux than Red Hat, which seems to have problems.
(currently testing something about signatures here)
Sure they can lose. Just look at the compatibility between various Linux distros. One is never sure that RPM that installs flawlesly on RH do the same on Suse or Caldera. ...
It is a major paing for the customer to figure out which set of libraries is missing on theis system. Just look at the commercial software available for Linux - most of it is complete static link
Hm. I was under the impression that the author actually read /. -- if so, he would come upon all kinds of ardent Linux lovers who are quite deluded about the readiness of Linux as a "mainstream consumer product." But maybe he was just being charitable...
Herbie J.
Install Suse. Go to RedHat contribs and pull out as many random RPM's as you want. Try to install them on Suse. Watch half of them complain about missing libs, different version of libs.. etc
What;s even more funny, half of RPM's created for RH 5.2 won't even install on laters RH distro.
One thing the author of the article forgot to discuss is that he did not have to install, or configure it. Now, I know for almost everyone on here, that wouldn't be a problem, but you can't tell me it is as easy as WinNT to setup... Let the flame death to me begin.
The story header says "that ad, in full color, dominated the entire front page". "dominated" does not mean covered completely. I presume that means here that the ad was large and prominently positioned at the top of the page.
Admitedly the use of the word "entire" was redundant - it could have been "that ad, in full color, dominated the front page", but is this slashdot or grammardot?
My Karma: ran over your Dogma
StrawberryFrog
With thanks to the other /.er who posted this link, I direct your attention to more Linux advertising done right.
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This was a great article except for one detail at the end, in which a person was quoted in saying that Linux will fragment like all other UNIXes.
The problem was that other UNIXes fragmented the market by adding proprietary add-ons, making it impossible for them to work together. However, this can only happen in a proprietary environment. This can never happen when users understand that proprietary software inevitably leads to market fragmentations, hijacking of standards, etc. etc. etc.
This is one thing that the open source movement is wrong about. They succeed in spreading the business model to the rest of the world, and that is a Good Thing(tm), but they fail to spread word about the evils of proprietary software. With licenses such as X or BSD, anyone can make exploit loopholes in the software to create an incompatible version, thus leading back to the old fragmentation problems that Linux rose from the ashes thereof.
nuclear cia fbi spy password code encrypt president bomb
Friends don't let friends misuse the subjunctive.
Okay: When it comes to desktop productivity, *I* use linux because *I* believe it's better. *I* can not do my job effectively without linux. *I* can not even read my mail effectively without linux. I don't care what other people use.
Personally, I choose whatever tool works the best. Unix for the server (Linux is not even the best version of Unix, by the way), Win2K for the desktop apps.
Agreed, there are better un*ces out there. I have chosen the best tool for my purposes (granted, when I started getting away from winblows (being a zealot again) a few years back, *BSD was *much* more difficult to install and configure, so I went the linux route). Other people can use what they want.
--keith
Your anectodal evidence about 'time between' is a bit confusing. How much data have you collected? I can't imagine you use all OSes cited equally, and the same apps on each. It's unclear how many 'weeks' of data on Windows 2000 you've managed to log, for instance. I have come to believe that Netscape is one of the more crash prone apps on Linux because it's one of the most powerful Linux 'desktop' apps (aside from things like Mathematica, which are expen$ive enough that the developers wring out a lot of the bugs).
In the end, your numbers end up sounding like FUD.
The way that you casually switch between talking about Linux and Unix doubtless has more than a few of us disturbed. Please stop trying to leverage the years of Unix history and call it Linux history.
Unix's traditional domain? You mean those huge RS-232 networks of dumb terminals we finally were rid of in the late 80's at most progressive companies? Surely you're not going to claim the 'PC Revolution' happened merely so people could have screen savers on their desks....
Are you implying that Netscape on your Unix box is just as responsive and well behaved as IE on Windows ?
Woohoo! My favorite ten year old installed Linux on my best home p.c. Somewhere just after Partition Magic started doing its thing, i stopped holding my breath and sat back to enjoy the ride. Do you remember when you were a kid brave enough to swing so high on the swingset that you were upside down, looking down at the sky? That's how it felt about three minutes into the install. I suddenly realized that although i hadn't backed up anything on the hard drive, I really didn't care if i lost all my apps? That all I cared about keeping were some text files? The documentation is good enough for a 10 year old kid to follow, and we had a field day picking which packages to install. Of course, it is going to take some work to clean up some of the config details, but I have my command prompt back. Hoohah! Life is sweet. What a way to mark the Microsoft ruling. I haven't had this much fun since I first got to play on a supercomputer with a gig of data, (which used to be a big deal.) Support your local installathon.
Ocean Barb
If you want Exceed on an NT/W2K system, check out the more expensive version of Interix rather than buying Exceed alone. It's about the same amount of money, and you get a whole Posix subsystem to run on the NT Kernel, the GNU tools, GCC, Motif, etc. It's kind of a rush to build Motif Apps on NT and run them native, in parallel with Win32 apps on the same hardware (but in completely separate API subsystems). A lot of Unix/Linux/BSD apps just plain build and run on Interix right out of the source tarball. There is irony in running X apps on an NT box and displaying them on a Unix X desktop.
I'm not sure that since Microsoft bought Interix it consists of the same 'bundle' with Exceed as it was a year ago when I sprung the $300+ for a copy, but it's worth looking into, as you'll spend close to that for Exceed alone from Hummingbird.
I mostly run vi on various embedded OS/2 machines at work, and from within telnet sessions to OS/2 development machines in the lab (from the Win 95 desktop my company pretty much requires me to use.) Heck, I can perform firmware builds on the OS/2 machine logged in to work from home and tweak the code using vi.
:-)
It's also nice that a vi variant is installed by default in all the freenixes. There's nothing like getting a new NetBSD box up and running, tweaking config files, setting up accounts and stuff, in a matter of minutes using vi and vipw. (my little Mac SE/30 box running NetBSD says hi to everyone, btw
vi is just plain cool.
Emacs
*grin*
Steve
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I wish someone would give me a defintion of a troll. I thought it was someone who hung out under bridges and posted useless comments. Those annoying "first post" things are good example of trolls.
/. a troll seems to be anyone who does not agree with the opinion of most /.ers.
However on
Could someone explain how Justin is a troll? What he said something that wasn't 100% rosey about linux? Everyone has a right to their own opinion. Someone could come right out and say linux and sucks -- if they have a reason for this then they aren't a troll.
BTW I personally think linux rocks! But that doesn't mean I don't respect other's opinions.
And what exactly is wrong with 30-person companies full of geeks? What exactly is wrong with allowing a little attitude in your purchasing? I suppose your preference is a cold corporate just-the-facts approach, where companies trot out bogus benchmarks a-plenty, and marketing means deciding once again to make the cases putty-colored. Penguin Computing gives their T-shirts away with purchases instead of solely at trade shows where half the browsers are there for the free stuff.
As long as they put together excellent products, (and Penguin Computing does, IMO,) a company gets many bonus points with me if they have an attitude and a sense of humor.
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And you probably won't as most of the bugs are hardware compatibility bugs. So as long as you stay with your base system you should be good. :)
(You have a dell don't you?)
Until Linux gets some applications that are clearly superior to the ones in Windows, it will never get any significant penetration. People need a really good reason to switch, and there just isn't one when it comes to Linux -- but there are a whole slew of negatives.
Isn't it obvious? Linux' killer application, right now, is development tools. The development tools, right now today, are clearly superior to anything offered on any other platform. Why do you think Linux has been able to attract so many software development geeks?
<soapbox mode: on>
Remember, Windows didn't always have superior applications to other alternatives. When Windows 3.0 was first introduced, the superior applications were on the DOS and Macintosh platforms (which is why Windows 3.0 beat out OS/2; better DOS compatibility). The fact that M$ developed what were then superior development tools to what was on DOS or Macintosh is exactly what M$ claims is the reason for the flocking of developers to its platform, and thus, ultimately the development of large numbers of applications, and the eventual superiority of those applications.
(While this claim is not entirely true, there is some element of truth to it.)
The point is, folks, that we're there. We've arrived. Now its time for the developers in the open source community to stand up and write those superior apps. There are a lot of things going on this arena (KOffice, GNUOffice, etc.) and its going to take time before we stop playing catchup, but if, and only if, we are willing to stick with it, and continue the fight, these superior applications will come.
My belief is that the key area where Linux developers need to concentrate on, once we get the basic office apps out of the way, is in the area of Internet-enabled apps. This is where MS and everyone else is headed, this is where we need to head as well. But we have the key experience that no one else has: many open source developers were on the Net before there was an HTML or a World Wide Web. This is an area where we have a chance to shine. Furthermore, developments in mobile technologies and embedded devices are equally as important, and we have some key players in these areas already, with Transmeta and others doing stuff for mobile and embedded devices...
My point is that the future is not as bleak as many who are not forward-thinking might expect. We won't be chasing MS forever, and eventually, we will succeed in "total world domination, but in a good way."
<soapbox mode: off>
My journal has hot
Forgive me if this seems offtopic. Perhaps this would make a good Topic of disscussion for Slashdot sometime in the future.
It seems to me that these days (since the '60s at least) people are all for public debate as long as it leads to the other side reaching the "correct" conclusion.
Debate, to me at least, is meant to be a medium for individuals with opposing views to discuss thier differences in hopes of reaching a consensus on the "truth" and/or "fact" of a matter. This means that the individuals involved in the discussion must be willing to examine thier own notions and pre-supposed biases to find which ones are sincere and logical as opposed to the ones that are based purely on emotion.
Unfortunately the concept of debate has become twisted into something it was never meant to be. Specifically, it has become a forum for bashing the other side as a means of making oneself feel superior.
The internet, rather than providing a medium for studying issues in an attempt to come to an informed conclusion, has become a hive where groups of people of different persuasions flock to thier own little corners to work on hardening thier own biases and predjudices by studying cooked up "facts" arguments and ideas. Furthermore, because these individuals have already become bigoted by way of emotion, they give no thought to questioning the accuracy or rationality of what they are seeing.
Yes, there have been times when I found myself holed in on trumped up facts and figures unwilling to question them because I had an emotional stake in being correct. Now I am working to identify those emotional influences before they effect my judgement.
This has been illustrated in the whole DOJ vs Microsoft story.
In an attempt to develope a balanced opinion on this I have come to the following conclusions.(These conclusions may very well change as time goes on and I learn more).
1. The United States and most other nations (that I am aware of) thrive on a mostly free and open enterprise system. The less the government interferes, the more successful the economy seems to be.
2. Since corporations operate in such a free environment, they have no excuse for abusing consumers and pushing the limits of what is legally and morally justifiable. When they are caught they should be dealth with harshly for abusing the system which allowed them to be successful in the first place.
Now, rather than narrowing this down to a Microsoft issue, I have attempted to use the anti-trust trials as a basis for developing a more coherent attitude regarding competition in the free enterprise.
Number 2 in the above poses some problems for me. Those being...
- How far is too far?
- Can this rule of thumb be applied in all situations? (ex. Monsanto)
Cisco systems seems to be the only gem in the corporate world (pending something that I'm not aware of). Thier hardware/software handles most the Internet traffic in the world. They gained that position by making quality products (as far as I can tell). However, I could be mistaken.
Is it safe/possible for me to debate these perspectives in an open forum such as Slashdot with hope of enlightening myself and expanding my knowledge? Or am I to be immediately stereotyped and subsequently slammed because my post(s) did not read quite the way someone would have liked them too?
I would hope that somewhere on the internet there is a place I can go to discuss these issues and other issues which are considered emotional hot buttons (religion, politics, esoteric sciences, et...) without having to deal with bigots and trolls who have nothing better to say than "F**ck you!" and "Wait till I get done ripping into your ideas..."
Is it okay to say "X is the morally and/or ethically correct choice." in a forum such as Slashdot? That depends. Can the individual provide solid rational arguments for that position? AND Is Slashdot flooded with emotionally charged trolls who have absolutely no interest in listening to the individual but rather prefer to slam that individual because he or she holds a position they simply dont like.
I hope I havent worn anyone out. Heh.
Schizznick
If I had a mod point,
I'd give him one for being such mensch,
If I were a wealthy man!
Thanks for the fine post.
How many people have just had a guts-full of anti M$ BS? IMHO that Pengiun ad just makes us look lame....
The first part of this message is just flamebait, and I'll take as much anti-MS material as I can get. However, I agree the Penguin ad definitely has issues. Although it may be amusing because everybody just loves the penguin (I actually don't), it's rather ineffective (not to mention a cliche). Using a giant Penguin is an exercise in preaching to the choir. It doesn't really attract a new audience because you have to know something about Linux to get the "joke."
If the Linux is interested in displacing MS for business products and services, there's going to have to be a more effective approach. The suits won't get anything out of such an ad.
- Scott
------
Scott Stevenson
Scott Stevenson
Tree House Ideas
Just because the user is dumb doesn't mean the operating system is bad. In fact, all the dumb user needs is a good sysadmin in the house to handle everything. In fact, it's quite good that programs don't install their own libraries rather than relying on dependencies, otherwise, you would end up with a Windows-like system where you have to reformat and reinstall Windows in order to clean out all the crap DLLs.
Chris Hagar
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." - Thomas Jefferson
Oh, and what does this have to do with Everything 2?
Chris Hagar
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." - Thomas Jefferson
As another post in this thread has pointed out pro Linux!= anti M$. Hell, right now I'll take anything over M$ from BSD to Be to Apple, it's just Linux is the closest thing to a free desktop for *all users* we have right now.
I think the article underestimated Linux's potential as a client workstation operating system. Though I don't think it will achieve 'world domination' anytime soon- I could see it in maybe 10 years or so. Don't forget that Microsoft didn't build they're monopoly over night... in fact they have been gaining momentum for some 20 years.
Why does linux have a chance?? Heres why. One reason is mind share... Linux is an enormous hit amoung the college crowd- some of the best minds out there are cutting their teeth on Linux. There is little to do in Windows that hasn't been done already (or is too big for new programmers). On the other hand Linux is a work in progress which attracts people who like to program. It was the same in DOS's early days... it was grossly inadequate so 'hackers' started writing tools to make it better. Unfortunately in the case of DOS... Mickysoft absorbed the improvements and called it their own "innovation".
Another reason is that peoples needs for a computer are really quite basic. People think they need Word & Excel... but they really don't... they just need a good word processor and spreadsheet. Linux already has a few good choices for that (Corel Office is what I use... works awesome!), StarOffice & Applixware. People want web access... Still waiting on this one (Netscape is a piece of ****) but Konqueror looks very promising with it's support Java and netscape plugins. Lastly what they need is a fairly intuitive desktop environment. KDE2 looks like it will be a huge step forward in that direction (or Gnome if your into that kind of thing). The recent success of Apple computers and (WebTV perhaps) somewhat reconfirms my theory on this, that if a computer fullfills a users basic needs- it really doesn't matter which software it's running. Therefore- if Linux continues to improve as fast as it has, and it stays at it's great low price- It is quite possible that it will achieve World Domination in time.
Blender And Linux Fan
certainly, that's part of the appeal, but it seems that linux is being pigeonholed as nothing more than an inferior alternative for people who hate microsoft.
I'm not sure of a good way to do it, but I'd think Linux would benefit greatly if we could find a way to change the image from "not microsoft" to "a kickass operating system you'll love" it seems the second message is more important, but it's usually drowned out by the first.
maybe this is obvious to everyone, but I'd like to see a way to accomplish it. Most of the more "high profile" linux people have already taken this position. Perhaps when we all talk about how great linux is, we shouldn't always try to mention how much windows sucks (hell, it's already known by most people that windows hasn't improved at all since 1995, other than crashing a bit less than it used to.)
I'm one of the deluded linux fans who really thinks linux has a very good chance at the desktop market. In fact, I'm counting on it. Not all of us only use linux for servers... hell linux already has mastered the server market, it'd be a waste to stop there.
________
1995: Microsoft - "Resistance is futile"
They fail to realize that two posters can have constrasting viewpoints; at the same time they blast "linux supporters" for having splits in the community
They think that because one person says something it is representative of the whole community; at the same time they just do not understand that it is possible for two people out of the thousands to see things a different way.
SATIRE=OFF
Seriously, some people think that MS _does_ need to be punished, while others think that free market forces will destroy it anyway.
Don't you get the fact that two people can have opposing viewpoints? By labeling a whole mass of unique people as "linux supporters", one overlooks the wide range of opinions contained therein. It is easy to mock a community by pointing out contradictions, ignoring the fact that there are always differences in the opinions of the community.
nuclear cia fbi spy password code encrypt president bomb
Friends don't let friends misuse the subjunctive.
I recognize at least one of those photos from Vogue magazine, or maybe it was Glamour. I bought one of those the other day for my daughter. You know, a magazine published for and popular with millions of women readers. Of course the model didn't have the penguin tattooed on her in the orginal photo. That's an overdub or palimpsest or whatever.
Nor was it originally captioned as she was a "slut." That's rather tasteless, but jeez, you should see the rest of the site. No, maybe you shouldn't. "Good morning, I have syphilis."
Yours WDK - WKiernan@concentric.net
While I currently have had not much direct experience with it, I have seen TONS of horror stories about Windows 2000, and not anything related to something that (as in Linux) you could just read the documentation and it would work correctly and flawlessly.
Chris Hagar
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." - Thomas Jefferson
Young predicts that Linux will ultimately power many of the hand-held devices, Internet "appliances," smart toasters and other goods that have computer chips embedded within them.
Why is it always toasters?
Be nice to your friends. If it weren't for them, you'd be a complete stranger.
Isn't that a contradiction in terms?
---
Zardoz has spoken!
Oper on the Nightstar
All you have to do is extract the binaries from the RPM and use them, they'll work fine. Also, I haven't seen one app on SuSE that I couldn't get for Red Hat or Mandrake and vice-versa.
Chris Hagar
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." - Thomas Jefferson
Your post was very thoughtful.
The internet seems like an infinitely-many-sided coin. On the one hand it breaks social actors into tiny, politically inert factions whose only interest is mutual assured approval. (MAA... sounds like a sheep?)
On the other hand, the internet allows people to communicate in a manner which does not depend upon geography, race, religion, gender etc. Only what you say matters, not who you are. That is a very liberating feature of the internet.
I don't know how these different forces will play out. That would be a great topic for Ask Slashdot -- if it hasn't been done already.
While I can't attest to the amount of distributions, that number seems a bit high. Regardless, it's variety, customization for what a particular user wants. I've never run into a program that would run on only 1, 2, or 3 distros. It doesn't matter how a package is packaged, it's not difficult to extract the binaries from that package, such as an RPM, and use it on any system. Besides, it's better to use sources anyway.
Chris Hagar
"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." - Thomas Jefferson
He is an imposter, and I believe he has been "bitchslapped", meaning all his posts start at -1.
--
It seems obvious to me that within a few years Linux will be the standard for operating systems just as TCP/IP is the standard for networking. We're not talking about a product but about a technology that so outstrips any of its rivals that the competition is moot.
Don't be so sure of this. Linux is good, hell yes I wouldn't have been using it for the past six years if it weren't but don't make the mistake of automatically assuming it's technologically superior to everything else out there just because it's free and reasonably popular.
It might turn out to be the best but right now there's still a ways to go before Linux can live up to the dream of technological OS perfection.
BeOS, *BSD, Solaris (maybe:) all have things going for them that Linux just doesn't do, and even in ISP server space which is generally considered it's strongest market, Linux is a long way off totally outstripping the competition. Why do you think places like yahoo and hotmail run BSD? Then there's the big iron like OS/3[6|9]0, sure there's a Linux port to the S360 but that's not enough to make up for the fact that it was never designed as a mainframe OS.
General technological excellence is all well and good but absolute technological superiority is a long long way away for any OS out there, if it's possible at all. Personally I don't think it is and that the requirements of OS-space are so varied that attempting to have one uber-kernel do it all just isn't viable. There are design decisions that you make for a desktop OS that are completely invalid on a mainframe and models you want in your mainframe OS that are utterly innapropriate for an ISP server
Silver
RedHat and Corel, at least, are a breeze by comparison. Debian's kind of a pain, though, IMO.
Also, NT is inflexible; for instance, once you've set up a machine, you can't go back and make it a PDC. You must reinstall. Lame.
--
No, POSIX is the standard. Both Linux and WinNT are -said to be- POSIX-compliant.
The problem is that idiots can't seem to handle not spelling the "oo" sound in "lose" as anything other than "oo". I wish one of them would just start spelling it "looze", avoid the ambiguity in "se", and be done with it.
"If one is really a superior person, the fact is likely to leak out without too much assistance" -- John Andrew Holmes
First, where does it say that the ad was purched? My impression was that the editorial staff included it on their own as an illustration to the story. I recall reading an article about Microsoft's taking over a couple of Metro stations with their job advertisements. The article included a large photo of one of the Metro stations. Nobody cried foul.
Second, there are many cases where their are favorable product reviews, articles, and opinion pieces that accompany an advertising campaign. When Window's 95 was rolled out, Microsoft had taken lots of full page ads and the papers included a lot of favorable articles and reviews. I don't recall anyone crying foul over that either.
The only time it would raise ethical questions is when the company paid the paper for the favorable article without it being pointed out that it was paid for.
Considering Microsoft's EULA, (you can not publish a review or benchmark without Microsoft's permission), I am suspicious of all reviews of Microsoft's products, whether or not Microsoft actually paid for it.
I feel like picking a fight with everyone who thinks they are right. - Rainmakers
Are you implying that Netscape on your Unix box is just as responsive and well behaved as IE on Windows ?
Actually, the difference is really too subtle for me to care. On a P3 they are both fast to load, run and don't tend to crash. Most of the browser software available is good enough that isnt really worth fussing over which one is slightly better.
I will admit that IE5 is a little better than NS4, but the 'well behavedness' of IE5 is dependant on how foobared the 98 install is. IE5 does not crash on my box, but my little brother's computer has issues all the time (since he constantly adds and removes software). It crashes every few hours. Netscape isnt hooked into the system in that manner on a *nix box, so unless you have really messed up X, it tends to perform independently of system foobaredness, and stay away from nasty segfaults. Plus, installing and removing games does not contribute to system foobaredness...not that there are many games to install.
A better list was quoted in the very same Washington Post Business section in the article directly beneath the Linux article:
"Responded Ellison: 'Microsoft has four stages in stealing someone else's idea. [The article details the Internet appliance (read Network Computer) battle, specifically Oracle-bankrolled NIC Co. vs. the gaggle of devices now shipping, including M$oft's] First is "This is really stupid." Then it's "This is stupid, but there are interesting things about it." Third is "We have a version, and ours is better." And the fourth is "What are you talking about? We invented it." That's what Bill calls innovation.'
(sigh)Oh does anyone read this far down and moderate anyway ?
Some of the nicest people I've ever played Koricky with were Microsoft PMs and coders, and if any of them still worked there...
...well they, better than anyone, knew it was over years ago.
I flee dead people.
Sure thing. On server-type systems, too.
Until Linux gets some applications that are clearly superior to the ones in Windows, it will never get any significant penetration.
To which apps do you refer? I personally can't work well in a Windoze environment, because a lot of what I do (remote admin of mail, news, web servers) simply can't be done well in Windoze.
My ''killer'' apps: TkRat, knews, xterm, ssh, and Nutscrape. A lot of these either aren't available in Windoze, or suck in Windoze, or require you to basically emulate a UNIX environment to get them to build. Why should I bother when linux gives me those things, for free, and open?
People need a really good reason to switch, and there just isn't one when it comes to Linux -- but there are a whole slew of negatives.
I could say the exact same thing about me switching from linux to Windoze.
I mean, what's the "killer app" in Linux for the desktop? There are no end-user apps that I can get that are better under Windows. With Win2K, Linux doesn't even have the stability advantage anymore.
What's the ''killer app'' in Windoze for the desktop? For you, it's probably MS Office, but I have no need for it. I'd bet that many sysadmin types also get along without it.
And don't even go there with the so-called ''stability'' advantage. Linux still has, and always will have, the security advantage: I feel better about an OS that doesn't hide its bugs. (Plus, linux is a lot cheaper....)
This is not to say that Linux won't see more penetration in the server arena. I personally like Unix better when it comes to server apps. But for the desktop, there simply isn't an overwhelming reason to switch.
Again, I could say the same for switching to Windoze from linux. And someone else (a moron) could say the same about liking Windoze better for server apps. Different strokes for different folks.
--keith
I flee dead people.
"When we set out, our goal wasn't to convert the 400 million PC users from Windows to Red Hat Linux," Young said. "There are 6 billion people on the planet. Our goal is to build technology for the other 5.6 billion."
Perfect quote, sums up my feelings except for one thing: I'm sure glad that *I* was one of the 400 million Windows users that got converted in the slipstream.
--
Life's a bitch but somebody's gotta do it.
However, here's something to think about: KDE 2 has a built-in office suite, and it is able to import MS Office documents. When KDE 2 is ready for release (probably later this year), it will represent a threat to Microsoft on the desktop to some degree, no doubt about it. It is super easy to use, and even uses some simplified terminology, for average Joes.
Now I realize that you're just trolling for Bill, but I hope others that begin to buy into your BS, will take a look at KDE 2, as it really makes Linux simple enough to use for just about anyone.
--
Much of what you say makes sense but I doubt developers will be disappointed if M$ switches to a Linux kernel, because the resulting code will be under the GPL. We don't hate M$, we hate how they do "business".
If some sort of WinLinux came about you would be able to open the hood and have some control over your OS, which is the itch that hackers are really wanting to scratch.
Also, it would be very difficult for M$ to treat users/competitors the way they do now if all they were offering was a cludgy GUI.
Hopefully that standard doesn't last. Linux is a decent free Unix implementation. Many will argue (with merit) that any of the BSDs is a nicer implementation, but nonetheless Linux is pretty decent.
Still, if you've looked at *any* of the research OSes in the past ten years or so, you'll see that Unix is pretty crippled. Linux is fine for the here-and-now people, but it if it ever becomes the standard, it won't last for long. Eros looks like it might be user-usable within the next five years (assuming the developers don't get bored with it); the Hurd is fairly usable right now (I can vouch for this because I use it every now and then...now if only my network card worked in it *grumble*), and Debian GNU/Hurd might hit 1.0 within two or three years; Plan 9 (does this count as a "research OS"?) looks pretty cool, and I understand it is definitely usable, too. There are others (including an exokernel from MIT (?) that looks pretty neat).
The point is: Unix is OK, but it's not great. It's inflexible; it's inconsistent; it's illogical in parts (a large part of it seems to be quick hacks without much thought). The only thing it has going for it is that it's more flexible, more consistent, and more logical than the popular OSes in many respects. And it's free, of course. If it ever becomes a standard, though, you'd better hope it's short term.
You don't need to scare-quote the word `hacker' unless you're using it just like I did (as a literal symbol), or if you're referring to the sensationalized sense of the word. By scare-quoting it you imply semantic inaccuracy or trivialization, implicitly questioning the contextually derived meaning of the word.
Remember: mental semantics isn't taught to people, it's absorbed by them.
Thus the more you use words popularly felt to be negative in a positive sense the more people tend to question their original concept of the meaning. So use the word `hacker' in a positive sense more often and people will begin to accept its positive meaning.
The point I am getting at is that linguistic subversion is the easiest way to propagate memes (which is why euphemisms are so popular in culturally negative discussion). Advertising is second. The Angry Penguin advert may perhaps draw attention to the article, but it certainly isn't going to do anything interesting to a memosphere that doesn't have a strong anchor meme to attach it to. All it will likely do to a non-fan will be to attract attention to the article beneath it, if the viewer makes that connection at all. The article's words will be what change things in the reader's mind. And I have to admit that, intentional or not, the author did a remarkable job in constructing a fine mesh of intersupporting memes that will do well at infecting the minds of people already worn down by a fairly negative meme complex already resident in the audience's minds (assuming the audience has had a hefty dose of BSODs and crashing programs from their Windows(R) experiences).
It's interesting to contemplate what people who have never experienced any other operating systems think about Windows(R). Do they simply accept what happens to their work when some Office(TM?) application crashes and sends their document to the Great Bit Bucket in the Sky? It's unquestionable that they feel some remorse over lost effort and time, but do they simply accept what happened as a fact of life? Do they wish that their computer and its applications crashed less often? Do they even understand that that sort of thing isn't supposed to happen in a piece of software that you pay more than a couple of dollars for? That sort of program behavior seems acceptable in a US$25 shareware toy or the like, but for anything requiring a greater monetary investment one generally doesn't expect such poor quality. After all, the typically sensible consumer doesn't simply accept a US$2000 automobile that has some catastrophic malfunction every week. For US$2000 perhaps a malfunction every few months is acceptable (at worst, with a complacent owner), but certainly not every week or so.
The fact that ordinarily sensible people will accept such poor performance at all is a frightening example of the strength of meme pollution that has been perpetrated by large corporations (with some not inconsiderable help from various political systems) for the past several decades. The average citizen of a post-industrial nation today is ever more willing to accept psychological, political, and economic mistreatment from their perceived societal superiors. I won't analogize to some other period of history since it would be entirely facetious, but I dare say that within another couple decades or so if such continual psychological manipulation occurs your Average Citizen will endure almost constant mental anguish from simply maintaining their existence in society. People do not take well to constant negative meme bombardment from family, much less nameless entities that they can't even face. The subtle implications of self-worthlessness caused by poor craftsmanship in products with which people spend much of their lives interacting are not something the human mind is used to dealing with. Remember that humans generally want to work with their tools and feel some form of success after each session with them. Even if a person isn't satisfied with the end product of a tool using session they will still gain some measure of enjoyment from simply manipulating the tools which they used. When such tools continually break during normal use a human becomes steadily more frustrated until they either obtain or create some other tool to work with or abandon the project altogether (if possible). If all the tools are of poor quality and the person doesn't have the capability to create an appropriate tool of their own or abandon the project they will rapidly become despondent and the longer this persists the more it will cause mental imbalance. Have you ever wondered why so many people in 'First World' countries are clinically depressed? Think about why people become depressed -- then look at what constant difficulties and stresses they have imposed on them from outside sources in their daily lives.
Just thought I'd share these thoughts.
ObDisclaimer: All the trademarks and other copyright and similar legal bulldada that aren't mine are the respective property of the people or organizations who supposedly own them. Though how a person can `own' a purely linguistic entity in any context still escapes me, even after the lawyers explained it. If I didn't attach the proper sequence of letters after a trademark or other lexical property please assume that the intent exists on my part and on the part of all other legally involved parties for whom I can speak.
I agree. A friend and I set up a Linux server for a small company here in Melbourne, and we've only visited them a few times since. Mind you, I do worry -- what chance does such a small company have keeping up with security updates, etc? Of course, the same risks exist with NT or any other OS, but I like to think we can provide a _better_ solution, and I don't think this problem has been solved well just yet.
:-)
Unless companies consider server services like other utilities (power, water, etc) and just buy server capacity from a supplier, eg. SANs, cable to the home/biz, etc. In this scenario, you can have both a cheap service (provided by Linux) with good security (since it is administered by the supplier's expertise).
As for the comment about this pic making us look bad -- remember, there's no such thing as bad publicity!
how long have you been waiting to use that? Rock on!
"With Win2K, Linux doesn't even have the stability advantage anymore."
Win2K can hardly be classified as stable as linux, it's not even as stable as NT4.
You lost me when you claimed Linux has lost the stability advantage. Time between blue-screen crashes in Windows NT: approx. 2 days. Time between blue-screen crashes in Windows 2000: approx 2 weeks. Time between OS crashes/any kind of instability in Linux: ... still waiting for one . . . .
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
Based on how they responded to Java once they understood the threat, I wonder if this is Microsoft's next move: a non-standard, unsatisfactory product called Microsoft Linux. I bet.
You misspeld "VNC"
http://www.uk.research.att.com/vnc/
GPL'd, excellent development, ssl'd, multi-platform, solid, small, fast.
" In other words, total world domination.
But in a good way."
This is exactly the atraction to Linux and open source in general. Companies competing to add features while making all the source available back to users to prevent lock in. Users can't loose.
Right now, you can get the same thing from ms, but everything they do is a "trade secret" protected by the never ending patent called DCMA (Digital Copyright Millenium Act). This locks in users to the ms way, like it or not.
This will be the second big shift in the computer industry in recent years. IBM lost share in the 80s and ms will loose share 2000 and beyond and the timing of Linux and open source couldn't have been better.
___
You know, when you make posts like this and use terms like "windoze", it makes you sound like a mindless zealot who refuses to see reality.
What's the ''killer app'' in Windoze for the desktop?
Oh, innumerable games, Photoshop, Illustrator, printing that works right for complex docs, IE (which is far superior to anything -- if you can't admit that, that's a sure sign that you aren't facing reality), Quicken, Quickbooks (or Peachtree, take your choice), Filemaker, Quark, Pagemaker, and yes, Office, which is far superior to any other suite on Linux (unless you're writing a letter to grandma, in which case StarOffice is fine). Do I really need to go on?
And as you admit, all the Gnu tools run fine on Win2K. I use them all the time, in fact.
Face it, when it comes to desktop productivity, you are not using Linux because it's better. You are using it because it's not Microsoft. That's fine if that's a good enough reason for you. But at least be honest about the reason.
Personally, I choose whatever tool works the best. Unix for the server (Linux is not even the best version of Unix, by the way), Win2K for the desktop apps. I have to say, it's nice to see clearly rather than waste time with inferior software (e.g., Netscape).
--
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
It seems obvious to me that within a few years Linux will be the standard for operating systems just as TCP/IP is the standard for networking. We're not talking about a product but about a technology that so outstrips any of its rivals that the competition is moot. The only marketing issue left to resolve is the end-user interface, something that will probably end-up defining the difference between company A's Linux and company B's Linux. After all, if the OS does its job, the end-user does not even see it. Microsoft will, one day, port their Windows front-end to Linux and actually end-up with a good and valuable product. The other route to this is gradual replacement of the OS kernel with Linux code. No company can justify long term expenditure to maintain proprietary technologies when there is a better, free alternative. The end-user would not care whether Windows 2xxx is based on NT or on Linux, so long as it runs their applications and looks familiar. They would pay the same as they do today. Less proprietary OS development means higher profits. Many of the people who contributed to Linux may be disappointed when they discover one day that their code is being used to generate higher profits for Microsoft.
My blog
you need to make sure that you set the permissions correctly... chmod 755 /home/httpd/html ... needs to be readable and executable...
Any wonder why not many grrls are Slashdotters?
;-)
Knowledge is power. Knowledge shared is power multiplied.
You make some damn good points. I upgraded from NT4 to Win2k about a week ago, and was PISSED when it hosed my LILO installation and I could no longer boot into Linux (the Release Candidates of Win2k didn't do this, so I wasn't expecting it to.)
:-), and Microsoft Access (for work only... stupid secretaries and stuff need access to the main campus Oracle database and I'm the one who has to create the Access/VBS interface... argh, I hate VB). Until there are versions of these for Linux (at the very least, 3D Studio MAX, Bryce, Painter, and either IE or a finished Mozilla) I'm going to have to use Win2k as my main desktop.
Anyway, I decided I'd play around with Win2k for a bit and then get LILO working again and go back to Linux for real work. I haven't yet though - no need to. Win2k does everything I need for a desktop (besides development, but I do that mostly on my Alpha anyway.) I use 3D Studio MAX, Bryce 4, Photoshop (although I like Gimp better), Illustrator (Linux's Illustrator-wannabees are terrible - ever try KIllustrator? Ugh), Poser, Painter 6, Internet Explorer 5, Microsoft Word (occasionally... I prefer vi with LaTeX or DocBook though
Until I upgraded from NT4 to Win2k, working in Windows was painful and I did it as infrequently as possible, but Win2k is very pleasant to work with, and relatively stable too.
Don't get me wrong - I love Linux, and I use it for all my server tasks (all my data is stored on my Alpha running Samba, I can't risk letting Win2k fuck it up. Windows is only for running Apps, IMHO, storing important data under Windows is a mistake), and my email and web server is running on the Alpha as well, but Win2k definately stomps Linux in the desktop area. Even for me, a hardcore Unix user.
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If you haven't yet, grab a copy of Hummingbird Exceed 6.1. It's a little pricey, but it's by far the best X server out there. You get the best of both worlds -- Apps under Win2k when you need them, and then a simple flip of the Alt-TAB into Unix. Honestly, I'm so used to it that I barely know that I'm using two computers. It might as well be a combined operating system.
I'm with you... I love Unix, but I just can't stand bad applications.
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Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more, Or close the wall up with our American dead!
It's interesting to speculate what kind of 'bias' the folks on this forum would be ranting about if Microsoft bought a full page ad and the editors of the paper tucked a praiseful article in so conveniently.
Oh wait! Microsoft does that kind of thing!
Oh wait! You mean the commercial Linux vendors are headed down that path now??
It's odd... the Slashdot readership seems to be changing. This site has always been pro free software and open standards, and anti proprietary software and closed standards. That's the ethical stance to take, and there's no more necessity to present the other side of the story than there would be to present "the other side of the story" than the mainstream media would do when reporting on the arrest of a homicidal maniac.
Objectivity in media is, in any case, a lie, invented by wire services so that they could sell their canned reports to both left and right wing newspapers. Every publication is informed by the views of its management and staff ; it's more honest to do as Slashdot does, and just declare your biases up front.
So I wonder what draws all these trolling incoherently pro-MS people here, with their extremely thin arguments, and studied reluctance to ever engage an interlocutor by responding to a refutation. It frightens me to think that people might be such dupes as to actually think that MS has been a force for good (other than MS employees, who have plenty of motivation to deceive themselves, or who take comfort in the positive efforts of their own ethical group within the belly of the beast (remember though the admonition that it is impossible to do good within an evil system - this is what i try to live by, though i realise that many sincere and intelligent people disagree))... so, in order to avoid the yawning chasm of that thought, i prefer to believe that these pro-MS trolls are one guy at an IP-spoofed terminal at Redmond Marketing.
Please let it be so.
[ hypermedia | virtual worlds | human interface | truth | beauty ]
Hypermedia, virtual worlds, human interface, truth, beauty.
Corporations operating in a capitalist economy don't walk on egg-shells, tap on the shoulder, smile, and nicely elbow each other out. They ruthlessly cut each other down. This is known as "hostility", and is commonly seen in all industries (except the tobacco lobby, where they are all buddies fighting the evil govt.).
Now...lies. When companies make products, they generally hire a bunch of people whose job it is to say that the product does good things, and not say that it does anything bad. These people are known as "marketing dudes". It is their job to tell lies, and they use space on printed paper and short intervals of time between predictably formulaic TV programmes to say how good the product it. These are known as "advertisements", and are a sophisticated and more entertaining form of lies. (Sometimes these go on forever, and these are known as "infomercials", and were invented by Ross Perot).
Sometimes, a company gets a brilliant idea - they can make their product in a certain way, so that other products can interact with their products only as they like it. These are called "standards". Companies battle over these to the death (see "beta vs. VHS", "AC vs. DC", "viagra vs. rhino horns") and the winner makes lots of $$$. The loser gets nothing.
Now, let's consider 2 scenarios.
1) All companies in the software industry were hostile and have always ruthlessly lied and cheated to gain the upper hand, using the techniques described above.
Or...
2) Before Microsoft came along, the software industry was veritably like the garden of eden. Companies cooperated and followed standards, and never tried to use their dominance (example - IBM with its mainframes, DEC with their servers). Everything was cheap and plentiful, and all the companies lived in harmony. There were no lies and hostility. Then came along evil Microsoft. It introduced an atmosphere of fear and hatred and hostility and lies. Companies started HATING each other and trying to DESTROY one another. And that's when the rot began. If Microsoft had not been around, none of this would have happened, and we would have lived in a wonderful world of magical soft music and nicely interacting software and hardware that meshed flawlessly to create a universe of little red LEDs and undying bliss.
I wonder which of these is true.
-Elendale (to early.... can't think....)
IANAT (I Am Not A Troll)
On the desktop, people use applications, not operating systems, to get work done.
Until Linux gets some applications that are clearly superior to the ones in Windows, it will never get any significant penetration. People need a really good reason to switch, and there just isn't one when it comes to Linux -- but there are a whole slew of negatives.
I mean, what's the "killer app" in Linux for the desktop? There are no end-user apps that I can get that are better under Windows. With Win2K, Linux doesn't even have the stability advantage anymore.
This is not to say that Linux won't see more penetration in the server arena. I personally like Unix better when it comes to server apps. But for the desktop, there simply isn't an overwhelming reason to switch.
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Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
I'm not.
Puh-lease. Linux is good, but to some people its just another way to make money. That doesn't make them any better than Microsoft.
So what? Everybody has to have a job in this world. Why not by promoting Linux?
I don't care for the motives of these people, as long as it is for the good of the end user/customer. If they do their jobs well, they will be rewarded anw.
Approximations, of course, but yes, I do equally use NT, Linux and Windows 2000. I work for an enterprise applications software company and we support all three operating systems. I must and do code to, admin for and work on these and other operating systems. But I wouldn't have to explain these numbers to anyone else who has worked on all three as much as I have.
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
I remember a quote Douglas Adams made during a developer conference at Apple: "We may have only ten percent of the users, but it's the top ten percent!"
~~~
Sigmenation fault.
http://www.washin gtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A36124-2000Jun10.html
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As to Ballmer's first assertion: he is wrong. Sure, there aren't many client deployments of Linux yet. But that is slowly changing. Witness my company. Management is seriously showing signs of tiring of the TOC (Total Cost of Ownership) issues inherent with the Microsoft design. Not the least of which is the never-ending upgrade cycles. And many people in management are starting to understand that vendor lock-in is a Bad Thing. Sentiment towards ridding the Corporation of Microsoft lock-in is growing. The only real stopper? Dependence on Microsoft's office productivity suite. Which brings us to Ballmer's second assertion.
The way Microsoft thinks, and the way they would like to have it, of course there's nothing in there that looks like a good opportunity for them. But it's important to understand how Microsoft defines "good opportunity." To Microsoft, a "good opportunity" is one that ultimately results in absolute control by Microsoft and that locks the customer in to that control. So of course Microsoft doesn't see a "good opportunity" in Linux. The way Linux exists precludes any possibility whatsoever that MS will ever be able to achieve the control that they desire. Nay, that they feel they must have.
Microsoft made the mistake of grabbing a tiger by the tail once. That tiger was Java. They aided its market penetration--no doubt thinking that they'd "embrace and extend" it to death. The developer community nearly overwhelmingly rejected that attempt. And Sun proved not shy in taking MS to task for their transgressions. MS has effectively lost control of Java (as if they ever had it), and has thus lost the ability to either make it theirs or destroy it.
They are unlikely to repeat that mistake with Linux.
I predict that we will see no Microsoft applications, client or server, for Linux until and unless the company is backed into a corner. As they were when they found they could no longer ignore the Internet. With a little luck, we'll see just that happen.
Unless they've changed the offer, isn't the free Solaris thing only for noncommercial/educational use?
"That's Tron. He fights for the Users."
http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3612
> Puh-lease. Linux is good, but to some people its just another way to make money. That doesn't make them any better than Microsoft.
For my money [no pun intended!] there's a heck of a difference between "just another way to make money" and "screwing your customers because you've got 'em by the yang". In that light, it does make them better than Microsoft.
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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
"Torvalds is a "hacker" in the traditional and true sense of the word, which originally meant a programmer with imagination and elegance."
It is because one day Linux will be a fond memory spuerseded by a better OS but Hackers will still be around and we need little phrases like this in mainstream journals to be able to say "I am a Hacker" and not to have to explain that no, we are not criminals although try to imply that i am one of those pseudo hackers one more and I may become one, grumble mumble.
"The obvious mathematical breakthrough would be development of an easy way to factor large prime numbers." Bill Gates,
Looking at the first 26 comments I am amazed at how many are
anti-Linux and/or pro-M$.
It seems that Bill is sending out his clueless M$ trolls in masse
Keep'm coming Bill!!
First, they'll flame... and get shot down because their ignorance about Linux is evident...
Then, they try it.
Then, the light dawns and the wall of ignorance and disinformation crumbles.
Then, they see Windows and the Gates PR machine for what it is... and understand what 'monopoly' means...
Then, they get angry, first at themselves for being so deluded, then at M$ for exploiting them...
Then, they join the Tux brigades
Most will eventually delete their WinXXX partition... especially when they see how Win2K is going to suck up their paycheck...
Running with Linux for over 20 years!