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Microsoft Expert Witness Stumbles
parking_god writes "MIT prof Stuart Madnick, testifying on MS's behalf, was caught out twice when a government attorney asked him to name an OS (other than one made by Microsoft) where the browser couldn't be removed.
Madnick also faltered on several other questions." Basically he doesn't
understand what GNOME and KDE are, and since we're all
holier-than-thou know-it-alls around here, we might as well laugh at Microsoft's expense ;)
so what did you expect from them. they are not even allowed to run anything else than ms on their desktops, it's prolly in their contract ;)
I just rooted your witness!
All your base are belong to us MSFT!
He missed an invaluable opportunity to hold his tongue.
-- Andrew Lang
Talk about perfect timing for a random draw from the fortune file...
Those who complain about affect & effect on
gnome and kde aren't OSes
Truth is, I still can't name one.
Based on upvotes, Ageism is the only "-ism" Slashdotters care about and think isn't SJW
hell, even Bill Gates uses a Mac
EIGHT IS MY FAVORITE NUMBER!
Microsoft Expert Witness Stumbles - Trips over his own tongue? Yes, I agree :-)
Move faster
a government attorney asked him to name an OS (other than one made by Microsoft) where the browser couldn't be removed. Madnick also faltered on several other questions.
Is Internet Explorer any less a part of Windows than the shell is a part of Unix? Where exactly do you draw the line? Discuss.
...the Microsoft witness could have tried to accuse Apple of "bundling" CyberDog/OpenDoc technology into the Mac OS...
Oh, that's right, MS bullied Apple into using Explorer, didn't they?
Those who complain about affect & effect on
Yes, this guy obviously doesn't have a clue what an operating system is. However, it's true that any KDE-based distro is in the same situation as Windows is: Sure you can remove the browser, but that will kill certain other programs that need to be replaced as well (e.g. the file browser) and other programs using the browser functionality will also lose freatures (e.g. no more HTML help in your IDE).
Is anyone actually surprised by this. I mean come on, he's probably an MCSE too ;)
Later,
Phil
asked him to name an OS (other than one made by Microsoft) where the browser couldn't be removed
msLacky: Well of course you cant remove Netscape from the Mozilla Operating system.
No sir that isnt an OS
mslacky: But its EVIL!!! Ill get That damn Dragon and his little penguin too!!!!
Thats enough sir you can step down
mslacky: Dont you see him that peguin hes making fun of me... oh Mr penguin stay right there ill get you, bad Mr penguin
"All I can tell the "lesser of two evils" folks is that if they keep voting for evil, they'll keep getting evil."-Lp.org
If someone who is a CS prof at MIT doesn't understand what a window manager is, I fear for the future of CS research. I have friends who are English majors and could explain that KDE, Gnome, and XFree86 are all prograams that may or may not be installed on a particular Linux system.
:)
Although I have to wonder what sort of deal did Microsoft offer him to forget the difference between Windoze and KDE?
Gnome does not necessarily even have a built-in browser for its desktop. Galeon gives you the option of being the default browser but does not have to reside on the same system with the rest of the desktop. Nautilus is the same way. If you still use GMC you have no built-in browser sucking up space.
_ __
I thought with KDE you did not HAVE to have Konquerer though it is by default the file manager/browser for KDE. There are other file managers that can be used with KDE that do not have built-in browsers I think.
I understand fully that KDE and GNOME are desktop environments for the Linux OS. Even so, even if the desktop could be considered the OS, his examples still do not apply.
Am I wrong on this or is this guy just the clueless MIT professor ever?
This is not a Troll I would actually like to know if I am wrong.
_______________________________________________
ACK
I can just picture this poor bastard being hung out to dry by administration in hopes of securing a better price break on a campus level agreement or trying to avoid the long arm of the BSA.
your = it belongs to you. you're = a contraction of you and are. Got it now?
with weird definitions of what constitutes an operating system. Remember when Stallman made quotes along the lines of "anything that doesn't come with its own compiler isn't a real operating system".
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
Each time I see another story about this I can't believe it.
The whole idea that an operating system (Windows) is dependent on an application (Internet Explorer) is a complete joke. I can't believe they have spent so much time and money arguing about this.
Mediocre Intellect Twats.
I mean, come on! This guy is supposed to teach CS? And not at some tinpot half-assed place either. Kind of thing that makes you shudder for the future of the field.
...an MIT professor of computer science does not know about KDE or Gnome?
Wtf?
don't mean to be a party popper, but isn't the browser an integral part of the windows os, w/o it you can't even look at your files, etc.? what's wrong with that?
Basically he doesn't understand what GNOME and KDE are, and since we're all holier-than-thou know-it-alls around here, we might as well laugh at Microsoft's expense ;)
Well given that this man is supposed to be an "expert witness" *some* knowledge of major competing OSes might be expected.
The vast majority of Microsoft's business tactics are legal yet unsavory. I respect that. This is capitolism after all. What bothers me about Microsoft is their monolithic view of their role in computing. The honestly believe that without them, no innovation would have occured between 1985 and now, and so we should just let them walk over consumers and competitors out of gratefulness.
I know it won't happen, but what I'd like to see come out of this trial would be a Microsoft not split up, shackled, or fined out of existance, but a Microsoft scared into respecting other's place in the industry.
In all honesty they've done a better job than anyone else at creating a useable desktop OS good for a wide range of activities on a large variety of hardware. I'm not quite sure how they've been so successful in the server market, though. Advertising, I guess. And for my money, they still make a damn good mouse.
In Capitalist America, bank robs you!
He is an MIT Sloan School (business school, department 15, management) professor. Many of us from course 6 (EECS) are happy to disavow him.
fit into all of this?
..embarressing for MS. "Technial expert" without any knowledge (other than name) of other rival OS's. Very poor..
They've had several industry witnesses who were forced to admit that they'd never read the settlement or the states proposals. The economist who testified for Microsoft had to admit that all of his research in this area had been funded by Microsoft, the Autodesk exec who after defending Microsoft had to relate how screwed over he felt by them excluding Java from Windows XP (needed for some Autodesk software). The most fun was the former Microsoftie, now head of his own company, who testified that the states plan would lead to the "balkanization" of Windows. On cross, he admitted that the Microsoft lawyers wrote the first draft of his testimony, and that he hadn't even know what balkanization meant.
How much are these Microsoft lawyers getting if this is the level of their trial prep?
*Bully from Simpsons voice* HA-ha!
Lies about crimes
He's someone who used to use Pert shampoo, maybe?
ObJoke: How did the programmer die in the shower? He read the instructions on the shampoo: "Lather, Rinse, Repeat."
So lemme get this straight -- this guy is a CS prof at MIT, home of the FSF. He voluntarily agreed to testify on Microsoft's behalf, and then didn't know the difference between an operating system and a desktop environment?
Man, this guy's courses must be popular! I bet you really have to fight to get in to: "Introduction to flicking on the power switch thingy 101" and "How to click on the start menu 304"
Are we sure he's a CS Prof? He sounds more like a Professor of Marketing...
I am not a lawyer, but what I would like to know is, how much MS pay a witness like this, to testify on their behalf? (if anything.)
smak.
--
b0rk!
My guess is that the judge's viewpoint is going to be closer to the general business press than the IT world (much less Slashdot), so I am not holding out much hope for a meaningful order here.
sPh
"Asked to evaluate language in the proposed settlements, Madnick studied the documents, then shook his head and said, "I somehow think there's something I'm missing, but I can't spot it at the moment."
The pre-prepared script from Microsoft that they had e-mailed to him perchance?
This mail was of course lost when someone sent him a malicious VB script entitled "How to make quick easy money".
;)
He is affiliated with the Sloan School of Management (Course 15), and not the EECS department (Course 6). Hence, the lack of knowledge about the OS itself. He's probably trying to get some more funding from Microsoft for the i-Campus initiative Here's his personal home page, FYI.
I just recently switched to English@Utica College from SoftEng@RIT. I definitely think I'm much freer to do what I want this way. ; )
Emacs: for people who just never know when to
I always wanted to go to MIT, because MY professors can never answer my CS questions. They have actually said "hey bud, I am part time here, gimme a break." Maybe todays professors arent ready for this new revolution.
pretzel_logic
>>Madnick testified that Microsoft (MSFT: Research, Estimates) probably would not be able to develop and market a workable version of Windows under the terms proposed by the dissenting states. He believes the requirements -- such as building Windows in such a way that computer manufacturers could alter it -- are not technically feasible.
And he's right, it's not technically feasible because Microsoft will not relinquish control of the necessary source, preferring to keep everything black boxed, the hell away from people who could alter the product that carries their name. It's about controlling how you can use the product that they are associated with, because, "hell, a third party could screw Windows up and Microsoft could get a bad rep."
We know Microsoft are control freaks, there's no way they'd allow Windows to be opened up like that, and without that unlocking of the black box, it *is* not technically feasible for a computer manufacturer to alter Windows, and the reason for this is "technically" MSFT are not legally bound to release their source, and "technically" could charge for any SDK they may choose to never release that would allow that access.
"technically" this poor bastard who's been set up to fail, trying to defend the indefensible, is correct. In an "I did not have sexual relations..." kind of way.
Chris.
The
This has been bugging me forever. Nobody is saying that they need to remove the browser from the OS, they just need to disable it. How hard is it to remove the icons for it, and disable the "internet http browser" aspect until the user voluntarily downloads a tiny piece of plug-in code which enables the browser to work with internet protocols? If the world's largest and most powerful software company can't figure out how to do this, then how in the world are they getting big business to pay them millions of dollars to manage their mission critical software?
Josh Woodward
Try removing the browser from WebTv devices.
Reaching way back to Windows 3.1 days: Microsoft called it "Microsoft Windows 3.1 Operating System" right on the front of the box. Of course, it was just a GUI that ran on top of DOS.
Based on that reasoning, KDE and Gnome could be considered operating systems too. They're GUIs that run on top of *nix.
It's wrong, but they're using the term consistently. Perhaps they have some adgenda to redefine the term "operating system".
The truth - just a poor excuse for a lack of creativity!
Line 9: Argument of type SIGNATURE expected.
There are dozens of amateur OS's out there that have functioning GUI's. With a little bit of research, MS could come back into court with proof that they're not the only ones who integrated the browser and that it must be a good idea.
Note: I don't know of any of those OS's that did integrate the browser, but I have not downloaded and played with every single one either.
-----------------
I've dirtied my hands writing poetry, for the sake of seduction; that is, for the sake of a useful cause. --Dostoevsky
As far as I know, you *can* remove the browser in windows. or at least replace it with gecko :)
:). But it shouldn't be so hard for someone with windows expertise.
All you have to do is replace mshtml.dll (the html rendering engine for windows) with one that is based off of gecko code. There! Now windows uses gecko instead of whatever they call explorer's rendering engine.
Problem is, i have no clue how to do this
Now all someone needs to do is write a VB app that lets you "choose" which rendering engine you want and sell it to the DOJ as a MS "remedy." Voila! Quick cash.
Still, it's fun to see these witnesses stumble at the expense of company which insists my operating system has to be bloated, buggy, and inefficient othewise it would fragment (ha!) the software industry and consumer market. Yet, it's sad to see some prominent figures in industry and education have to admit they're talking through their hats and will have us snickering behind their backs for years to come.
"Hello, I'm Jerry Sanders."
*snerk* *snerk* "Please to meet you, Jerry!" *snerk*
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
but thanks for giving them the right answer explicitly right here on /. so they can use it tomorrow!
I can see it now: "Well-known linux-oriented news site slashdot reported yesterday, and I quote..." ;)
The spin in Seattle on public radio was entirely positive onn this -- which was interesting.
I comment occasionally so that I can mod others -1 overrated or -1 offtopic.
ok, I laughed.
"And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the World"
1 John 4:14
Microsoft deliberately designs its products to interfere with technology made by other companies, forcing people to use Microsoft products...
This is not an uncommon practice. Don't believe me? Try installing Real Player (Real One) and watch the default installation - that which the majority of users would use - take over every media file in your system. This is directly interfering with the use of other media - now requiring extra steps to use anything but the default. Try unassociating - no obvious route exists. This is just one example.
Counterpoint: You are still able to use these alternative media, even though there is a "performance cost" involved in having to take extra steps. Don't like it? Don't be an idiot and use the default install.
Both are worth considering in the overall sense of programming specifically to exclude the competition and its prevalence in the computer industry - especially given the foreknowledge that the majority of your users will not consider themselves 'advanced' enough to select options in the non-default setup. It's another question of ethics that really has not been given a great deal of attention - though we've likely got more pressing issues to consider (e.g.: DMCA, etc).
Perhaps if Microsoft started releasing/developing/participating in some standards or specifications, or if they further opened up their API, interoperability would be possible.
The cure for cancer is coming: Reovirus
"perfect interoperability, which would allow products to be substituted for each other with no performance degradation, was a theoretical impossibility"
What a bunch of crap! Anything good that has ever happened in CS innovation was because of the compulsions of diversity in harware/software. TCP / IP anyone ? How would our dear professor like an internet that would work only between pentium 4s running Windows XP, since we are wasting our efforts achieving interoperability ?
"It would be surprising if two different products behaved exactly alike"
You moron! thats what we exactly want. I dont want the stuff shoved down my throat by microsoft - my co-worker loves it. So I use another product that behaves differently. I download OSS and change a bit of functionality here and there. I edit config files. *Why* on earth do you think everyone needs to use the same software with same features and settings ?
This guy is taking the sickening route every monopolists takes "Trust us with our soul. We know what is best for you. Its going to be chaos if we have competition. Never mind the fact that our product sucks, our licensing sucks, our support sucks and our pricing will suffocate you"
-Dracken
Given the M$ penchant for random DLLs, it's entirely possible that removing or disabling all the parts of IE would indeed break Windows, since god know what else is thrown into the code with it - I think most of Windows Explorer is actually IE; not having a directory browser would make that sucker unusable. This is, of course, not a good defense - it's just proof that M$ has bad design at best, or malicious design at worst. On another note, I fear for the CS department at MIT when a professor doesn't know the difference between a windowing environment and an actual OS. That truly scares me.
I've been thinking that rewriting my init scripts in python would be a fun way to learn it.
Best Slashdot Co
If Internet Explorer is so tightly integrated into Windows, how come you can upgrade it? I just upgraded the browser on my NT workstation here at the office from Internet Explorer 5.5 to Internet Explorer 6.0. Does that mean I also upgraded my operating system? Do I get better performance reading large files? Can I crunch data faster? Is there better communication between my hard drive controller and my memory sub-system? Microsoft is SO full of shit.
--- Think of it as evolution in action ---
From the article: >>Madnick argued that perfect interoperability, which would allow products to be substituted for each other with no performance degradation, was a theoretical impossibility. "It would be surprising if two different products behaved exactly alike," he told the court Wednesday. But isn't this what web browers do anyway? There are standards (W3C) for allow each browser to 'perform' (if you will) the same task, i.e. allowing the user to see the 'net the same way as every other user. Ditto, I can use Internet Explorer, and Netscape mail, and get the same functionality as if I used Netscape and Outlook Express...well with the exception of not having to deal with viruses if I use Netscape mail, but I digress...
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
But that is not the point. Fact is that they destroyed his credibility with these questions. Excellent work. I have a bit more faith that the DOJ actually has some brains about going after M$ this time.
But really - what does this mean? The layperson out and about won't hear about this. They are not informed about this and regardless of what happenes, short of M$ being broken up - people won't stop using their products. I like all of this news, but the masses just don't hear about these things (they don't read slashodot).
RonB
It is human nature to take shortcuts in thinking.
You mean there are shells other than emacs??
So you are off topic, but I am on topic, right?
Best Slashdot Co
Again, from the article:
>>Madnick testified that Microsoft (MSFT: Research, Estimates) probably would not be able to develop and market a workable version of Windows...
There you have it ladies and gentlemen!
So rise up, all ye lost ones, as one, we'll claw the clouds.
what did you expect from a MS exec. Did you think he would be redhat certified? Give the guy a break, He is paid to know MS products and he does very well. I don't expect any of you to posess any real knowledge about anything other then open sore software. It's all about your expectations.
Does anybody else see that this judge is totally in the pay of Mircosoft. This is a complete farce!
Ok then ... so what about the examples that you gave earlier ...
But KDE is a computer program designed to run on top of the Linux operating system, as Hodges pointed out. Madnick conceded that was true, and instead suggested GNOME as an example. But GNOME performs the same function as KDE on a computer equipped with the Linux operating system.
This is VERY funny ... on one hand, it's "theoretical impossibility" to have TWO INDEPENDENT systems that can "be substituted for each other with no performance degradation" ...
Yet he uses the PERFECT example of doing such ... KDE and GNOME.
This stuff is so funny, it writes itself ...
On a bit of a serious note, IS there any performance degradation between KDE and GNOME?
Karma? Karma? I don't need no stinkin' karma.
and he does not even know the diffrence between a Shell and an Operating system?
my god, I think he just lost all admiration that he had from his students, and I would not be supprised if the University board reviews his ability to teach at their school
I mean having a CS professor at MIT who cannot distiguish the diffrence brings down the credibility and prestige of the university as a whole.
I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
Isn't it a little harsh how they're going after this guy as incompetant? Read his answers- you'll see that he's doing his best to tell the truth and give factual information, as opposed to blurt out opinions.
/.) makes him out to be an idiot, which I'll bet he's not..
Look the guy up. Read his Bio. Look at his list of papers. The dude was a bigshot on IBM's VM/370, has BS/MS in EE, Masters in Management, and a Ph.D. in CS (from MIT).
My point is that its easy to slam someone because "he so smart, but don't he ain't know nothin' about KDE". This article (ahd
The article says "Stuart E. Madnick, a computer science professor at MIT." Got to MIT's EECS web site and he is nowhere to be found. Where is he? In the School of Management. His home page claims "Expertise: Database and information integration technologies, impact of information technologies, Internet applications"
Hmmn. I'm not so sure this played against Microsoft. Consider: Gnome and KDE are desktop environments, not OSes. What if MS decides to change its strategy, and claim that IE cannot be separated from the Windows desktop environment? The fact that the desktop environment cannot be separated from the Windows OS wouldn't matter -- MS gets credence for its claim and can legitimately point to other software that does the same thing.
Don't get me wrong, this witness's testimony didn't help MS one bit. But his stumbling may have illuminated a new strategy for MS to pursue.
Genocide Man -- Life is funny. Death is funnier. Mass murder can be hilarious.
Ok, rules say that blahblahblah, but if really crucial evidence comes up why isn't it allowed to be submitted ?
This trial is more and more of a farce, and it's all at the expense of the US in general, first most of the states simply back off (obviously due to string pulling), then the trial itself is anything but proper.. Bah, your courtsystem seems even worse than most European ones!
life+universe+everything=42
CS professors are not computer technicians! You dumbasses should know that. CS professors are applied mathematicians. Many of them are clueless to the latest developments in GUIs and other pratical computer applications. They research, teach and develope theories. They DO NOT install video cards for consumers. You dumbasses do that.
Computer Science has nothing to do with computers and everything to do with MATH.
You dumb PC techs with the 2-year vocational diplomas who post like gods here on Slasdot know next to nothing about CS. So, stop acting like you do.
Many questions will be asked, exercise caution and keep feet away from mouth, many will see a new side of you, truth may hurt or embarass, by evening you may be seeking a rock to hide beneath.
Yeah, but all three degrees of his are from Course 6, so someone there's to blame...
Of course, they're probably all dead now...
"I'm an old-fashioned type of guy. I worship the Sun and Moon as gods. And fear them."
He is most famous for co-authoring the book mostly called "Madnick and Donovan" which was some sort of IBM 360 OS bible back in the way-back days of punch cards.
BTW, it is might be interesting to note that Richard Schmalensee was the MIT professor who humiliated himself on the stand in the first phase of the trial, and he is also a professor of management in the same school at MIT. It's really not a bad school, they only look bad when they whore themselves for Microsoft money
shouldn't that headline read: "Witness for MS caught dissembling"?
I thought this was wierd, so I did some checking on this guy. I looked for him on MIT Electrical Engineering and Computer Science faculty list, but couldn't find him. So I looked him up in the people directory and found this:
name: Madnick, Stuart E email: smadnick@MIT.EDU phone: (617) 253-6671 address: E53-321 department: School Of Mgmt title: J N Maguire Prof Of Info Tech url: http://mit.edu/smadnick/www/home.html
His department is not EECS, it is the School of Management! His research is in areas such as Total Data Quality Management and Productivity From Information Technology. Here is a bio description from his web page:
http://mit.edu/smadnick/www/home.html Madnick finds ways to integrate information systems, giving organizations a more global view of their operations. He is leading a project that develops new technologies for gathering and analyzing information from many different sources, including conventional databases and the World Wide Web. He is also testing these new technologies in industries such as financial services, manufacturing, logistics, and transportation.
Microsoft basically found anyone from MIT they could because it is MIT. I'm surprised they didn't find a janitor from MIT to testify.
Brian EllenbergerPersonally, I think that's a bad definition of "operating system," but it is an accepted one.
--
Repeal me, NOW!!!
Thank you.
Konqi serves the same purpose in KDE/Linux as Internet/Windows Explorer (same thing these days) serves in Windows. It does file management, web browsing, help, and html email rendering. Both do all of this through a component architecture.
What would KDE be without Konq? Same thing as Windows. Not really usable the way it was intended.
The article ribs the witness for calling KDE an operating system. Well, no, KDE is a user interface / window manager / shell sitting on top of the Linux (or other) kernel. Same as Explorer, which is a user interface / window manager / shell on top of the Windows NT kernel (in NT/2000/XP anyway). Perhaps he should have said KDE/Linux, but do we really want to go there?
This has been said several times, but must be said
again and again. Madnick is not a computer
science professor at MIT!!!! I find this
frustrating, especially having graduated from MIT
in CS. I'm so sad that this guy is spoiling the
reputation of the MIT CS department.
He teaches management!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
[686 parkerlocal@waikiki Documentation]$ finger madnick@mit.edu
[mit.edu]
...
There was 1 match to your request.
name: Madnick, Stuart E
email: smadnick@MIT.EDU
phone: (617) 253-6671
address: E53-321
department: School Of Mgmt
title: J N Maguire Prof Of Info Tech
url: http://mit.edu/smadnick/www/home.html
alias: S-madnick
It should be, but Microsoft and Netscape broke the standards. I think a better example would be hardware systems...e.g., I can interchange most standard networking gear all day long and things will still work. Thank heaven Microsoft hasn't yet broken most of the hardware standards...My M$ keyboard works just fine with Linux (well, except for those dumb browser buttons hardwired onto the board)
What is your Slash Rating?
I'm surprised they didn't find a janitor from MIT to testify.
Do you like Apple Macintosh?
*shrugs*
Well I got the highest mah-ket share. Howd'ya like dem Apples?
Apparently, it can be done with a 100k zip file, for free.
Quote: " The issue arose Tuesday after Microsoft withdrew several witnesses Monday night, one of whom, Richard Fade, is senior vice president of the OEM division, which works with computer manufacturers."
Why are they doing this? MS claims they feel strong enough in their case to do this, but almost all of their witnesses (with the exception of Gates) have been shown to either not know the states proposal or to have been fed MS prepared texts. I suspect that MS is actually scared that their own company witnesses (most of those now withdrawn) could negatively affect their case.
(In the sixties at MIT, the Project MAC folks mostly thought that the school of management people were not in the forefront of the field. Undergraduates who were flunking out of EE would change majors to Management and coast through. I am sure things have changed since then but in those days, mis-identifying Madnick as a CS professor would get an immediate reaction.)
CNN needs to send thier reporters to remedial journalism school asap!
s / t-infra-global.htm
STUART MADNICK, the John Norris Maguire Professor of Information Technology at MIT's Sloan School, has authored or co-authored over 250 books and articles on information retrieval and advanced information systems in financial services, health care, and manufacturing.
http://mitsloan.mit.edu/execed/specialexec/course
Gee. Microsoft has the option of "integrating" Outlook, Access, Word, Solitaire if they want. Why don't they? Because they have all those app-markets nearly sewn-up, that's why!
Don't forget that before IE became the uber-browser for Windows, Netscape still had a significant share. Whoops... I almost forgot... they don't have the DB market sewn-up, so that's what their new proprietary DB-based file-system is about, isn't it?
The past is the scroll of prophecy unrolled.
You can deinstall KDE and still use bash, tcsh and lynx.
This guy is most certainly not a CS professor at MIT. He's a professor of Information Technology. Granted, he does have a PhD in CS, but his expertise is not in Op. Sys. Rather, it's in "Database and information integration technologies, impact of information technologies, and Internet applications." I don't know to what extent this casts a shadow of doubt. Check his page out at http://web.mit.edu/smadnick/www/home.html
Seems to me all you'd have to do is force MS to publically document the API. Actually they should be forced to document APIs, file formats and protocols BEFORE their products are released, and they should be compelled to use only protocols and formats unencumbered by patents or copyrights (for things like XML DTDs.) The documentation should be unencumbered by any license and should be freely available on their web site for all to download.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Man I'm sick of these court room reports. Take off the bias, hand me the dead cow. Where are the transcripts? I'll read it myself and see whether this (business school) Prof was really a clueby or whether the state's attorney was playing semantic games. After all, what _is_ an operating system? He refers to Linux as being one.. what? Linux is a kernel!
How we know is more important than what we know.
If you check Stuart Madnick's homepage, he's not a CS professor. He's a professor of management. Need I say more?
I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just. --Thomas Jefferson
Incredible! From his bio
Dr. Madnick is a prolific writer and is the author or co-author of over 250 books, articles, or reports including the classic textbook, Operating Systems (McGraw-Hill)
Maybe someone who writes a textbook on Operating System should understand the difference between an Operating System and a desktop environment?
So much for journalistic integrity...
"I'm not trying to be evasive," Stuart E. Madnick, a computer science professor at MIT, said at one point. "I'm just trying to be precise." (from the linked article).
Similarly,
Stuart Madnick, a computer science professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, backed up Microsoft's position that features like the Internet Explorer Web browser and its media player are not discrete programs. They are made up of many separate files that are dependent on each other, he said. (from Nando Times)
I'm guessing whoever did the basic research (AP is credited on the Nando article, didn't see an attribution on the CNN one) didn't do their homework, or else Madnick is claiming to be a CS prof. If the former is true, then it is a lesson to be careful accepting what journalists say. If the latter, it's entirely possible that Madnick is perjuring himself by asserting credentials he doesn't posses.
What is your Slash Rating?
Ohh, I was wondering why I hadn't heard of him (figured maybe he was wet behind the ears yet).
As far as that MIT professor I would not be surprised if he was picked by MS as a guy who likes using Windows (PowerPoint, mostly I suspect), knows nothing about other operating systems and has enough clout to impress a non-technical judge.
A religious war is an adult version of a fight over who has the best imaginary friend
- To choose Conservative or Labour is to choose to go the current way of America. Do you really want no public services but taxes as high as today? If so, show your affinity for the Tories. Do you want a lapdog for G. W. Bush for your leader? If so, show your affinity for Labour.
- To not vote at all is to play on the apathy which has made Labour so strong. And we must take a warning from France as to what else abstainment will do!
These are not general elections, so you may have individual causes that are important to you, and override the candidates' party affiliations. This is OK. But remember, the spirit of the nation is reflected in the sum of the attitudes of its individual people, which begins with local democracy. Yes, democracy is a mess, but think how much worse it is in countries where there is no opportunity at all to have a voice. Let's not lose what we have.This has been bugging me forever.
This is saying more about you than the problem...
remove the browser from the OS, they just need to disable it
Not true. A withness of the 9 states said that leaving the programming interfaces there woule let the programmers use it, making it hard for competiters to get into the market.
If the world's largest and most powerful software company can't figure out how to do this
the most powerful software company still manages to crash my machine. If they cannot figure out how to solve this..... (Mainframe companies figured this out)
getting big business to pay them millions of dollars to manage their mission critical software?
Sounds like marketing.
Whoever modded you insighedful must be on a bad day, funny would have been OK.
Interesting, the article states that he "immediately offered up KDE as an example." After Hodges pointed out his mistake, he didn't hesitate to mention GNOME. I'd have to agree that he wasn't tripping over his words. He's no idiot.
If IE is such an integral component to the OS, why are there Mac and Solaris versions? I guarantee that those versions aren't essential to the OS they run on :)
What is your Slash Rating?
Got me. Obviously, another example of the failed education system in the U.S.A.
The pure brilliance of this muve is amazing.
I can see where they'll be going with this
and none of you MOFO's have a clue
-Flaimbate
He made a far worse error than suggesting KDE or Gnome were an operting system component.
KDE and Gnome come with source-code, so you CAN remove/ re-write, substiture etc... the web browser or any other componenets
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
How's this for a ringing endorsement of Microsoft's products?
Emphasis mine. Source: ZDNet: Microsoft's MIT prof gets grilled by states
Mind you, this was a witness for Microsoft. Amazing. Microsoft is so arrogant, it can claim gross incompetence to avoid incrimination, and still look forward to getting away with it.
This sig intentionally left blank.
....or does this guy bear an uncanny resemblance to a certain Bill G? Nepotism? Of course not.
Dr. Madnick is a prolific writer and is the author or co-author of over 250 books, articles, or reports including the classic textbook, Operating Systems (McGraw-Hill) [my bold], and the book, The Dynamics of Software Development (Prentice-Hall). He has also contributed chapters to recent books: The Corporation of the 1990s: Information Technology and Organizational transformation (Oxford University Press) and Information Technology in Action (Prentice-Hall).
His current research interests include connectivity among disparate distributed information systems, database technology, software project management, and the strategic use of information technology. He is presently co-Director of the PROductivity From Information Technology (PROFIT) Initiative and co-Heads the Total Data Quality Management (TDQM) research program.
He has been the Principal Investigator of a large-scale DARPA-funded research effort on Context Interchange which involves the development of technology that helps organizations to work more cooperatively, coordinated, and collaboratively. As part of this effort, he is the recent co-inventor on the patent applications "Querying Heterogeneous Data Sources over a Network Using Context Interchange" and "Data Extraction from World Wide Web Pages."
He has been active in industry, making significant contributions as a key designer and developer of projects such as IBM's VM/370 operating system and Lockheed's DIALOG information retrieval system. He has served as a consultant to many major corporations, such as IBM, AT&T, and Citicorp. He has also been the founder or co-founder of several high-tech firms, including Intercomp (acquired by Logicon), Mitrol (acquired by General Electric's Information Systems Company), and Cambridge Institute for Information Systems (subsequently re-named Cambridge Technology Group), and currently operates a hotel in the 14th century Langley Castle in England.
Dr. Madnick has degrees in Electrical Engineering (B.S. and M.S.), Management (M.S.), and Computer Science (Ph.D.) [my bold] from MIT. He has been a Visiting Professor at Harvard University, Nanyang Technological University (Singapore), University of Newcastle (England), and Technion (Israel).
Why did MS pick Madnick as their witness then? I think its because they cold present him as a CS professor and yet knew about his lack of technical insight. That way they could prime him without his awareness of being manipulated.
Hope the Judge sees through that.
Help fight continental drift.
Windows is a GUI system with emulated DOS. Linux is a kernel, shell, X, then a windowing system. There are multiple layers involved where you are free to build on one as you please. Explorer is a larger more integrated part of what is known as windows. I, like BeOS really don't see the problem with MS making explorer part of windows because that's what works for performance. I have my gripes about the way MS does some things but this is not one of them. To me this is kind of like going after the mafia for tax evasion, if it's the only thing that holds water go with it.
Saying Java is nice because it works on all OS's is like saying that anal sex is nice because it works on all genders.
Confusion may arise from his title (as listed in the MIT directory), "J N Maguire Prof Of Info Tech".
I use KDE for everything but Konqueror. To use the web, I use Mozilla, and to do file management, I'd rather just drop to a shell.
Otherwise, I love all the integration I can (selectively) get from environments like KDE and GNOME. It's perfectly usable without Konq or Galeon/Nautilus/Etc.
I agree that it is fair to compare KDE with the Windows user environment. But then you see that KDE already does everything that these guys are fighting over; any software can be compiled out of the system, and it's already broken up into major componets for you.
You are all Gnomes running around in a HURD. I have the pitchfork, hahahahahahahahahahahaahaaaahehehehehehehehehehehe hehehehhehehahahaheheheheheheheheh hehe
Move hurd of gnomes move!
Gnome 2 will be the sizzahtz in da house./
31337 3l33+3 yeah who needs to pirate when we can just compile our own code and use it for the benefit of mankind! DMT hooooo
That's why they can't remove the browser...
Write your own article outlining all this and giving your analysis of what's going on, and submit /that/ to /. - you may have more luck getting heard that way . . .
;-)
Lots of interesting quotes, by the way - kudos
himi
My very own DeCSS mirror.
I vaguely recall that he TA'd 6.251 with Donovan back in 1970. Is this correct?
I think the bigger question is why should they?
But anyway, it's done already. HTML viewing is separate from HTTP implementation -- they're two different DLL's. Disabling the icon is a checkbox in settings. In a company, it can be an automatic policy, that icon will never appear. It's not only not hard for MS, it's not hard for any OEM. The contract for not allowing the OEM to not disable the icon is a little funky until you realize that the shell is explorer, and this is internet explorer. It'd be like removing explorer as the shell. MS thrives on projecting an image of consistency (not that they succeed all that wildly, but the metaphors remain the same), and customization by the OEM makes the consumer think that Microsoft did it.
I'm posting this from mozilla on win32, which won me over on its own merits -- took it a while, but it didn't need to take down MS in the meantime. I still have that big bad blue 'e' on my desktop, but somehow it hasn't yet compelled me to click on it.
BTW, how do you suggest the user download a patch to make IE work when they don't have a means of getting it? Or is FTP good enough to satisfy the crippling?
Damn, I'm steamed. I think I'll change my sig to something pro-microsoft soon.
I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
That may be his title, but look one line up to check his department... That should eliminate all doubt.
Microsoft as architected the OS so that it IS difficult to remove the browser technology from the OS. If you open a folder in windows, you get the nifty file browser. Near the top is an "Address" field that probably has a folder icon and the name of the directory your looking at. Try pasting "http://www.slashdot.org" in there and POOF! You're now looking at the Slashdot homepage.
So you see, MS has integrated "browser technology" in even the most fundamental operations of the GUI. To remove it would be quite a bit more that just deleting the IE icon off the desktop.
=Shreak
Try editing your win.ini file, change the line:
and then reboot.
shell=explorer.exe
to
shell=progman.exe
(This works with Win9X.)
Now if IE/Windows Explorer are so integrated into the Win32 API, why do all my programs will work with a Windows 3.1-like interface using Progman as the shell?
"As flies to the wanton boys are we to the gods; they kill us for sport." - William Shakespeare, King Lear
Check out this Newsforge article by Roblimo: Custom browser developer says it's easy to switch from IE to Gecko
Why is the Slashdot readership considered so anti-microsoft when about 50% of the highly-rated comments on any given Microsoft-related story are pro-MS?
It just amazes me that the still-litigating states don't bring up IE on Mac OS. It is definitely self-contained, it can definitely be removed. If they can do that on a different OS, why can't they do that on their own?
I suspect the question isn't why can't they, but why they choose not to. And I'm sure that the answer to that question has nothing to do with benefits for the end-users & consumers...
Here they are.
See page 5737.
Not true. A withness of the 9 states said that leaving the programming interfaces there woule let the programmers use it, making it hard for competiters to get into the market.
... then find out the states are even worse.
So, speaking as a developer, you're not really interested in freeing me, you really want to control me. Screw you. You just lost my support. Utterly.
You do realize that mozilla for win32 also uses MS's API's? At least I'm presuming so, unless they re-implemented outlook, ms-help, and vs URL's on their own.
I try to keep reminding myself that slashdot does not represent the general population
I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
Yeah - the Sloan school is to produce pointy haired bosses whose job it is to read incredibly shallow tech industry publications and leap onto every bandwagon headed for a ditch. (disclaimer - I applied to MIT's B-school - very dumb idea. The admissions process did me a favor)
Now, since it is MIT, that does alter the probability of tech illiteracy vs. bad faith goon. I think it's about 50-50.
THe guy does IT. The IT perspective is bureaucratic. Spending money protects budgets, going with the herd is a reflex, and buying shrink-wrap tangible things is inside the comfort zone. You can buy distros, you can purchase service contracts, but they won't have the same marketing gloss that MS products have. So we're outside the comfort zone of the conformist-leaning bureaucrat. So I am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, and conclude he's an idiot, not a prostitute.
If I recall correctly, that thingy released in '95
was also a Windows Operating System (TM).
It came without a web browser and yet was still
able to browse local files and read help pages.
Hmm, my mind must be slipping. BTW, isn't there
this New Zeeland guy that made some 98lite
, removing IE from win98? Naah, can't be...
Bill says it's impossible!
No wonder IT has a bad name. It's not us simple BOFHs, it's those pesky management types. This is not surprising, because recently I've carpooled with two different people who were studying IT management, but not IT. As far as I could tell, there was no technical curriculum. They were more naive and technically ignorant than a newly minted MCSE, but training to be my boss.
Maybe they were being conned, but I somehow suspect they'll find jobs. Watch Out!
Assembly is the reverse of disassembly.
I am surprised (pleasantly) that the lawyer recognized and was able to deal with the situation. I mean, sure, I have little doubt that the lawyers have been briefed, but this lawyer:
- Had to know that GNOME and KDE existed
- Had to know what they were, generally
- Had to understand that the answer was wrong
- Had to be able to articulate that the answer was wrong, with enough accuracy/confidence to have a witness with Comp Sci experience admit his error
I haven't been wowwed by this trial (I think MS has stiffled the industry, and I think the charges have focused on the wrong elements of MS behavior), but I am pleased to see that the legal staff has assumed an apparently comfortable amount of non-MS technical familiarity. This is a rare bit of good foreshadowing for future technical cases.1. The Judge knows little about the technical arguments. Her experience is in criminal law.
2. The Judge knows little about anti-trust. Between that and and trying to understand the technical arguments, she won't learn it all, and in this case it's necessary.
3. The Microsoft legal team has been using "legal FUD" on the Judge. They've been harrassing her non-stop on issues of who has jurisdiction, that there's no precedent for non-federal organizations to prosecute under federal laws (which is bogus), etc. This works in this case because this is basically her first "big and public case", it's in a relatively new (and little-understood by non-professionals) sector, and because they're feeding on and fueling her fears of screwing up.
(1,2,3) Notice how she has ruled on very little of the technology and broader legal based motions. She's trying to give herself as much time as possible to understand them, and given how much time it's been, it's clear she understands very little of the background pertaining to the motions.
4. Because of (1.), she'll defer the bases of her opinions to the things she has the most exposure to, which would be (3.) and (2.)
5. Gates is EXTREMELY charasmatic. Girls think he's the most tender and sensitive being on the planet. I've seen it over and over. As much as I think him and his actions are repulsive, it's still really hard to hate him when you see him in person, or even on TV. I think journalists actually have a hard time finding photographs of him that reflect his unhealthy nature.
6. The states aren't doing they're job dispelling the arguments Microsoft is presenting and the bases they're manipulating in 1,2,3,4. They can argue all day about it being technologically feasible to do whatever, but the Judge will never understand it in time, so she'll defer to more basic law-based arguments that in comparison have almost nothing to do with the case.
I really can't believe that we're still arguing about browser bundling in Windows. This point may have been significant 5 years ago, but the battle has been over for awhile.
KDE and GNOME may not be "operating systems" in the strictest sense of the term, but for the end-user they form the most critical and recognizable part of the operating system: the desktop. What part of Linux is the OS anyway? Is it the underlying kernel that provides support for your hardware and devices? Is it the set of GNU system tools and utilities that you use to maintain your system? Is it the window manager and desktop shell?
Linux was designed to be more modular than Windows, but this additional freedom and flexibility come at a price. What parts of a bundled Linux distribution can be removed or replaced by other work-alike components? Almost everything, but when modern applications come to depend on the existence of other "operating system" components, the complexity of setting up a system can increase exponentially. The operating system itself, however, is not useful in the general sense; it is only necessary. For a computer to be useful, you need applications.
Microsoft has chosen the route of providing a consistent base of OS and applications which are always installed and, in some cases, cannot be easily removed. Consider this the lowest-common denominator approach that bundles every basic tool that the average computer user may need. This includes (in Windows XP): video and audio player/editor (Media Player, Sound Recorder, Movie Maker), basic text editor (Notepad and Wordpad), e-mail (Outlook Express), web browser (Internet Explorer), file manager (Explorer), image/photo viewer/editor (Picture Viewer and Paintbrush), and communications software(Hyperterminal and MSN Instant Messenger) among other things.
Out of all of these commonly bundled applications (after all what desktop OS distribution doesn't include one of these applications in some form or another), the web browser has assumed a unique and important role in the modern computing environment. It has transcended its role as a mere user application and has become a vital system component that other applications have come to rely on. Will your operating system work without a web browser? Yes but, as I stated earlier, the operating system *doesn't matter*.
People use computers to get work done. Work is done by using applications. Applications rely on the operating system to provide basic system services. HTML and HTTP have become basic system services for a large number of applications to provide online help systems, downloadable updates and enhancements, and even application user interface. Because a web browser is included as part of the operating system, Windows application vendors can rely on its existence to provide features to their own applications. Is this not, after all, the entire purpose of the operating system?
The states and the DOJ can force Microsoft's hand and make them remove Internet Explorer from the operating system, but does this really make any sense? Users have always had the ability to use another browser when they surf the web, but an integrated HTML rendering engine and HTTP protocol implementation that it guaranteed to be bundled with the OS makes so much damn sense I really, truly don't understand what all the fuss is about.
Co-Director, PRoductivity From Information Technology (PROFIT) Program: http://mitsloan.mit.edu/research/profit/index.html
Co-Principal Inbestigator, COntext INtercharge (COIN) project: http://context.mit.edu/~coin/
PROFIT and COIN - yep. Must be a Microsoft shill.
In Soviet Russia, hot grits put YOU down THEIR pants.
Yes. A Toyota Corolla.
Thats not a boat. Its a car.
Oh yes, I guess you're right. How about a Honda Civic?
WTF?
Can you run GUI apps written for KDE without installing Konquerer? KOffice or whatever?
That would be the key question. If you can't run apps written in the environment without installing the web browser, then the situation is analgous to Windows. Semantics about whether it's a "operating system" or "operating environment" are immaterial - Windows includes the Windows Operating Environment, and all Windows apps count on it being there. If you want to force them to sell a version without the operating environemnt, go ahead, but nothing's going to run on it except maybe Ping.
I am not a linux Guru like many of you, but I do use the operating system...
... startx, click on your favorite browsing icon... :)
and I would tend to explain KDE/Linux to someone
that has no idea about Linux/KDE/Gnome..etc
as MS-DOS with Windows 3.11 for Workgroups
installed on top of it...
You can use DOS all you want...and if you want GUI, you just load up Win3.11 and there ya go..choose your browser...and enjoy.
KDE would be along the same 'principle'
or bust into a shell and use lynx
Integration is lovely...as long as it is an OPTION, not a requirement.
"Just Smile and Nod." --Huck
It seems to me that one point that's been missed in the hubbub about whether KDE and GNOME are desktop environments or part of the operating system is that the witness was wrong about the web browsers' removability. It's quite possible to pull remove the web browser from either KDE or GNOME. If I decide that Konqueror is taking up valuable space that should be saved for Mozilla, I can just rpm -e kdeaddons-konqueror and it's gone. Similarly I can remove galeon with rpm -e galeon. I'll lose some functionality by doing so, true, but neither one is so deeply entwined into the system that it's unremovable.
There's no point in questioning authority if you aren't going to listen to the answers.
Oh Oh!!! Can I be next?!?!
"Just Smile and Nod." --Huck
Man, you fucked up very badly. Try harde next time, or i will fuck your asspussy deeply.
I *am* an English major...twice...and I'm also hoping to go to MIT to do my PhD (my subject area is veering into the intersection of metaphorics, pragmatics, rhetoric, AI, UI design, and other related esoterica). This guy doesn't make me feel good at *all,* especially since I'm researching Linux pragmatics and rhetoric right now. :)
Onyx Chief Executive Brent Frei (the former Microsoftie) admitting about "balkanization" (same URL, lower down in the article)
University of Chicago economist Kevin Murphy admitting that he'd done little on antitrust until hired by Microsoft in 1998, and that all of his research since had been at least partially funded by them (http://news.com.com/2100-1001-885605.html)
AMD CEO Jerry Sanders admitting that he hadn't read the state's proposed sanctions, and that he'd specifically asked Microsoft to support AMD's new chip (which they have, since) (http://news.com.com/2100-1001-883961.html)
Let's be correct ourselves before we go correcting others.
We need to acknowledge GNU as the **major** part of
what we all collectively refer to as Linux.
Whatever you want to call it though, I love it.
C'mon, a doctorate in comp sci from MIT, with just one management degree compared to the 3 EE/comp sci degrees. He must know something about the subject, if not to the specific degree slashdot would like, but maybe we're not getting the whole story.
Why does everyone assume that a degree in something makes you competent? I admit, at first, I myself was intimidated when I had to interview a PH.D for a software position. I was expecting to be amazed, or at least impressed. Sadly that was not the case. The man was functionally illiterate in the skills listed on his resume.
Now I know one cant judge society from first person perspective, but in my experience skill is inversely proportional to education. For the record Ive never met a PHd who was not an idiot.
The linked article clearly states:
KDE and Gnome are in no way tied to Linux, not in the way IE is tied to Windows. You can build them on many different versions of Unix, from FreeBSD to Solaris to AIX. They aren't even tied to a particular graphics subsystem -- you can run them with different Xs.
The legal issue is not just the integration from the user's perspective -- it's the ability of a supplier to choose what enviroment to present to the user. With KDE and GNOME, a supplier has tremendous lattitude to customize the enviroment for their customers. This world is completely different from the Windows world.
there is not a mainstream OS out there that doesn't ship with a browser in it's default configuration...mainstream linux distros included...be reasonable...today a browser is an essential part of an OS because it is an essential everyday tool
Slashdot, the site where everything's made up and the points don't matter
You can read the whole transcript on the Microsoft web site:
Q. You mentioned in paragraph 20 TCP/IP. Could you tell us what is TCP/IP?
A. Well, the initials stand for transmission control protocol slash Internet protocol, and these are the two primary protocols used in the Internet for computers to communicate with each other.
Q. Is TCP/IP something that is part of the operating system or part of the Web browser?
A. In... I guess I would say part of the operating system in the sense as this section has illustrated, the functionality of operating systems have constantly increased over the past decades, and I believe almost every operating system, commercial operating system, I know of today provides TCP/IP whether or not, because -- if I can -- there are many other functions, such as FTP and others, that rely upon IP in order to do their job.
So there are many other functions besides browsing that operating systems rely upon these things, so therefore it would have to be part of the operating system.
Q. As part of the operating system in Windows 95, is that your testimony?
A. It was added, as I mentioned, over time. I don't -- I believe it was added into Windows 95. I forgot exactly which version it was added into.
Q. And in the current version of windows today, it's part of the operating system and not part of the Web browser. Is that your testimony?
A. As I said, as in many other -- most other commercial operating systems, I believe it is part of the key functions of the operating system.
Q. Let's turn if we could to paragraph 22 of your testimony, which is at page 11. Professor, at paragraph 22 you mention IBM's OS/2 Warp 3 operating system. Do you see that.
A. Yes, I do.
Q. And you say that IBM's OS/2 Warp operating system included Web browsing software. Do you see that?
A. Yes, I do.
Q. Was the OS/2 Web browser removable without impairing the functionality of the IBM operating system?
A. I do not know that. I did not study that aspect. My point in this section was to illustrate that these functionalities are included in operating systems in various ways.
Q. Since you don't know about OS/2, is there any other operating system you're aware of in which the Web browsing functionality is commingled with the operating system?
A. Yes, I do, if we take the view that the Web browsing functionality is also relied upon in other parts of the operating system.
Q. Which operating systems would those be?
A. Well, some examples, and there may be many others, would be the KDE user interface or GUI that exists on the Linux operating system.
Q. Now, KDE is not an operating system; correct?
A. I think I -- every definition in this court it would be middleware, in which case it would be a platform software.
Q. KDE is the graphic user interface, graphical user interface, for the Linux operating system; is that correct?
A. Yes. It's one of the interfaces available.
Q. It can be removed and replaced; correct?
A. Well, it can be -- if it is removed, of course, by -- if it's just removed, then the user will not be able to use the system. You could replace it by others and, in fact, most of the others I'm aware of likewise have, as you would call it, commingled Web browsing with their functionality.
Q. In Windows can you remove the graphical user interface?
THE COURT: Are you talking about now?
MR. HODGES: Today, correct.
A. As I understand -- I believe it's either yes or will soon be. I believe the provision that the Microsoft has agreed to as part of the settlement is that the end user would be able to remove access to the browser, if that was your question.
Q. My question is: Can the graphical user interface of Windows be removed?
A. I'm sorry. No, I do not believe so. It would no longer be Windows.
Q. Has it ever been the case that the graphical user interface of Windows could be removed?
A. I guess the answer might be yes in the sense, as I said again in this session, at one time operating systems had no graphical interface at all if you go back to essentially the original MS-DOS. So this is the examples of the kinds of functionality that operating systems have increasingly provided to users to enhance their effectiveness. So, yes, there was a point in time where it did not exist and there's a point in time where it was added to the operating system.
Q. If KDE is removed from the Linux operating system, then its Web browsing functionality is also removed; is that correct?
A. Well, the Web browsing that's provided through the interface is removed, yes.
Q. The Web browsing provided through KDE; correct?
A. That is correct.
Q. Now, you say that, in paragraph 24 -- it's actually on page 12, paragraph 24. I'll read this to you. "One cannot delete the Web browser from KDE without losing the ability to manage files on the user's own hard disk." Do you see that language?
A. Yes, I do.
Q. Now, isn't it the case that files can be managed by using standard UNIX command in the shell even if KDE is not installed?
A. That is correct. The assumption here was we are talking about the user using the system as a modern operating system which requires access to this kind of interface.
Q. We've talked about Windows and we've talked about the KDE interface, and my question is: Can you name any operating system, other than Windows, that commingles a Web browser with the operating system?
A. I have not attempted to identify all the others. As I indicate in this whole section, these are examples of the kinds of innovative features that vendors constantly add to the systems. Some have reached that stage of benefiting from the kinds of interactions possible, some have not. These are the ones I've identified as part of the study so far.
Q. Based on your experience as a computer scientist and as a Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, are you aware of any operating system, other than Windows, that binds the Web browser into the operating system? MR. LACOVARA: I'll object. We have now shifted from commingling to binding without a definition. It may have just been inadvertent on Mr. Hodges' part.
MR. HODGES: It was inadvertent, and I appreciate that clarification.
Q. If I change the word from "binding" to "commingling," let me ask you, are you aware of any operating system, other than Windows, that commingles a Web browser with the operating system?
MR. LACOVARA: I would object to that. I think it's the third time he's asked the question. Asked and answered. THE COURT: I'll let him to proceed. But this is the last time.
A. Okay. If I recall the question, I think I answered it in terms of identifying KDE and I believe GNOME, which is another interface on Linux, also has the Web browser functionality integrated. So those are two examples. And, once again, this was not an attempt to exhaustively study all the others or systems that are under development today.
Q. GNOME is a -- it's spelled G-N-O-M-E; correct?
A. That's correct, yes.
Q. It's not the way most people would pronounce that word. GNOME is also a graphical user interface for Linux; correct.
A. That is correct. It provides that kind of functionality.
Q. And it is also, like KDE, a removable graphical user interface for Linux; correct?
A. It's removable in the sense if you remove it you no longer have access to a graphical user interface.
Q. It's not an operating system; correct?
A. Well, it is part of what we described as middleware under the understanding of the terms being used, and we go from there.
Q. I'll try to stay in order, but I need to flip back to page 11 and paragraph 23 if I could. You say in the second sentence --
A. I'm sorry. What page?
Q. I'm sorry. It's page 11, paragraph 23. I can tell you, Professor, it also appears up there on the monitor in front of you, so whatever is easier for you is fine.
THE COURT: The small monitor has it, too.
THE WITNESS: It's sometimes helpful to see the context. That's why I like to look at the documents.
BY MR. HODGES:
Q. The second line of paragraph 23 -- the second sentence, I'm sorry -- you say that Windows, like all commercial operating systems of which I am aware, ships with a simple text editor, Notepad in the case of Windows, that is a relatively self-contained block of code that is easily removable. What's the basis for that statement?
A. It's a long sentence. Is there some particular part of it you're having a question about?
Q. Yes. I want to know what's the basis for your statement that the Notepad is easily removable?
A. The fact that there is a file -- I can't remember it's name, but it's probably something like Notepad.exe -- that in theory one could delete without having any other effects upon the operating system.
Q. Is this based on your review of the Windows XP source code?
A. Not specifically.
Q. Professor, have you had an opportunity to review the direct testimony of Robert Short of Microsoft?
A. I have seen it.
Q. Mr. Short is the vice president of Windows core
technologies. Does that sound right to you?
A. Yes, it does.
Q. Are you aware that Mr. Short testified that there are
cross-dependencies between the Notepad and Internet Explorer?
A. After I wrote my report, I believe I remembered hearing
that mentioned in his report or his testimony. Yes the answer
is.
Q. Do you disagree with Mr. Short?
A. I assume he knows much more about the internals of Windows
than I do. I believe my point may still be true, although I've
not consulted with him, in that I believe the removable of
Notepad does not impact any other part of the system.
I believe in his testimony -- I think he was trying to
illustrate that other parts -- using my earlier diagram of HTML
Renderer, for example, or Shell Doc Viewer -- that removal of
other parts of the middleware that might seem to be unrelated
might cause Notepad to fail.
Am I clear on the duality here or the differences? Am
I clear on the differences that removing Notepad may not cause
other parts of the system to fail, but that removing other
parts of the system that may appear to be file removed from
Notepad might cause Notepad to fail. I think that is two
different issues.
Q. Are you aware that Mr. Short used the term
cross-dependencies?
A. I don't recall what exact term he used.
Q. If there are cross-dependencies, doesn't that apply that
Notepad relies on Internet Explorer and Internet Explorer
relies on Notepad?
A. I can't speak for him.
Q. Is that what the term cross-dependencies means to you?
A. That would be a one interpretation, yes.
Q. And if there are cross-dependencies, wouldn't it be the
case that removing Notepad would affect other parts of the
Windows operating system product?
A. That might be true. I was only trying to give a simple
example here. If that one doesn't apply I'll have to find some
other example.
Q. I take it you were not aware of any cross-dependency involving the Notepad?
A. No, I was not.
Q. Is there any technical reason that there needs to be a cross-dependency between the Notepad and Internet Explorer?
A. As I said, this is not an area that I have studied. If you would like me to speculate or to try to conjure up a reason, I could try to do so, but it would be totally ad hoc thinking.
Q. I don't want you to speculate. I want to ask if you are aware of any technical reason that there needs to be a cross-dependency between the Notepad and Internet Explorer? And if you don't know, that's acceptable.
A. What might be helpful is the realization based upon my many years trying to understand all of the inter-dependencies that go on in a complex product is extremely difficult, and often I've been quite surprised myself to realize that one part of the system was able to make use of another part.
So, you know, with some careful thought it is possible I might find that there actually is a reason for cross- dependencies. But it was not something that immediately came to mind.
Q. So you could speculate that, but you don't know. Is that an accurate summary?
A. As I've said, I have not studied that issue.
Q. Now, you have reviewed the Windows XP source code; correct?
A. Yes, I have. Though I will not say I've looked at every 36 million or so lines of code carefully.
Q. Is it 36 million or 39 million?
A. As I said, a million here, a million there, it adds up after a while I guess.
Q. Pretty soon you're talking about real lines of code?
A. Exactly.
Q. What exactly have you done?
A. The main purpose of looking -- once again, given both the limited amount of time and the size, was really to better understand the way in which a system was modularized, the way in which it's broken up into individual routines and the types of interdepencies that exist, so it's more to get a feel for the overall structure of the system.
Q. Is there any way you can quantify how much effort was involved in your review of the Windows XP source code?
A. Physical amount of time, probably 8 or 10 hours.
How we know is more important than what we know.
I just wanted to thank you for your service, I really appreciate your efforts. Do not let you demoralize by the others, I like what you do (really!).
:-((
I would mod your content-postings up, but I don't have any mod-points
Excuse me sir, but I am not a holier-than-thou! I will have you know that I am *far* above such infantile behavior. Only an *idiot* would adopt such a stance, and am I ever glad that I'm not like *them*. I'm good and I'm humble, much unlike the rest of you.
09
That capability is going to be part of Windows XP SP1, as part of Microsoft's desire to conform to the DOJ settlement.
The States aren't asking for that... they want all of IE removed, the rendering engine used by Explorer, the help system, everything. Why? Well nobody is quite sure about that.
..a university professor who is ignorant of the real world. Never met one of those before...
Do daemons dream of electric sleep()?
i didn't write an OS book, but i might have read one once. from what i recall, the OS is a system that operates the computer. it includes the kernel and other various other software applications (including a desktop environment, a web browser, a calculator, etc).
Why do OEM's care so much about altering the desktop? It's M$'s product, the OEM's shouldn't be allowed to mess with it.
The fact that you can't be a licensed Windows PC Provider AND sell naked PC's or PC's with Linux or ANY OTHER OS on them when you sign the contract with Microsoft is the issue they should be looking at.
If I told you that you could sell PC's with Mandrake on them but if you signed up to do so were then legally inable to sell naked PC's or PC's with Windows on them you'd be pissed too.
I removed /usr/local/bin/perl and now all my perl scripts don't work. That must mean that perl is an essential part of unix. I'm sure Larry Wall would agree with that.
and say something like "I believe Microsoft Windows is the only major operating system that streamlines the user experience in this way".
When government attorney Kevin Hodges asked him to name an operating system besides those made by Microsoft in which the Web browsing software could not be removed, Madnick [...] suggested GNOME as an example.
I have not used GNOME for a while (got used to KDE - flame away), but what is GNOME's web browser that cannot be removed?
I hate potilicans!!
Lameness filter encountered. Post aborted!
Lameness filter encountered. Post aborted!
Would everyone who wishes to point out that Stuart Madnick is a business professor, and not a computer science professor, please check in at the desk, take a number, and wait in line over there along the far wall?
Thank you.
Someone you trust is one of us.
would I be here?
Best Slashdot Co
It clearly is an acronym for "Microsoft Institute of Technology". Given the level of incompetence and/or outright dishonesty, this guy fits right in.
You can sell Linux without KDE. None of the KDE apps will run, but oh well.
Therefore, sell Windows without the Windows GUI. Absolutely nothing will run except maybe ping, but oh well. That way we don't have to worry about removing IE from the Windows GUI, the same we don't worry about removing Konquerer from KDE.
nut it appears to me that maybe the lawyers on both sides should be reading /. for unique insights into the days testimony...
what better legal assistants could lawyers ask for in a tech case than an enourmous group of grassroots people actually involved *in* the tech industry. I get more rational info (both sides) from this site than from the all the tech news out there.
Ok so MS actually thinks their business can not be characterized as "high prices and inferior products", and is taking issue with what they see as a turnabout by somone they might wish to see as an ally.
Clearly MS is very chipped off that the people who largely won IBM's defense in that case now are giving testimony suggesting that MS is in violation of antitrust law.
I attended a lecture by Fisher in the mid-80s where he delineated that IBM had:
and were not going to screw that up by running afould of anti-trust laws
The government's case (brought in the closing days of the Johnson administration) had been seriously flawed (e.g. claiming that IBM 'controlled' 70% of the US computing market, they included plug-compatible competitors in IBM's market share while not counting the 2nd largest manufacturer of the time (DEC) in the caculation)
One difference here of course is that MS *has* been found to be a monopoly and (imo) has based much of its strategy on hurting competitors instead of helping customers. Personally I think MS has beleived from the beginning that if they are simply 'excellent' and compete hard they will win, and the notion that they have indeed been found in violation of antitrust is just a foreign idea.
IBM is a tough competitor in many areas, but they mostly seem to behave themselves in the manners that a potentially monopoly player is required under US law and regulation: They license IP, they publish detailed specs, they do not pre-announce products in a manner that would be found to be anti-competitive (and yes there's been a lot of controversy on this last one).
As for pulling witnesses 'Because the trial is going so well' ... ok they're doing better then in the actual trial but clearly the non-settling states had plans to get more mileage still from MS's witnesses than MS would gain.
Just hoping this judge manages more than a wrist-slap. MS bullied the govt' out of their first forray in '95 and then proceeded to wiggle around the few penalties that were set ... maybe it'll be different this time
Linux is Linux, if One need clarify their dist: <Dist>/GNU Linux
bsds are of course just BSD
From his homepage:
(title)Personal Home Page(/title)
(meta NAME="GENERATOR" CONTENT="Mozilla/3.01Gold (Win95; I) [Netscape]")
Good work Brian.. Now I suppose that M$ would have us all be credulous enough to believe that this isn't a well-paid witness, thoroughly bribed by Microslop.
Rien n'est plus beau que le creux du 0.
If you didn't know anything about MS Word, then you shouldn't bother continuing to live. MS Word is the basis of our modern society. Without MS Word, we Couldn't have the US Constitution! Without MS Word, we wouldn't have wonderful, powerful laws like the DMCA.
Geeze, they even teach MS Word in school these days. MS Word is the only application that you are allowed to even write in. I think that they should outlaw every other method of generating text. Especially that dreadfully awful and bland thing called "vi" and that other one called "emacs". I mean who the heck wants to use a word processor with a name like either of those?
My mouth feels funny just saying those words...
(Of course, if you wish to buy a bridge. I happen to own a few that I would be willing to sell...)
--
If you ignore the other uses of a tool, does that make the tool less useful, or you less useful?
...who go off and start their own businesses and use MS developer-assistance funds (well, I think they used them). I believe Microsoft still has a stake in them as well.
Real Player was founded by people who left MS, and we should not be surprised they used some Microsoft tactics. (Of course, they were surprised when MS used those tactics on them. But those who live by the sword....)
You are correct, however, in identifying this as an important question of ethics which is all-too-prevalent in the industry. Maybe a code of ethics for coders is what we need.
Eternal vigilance only works if you look in every direction.
The point that it is a browser is irrelevant. The prosecution is attempting to point out that Microsoft has been anti-competitive in the past, and may still be running this type of business.
In this day and age, most people have somewhat of a grasp of what a "browser" is and it's use. The quickest way the prosecution could fsck this case is if they decide to saturate the courtroom with abstract technological jargon. I believe the browser issue was a good tactic to implement.
>This guy's an expert in what sense, exactly?
Well, Mr. Madnick wrote this classic* book about operating systems, for example. Nevermind that it's probably written on parchment and the computers were still running on steam in 1974 as far as I know, he's undoubtedly an expert when it comes to present-day operating systems.
*as in "hilariously outdated"
"There are already a million monkeys on a million typewriters, and Usenet is NOTHING like Shakespeare." - Blair Houghton
Remember when Stallman made quotes along the lines of "anything that doesn't come with its own compiler isn't a real operating system".
and this is loony how?
Of course you'll _need_ a compiler with your Operating System. One of my cheif beefs with the Empire is that they want another $500 or so for theirs (unless you buy it at the college bookstore). Note that RMS, Linux, GNU & Hurd will hardly get prissy with you if you want to replace gcc with something _else_, but you'll _need_ a compiler for most installations, except of course those where the compiler is on another machine and things are built remotely.
Of course you'll need a browser, too (for a desktop workstation, not, say, an nfs server). The point here is that with
GNU/Linux, *BSD or such you can choose from a rich selection of browsers (or none when apporpriate), varying considerably in functionality, speed, memory footprint, licensing, cost,... while the monopolist quite aggressively forces Exploiter on you.
It's very easy to argue that a compiler is a far more fundamental and important part of an OS than an Internet browser. Real Operating Systems come with both. Real Operating Systems let you choose whether or not you want to install either, or both, or substitute something else of your own preference. Toy OSsen (and right now the Redmond "OS"'s cheif distinction is that it runs a lot of video games) "protect" the luser from the "confusion" of having to make these decisions of what to install or not.
Exceeding the recommended torque is not recommended.
He may be very intelligent, but if he's so clueless about operating system issues then he shouldn't be testifying about them.
Seems like Microsoft is counting on the "star power" of an IT professor from MIT testifying on their behalf to dazzle the judge. Might as well just use a rocket scientist...
Before we say this guy has no clue.. maybe he's smarter then we're giving him credit. Indeed he meantioned KDE and GNOME. They are nothing but WMs running on top of Linux. Just like WIN95 was nothing but a file manager / WM running on top of DOS!! Perhaps tha'ts all Win2000 is and DOS is just masked really well? eh?
Yeah but would you rather download a say 100kB activation program for IE or ~9MB for Netscape or Mozilla? Oh and how do you find either without a web browser...
MIT has a disconnect between theoretical and practical computer science. The courses in the computer science department (part of EE Couse VI) are theoretical and not highly useful for immediate employment. For example the required course for all EE and CS majors use the computer language Scheme, a OO version of LISP (for over 30 years). If you want anything practical- you take scientific computing such as C++ or Java in an engineering department or business computing in the Sloan Business school (Course 15). I took courses in both departments, including Madnick's, for intellectual and practical reasons. Over the years the practical courses become less relavant because languages change so much.
Finally, somebody gets it right. Microsoft is using the browser technology they put into Internet Explorer to support other products (as a help system viewer, for UI enhancements, etc.). The "browser" isn't a tool that can be replaced anymore. It's a part of the OS. While you can currently get other tools to do the same things as Internet Explorer, Microsoft is using the technology to build even better products. Nobody seems to get this.
Personally, I don't understand why Microsoft didn't just call it "Explorer". This "Explorer" would have been able to view Word Docs, Excel Spreadsheets, the filesystem, etc. while "well, would you look at that!" also allowing you to view web pages. That would have given the states fits to try and prove (that IE could be removed). This is the point. IE doesn't exist just to view web pages. It's moved beyond that point. But most folks still can't (refuse?) to see it that way.
Just don't get me started on the lack of native DVD playback support in XP...
Most of that functionality can be turned off.
unclick 'view as web page'
Then go to the options section and use the classic
style and alot of extraneous crap gets turned off
Someone like that would make a good college professor..
Oh.
"I can't give you a brain, so I'll give you a diploma" - The Great Oz (blatently stolen sig)
Look. Microsoft is lying. It's really that simple. There's no point in discussing how hard it could be, because the statement that it's impossible or even hard is false. There's no need to wonder about it, either. Microsoft sticks to this because it obfuscates the fact that they prevented OEM's from putting a Netscape icon on the desktop back in the day, not due to any technical problems but rather due to a business decision. All they have to do is convince a judge or delay a judgement. If they delay it long enough, it doesn't matter, because they've move on to other things.
Is that there is a government attorney out there who can not only think on his feet but actually seems to know something about what linux is, what KDE & GNOME are, etc. Anyone know more about this Hodges guy?
When will people stop being distracted by the browser issue? It is currently illegal for any shop which sell Microsoft Windows on their PCs to sell dual-boot machines, linux machines, AppleMacs, or OS-less machines.
We've recently heard microsoft claiming that it's illegal even to accept donated computers without proof of license (despite those computers coming from suppliers who have never, ever sold a computer without a licensed copy of Windows bound to that PC)
And we still have microsoft trying to break open protocols, making hostile takeovers of other open protocols, and lying about the GPL.
The browser is not an issue. You're welcome to borrow my Mozilla CDs, as my neighbours do. My computer shop will happily install netscape 6 for free on a new computer. But until it becomes legally possible to choose an alternative to microsoft, how will removing the browser break up their monopoly?
It also becomes clear, that the Microsoft strategy is simply to confuse the court, since it is undoubtedly not clear to the judge, what exactly is kernel, application, middleware, etc. All MS wants to do is muddy the waters so much that the judge will be over-cautious.
As an example, it appears from the transcript that Microsoft had previously claimed "crossdependency" between IE and Notepad.
Now, clearly ignoring the weasel words, there's no technical reason for the cross dependencies, and if they actually exist (which I personally doubt) it's because MS has been putting them in on purpose purely to make the case that Windows is one monolithic thing.
Maybe the state should introduce some of the NT design documents that claim how modular it is.
One of the inaccurate statements this moron made was that you couldn't remove browsing functionality from KDE or Gnome without losing the entire GUI.
Those respective projects should bust their butts to immediated deliver updates of the latest version with absolutely no integrated web browsing functionality, just to further demonstrate the worthlessness of this clown's testimony.
---------------------------------------------
SERENITY NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I wonder if boycotting Prof.Madnick's class would be effective?
The Netscape operating system won't work if you remove the browser. Come to think of it, the Lynx operating system doesn't work very well either when the browser is removed.
So how are they going to "voluntarily download a tiny piece of plug-in code" if they don't have a browser? Should MS put in an FTP client? It's the same issue. MS is giving away a free ride on the internet, whereas others would love to make people pay (essentially we all are by buying a Windows bundled PC or Windows itself) extra by using/buying competitor x's browser. It's all about power. MS has it. The states don't like that.
Get Firefox!
As always, all IMO. Insert "I think" everywhere grammatically possible.
I mean, your damn add/remove programs won't work if you remove IE. Neither will my Quicken deluxe either.
DO NOT DISTURB THE SE
In Windows 98. NT (and it's children, SPx, 2000, XP home/pro) are different. I'm skeptical that IE can be removed from the newer OS's while still keeping the other functions intact. It can be done, but Windows would lose some functionality, or would have to be rewritten.
Get Firefox!
Isn't that self-explanatory?
I know, it's mad...
Should invading one's peaceful neighbours be opposed, or rewarded with trade deals?
Is he a computer science expert? I know that the MIT is not what it used to be, but I would expect a technical expert from that institution, giving his expert opinion on issues having to do with operating systems, to have a slightly clearer picture of the contemporary landscape of operating systems used by people.
Is this guy the best expert MS can come up with?
Futurama reference?
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
Damn, The State rule(d).
i posted as thrid and was moderated redundant :-) samrt guy this moderator. me, i'm not so smart, since i'll prolly lose another point on this ot post
hehe
What do you think about having CD writing integrated as part of the OS in XP? No need for anyone to buy nero, or CD creator. Is it just more of MS brand evil?
Or is it these people? They are anti-competively making things more intuitive and easier to use, they must be stopped!
--Jimmy has fancy plans; and pants to match.
Doesn't IRIX have a browser built into its default window manager? I don't know if thats something that can be stripped out or not.
They would never have gotten rid of DOS under Windows. Then they'd have an out - "Windows isn't the OS, DOS is! You can remove IE and replace it with a different browser, and DOS will run just fine!"
As a matter of fact, they could even claim that Windows is modular - if they hadn't steamrolled the competition (Desq, TopView, VisiOn) back in the old days.
I've found quotes about several of their less-than-helpful witnesses, but I can't find that one. And the economist whose research was funded by MS. I'm trying to complete my list.
Nope, no sig
In related news, Richard Stallman of the Free Software foundation said in a press release, "I would like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that KDE and Gnome are OS kernels, and should properly be called GNU/KDE and GNU/Gnome when referred to as fully functioning operating systems."
The guy who said IE is a shell has got it wrong. IE is needed because it is the Windoze equivalent of more. In UNIX it is a bit easier to drop in a replacement, but the fact remains: if you remove 'more' from a UNIX OS, all kinds of things are going to break.
Imagine asking Red Hat to remove the GNU 'less' so that the Sun version of 'more' could compete. It is sheer lunacy.
Here's a nice comparson of abstraction layers Linux or Unix v.s Windows. There is a difference :-)
Windows NT/2000/XP:
1. Kernel (unchangeable)
2. Gui (Unchangeable)
3. Fileman (changeable, but unremoveable)
4. WWW-Browser (changeable, but unremoveable)
Linux
1. Kernel (Recompileable)
2. Shell (Changeable: bash, tsh etc.)
3. Gui platform (Changeable and removeable: XFree, Accellerated X)
4. Gui (changeable and removeable: KDE, Gnome, enlightment etc.)
5. Fileman (Changeable and removeable: Konqueror, Nautilus, gmc)
6. Browser (Changeable and removeable: Konqueror, Nautilus, netscape, mozilla etc.)
Of course you all know this! It just illustrates that Windows users can't choose freely between different alternative abstractions for the os, while Linux and Unix CAN do this.
I don't mind Windows beeing installed with IE and Explorer as default, but it should be removeable and changeable. People don't want to have different applications doing the same thing installed at once because it makes a mess, and they want to be able to choose. At least I do
What will be the next unremoveable feature in Microsoft Windows? MediaPlayer "forcing" us to use asx formats, The XP Video-Editor, A lightweight version of M.S Office would be strategic pherhaps.
Microsoft will continue to make applications which are unremovable because it makes the applications in their OS better intergrated with eachother. And users will stop using competetive applications becaus they can't easily remove currently installed applications and in addition to that, competetive applications often cost money. They to must earn money somehow.
That's why we need a ruling to say that MS is to make a leightweight OS with only the gui-platform installed, just like in Windows 3.1, so that other companies in the IT industry can create abstraction layers and make money to. This package should be sold to third party vendors at a reduced price matching the reduced amount of code lines in percentage of the complete code. Then we atleast have a fair competition. mindflow
Those of you may recall that HotJava was Sun's earlier attempt at building it's own Java-based browser and JavaOS was the slim "OS" that was to be used on their JavaStation (Java Terminals) some years ago. They even got to the point of developing HotJava Views that were HotJava-specific desktop tools like Mail, Calendar, etc.
Even though Sun has since dropped these older products like a bad habit, and at the time had toyed with using earlier attempts at writing Netscape in Java as this browser instead of HotJava, it might have made this guy seemed half intelligent if he had brought it up. Not to mention, using an example from Sun Microsystems might have been politically what Microsoft would want too. Still a smart question from cross-examination! Touche.
There have been a few exceptions to this. This opinion article came out yesterday that had some good points.
Really? Was this one of them:
Perhaps Gates should resign and Judge Kollar-Kotelly should start drawing a salary as chief software architect at Microsoft. Somehow I think even Judge Jackson wasn't stupid or biased enough to do this.
Since the author clearly thinks Microsoft was only found guilty because of a stupid, biased judge, I don't see how he can expect to be taken seriously in analyzing the remedy.
Nope, no sig
they only look bad when they whore themselves for Microsoft money
Hey, that's good business pracitce! In fact, it would seem like they're giving away a free lesson here!
c-hack.com |
Turns out you can't replace Samba with Microsoft Networking without taking a BIG performance hit... that's right, Samba's implementation of SMB is twice as fast as Microsoft's, according to IT week Of course, all those open-source geeks are doing is copying M$, not providing any "innovation".
From the Article: "I'm not trying to be evasive," Stuart E. Madnick, a computer and software expert and professor at MIT, said at one point during Wednesday's testimony. "I'm just trying to be precise
Unless he's talking about being consistently vague, I believe he meant to say accurate.
Internet Explorer is part of the user-interface level. The operating system is not (or atleast should not) be at this level. Thus, I find it very hard to believe that Windows cannot exist without Internet Explorer. After all, Window 95 existed without requiring Internet Explorer.
However, I am willing to believe that now Windows Explorer (the Windows UI shell) cannot exist without Internet Explorer. Windows Explorer is, after all, just another application just like Program Manager was back in Windows 3.1.
Madnick said the diagram showed how Windows was like a "house of cards" that could collapse if any of the pieces were removed
I'm going to have to agree with this, as we have all seen windows collapsing into the "blue screen of death". However I don't agree that you need to remove anything, it kinda happens automagically.
:)
The states didn't have the same problem because they let their witnesses help them WRITE the proposals.
... Remedy phase designed to help Microsoft's competitors. Let's not sugar-coat the truth.
Remedy phase designed to help the consumer?
Nah
from his web page:
"Dr. Madnick is a prolific writer and is the author or co-author of over 250 books, articles, or reports including the classic textbook, Operating Systems (McGraw-Hill)"
http://mit.edu/smadnick/www/home.html
but also take a look at the _source_ of the page.
Ctrl+F7 gives me x display :1 ctrl-F8 gives me x display :2. I run gnome on :1 and kde on :2. Windows sucks eggs compared to a decent Linux/unix system.
Yes, Mom, I know I took the candy from the jar. But Billy would have taken candy from the jar if he had been me.
If I may assume for the moment that Madnick is neither stupid nor lying, what could he possibly be trying to say? Maybe he was simply using Microsoft's definition of operating system.
Windows has always been a combination operating system and windows manager not unlike linux/kde or linux/gnome. I myself have run win95 on top of Novell DOS. It worked just fine after a bit of tweaking. MS has tried to pretend over the years that what the user sees _is_ the OS. Hence, the WinXP window manager _is_ the WinXP OS, the KDE window manager _is_ the KDE OS, the Gnome window manager _is_ the Gnome OS.
Hmmm... I wonder if anyone has tried to use WINE to run Win95 on Linux!
Maybe I'm stupid but doesn't IE run on the Mac. The Mac is not a M$ OS. IE doesn't need the Windows OS to operate nor is it part of the operating system no more than M$ Money is part of the OS.
It seems to me that M$ is simply trying to obfuscate the difference between what has traditionally been the dividing line of OS and application. Hopefully this will confuse the court and win their case. JTP (Joe Tax Payer) is then stuck with the bill (the legal cost).
Maybe the problem is that definitions of OS and Application should be codified.
Also let's not forget that the main battle here is for what shows up on the desktop. Not how the destop actually functions. ie. Should M$ be able to force all PC distributors to include M$ Money on the desktop rather than them cutting a deal and putting Quicken there instead.
Although Bill would like to portray this as you're screwing our ability to make software it is much simpler than that and would not restrict them at all.
They don't use the functionality provided from Microsoft applications, only the Win32 API. Relying on finding MS applications that behave exactly the same way on Windows, Mac, Linux, HP/UX, Solaris, BeOS and OS/2 is impossible. And, after all, Outlook isn't even installed on most systems, and Outlook Express can be removed with hacks such as Win98 Lite.
War is one of the most horrible things a human can be exposed to. And one of the worlds largest industries.
thanks for the wasted point
you fucking shit eating palestinian sympathizer
go die
It's not hard to do and Microsoft is not unwilling to do that either IIRC.
It is the competitors who are funding the states campaign who won't be satisfied with that, though. They want IE gone with all DLLs etc. and that's why the states will continue to push for that.
No... the Futurama bit was a reference to Good Will Hunting, hence the title of his post.
1. You can replace both Explorer.exe and IEPlorer.exe in any version of windows.
You can go here http://shellcity.net/ and find a kazillion shells for windows.
Holy shit, yes you can even have a Next like shell for Windows.
all you have to do is download or write your own shell and add shell=myShell.exe in system.ini.
This is so simple even an idiot *nix guru can do it.
For those who do not know, a "*nix guru" is a moron who hasn't figured out the easy way to interact with computers. You know, the retards who think that computing technology peaked in 1970 and who are dumb enough to actually believe they are more productive using command line programs.
36 million lines of code....8-10 hours.
And for his next trick he'll estimate the volume of the Atlantic ocean using nothing more than a teaspoon.
"Madnick argued that perfect interoperability, which would allow products to be substituted for each other with no performance degradation, was a theoretical impossibility. "It would be surprising if two different products behaved exactly alike," he told the court Wednesday."
This is so pathetic coming from someone claming any sort of knowledge about computers. Where have he been the last 30 years? Never heard of networks, tcp/ip OSI model? What about mail applications?
Its fully possible to make two applications behave exactly the same if you supply an open standard that outlines exactly how, when and why things work. People have dome it for all times. The only thing that prevents this is fear of loosing marketshares. This man is a baboon but i dont think that many respected collegues of him would say theese things. Either he is totally out on a bike or he had a bad ghostwriter from Microsoft.
HTTP/1.1 400
I wonder if the members of the MIT board of trustees or their CompSci department are at all embarassed about this guy. I bet there are more than a few folks around the country scratcing their heads thinking "If this man is an example of the intellect one can expect from MIT professors, how in the world did they reject my enrollment application???"
The states remedies will help the consumer substantially more than the Microsoft-authored remedies. This remedy phase is designed to make us forget why Microsoft got into trouble in the first place, so we'll just be happy to swallow whatever gilded shit they decide to shove down our throats.
And *any* effective remedy is going to help Microsoft's competitors. That's what "restoring competition" is all about.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
Go to Madnick's home page at MIT. It looks to me like the guy is stuck in the 1970's somewhere and he just seems deeply in love with big corporations--but judge for yourself. There's little experience listed there with desktop machines, the consumer market, or modern software systems.
His written testimony is quite funny. He writes things like (I'm paraphrasing) "if we do this, it would help Microsoft's competitors and hurt Microsoft" (yup, that's the point of an antitrust remedy), "this would mean that consumers might have to choose from many different components" (yup, again, that's the point), and "opening up would expose Microsoft's intellectual property" (again, that's the point: the value of much of Microsoft's so-called "intellectual property" lies in their monopoly position, not in some kind of innovation or technical contribution).
It's good that this guy exposed himself for what he really is: a hired gun with little expertise in the area he is testifying on.
Microsoft's last big-name hired Gun was Gregory Mankiw from Harvard, who stated big and bold that "delaying the release of Windows would be like throwing sand in the gears of human progress", but then later had to admit that he knew absolutely nothing about computers and just kind of thought that he thought Microsoft was good because monopolies in general were good (as a modern Harvard economist, he didn't quite put it that way, but that's what it amounted to).
They don't use the functionality provided from Microsoft applications, only the Win32 API
Um, there's the matter of the fact that those url's do work from mozilla. Not in mozilla, since the container has no way to capture it (IE doesn't try to either), but this url does work on win32 mozilla if you have outlook installed. Not OE, Outlook. I wasn't even talking about OE, I don't even know why you brought it up.
And it's not the Win32 API. It's not even MFC. It's an API that IE provides and the rest of windows (such as outlook) uses.
I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
AMD CEO Jerry Sanders admitting that he hadn't read the state's proposed sanctions, and that he'd specifically asked Microsoft to support AMD's new chip (which they have, since) (http://news.com.com/2100-1001-883961.html)
University of Chicago economist Kevin Murphy admitting that he'd done little on antitrust until hired by Microsoft in 1998, and that all of his research since had been at least partially funded by them (http://news.com.com/2100-1001-885605.html)
Onyx Chief Executive Brent Frei (the former Microsoftie), who also hadn't read the states proposals, had Microsoft general counsel Bill Neukom tell him what to testify about and had to ask Neukom what "balkanization" meant. (http://news.com.com/2100-1001-886341.html) (about halfway down the page).
Autodesk Chief Technology Officer Scott Borduin's, who after disparing the state's sanctions because it would put at risk the "stable, predictable" platform offered by Windows", was forced to admit that he had complained when Microsoft excluded Java from Windows XP, thus fragmenting Windows. (http://news.com.com/2100-1001-886341.html)
You'd stumble too if you had a fat bag of cash waiting for you that hinged upon your testimony....
A fool's brain digests philosophy into folly,
science into superstition,
and art into pedantry.
Hence university education.
--George Bernard Shaw
Is Microsoft paying people off to meddle with the news? I *was* reading the article a few moments ago, but accidently closed Mozilla. When I came back, I now see something about how RealOne is so wonderful only because of Windows features. Something fishy?
Why bother.
... the appeals court ruling that upheld the conclusions of law essentially in their entirety, but remanded the case back to the lower court to re-evaluate the remedy?
Nope, no sig
If I run Lynx on Linux, then I have to have GNOME or KDE, right?
So there is NO WAY I can run a web browser on the Linux kernel.
Well, guess that makes me an MIT Professor.
Next, I will proceed to demonstrate why gravity doesn't exist, and how the moon is made of blue cheese.
The only kernels I use are for popping.
-
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?
From the article:
"He said Microsoft could replicate necessary portions of the operating system before taking out a feature like the Web browser. But he guessed that the change could make Windows "100 to 1,000 times more bloated." "
So what if Windows is 1000 times more bloated? It happens every couple years anyway...
IT person : CS person is like
Auto mechanic : Mechanical engineer
Microwaving frozen meal : Chef creating own dishes from scratch
etc, etc.
IT is a offshoot BUSINESS field, CS is offshoot of MATHEMATICS, IT people are generally glorified academic PHBs, having no real in-depth CS knowledge. Maybe C or Java programming, basic sort/search algorithms at best.
There's 10 types of people in this world, those who understand binary and those who don't.
was that the government's lawyer was trying to say that Notepad has a dependency on IE. That it is both ways, a cross-dependancy, and the expert really wanted to say "hell no man, that's stupid" but he couldn't because the lawyer asked him specific questions: Do you disagree with the other witness? No, I cant because he's a microsoft engineer and I'm not. Is a cross dependency both ways? That's one interpretation. Slimey lawyer tricks. I'm sure IE just says to shell.dll, start this .txt file which it has written out to a temp directory and it will do so using whatever editor you have set to open files with a .txt extension. There is no dependency and everything is replacable already.
How we know is more important than what we know.
The link now points at a different MS article (relating to RealNetworks). Where's the original? I wanna get my hands on some of those quotes first-hand :-)
First, let's define the requirements... a web browser is "replaceable" if you can remove its on-screen icon, eliminate its memory use, eliminate its disk space use, add a different web browsing program, and then have all the requests for web viewing from other programs (particularly operating system components) go to the other (new) web browser. What's more, it MUST be possible for PC vendors and users to make this change without special dispensation by anyone else.
This is possible on Linux, in a number of different ways. First, you could choose to use solely a textual (not graphical) environment... you can use text browsers like links, lynx, etc. These browsers can be added or removed at will. Many of today's users will want a graphical environment, of course, so let's concentrate on that. If you want to use a graphical environment, there are several available, from ``small'' environments (e.g., simply window managers like E or WindowMaker without environment components) to full-scale desktop graphical environments (mainly GNOME and KDE). Even if a web browser was embedded into a particular graphical environment, the fact that resellers and users can choose which environment to install (and not install a different one) is sufficient to meet every one of those requirements.
Even if you assumed that if only GNOME existed, GNOME still meets all these criteria. You can add or remove programs using the normal installation programs (e.g., rpm or apt); removing a program eliminates the disk and memory usage of the program, and usually if a program is added or removed the panel is adjusted automatically. You can also modify the on-screen panel and desktop to add or remove arbitrary programs, including the web browser, so clearly you can add or remove a web browser's icons. You can change what web browser is invoked by other GNOME programs; in Red Hat Linux 7.2 and GNOME, select "Programs / Settings / Doc Handlers / URL Handlers", which lets you choose by URL scheme. You can even choose what web browser is used based on the filetype, by selecting "Programs / Settings / File Types and Programs". Thus, you can install or uninstall any web browser, and have it invoked by the GNOME calls for invoking URLs. And all of this can be done by both resellers and users; you don't need dispensation by anyone.
Even if you thought it was impossible to change web browsers in KDE, you can still remove KDE and use GNOME instead. GNOME certainly shows that supporting arbitrary web browsers is quite simple. Clearly there's no technical reason that web browsers have to be so intermingled with the other components.
- David A. Wheeler (see my Secure Programming HOWTO)
I love the analogy put forward by the witness that the OS is as fragile as a "house of cards." (Page 5722, line 17.) Maybe he's not so dumb after all... :)
I find this
frustrating, especially having graduated from MIT
in CS.
What a coicidence! Madnick got his PhD in CS from MIT!
Does that make you feel any better?
"And like that
I wish I could get to be an "expert" in something so large so quickly. Maybe it's 'cause he's from MIT.
and say "Just becouse I dont know what it is doesnt mean I am lying"
I think you underestimate just how much I just dont care.
Exactly. And according to the emails that the government dug up during the trial, they did this deliberately in order to make IE inseperable from the OS. They should get smacked down hard for that. So what if they have to rewrite it? If it takes them 5 years or more to release the next version of the OS, there will be great rejoicing in the IT community.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Defining "OS" strictly in terms of the kernel is a very limited perspective, and generally not in-line with current OS design. An Operating System includes a kernel: it also includes system software, that is, anything a user might need (or, more generally, want) in order to perform basic, common operations on the system. This is the basis behind GNU's contention that Linux systems are actually GNU/Linux systems: take the GNU software away and you don't have much to work with.
KDE and Gnome -are- operating systems. They define their own rules for how interactions take place between applications, and the user, and the "low level" services provided by the underlying system.
10 years ago the term "system software" would include file manipulation commands and a command shell, because those were the basic services users and programmers needed. These days applications are routinely expected to carry on various kinds of networking transactions, work with common data types hosted by other applications, and hardly any user wants to do without simple services like a media player or a web browser. That means that MS must at least include these things with the OS, or the system isn't complete.
As for whether the features should be decoupled: if a vendor like Microsoft provides a set of programs in a single bundle, it's not unreasonable for some of those programs to rely upon each other. The OS kernel wouldn't be expected to rely on something like the web browser in such a case, but important system software -might-. And in the effort to provide a fault-free system, it's not at all hard to imagine why such a vendor might want to prevent the use of a third-party substitute module, whose quality the vendor can't vouch for.
Bow-ties are cool.
that is just logicaly impossible.
Apple makes sure that developers well understand that components may be pulled from the OS (and they make it really simple, you open up the Extensions directory and drag it to the trash) and recommend that everything be checked for its existance before called, and, the Quicktime Player is not necessary to do graphics, just the quicktime extensions. SO, not only can you pull the Quicktime fully from your computer, you can also pull just the Quicktime Player out and use something else.
No, they are specifically re-engineering their other products so that removing the browser becomes more complicated. WinDOS does pretty much what it did before the Web Browser became a big thing. This "current problem" is one entirely of Microsoft's own creation.
They chose poor engineering practices so that they could come back and whine about the problems that would be caused forcing them to "play nice".
What "better products"?
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
So? All of the software resellers that you allude to have a choice in what they sell. Those that resell Microsoft products should have the same ability. Microsoft should not have the ability to dictate to it's users (REAL USERS like Gateway), how their product is to be used AFTER THE SALE.
Merely give Gateway the rights it should have as a consumer. Prevent Microsoft from abusing it's position as "dominant vendor" to strip Gateway of it's rights.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
I've got a NOVEL idea: let the entity that SELLS THE PC direct end users to useful extension products.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Never mind the issue of GNOME versus KDE. Why was there expert (sic) witness unaware of all of the servers running happily without even X installed? And why didn't the nail him on that during cross-examination?
No, the states don't like the fact that Microsoft has it and is abusing it to the deteriment of it's own customers.
You do realize that NETSCAPE was a Microsoft customer. DELL is also a Microsoft customer.
A specialized ftp client, or even a standardized ftp library, would not be quite so problematic. It becomes problematic when market segments are systematically and artificially destroyed.
The problems you bring up are hardly unsurmountable or even difficult.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
In terms of war it's negligible. It's not nice, and we're certainly not going to run around bragging about it, but it's war, and these losses are nothing compared to what these folks have suffered at the hands of their own leaders.
**>>BELCH
# apt-get install nautilus-mozilla
Sorry, but the following packages have unmet dependencies:
nautilus-mozilla: Conflicts: mozilla-browser
(>= 2:0.9.10)
E: Sorry, broken packages
# echo I want my integrated browser back!
...or you may not. But you sound like you might be ready for the only party dedicated to the idea of personal and economical freedom, for real.
I think a lot of the issues you're seeing is a result of big corporations buying government coercion in their favor from politicians. The root problem is still government power, but it gets a bit complicated.
Quick, not too slanted, test: http://www.lp.org/quiz/
"MIT prof Stuart Madnick, testifying on MS's behalf, was caught out twice when a government attorney asked him to name an OS (other than one made by Microsoft) where the browser couldn't be removed. Madnick also faltered on several other questions."
What does that question have to do with ANYTHING? He was there to testify as to how hard it would be to remove IE from windows, not to discuss browser integration in other platforms. He said it would be hard to do in windows, how does the fact that it would be easy to do in linux have ANY relevance about what he said?
Prof: "40^2 = 1600"
Lawyer: "Ok, well can you think of any numbers that when squared don't equal 1600?"
Prof: "Well yes . . . "
Lawyer: "Ahh ha!"
"The crows seemed to be calling his name, thought Caw."
IE fires up notepad for the View Source command, unless you tweak the registry to use something else.
DCMonkey
www.litestep.net
Booyah!!!
I'll be honest, we're throwing science against the wall to see what sticks. -Cave Johnson
This guy is from MIT, but not, AFAIK, a *computer science* professor. He's a "Professor of Information Technology", and has been with MIT's Information Technologies Group...which is "rated #1 in the nation aming business school information technology programs".
Asking him whether it's technically possible to remove the damn thing is just silly -- he can only tell you whether MS says it's kosher to remove IE or not. I'll bet he hasn't touched a line of code in thirty years.
How is it possible not to know that Microsoft has already been found guilty!
That much we know, and it is no longer in dispute. If you wish to
argue that the gigantic Microsoft monopoly have proved good for innovation,
has benefited consumers, and as a logical consequence has been (like Gates
always reminds us) a benefactor to mankind but the GPL spreads ill
and misfortune, this at least we can discuss if you can convince me
that you are not in jest and you are actually set for a serious
discussion. We could argue it all day. But we cannot argue whether
Microsoft has broken US laws and the government has the duty to
though them in jail.
How has Microsoft hurt the mom-and-pop businesses? Oh! that is easy.
If they don't sell you Windows, the store owner is out of business.
In fact, even if Microsoft did hurt you, you will never have the
balls to go to court and speak against them. You in your small or big
company will starve until you die. Do you recall how many software companies
that make Windows products had the guts to testify against Microsoft?
And do you know what happened to the audio company that actually appeared
to speak against them? Enough!
so i decided to share it with the rest of you:
the original article
have fun
-- john
I'll bet your just some lame script kiddy who thinks he's 31337 because you used some C in place of english.
I'll bet you say "LOL" when someone tells you a joke.
My mind exactly.
And another gem:
"But he [Madnick] guessed that the change could make Windows '100 to 1,000 times more bloated.'"
I can't imagine how taking out IE and WMP would make the core Windows 2004 components take a whole Terabyte! No one but Microsoft could actually make good on that sort of dismal prognosis.
"With sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine. However, this is not necessarily a good idea...."
RFC 1925
Gee, did someone else figure out how to use MicroShit's perverse tools for their own advantage? That's not fair! MicroShit invented those tools to crush others, how dare they use them to poop back on MicroShit with them?
See a patern here? It goes back to the "jolting" experience that MicroShit designed for anyone who wanted to use a browser that was not IE. Microsoft made an OS to screw the user. It's not suprising that others would who wish to do the same would be attracted to the platform. If MicroShit wanted their users to be able to configure their machines the way they want, they would have real user accounts, permissions, text configuration files istead of a binary "registration" file that breaks the whole computer when corrupted, and finally they would release their source code. Instead they are more concerned with selling desktop "real estate" for advertising, Office sales, and other pushy little domination games. MicroShit is all about limiting technology for their own profit.
There is no greater issue concerning us today than the unholy aliance of M$ and the media companies to force the SSSCA on all of us. The SSSCA or whatever it's called these days, is only possible in a M$ type world. I hate having to use M$ at work. I think I'd leave the country if laws were made that declared all alternatvies illegal. It's a freedom of speech issue. The country has really gone to hell when legislators can take the crassest of the entertianment industry more seriously than freedom as reflected in the Bill of Rights.
DMCA, Hollings, Palladium. What might have sounded like paranoia is now common sense.
For a transcript of what actually transpired
m l
in the courtroom, go here:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/4/25136.ht
You will find that the guy knows what he's talking
about. Double check your sources before flaming away!
Admit it, in KDE you still use konq for embedding web browsers in an app. Is there a simple way to replace that? Not a KDE developer, but from what I've seen, konq still looks pretty locked into KDE.
Of course, maybe thats what you want. the idea, is choices, choices, choices. And we dont have to run windows at all.
Question
http://www.ironfroggy.com/
This link was provided by someone who replied to my post. For those of you who haven't notice, CNN pulled the original article and replaced it with a more Microsoft-friendly one. Total bullshit. I am sure MS offered them a chunk of cash to keep this on the down-low.
. html
Go grab it here: http://sage.che.pitt.edu/~harrold/tmp/73B9A1D4d01
Why bother.
Sounds like this a game I would enjoy. Between RPG II and Encore/Gould (or should I say SEL ;-), I could have a lot of fun here.
You do realize that mozilla for win32 also uses MS's API's? At least I'm presuming so, unless they re-implemented outlook, ms-help, and vs URL's on their own.
Outlook: the mailing interface in mozilla is native, it already was in netscape 4.
MS help: just some html files make already great help.
what is "vs url's" (da snap ik nie).
I just can take you serious after these stated facts.
TCP/IP address changes in Win 95 force a reboot. Rebooting is not a good mesure of what is and is not part of the OS.
Which clearly makes *us* doing it ok!
The Free desktop that Just Works
He still should of known what linux is. Hell, I even heard linux mentioned in jeopardy on television. Sure its a geek show but it certianly is not aimed at cs students. This guy here suppose to teach MIS at a very high level. I believe unix is taught more in MIS related majors then cs ones because its suppose to be practical. Cs really is about mathamically theories and problem solving. It has nothing and I mean almost nothing to do with computers. I despise the circulumn. MIS is more practical in the real world outside of university. My brother has a masters in MIS and he had to learn assembler, fortran, writing programs to solve bussiness related problems, etc. He learned alot. ALot more then named b-tree algirythms. He actually learned how to solve a problem with a computer. Wow, What an experience.
Also MIT is not only a premiere school but a really expensive one. If I pay to be educated by MIT, I would demand an education experience above anything else. This guy can not fullfill this role and should reprimanded. I sure would not want to be taught by him.
http://saveie6.com/
If we stick with it and help them move towards a more user-friendly democracy, yes. Abso-frikkin'-lutely.
**>>BELCH
To me, Unix==kernel. Everything else is application space. I agree that many of the standard "low level" applications require /bin/sh to exist and do certain things, but they can all be rewritten without the system being unix.
Unfortunately I have to use Win2k at work, but I live in cygwin as much as possible. This adds a layer that has the same interface as the standard unix interfaces, but this doesn't make my Win2k box unix.
Going the other way, someone could scrap all the standard Unix commands (shells, tools, X, etc) and build a windows-like environment on top of a *nix kernel (think of wine on steroids). It would look like windows, it would smell like windows, but it wouldn't be windows. Even though cmd.exe would be just like on windows, the process model would be different. Signals, UIDs, "everything is a file", process oriented model (not tasks), so on and so forth. Hell, it'd support fork().
With work, you can make one application space look quite a bit like another, but the guts will always be different. Perl is a pretty good example of an application that really tries to be platform agnostic, but it does function differently on different systems.
Anyone who can review 36 millions lines of code in 8~10 hours is a genius in my book. This guy rocks! I guess he can write full blown operating systems like KDE when he takes a lunch break. If this man could not separate IE from Windows, ask yourself, who might?
Damn, I wish I was so cool like Madnick.
Outlook: the mailing interface in mozilla is native, it already was in netscape 4.
MS help: just some html files make already great help.
what is "vs url's" (da snap ik nie).
Not sure how to explain myself better (was that dutch?). The outlook: url actually launches outlook -- it's not something Mozilla does, it's something Mozilla calls in one of the IE API's (urlmon.dll I think, but I'm not much of a windows developer). I'm sure mozilla will work without IE -- the point is, it works with it. This is a lot different than IE being Mozilla's enemy, it's mozilla working with IE, and IE's API working well with mozilla. IE didn't have to be destroyed first.
A vs URL points to things in visual studio -- you can link to workspaces and projects and other things in visual studio, using a vs url. I'm not that familiar with it, I just don't think it's very useful except for sharing information between developers.
I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
This is in response to the AC who wrote, "show me a company that writes its own OS and browser" ... okay, here you go - QNX. It's actually an RTOS, it's VERY neat, and they use the photon browser for surfing around on the web. Check it out; it's a full RTOS that fits on a floppy ... neat, eh?
How dare they offer a web browser with their OS???!!! What gall!!! I demand that Microsoft withdraw IE so that we have no choice but to use buggy, slow, crash-prone, and generally shitty Netscape instead.
That's not really the point. What's at stake here is the principle, because that's going to set precedents. I'll come back to why that's important later.
Not at all. You're confusing the ability to render HTML (which is arguably a UI service, just as drawing a window or displaying a menu is) with the application known as a web browser (which is not in any way a necessary part of any OS). The former is what's become important to other applications, not the latter.
On a level playing field, I see no reason MS shouldn't ship both an HTML rendering service as part of the OS, and a web browser application that uses it. However, at that point, the web browser application should (on technical grounds) be completely removeable and replaceable by another product that uses the same underlying HTML rendering, without prejudice. (This, of course, relies on competitors having access to the same OS APIs as the MS web browser development team, and the information necessary to use them.)
The point is that this isn't a level playing field. By blurring the lines between what is a fundamental part of the OS and what is a value-adding application shipped with it, MS have forced a legitimate competitor (Netscape) out of the market.
Now, if you allow them to get away with that, you set a precedent that says next time, they can do the same thing to Real in the media market, AOL T-W in the instant messaging market, and so on. You basically create law that says forcing people out that way is OK.
If, on the other hand, you set a clear precedent that an OS vendor must allow competitors to develop the same supporting applications as they can, and must allow anyone interested to replace the supplied-with-OS apps with alternatives without prejudice if they wish to do so, then you have created an open-and-shut-case scenario should MS ever abuse their monopoly in that way again. Given the nature of the US legal system and the scale of damages it tends to award, that basically makes it likely that future abuses won't happen. But first, you have to set a clear precedent, and that's what the states' attorneys are presumably trying to do.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
CNN, a Time Warner AOL company, who happens to own Netscape, offering a strong anti-MS article. Really, wow, how facinating. I thought this was way news companies weren't supposed to own products.
What's next, the news company promoting fears of which they own remedies for?