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Ballmer Admits 'Linux Changed Our Game'
wackybrit writes: "We've all known Linux has got Microsoft all worried, but they've always denied it. On Monday at a conference in LA, however, Steve Ballmer (of Microsoft) confessed that the FUD surrounding Linux isn't quite what it was made out to be. The Register has also covered the story in an easier to read fashion. They point out that Microsoft has just changed a page on their site which originally derided Linux, but now simply states what 'Windows does better.'"
Really? Microsoft noticed linux? I can't believe it!
--
pants ahoy
He was right, it is the DEVELOPERS that have the real power; just not those who work for Microsoft.
"The chief enemy of creativity is 'good taste'" -Pablo Picasso
I thought the only word he could say was "DEVELOPERS, DEVELOPERS, DEVELOPERS!"
Who knew?
- ufcker.com -
Linux SUX! I use RedHat!
Among other things, it made them MUCH more security concious, and windows has been improving over the years... Hell, win2k is actually usable... to bad I cant say the same for XP...
I'd LOVE to ditch My windows machine completely, but, dammit, where are the Linux games??
The devil is not nicer, he is just trying to improve his appearence to seduce people easier.
My favourite Steve Ballmer quote from this article:
"We haven't figured out how to be lower priced than Linux"
(:
Ladies, form queue here -->
The funniest part is the claim that Microsoft products cost more because they're worth more. That's some outstanding logic for ya.
Not like the old page that said `Linux only had 128 MB swap files' and FUD like that. This page actually lists things that Microsoft does better, in a mostly factual, hype-limited way. They're not trying to be really fair to Linux, but at least they don't pull things that don't matter out of their rear and say `see? we're better!'. The things they list are, at least for a large part of it, actually important, and things that Microsoft does do better.
As much as I love to bash Microsoft, they're finally doing this right. At least with this page, anyways.
Ballmer now concedes that MS execs "haven't figured out how to be lower-priced than Linux.
You keep them on that task Ballmer. And let me know when they figure out how to be lower-priced than free. My bet, it'll take them a while.
/usr/games/fortune
What if instead of licensing it, they decided they'd just give it away and sell support and Office applications. Would people accuse them of being more monopolistic? I remember hearing that IBM at one point considered giving away OS/2, but decided it against because of fears of anti-trust penalties.
I like this clause: "In addition, open source components are often licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL), which may expose the OEM's intellectual property and source code to open source participants and its competitors."
I couldn't have stated it better myself.
Come on now. So we have a open source Unix clone or two. Now is the time to up the game and show them what we can really do. I work on mingw32, Wine and ReactOS. Why? Because of Linux and BSD. Linux and BSD have done to Solaris, AIX and HP-UX what ReactOS/Mingw and dlls ported from Wine will do to Windows NT/2K
Flame Off.
Free Unix? Free Windows. http://www.reactos.com
First they ignore you
Then they laugh at you
Then they fight you
Then you win
--Gandhi
i can't wait to see on that page "our server os has drm , linux doesn't", then we'll have "our server os incorporates perfectly with mpaa and riaa demands and will report everything the server does. windows roi though makes up for the enourmous bandwidth cost of your every move being transmited to the mpaa." show me server that does that. i'll show you how IBM is gonna make a lot of money. i personly think if this new proccessor takes off ibm should get into the ocnsumer processer market.
"....(Microsloth) does not contain licensing provisions that require an OEM, and potentially its licensees, to disclose the source code for its intellectual property in a widespread fashion to open source participants.."
Um... isn't the the whole point of OPEN source software?
Jesus Saves! And takes half damage (shouldn't the Son of God have improved evasion?)
What was his reasons for this? I don't remember any Federal judges smacking MS's hand and telling them to apologise for their anti-Linux diatribe.
Or maybe this a pre-empted attempt to "play nice" so the states have one less reason to want MS to bend over
- HeXa
This happened in 1998, but only inside MS.
... ... Availability/Reliability ... Scaleability/Performance ... Interoperability ...
I'm amazed they're doing what they now are.
From the (http://opensource.org/halloween/halloween2.php) anotated halloween docs, which were leaked in 1998:
------
Here are some notable quotes from the document, with hotlinks to where they are embedded. It's helpful to know that ``OSS'' is the author's abbreviation for ``Open Source Software''.
* Linux represents a best-of-breed UNIX, that is trusted in mission critical applications, and - due to it's open source code - has a long term credibility which exceeds many other competitive OS's.
* Most of the primary apps that people require when they move to Linux are already available for free. This includes web servers, POP clients, mail servers, text editors, etc
* An advanced Win32 GUI user would have a short learning cycle to become productive [under Linux].
* I previously had IE4/NT4 on the same box and by comparison the combination of Linux / Navigator ran at least 30-40% faster when rendering simple HTML + graphics.
* Long term, my simple experiments do indicate that Linux has a chance at the desktop market
* Consumers Love It.
* Linux's (real and perceived) virtues over Windows NT include: Customization
* Linux is emerging as a key operating system in the nascent thin server market
* Using today's server requirements, Linux is a credible alternative to commercial developed servers in many, high volume applications.
* The effect of patents and copyright in combatting Linux remains to be investigated.
* Note, however, that Compaq and Dell merely have to credibly threaten Linux adoption in order to push for lower OEM OS pricing.
Could it be that the open source community's quick responses to security issues, bug fixes and the realization that the community has produced a wide variety of generally stable, reliable products at a very reasonable TCO is forcing Microsoft to re-evaluate more than just their marketing tactics? It has to be harder these days to foist crap (like IIS) on IT managers without encountering at least a healthy amount of skepticism, especially when there's a quality, open source alternative like Apache waiting in the wings... Open source could very well be forcing Microsoft to become a better competitor by making them release better products! Real competition - better for all of us.
The problem with Microsoft is that they have a sincere fear of Linux. If you look at the page on the microsoft page, you'll notice that their arguments are largely focused on being stuck with a single vendor of Linux that may go belly up. That is the entire jist of what they are saying! Unfortuantely, taking a Microsoft solution also ties one's business to a single vendor. Next, they seem to complain that Linux is a disjointed and incoherent group of programs and that nothing is integrated. Well of course it is! The Kernel itself is Linux. The vendors put the packages (aka solutions) together themselves. This rethinking on Microsoft's part is nothing more than disguised FUD.
/.'ers actually read what the page says and then comment on it.
I hope you
The link to Microshits web page has some interesting comparisons. I tend to find the availabilty of choices good in general while they are knocking it because Linux offers more than one type of component/feature. And I won't even mention the areas where MS is holding back compatibality between the two OS's, ie. the SAMBA comparison for example.
But thats my quick 2 cents worth opinion.
A little competition will improve both operating system. Lets hope micro$oft thinks again about there new license agreements and makes the OS more stable and secure. I just wish there were more operating systems out there to take away Microsoft's monopoly powers and have a healthy competition. I'm sure Apples OS X should gain some more market share in the next few years. Is BeOS still alive? Any positive futures for them?
Opensource=Openmind=Freedom
I have seen comparisons over the years of various forms of Win32 compared to various commercial Unix variants, cost wise, and it has always been my impression that once you get to more than a few users, or into serious serving, Win32 was more expensive than Unix. Win32 only one for small print or email servers, that kind of thing, say for an office with 10 clients. It all came down to Win32 per-seat charges, where Unix has always had unlimited sendmail and print servers.
Is / was this actually true? Did / does it also apply to databases and other packages which have per-seat charges? I realize hardware confuses the comparisons, because commerical Unix has always been tied to specific hardware, making it hard to separate the prices.
Probably not phrased right. I personally have avoided M$ products as much as possible, because first, they have been obnoxiously buggy, second, they have only been useful if you want to do things their way, not if you want to do things just a little bit different, and lastly, because they have lousy business ethics. So I don't have any real world knowledge of how much Win32 systems cost. I am just curious about general cost comparisons.
Infuriate left and right
Beautiful...
Let's be honest, Linux is fun, but it's not a one-size-fits-all toolkit. There are some things (flame on!) that windows simply does better (games), though they are largely due to their dominance in the marketplace. Given a cheaper, better functioning product, people WILL switch.
It's almost nice to see MS trying to compete on the merits, though the IP comment about the GPL was a little backhanded.
It's almost... almost too good to be true...
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
You fucking suck dude. This is exactly the whole spirit of the Linux community and the fact that this is modded up proves it.
Let the show be what the show is. If you don't like it, change the channel and go have a glass of STFU juice.
In the near future Microsoft starts admitting that linux has it strongpoints. Microsoft slowly starts adopting linux within its newer OS's... Good or bad?
Some decent comparisons there, but then, along comes the FUD, I guess they couldn't resist:
Let's skip the meaningless "Better business alignment" and skip straight to the part that keeps the bullshit detector pegged at 10.
I think the GPL is pretty damn clear. If you redistribute the code, you have to license under the GPL. And if you don't like it, you can choose to completely ignore the GPL (thus falling back to copyright law).
Microsoft's "licenses" (which may change during the next upgrade, and even change randomly depending on the version of the product or where you bought it from, and may someday change AT ANY TIME), these licenses DO NOT allow ANY kind of re-distribution. They do not allow you to use the product you bought any way you like (even though this may not be enforcable, they assert it anyway). And you MUST accept the license, it's not optional. You could be sued by Microsoft for doing something in the privacy of your own home. Like using the wrong kind of remote access software (or whatever that one was). Or maybe this week the license will forbid copying MP3s. Or maybe next week it will allow Microsoft unilateral access to your pr0n collection. Who knows?
The GPL is straightforward, written in straightforward English, and most importantly of all, is exactly the same in all GPL'd software. You know exactly what you're getting and can reject it up front, if you want.
C'mon Microsoft, nobody except a few PHB's are buying this intellectual property cancer unAmerican anti-GPL crap, so GIVE UP!
Since I've heard that Windows XP/2000 has code that comes from FreeBSD.
It is interesting to note, though, that MS is essentially fighting an OS war that is very reminiscent to the old browser days of IE4 vs Netscape. In both cases, you have a free, enterprise level product competing against a commercially developed piece of software. (Of course, as we all know, Netscape lost). You would think that the people over at MS would see some of the similarities--but fortunately for them (and unfortunate for everyone else), the linux community is too splintered by its own individuality to create a unified distribution with the same ease of use as windows.
- Better business alignment
- with straightforward licensing and clarity of intellectual property ownership. (emphasis added)
I just can't see the truth in that one. Microsoft licenses are so long and complicated sometimes that I wonder if anyone would ever get much work done if they actually had to sit there and analyze it all instead of just clicking "OK", "I agree", etc.Bah, crybabies. They already have the most newbies using their products, now they're feeling threatened and trying to prove they're more money-hungery than before. Damn the corprate world!
We've all known Linux has got Microsoft all worried, but they've always denied it.
Umm... no, the haven't. Anyone who remembers the Halloween documents (and the subsequent Microsoft statement saying "ya, those were real") knows that they have always considered it a threat and they've made no secret of it.
In the words of the Wolf from Pulp Fiction: "Let's not start sucking each others dicks just yet."
python -c "x='python -c %sx=%s; print x%%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))%s'; print x%(chr(34),repr(x),chr(34))"
While Microsoft's new page is a nice change from the old one, it still contains quite a bit of their same old FUD. Here's a nice tidbit from the very bottom of the page:
To ensure proper management of its intellectual property rights, an OEM must carefully examine an array of licensing complexities around the General Public License (GPL) that govern Linux. These complexities have resulted in embedded and dedicated operating system companies such as Wind River saying that they are seeing "a growing problem due to the growing uncertainty of using GPL-based code in embedded devices". An example of this risk can be taken from NVIDIA. An NVIDIA programmer, in the course of developing a driver for one of its products, used a portion of code from a freely available video driver. The developer failed to realize the code was licensed under the GPL and would therefore require NVIDIA to release the source code for its entire driver. Because NVIDIA did not want to release the source code to its commercial software, the company incurred substantial cost to develop a new driver that did not contain the GPL code.
Companies need to recognize that in embedded and dedicated devices, such as server appliances, significant gray areas exist in the implications of the GPL's terms. Some forms of code linking and commingling may or may not trigger legal obligations under the GPL. As Michael Scott and Michael Krieger, a lawyer and computer science professor respectively, recently wrote, "Rare is the month when a lawyer who specializes in technology does not have a new client asking for help in untangling an open source code problem".
In other words, they are still yelling "GPL bad! MS good!", they're just using a more dignified approach now.
I find it especially telling to look at the example they used. They place all the blame for the NVIDIA programmer's mistake on the GPL. I'm sorry, but if you are going to use someone else's code in your program, it is your fault if you don't abide by their rules, not theirs.
An example of this risk can be taken from NVIDIA. An NVIDIA programmer, in the course of developing a driver for one of its products, used a portion of code from a freely available video driver. The developer failed to realize the code was licensed under the GPL and would therefore require NVIDIA to release the source code for its entire driver. Because NVIDIA did not want to release the source code to its commercial software, the company incurred substantial cost to develop a new driver that did not contain the GPL code.
Did anyone notice this: "...hot-fix support, and hierarchical storage management...." (windows 2000). "Furthermore, Linux offers no support for hot fixes and does not have a hierarchical storage management capability." (Linux) Hmmm, starange what are kernel patches then? By the way hotfixes (that usualy break something elses) from ms are always way to late. Also this hummors me: "Windows 2000-based server appliances provide advanced reliability features including a mature, well-tested journaling file system (JFS), which enables easy,..." "Linux now has over five options for a JFS. All of these are new to Linux and the depth of integration and regression testing can be scattered and the number of real-world implementations limited. The OEM will need to verify for itself the integration, depth of testing, and in-field results. With Linux, the OEM will have to take on the extra integration work to incorporate an add-in..." So what happened to the best file systems ever (NTFS) that ms was promoting. Also according to ms extra work on JFS by distributions, that increase realiabitly and stabilty is a bad thing according to M$. Last couple funny things i will leave of with: "..And no functionality equivalent to Windows File Protection--significantly increasing difficulty and time when recovering from a failure." I alays thought linux had file portecting, using users and groups and modes. (did Ms chmod -Rf 777 / after linux installs). "significantly increasing difficulty and time when recovering from a failure." - did these people ever try to use nt recovery console, to save windows (i think not). Hmm, resucing linux data using a boot disk, is so easy.
This idea is responsive. It attracted people like me to business and Slashdot in the first place. That they are new is almost beside the point. How will proprietary freedom be curbed, and Ballmer developed, in regimes that are interesting and repressive? Why would these interesting governments support the use of Microsoft to destroy an open society any more than they would sanction interesting business or abandon censorship?
Free Software is the hippest political idea around at the moment, perhaps because it has been hijacked so completely by the multinationals. Herd-like college kids and new political activists associate experience with a broad range of information, from cultural imperialism to Free Software to fascinating system.
But others (like me) see it as the best hope for a world in which gaps between the Microsoft and Free Software worlds are widening, and the have-nots are increasingly enraged at the fascinating information.
Proven, comprehensive operating system platforms delivering seamless integration, industry-leading scalability and performance, broad application support, and solid reliability.
Yes, given Linux's extremely widespread use, including at some of the biggest Internet sites in the world, Linux certainly has this advantage.
Faster time-to-market via powerful tools and an extensible framework.
Linux's Posix-based environment is proven, extensible, mature, and very widely used. Its Internet, services, management, and GUI frameworks are also highly extensible and industry leading. An additional time-to-market advantage is the immediate availability of updates and bug fixes throughout the community. This is in contrast with Microsoft's centralized development style, in which I am completely dependent on their efforts to deliver bug fixes.
Ease of deployment, interoperability, and manageability in a heterogeneous environment.
Indeed: score another one for Linux. Its POSIX foundations, widest support for network protocols and services, and multitude of options for management (including command line, GUI-based and network based), make it the clear winner.
Better business alignment with straightforward licensing and clarity of intellectual property ownership.
Yes, I very much prefer the straightforward licensing and clarity of the GPL over the muddy and complex legal agreements with a company like Microsoft. Furthermore, licensing costs for Linux are predictable in perpetuity. And, as an added bonus, I do not need to hire expensive lawyers to analyze the GPL--it is a known, standard, predictable agreement.
So, according to some study on webservers (probably funded exclusively by M$), IIS 5 performs better than Zeus 3.3.2. Yes, Zeus. Seriously, who in their right mind would compare Zeus to IIS rather than Apache and IIS? And I love how they use different hardware for the comparisons... kinda trying to imply that Linux doesn't work on "normal" Dell hardware, but only "expensive" IBM hardware.
Here's the quote from M$:
IWARS.
People, in general, disappoint me. Politicians even more so.
I followed the link towards the bottom of the ms/linux comaprison where it says ms makes a better web server platform. The benchmark they are quoting is over 1 1/2 years old and show that the ms based system had faster hardware.
Run your operating system on faster hardware then claim it is faster than the opposition. One way to get benchmarks in your favour.
The whole IP thing is just FUD. If yuo use linux to run your servers you are much less likely to fall foul of IP laws than if you use Windows in the same situation. Compare the usage restrictions in MS's EULA and in the GPL (for the uninformed, there aren't any in the GPL).
And then there's the SpecWeb99 link. The machines compared is Windows 2k with RH 6.1 in Q4 1999. If you actually bother to go to the full list you'll find that linux servers are generally faster than IIS running on the same hardware. Sometimes being over twice as fast.
So no, this isn't any "fairer" than the last page. It's just less full of complete untruths. Instead it has things that are technically true but not the whole story. A quite nice example of content free marketing.
Nerd: Derogatory term typically directed at anybody with a lower Slashdot ID than you.
Quote:
An example of this risk can be taken from NVIDIA. An NVIDIA programmer, in the course of developing a driver for one of its products, used a portion of code from a freely available video driver. The developer failed to realize the code was licensed under the GPL and would therefore require NVIDIA to release the source code for its entire driver. Because NVIDIA did not want to release the source code to its commercial software, the company incurred substantial cost to develop a new driver that did not contain the GPL code.
So basically you are stating that if you steal the GPL code, and then someone catches you that you must spend time to write the code yourself. Wow. What a huge risk.
I wonder why they are worried about that type of risk....
They're runnin' for the hills! After 'em boys!
Stop the Slashdot Effect! Don't read the articles!
I really have to commend Microsoft on this one. It took them long enough, but finally they're doing the mature thing and acknowledging Linux's power. I love that Ghandi quote by the way.
-------
"In times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act."
-- George Orwell
My Mom would NEVER run Linux, or yours... Macs OK.
Why?
GUI
That GUI is the same reason people copied the mac and made MS WIndows.
People what to indicate... not regurgitate
no syntax errors
no command line
no typos
no headaches
your mom would never be happy running Linux, even with buggy GNOME (so retarded I can cause it to barf a thread on a standard install on RedHat)
Apples Open sourced FreeBSD (Darwin) + Mach kernel + NeXTStep + Old Mac emulator + new driver stack model (IOKit) + Cocoa all make Linux.... any version seem pale. And a dual 1 Ghz G4 gets over twice as many RC5 keys per second than the fastest AMD dual MP mobo out there. (mainly because Macs have a large L3 cache and AMDs have no L3 cache)
But regardless of the speed, apple and microsoft have GUIs that old doctors, old lawyers, and your parents (assumed high IQ), would prefer over the hassle of a desktop only running Linux.
nobody ever likes to talk about this. Ever. If just someone would push ease of use, then linux has a chance. As it stands now the stock price of RHAT and LNUX tell the tale of Linux.
Hurray for GUIs.... they revolutionized the world and brought computers to the entire world.
Ballmer admits middle name is "Obvious"
From the m$ site:
A SPECweb99 study found that a Windows 2000 Web server could process more requests and serve more users than a similarly configured computer running Linux.
The study compared this with this. I dont know about you, but I find those machines to be vary dissimilar (a 667MHz w/ 2G Ram vs. a 533 w/ 1.5G). I find these (ms/rh) comparisons much more compareable.
"This potentially ties the OEM to a particular Linux vendor's distribution and its support programs."
"This can tie the OEM to a particular, potentially financially unstable Linux vendor and its support programs"
"With Linux, the OEM will have to take on the extra integration work to incorporate an add-in JFS or opt for a vendor-specific Linux distribution such as Red Hat, tying the OEM to that vendor for ongoing upgrades, support, and maintenance at an extra cost."
Wow, M$ saying that being tied to a single vendor is a bad thing, for once, they're right !
--- There isn't any problem that can't be solved by a small, low yield nuclear device, is there??
You guys saw him admitting that Linux made them change their ways.
I read it as "The reason the cost of Windows hasn't gone down is because of Linux."
Democrats or Republicans. They are both taking us to the same place and they are not afraid of us anymore.
This is true. Microsoft does tend to impose the One True Way (TM), which can simplify some things. However, other people regard the fact that you can choose the best technologies for your application as a positive.
Also often true, but: a) a lot of those capabilities are Windows tools that you probably wouldn't use in a Linux project unless you had to for compatibility reasons, b) a lot of them were open source packages that are usually packaged by the various distributions and are an apt-get away from installing, c) if they're open source, the extra licensing costs are zero anyway, and d) who says building everything into the OS is a good idea anyway?
And Windows is perfect?
It's good news that MS are changing their arguments to push their products over Linux-based solutions, because it tends to suggest that their customers (at least in this application domains) weren't listening to their old ones.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo
--Andy Finkel (J. Klass?)
The best part from the comparison page is in the scaling/performance block:
This can tie the OEM to a particular, potentially financially unstable Linux vendor and its support programs...
Microsoft is worried that a particular software package may tie users to a particular vendor. Oh the irony...
BTW - anyone know what a karma value of 'Excellent' means? Does this mean I've reached the cap?
Studies have proven conclusively that there is an inverse relationship between amount a person swears and the size his penis.
Letmeguess, it's to point where they have to pay you run windows.
Maybe that's why they are accumulating such a huge cash reserve...
-cmh
Short summary of "A Teardrops Falls": Ambush by ftp!
Wow, I just took a look at the top three items of the Win2k/Linux comparisons, and it's really good FUD:
Linux:
- No support for SSO, thus requiring end users to use at least two logon names and passwordsone for Windows and one for Linux/UNIX.
What? Have you ever heard about OpenLDAP? Kerberos? Samba? even NIS allows you to do that!
- Support for CIFS but only via Samba, not as an integrated, tested solution.
Not integrated and tested by who?? HP, NEC, SGI, IBM, Apple... all them sell Samba based solutions. I'm quite sure that Samba implementation of CIFS is way betters than MS's, well known for being broken and quite buggy...(on purpose maybe?)
- [...]it is questionable whether commercial Linux vendors will be around to provide support in the long term, [...]
<sarcasm>Yea, I'm sure IBM, HP, Sun, Dell, Intel, and SGI will all go out of business next week... and then, I will not be able to contact any other linux Company, that will not have access to the src, and will not be able to provide support for my uber-closed Linux systems</sarcasm>
Win2k:
- Integrated support for Windows NT®, FTP, HTTP, Appletalk, and Novell environments, which enables consolidated administration in heterogeneous networks. Wow! They have "integrated support" for FTP and HTTP!!! OMG!
And you only need to patch it every 5min!
<sarcasm>I doubt that any OSS operating system will ever match that level of astounding functionality</sarcasm>
Not to mention that MS ftpd is one of the worst ftp implementations I have ever seen.
BTW, have you every tried to get Appletalk working on Win2k? I had to do it once, I would prefer to burn in hell for the rest of eternity than having to do it again...
I will not bother with the rest of the list... but it's funny how people can bluntly lie like this and get away with it... *sigh*
Enough time wasted with this, I'm going back to work with my "inferior" OS, that saves my company loads of money, not to mention headaches... thanks God that I have a smart boss(hi Carl!) that isn't fooled by shit like this...
\\Uriel
"When in doubt, use brute force." Ken Thompson
Nice analogy... uhh... A cold winter would be better than a entire year of shitty XP headlines. moron.
I am not going to go through every point MSFT has on that page, but what I hope to show is that they are not changing their strategy, just their tactics to carry out the strategy.
It used to be that MSFT FUD was a set of bald faced lies, apparently the hope was that no one would check them out at all. Well people did, found out they were lies and went to Linux.
All of the new MSFT FUD is now more subtle, and appears to have supporting material in some cases. Now you can even check this stuff out, and if you are not very knowledgeable about software you can be fooled.
Point 1
Sum up as "Linux/Samba is not really compatible with Windows networking."
In fact Linux, and Samba do support almost all features of CIFS. When Samba has been incompatible it is because MSFT changed their implementation. For this matter, Win95 and Win98 are incompatible with W2K CIFS networking.
Point 2
Sum up as "Linux is not fully compatible with Active Directory"
True enough, but Linux is compatible to the extent that Active Directory is compatible with LDAP. In truth, MSFT is the one failing to comply with existing standards...neat how they twist this one around.
Point 5
Sum up as "IIS 5 is faster than Linux for SpecWeb99"
This is just FUD. The link they point to seems to agree with their assertion but how about this link instead. It sure seems to tell a different story on identically configured hardware.
Point 11
Sum up as "Windows has reliable drivers that are signed by MSFT, Linux doesn't"
Windows has NEVER had reliable drivers. Not all the best drivers are signed by MSFT if at all.
The situation is only somewhat better than Windows for Linux to be fair. First off most drivers are delivered with an MD5 checksum, which is good enough for most uses. Secondly you get the source most of the time. Finally, since when has NASA written drivers for MSFT ? (Thanks to Don Becker, NASA GSFC.)
Point 16
My favorite..."The GPL is nasty and dangerous and can force you to give away all your secrets."
First off the GPL is easy to understand, and very consistent. You get quite a lot for a simple price, "our changes to the code are to be made public with your codes binary release."
MSFT has a problem with this because they are in the business of keeping code secret, not open sharing of ideas. Frankly that is OK, and can be a fair way to do business, despite what many OSS evangelists will tell you. What it fails to be however is an advantage to the consumer of the final product.
Don't post innacurate information
If you do, I swear by my pretty floral bonnet I will end you.
People used to quote Gandhi :
"They first ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win!"
But as much as I like Linux, I know it still has about 1% of the market, mostly in the servers.
A lot of people that work with linux still enjoy back home their windows (dual ?) boxes.
And worst, they actually like windows and its apps/games.
If Microsoft changed its mind about linux, it means that they dont consider linux a competitor anymore or that they lost the battle and are trying not to lie about it any longer to preserve a bit of its image ?
What do you think ?
"Microsoft stock price is too high."
He said this a couple of years ago, when it was over $100. By golly, he was right.
One of the many reasons why M$ has been so successful over the years is because they are paranoid. Any company that seems remotely threatening, M$ will either acquire, destroy, or spread FUD. I bet Linux was on their radar long before the ween memo.
I remember an artical on /. that was talking about MS's implementation of Kerbros and they said that MS had changed it and it breaks some of the interoopability with standard Kerbros, and MS is saying that Linux doesn't support that standard.
Don't we all just love MS.
MS's licensing is about as friendly as the Federal tax code. I had to figure it out for a shop that included a MS-SQL engine, a web server that used said SQL engine, and a handful of programmers who needed to use visual studio and interdev. I'm sure for a large company it's nightmarish.
They have all sorts of different plans, and it was almost impossible to figure out what would be the cheapest way to go over all. My boss would ask me a question, I'd call our rep at CDW, he'd talk to the inhouse CDW licensing guru, and if that failed to produce a solid ruling (about 50% of the time), they'd call MS on a special number that I couldn't use myself.
If you know SQL but haven't used MS-SQL specifically, it's harder to learn about the licensing of the product than it is to learn how to admin it under normal circumstances.
License management is a huge burden on IT people.
If you have something like a MSDN Ultimate subscription (which is actually a very cool thing to have), you can get into lots of trouble because you can make stuff work without keeping track of the licenses. It's very easy to get behind the 8-ball, to lose track of what you've done. I believe that a lot of companies are in that position -- they try to keep the licenses clean, but when things are hectic they don't always cross the t's and dot the i's.
Of course this creates a huge potential liability, and gives MS an enormous lever if they decide to audit your company.
For typical non-geek workstations, we depended on Dell. We bought the machines with the software we needed, and counted on Dell to keep track of the purchase in case we got into trouble. It never came up, so I don't know if that would have worked.
All of this was very half-assed, but we were growing fast and there just weren't enough hours in the day to get everything done. It's clean now.
you will be asked to remove the GPLd code you used. If you remove that code you will not lose your rights to the other code because:
a) the fsf and its general council have clearly stated that they will give people chance to remove GPLed code.
b) no court will force you to surrender your code if you stop the breach of the GPL.
So the whole "you may accidentaly lose all your IP" story is a bunch of bs.
Could it be that Linux is becoming a target for MS' "embrace and extend" tactics? Such as happened to Kerberos?
And to really get the rumour mill rolling: Is this why Microsoft has reserved a booth at LinuxWorld Expo?
My opinion? See above.
I find it ironic that on their site the only cons they abould list about using Linux is with problems interfacing with MS/Windows systems. Seems to me like thats their problem, not ours. pH34r 7H3 P3|\|GU1|\|!
_______
Death wish, n.:
The only wish that always comes true, whether or not one wishes it t
Well I took a quick glance of the rest of the comments and saw that nobody responded to the claim on SMP support. It's true that that's something Windoze does better. I believe Linux's threading implementation can be much better as well.
Would love to be disabused of course ..
The article is very biosed.
for example:
"We have prided ourselves on always being the cheapest guy on the block--we were going to be higher volume and lower priced than anybody else out there, whether it was Novell, Lotus or anybody else," said Ballmer,
That is complete nonsence, linux is free and has been around since 1991, when I started using it in 1992 it was already a lot better than windows windows was running back then 16 bit code while linux was already 32 bit code. not only that but linux is free as in freedom and in price that makes it double free, windows not only is expensive but requieres expensive licensing.
The comparison of windows vs linux is not a legitimatimate comparison, since they are comparing windows to linux running on a windows environment, a better comparison would be windows vs linux in a unix environment.
There are many things windows can not and it is not design to do that linux does really well.
For example:
1. Diskless X terminals.
2. NFS version 3 support.
3. XFS JFS EXT3 journal filesystems
4. Comply to industry standards.
5. NIS support. sure windows has it, but have you ever checked how well it performs. it sucks.
6. user friendlyness, have you ever tryed installing windows in a disk that was not the primary IDE without getting the boot records destroyed. Linux can be installed in any partition with easyness.
7. multiuser, windows is not really multiuser, sure you can share printers and the filesystem with many other users but that does not make it a multiuser OS, how about sharing the CPU with the processes of other users.? Linux is a true multiuser OS.
8. Stability, I had linux servers up and running with an uptime of up to half a year, on overage a month, with windows at most the uptime is a day or 2.
9. CLI in linux is very powerfull, the GUI makes things even nicer, if there is a problem with the GUI you use the CLI and fix it, working remotely using a modem you use the CLI and can get a lot done. In windows the CLI is useless, not much you can do with only the CLI, you have to use the GUI, it is required, and if you are working remotely over a modem connection you can not use the windows GUI due to performance reasons, with X even with an slow connection there is always a solution like LBX for example.
10. performance on unix native tools is by far superior in linux, for example linux nfs is far better than windows nfs, however some comparisons are biased when done by microst because for a network filesystem comparison instead of making the comparison with nfs they compare with SMB (windows file sharing) and in the case of linux that is done using samba which is an application program so in linux is being done at a user level instead of a native hardware level like nfs would be. not really a fair comparison, if we were to choose all the tools that linux does natively at kernel level vs windows at user level windows would look terrible, but with windows being closed source it is hard to know if something is running at a user level (software) vs kernel (hardware).
11. the security of linux is far superior is not perfect but is much better, just read the bugtraq mailling list for this.
I am a linux consultant, have been providing linux support for many years. my web site where
I am planning on putting there some linux related information in the near future is http://www.consultorlinux.com
sergio
Look at these quotes from the story:
Perhaps now that they can't prop up their financial statements, they are trying to spin it by saying "we were trying to compete on price with something our competition gives away for free." Where have I heard that before? Let me see, oh yes, during the anti-trust trial, I believe, from that other browser maker.The recent statements about it being Apple's fault they haven't sold half as many versions of Office v.X as they had projected could also play into this strategy. "We would have made our quarterly projections, if Apple would have just advertised OS X more!"
From their win2k/linux comparison page:
Better business alignment with straightforward licensing and clarity of intellectual property ownership
[win2k]
The Microsoft licensing model does not contain licensing provisions that require an OEM, and potentially its licensees, to disclose the source code for its intellectual property in a widespread fashion to open source participants. An OEM building a server appliance with Windows 2000 Server operating systems and the SAK has the assurance the software code and added value it develops remain the OEM's intellectual property.
[linux]
To ensure proper management of its intellectual property rights, an OEM must carefully examine an array of licensing complexities around the General Public License (GPL) that govern Linux. These complexities have resulted in embedded and dedicated operating system companies such as Wind River saying that they are seeing "a growing problem due to the growing uncertainty of using GPL-based code in embedded devices". An example of this risk can be taken from NVIDIA. An NVIDIA programmer, in the course of developing a driver for one of its products, used a portion of code from a freely available video driver. The developer failed to realize the code was licensed under the GPL and would therefore require NVIDIA to release the source code for its entire driver. Because NVIDIA did not want to release the source code to its commercial software, the company incurred substantial cost to develop a new driver that did not contain the GPL code.
Companies need to recognize that in embedded and dedicated devices, such as server appliances, significant gray areas exist in the implications of the GPL's terms. Some forms of code linking and commingling may or may not trigger legal obligations under the GPL. As Michael Scott and Michael Krieger, a lawyer and computer science professor respectively, recently wrote, "Rare is the month when a lawyer who specializes in technology does not have a new client asking for help in untangling an open source code problem".
Yeah, last time I checked if you use parts of or modify the GPL'd source code that comes with a linux distribution you have to give your product back to the community. When you use parts of or modify the source code that comes with windows, you....ummm.....
Well I have to retract here; unfortunitely I checked my facts after I posted. I was dead wrong about Samba not supporting LDAP in 3.0. As of the July 8th Roadmap (http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=samba-technical&m =102614348413068&w=2) it will.
Sorry all.
As someone on the varbusiness site noted, Microsoft is *NEVER* friendly nor admits to FUD or mistakes *UNLESS* they are preparing some sort of new attack on their competition. I would watch that space for upcoming announcements with regard to new Microsoft licencing restrictions (Trying to make it illegal to use Win on the same computer as Linux??) or something else.
So that's why a lot of companies are working on technologies like DRM or censorware proxies so people wont be able to excersise fair use rights (I repeat fair use rights, not piracy), the right to speak freely and actualy control, what their computers contain and run?
Or are they just missing that opportunity (purposedly or not) in exchange for money and control?
hany
It's real fun to compare a produkt wat ''ll be discontinued in 9 months against a produkt what you can upgrade or use longer then these 9 months with full support from the Linux community.
:)
That's Competitive Comparisons
Assuming that MS doesn't turn out to be as insolvent as Worldcom or Enron, their current strategy seems to lead them out of software development and into providing services. With software no longer their primary money maker, it'll be pushed to the side probably much the same way that stability and security have been pushed asided for new features.
This may be one of a long chain of public announcements leading to MS support of OSS while they try to figure out how to lock in OSS users.
Beta is broken and the link to classic doesn't work. Stop wasting our time or there won't be anybody left here.
There does not seem to be a slashdot effect on the MS site. Can they use that as an advantage?. Since the site is actually dynamic (ASP + SQLServer + some serious hardware), I was expecting it to atleast blink. But no. I wish the story was posted in the morning when there would be more slashdotters.
Plain and simple most people use computers for web browsing, email, and word processing. In windows, if you're bored you have 4 games to choose from for free. With linux, many more games are included for free. This is the reason it will defeat Microsoft. When the average person on their 56k connection is waiting for a page to display they can play Mahjon or asteroids as well as a plethora, (learned that from the 3 amigos heh), of other games.
or: "You're too good. Now get the hell off my dad's polo field!"
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
3rd option: Negotiate a special licence from copyright holder of GPLed work under which you can keep borrowed code in your software and still distribute it under other that GPL license.
hany
Give me a -1 if you will, but the parent deserves a better mention.
For OEMs[compag aka hp and mike dell] considering or planning[choose us] to enter the server appliance [single application] market, the choice between Linux or Windows for a server appliance[SINGLE APPLICATION] operating system involves critical[please choose us] trade-offs[huh?] between platform[wINTEL] functionality[we 0wnz u], incremental engineering[3.1 3.51 4.sp1 sp2 sp3 sp4 sp5 sp6 2000 sp1 sp2 XP .net media center] and development effort[$40 bil], overall cost[PROFIT = Revenue - Cost], and, most importantly, time-to-market[Updates!]. Ultimately, the OEM's[$$] goal[$$$] is to select an operating system and tool set[that are designed to force you to use our software] that enable them[HPAQ, Dell, Gateway hell there are 3 left!!!] to get to market[End User Monopoly] quickly, limit development cost[MCSE dime-a-dozen], and differentiate their appliance[Competion?], all on a reliable[Not True: Ex. Exchange + no downtime = not possible] platform[wINTEL (by the way look at Linux IA-64 project, very promising)] that delivers superior[Proof?] price-performance[Single application machines versus multi-app machines? um no.]. In addition, OEMs[companies that are trying to make as much money as possible ie. fear of a new market] want an operating system[GUI, Window manager, office environment, Wordpad makes you want Word...] that delivers[UPDATES every week!!!] proven value[subscribing and signing a very long and resretrictive liscense] from a reputable vendor[Hp(aq), DEll] who will support[banking on their dominance] them for the long term[6 months in the comp biz is long term].
.net] delivering seamless [lots of single application boxes] integration[one and only one implemetation of an api], industry-leading[monolpoly] scalability[Fuji got 128 processors to work w/ MS; Unix scales to 5000 plus via IBM] and performance[Proof?], broad[monopoly] application support, and solid[when 95% uptime is good enough (thats what we get w/Exchange)] reliability.
[long_sentence]Server appliances[single application] built[constructed, hedged] on [the almighty] Windows 2000 Server operating systems with the Microsoft Server Appliance Kit (SAK)[not SDK but SAK] deliver four distinct advantages over Linux:
Windows 2000 Server and Advanced Server:
Proven[...to be broken into], comprehensive[.net is "open"] operating system platforms[the future is
Microsoft Server Appliance Kit:
Faster time-to-market via powerful tools and an extensible framework.
Ease of deployment, interoperability, and manageability in a heterogeneous[Windows on Intel as opposed to linux/xBsd/Unix on anything and everything, sounds more like heterougeneous to me] environment[GUI].
Microsoft:
Better business[WE have a CEO!!] alignment[exclusive contracts] with straightforward[read our EULA's every 2 weeks to see] licensing and clarity[if you're a lawyer] of intellectual property[patents, dma, aka RIAA MPAA pays us if we get this done] ownership[$40 bil].[/long_sentence]
It is simply a new face to the same story. Microsoft will not admit that it is absolutely incapable of using accepted standards without modifying it to make it incompatible with anything else and ONLY for that reason.
They will dig themselves a hole in the ground because their obsessive desire to control everything gets on everybodies nerves, including most of their "partners". And it is to these "partners" that this message is addressed. Microsoft is very worried that those companies have started using Linux in a big way and are very irritated with Microsoft's FUD because it goes against what they are experiencing in the practical day to day implementations, where Linux is stable, cheap, powerful and flexible.
However I still don't think that this will save MS' ass in the data center. The economy is bad and no one has extra money for MS games.
Windows advantage:
Built-in support for Single Sign-On (SSO), which allows end users access to all authorized network resources with a single authentication.
Solution: Build something like this in Linux, and trumpet it.
Windows advantage:
Support for both CIFS and NFS in an integrated fashion, easily enabling interoperability between UNIX and Windows-based networks.
Integrated support for Windows NT®, FTP, HTTP, Appletalk, and Novell environments, which enables consolidated administration in heterogeneous networks.
Solution: Build something like this in Linux, and trumpet it.
Windows advantage:
Via Winsock and other programming interfaces, both Windows and non-Windows-based clients or servers can seamlessly access a Windows 2000 Server-based network attached storage (NAS) server appliance
Solution Build something like this in Linux, and trumpet it.
The Windows advantage is always compatibility to LINUX! So turn the tables and Windows has no more advantages at all. Make LINUX more compatible to Windows, make it easier to seamlessly integrate LINUX into a Windows Server landscape and then, at least according to MS, there will be no reason at all to buy Windows.
You know, for all the crap we give Bill. I bet he would actually be pretty interesting to meet. I mean it's HIM and not us (or our parents) that made a fortune selling products that the general consumer jumped all over.
I wonder if he reads this site on a daily basis just like the rest of us. I've heard people say he's not that great of a programmer, but I bet he still knows his stuff.
For all we know, he could very well secretly have linux boxes that he plays around on.
In the end, I believe that Microsoft will use some BSD variant similar to what Macintosh has done... I mean, they copied before and it worked... Why not follow the same philosophy again?
IF they did do that... I bet slowly and surely, a WHOLE LOT of people on this site would start to reconsider windows. Not to mention the corporate world.
The man who trades freedom for security does not deserve nor will he ever receive either. - Benjamin Franklin
Blue screens of death
"This potentially ties the OEM to a particular Linux vendor's distribution and its support programs."
:)
Umn isn't that what MS does ? Isn't that what this page is meant to do ? Prevent users from breaking loose. Tie ppl to themselves. Poor MS
"He also addressed the licensing changes that the company put in place over the last year, calling them an important part of a long-term simplification strategy. "
.5 million + a yearly licensing fee. Managment nearly had a fit seeing these numbers and began looking at every possible solution. Now, some of the IT guys in the company have always tried to push linux to managment, the only downside is the switchover cost and converting a lot of our current systems over. They just pushed it under the rug and continued to pay the somewhat resasonable amount microsoft had asked in the past. Now that M$ has pulled this fast one on us, we're finally seriously considering alternatives to cut costs.
:)
The "changes" to licensing in the article have really hit my company hard. Were a medium sized company (400 people or so), should we jump on board with this new licensing thing microsoft has planned it will cost us
In the end Microsoft's new "licensing" stragey to implement their "Long term simplification strategy" will in reality force many of the medium sized smart and growing companies to search for more cost effective solutions. One of them being Linux/Unix. Once IT staff who were never exposed to the world of unix get used to the power of Unix along with its cost savings, only then will Microsoft start feeling the heat. People will become more reluctant to switch from linux (which is free) thanks to Microsofts new "pay us lots of money every year for upgrades to our buggy software" strategy on companies put into this situation.
Right now our IT staff is working around the clock to show managment that Linux is the cost effective solution for many growing medium sized businesses. Larger companies already stuck in the microsoft licensing trap will end up paying more and more each year to Microsoft and will eventually lose their competitive edge against linux which constantly is improving itself.
How are other people dealing with the Microsoft Licensing deadline (July 31st) in their company? Input is appreciated
lsdjflskdjf
This sig under construction. Please check back later.
From the MS page: However, these add-on clustering solutions come from various sources, do not conform to any set standards, and are often implemented on a particular Linux distribution
Nice to notice that Miscrosoft considers it a disadvantage if you software comes from one house.
The site where: "I'm right, as long as you ignore the things that prove me wrong", became a valid method of debate.
All your softare are belong to M$ so just STFU
I know MS sees Linux as their biggest enemy. But I can't understand... what is it that makes Microsoft fear them?
Microsoft's main target is the desktop. Today Windows is installed on nearly every PC out there. People still consider Linux "not userfriendly", and lots of apps don't work on Linux (people don't want alternatives, they want Office; they don't want alternatives, they want KaZaA), so Linux is not a real threat on the desktop.
And on the server market, I can't say that MS is doing bad either. I've read somewhere that MS has a marketshare of about 40%. And there are already people out there who claim that Windows XP's stability rivals that of Unix.
So just what makes Microsoft fear Linux so much? Linux is not a real threat on the desktop, Microsoft's main target.
Microsoft spending billions of dollars on program development while Linux rely primarily on volunterism and good will of developers all over the world. If Microsoft Windows only worthy competitor is Linux, rather than non-free operating system like OS/2, BeOS, VMS, Novell then I think our economic system is screwed. To think that a corporate monopoly has to take on volunteer efforts really disgust me.
Elsewhere in the document I found the phrase integrated application integration. I can only conclude that the author has gorged himself on buzzwords and succumbed to FUD poisoning.
Would it be unfair in this context for me to report what happened when I tried to post a comment to the varbusiness story? I got: If your car has major structural flaws due to faulty engineering and shoddy workmanship, would you weld a "reliability framework" of 2" pipe around it? Or just get rid of it?
Then we return to Microsoft's phobia of GPL virality: Implication: if the accidentally included code belonged to Microsoft, NVIDIA would have been allowed to incorporate it for free, and would not have "incurred substantial cost". I doubt that. Anyhow, this whining about "substantial cost" implies that the owners of the (non)plagiarized code somehow victimized NVIDIA. This is like saying that since you wouldn't lend me your car for my upcoming vacation, I "incurred substantial cost" renting one.
- Linux supports many kinds of authentication via PAM. The only uses of clear text authentication I can think of are telnet, ftp and r*. Any OS supporting these legacy protocols must necessarily allow clear text authentication.
- I think the complaint about "configurations of individual permissions" refers to some additional refinement of permissions in Windows. In reality, the Unix permissions scheme adapts fairly well to real-world issues, providing good security without too much inconvenience. The Windows permission scheme, in contrast, appears over-complicated, poorly understood by Windows admins, and frequently ignored/bypassed.
- Any encryption natively supported by Windows, except for the simplest symmetric cipher implementations, is highly suspect. Not being subject to peer review, it could contain accidental or deliberate weaknesses that reduce the entropy of keys of leak portions of key material. It is well known that the NSA puts pressure on commercial vendors to introduce back doors - they did so with Crypto AG and Gretag.
I'm not sure the FUD-filled utterances of Microsoft deserve this level of scrutiny. They are aiming for that narrow group of "appliance" OEM's who are so lacking in skills and self-confidence that they might cave and pay Microsoft for protection.there's more in intellectual property than just copyright, don't forget patents! look at the OpenGL-mess and it won't be clear, that there will be a free OpenGL 1.4 for linux.
And a dual 1 Ghz G4 gets over twice as many RC5 keys per second than the fastest AMD dual MP mobo out there. (mainly because Macs have a large L3 cache and AMDs have no L3 cache)
Hardly. It's because PPCs have a particular CPU instruction (that doesn't exist in most other CPUs, including Athlons) that happens to be very useful for the kind of calculations that RC5 requires. Doesn't help for any normal sort of load though. Go read the RC5 FAQ, f'chrissakes.
If it is interesting to the editors (and obviously a lot of others), why not post it? Just because MS-zealot-trolls demand that they stop? Hah.
Trying not to drop into an ad-hominem cheapshot
The last project that I know of which Gates authored was a ROM Basic. The Basic interpreters which followed for various early microcomputers were written by his assciates at MSFT. Of course whether or not Bill still writes code I have no actual knowlege, but nothing I've read from MSFT suggests that he acts in any capacity but architect / vision-leader.
I think this 'aura' of a brilliant coder plus his wealth is exactly the primary MSFT strategic advantage. I know dozens of lawyers, MBA's, executives who seem to beleive the following:
This guy (company) is fabuloulsy successful so their product must be just wonderful
and:
He's this really brilliant programmer / geek and that's the basis of it all
And because these folks haven't got a tech background they're basically taking it on faith. honestly it's insidious, I've seen an entire company (very big one) in a different business say 'wow that's great, lets emulate it ... ohh and yes lets also go with MS in the Data Center! [doh!]. (They fired an MIS director and then a CIO who couldn't make this fine strategy actually work in practice.)
Now what *is* true about Bill (IMO) is that he's really bright (and that his early commercial coding was largely in either assembler or on DEC PDP / Vaxen used for emulation of 8080/z90/x86 systems). Where to my knowlege he applies this is strategy and architecture, and if I don't like his choices, I'm the first to admit they've been effective (if underhanded and illegal) in the market.
Second, for 2 decades MSFT aggressively hired the very best and brightest CS grads. A freind who teaches in one of the better university CS departments observed this and on that basis only started investing in MSFT. That was a very good investment strategy for him :-).
Today I think even the financial types are beginning to realize that some of this is smoke & mirrors. I think the combination of unreasonable licensing changes and the slap on the wrist they just got from SEC are just the sort of thing that these people pay attention to.
Microsoft has always been brought more or less kicking and screaming into standard technologies. netbui vs tcp/ip; WINS vs DNS; NT Domains vs Kerberos|LDAP. Often they have implemented open technology (DCE) in the internals, just not making these the preferred API's.
Of course the whole time I and other opensource types have been looking on and saying *yikes* you want to put this cruft in an enterprise??! MSFT is highly feature driven and lusers love features. Nowhere near enough coders (or architects) work to the priciple that the least code that will do the job is usually the best solution.
Througout, Gates has pushed Basic as the language of choice [shrug]. Gates I don't really want to meet, his original partner Paul Allen, also a billionaire who has said "Blame me for having to type the backslash" ... he doesn't want to meet me in an alley :-)
I will say that I'm glad Gates is focussing on technology again. .NET has promise, and the mono initiative will make it open. His foundation is also giving big money in important areas of medical research and he cares about the right stuff, (e.g. HIV/AIDS).
Linux is Linux, if One need clarify their dist: <Dist>/GNU Linux
bsds are of course just BSD
Odd to think that, back in May, a typical job ad on the MS site was couched in the following terms: LEAD PRODUCT MANAGER [Job Code: N05rc-an ] Be a part of the core team running product management for the .NET Platform and Evangelism Group. As Microsoft heightens its efforts to increase our mind share with developers, the .NET developer platform efforts are becoming increasingly important. Be a part of the core team driving our leadership with developers and winning against Java and Linux.
>
Job Location: Redmond, Washington
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right out of the M$ advanteges over linux list
"clarity of intellectual property ownership."
how about Clarity of EULA ?
As of Postgres v6.2, time travel is no longer supported.
this girl is HOT!!!
. ht m
http://www.canalrcn.com/progs/betty/anamariao_c
A lot of people don't seem to understand this. It's not a question about what the end-user can do. The question is what the software houses and publishers can do. Publisher uses Linux, publisher releases proprietary software, publisher risks tripping over GPL and forcing their work to be open to you. You might like it, but the publisher who actually did the work might not. The software world isn't out there to supply RedHat with free software.
And the rest of your comment is just plain FUD. I guess you can spew it like the best of them. But that's okay, an educated response isn't what I would come to Slashdot to see either. Just more garbage like you.
M$ knows the government is watching them. They know that any one of these days they can REALLY be split up.
What would you do if your company were in such a situation?
I'll tell you what I'd do. I'd purposely let my competitors gain a bit of market share, but keep them in check at all times. I'd invest in Apple so they don't go kapoof. I'd play up Linux as a competitor just so "they" think M$ isn't really a monopoly any longer.
Don't fall for this people. Not saying that it's happening, but be on the lookout.
Now for my second point:
M$ has a concentrated effort to kill their competitors, but Linux doesn't. When's the last time Linux embraced and extended a protocol to mess with M$'s implementation? Like never. And when was the last time M$ changed a standard and broke Linux compatibility? **cough**Samba**cough**
Until there's a concentrated effor on behalf of the Linux community to mess with M$ in return, this competition isn't really anything they're afraid of.
Let's just say a day comes when Linux gains so much market share that M$ really starts feeling the heat? What can they do? They can make their own version of Linux and "extend" it till they kidnap it all to themselves. And this would only occur "IF" (and that's a big IF) Linux ever gains THAT much market share.
eTrade SUCKS
And KDE is way less responsive and robust than Win2k/XP... (unless the 'doze hasn't been reinstalled for at least 4 months)
hmm, what else?...
And to preempt others' comments:
lightweight windowmanagers = good, blah, blah, blah.
No they aren't.
Look, that show is the US version of "Pop Idol", which was shown in the UK a few months back.
We now have both the winner & the runner up attempting to out-do each other in the charts. The results of two teenage boys trying to out-balad each other has been fucking painful. You don't want that, trust me!
he cant't, because of GPL. He doesn't want to be infected ;-)
---
But it's worth pointing out 51 times.
It seems that many of the points made on the MS website have more to do with Linux not working with windows. For example:
No support for SSO, thus requiring end users to use at least two logon names and passwords-one for Windows and one for Linux/UNIX
So, if you only use Windows, you only need 1 password, but if you use Linux, you'll need one for us and one for them. So automatically they decide that EVERYONE must use windows, and you have an option to choose Linux for a couple of minor things. And this is MS first point in all of the comparison, thus you'd think it was one of their strongest/most important arguments.
I demand a million helicopters and a DOLLAR!
How many MCSEs does it take to screw in a light bulb?
Two.
1 to hold and babysit the light bulb while the other one goes and fetches a Unix guy to do it for them.
I find the Win2k/Linux page on Microsoft pretty humerous. With all the faults (of Linux) they mention they seem to presume that you actually want to run Win2k *and* Linux.
I think this situation is what the LGPL is designed to cover.
Karma: Food Fight (Mostly affected by Date Plate).
Too bad I came in too late and this is going to wind up at the bottom.
This is a classic case of creative quoting, just like we're used from both the Register and especially slashdot. Balmer said nothing of the kind. What he actually did was confirm what MS has always said, he just said it in different words.
[Quote] "We may have a high price on this one, but look at the additional value and how that value actually leads to a lower cost of ownership despite the fact that our price may be higher."[/Quote]
Open software may be a good thing, but with free software you get exactly what you pay for.
Who wrote that at MS? Marketing dept. ?
I think we're going to see MS "embrace" Linux and make it the kernel of its next OS...wait,wait, don't run away yet -- here's the idea:
:)
.NET framework (MONO) to Linux? There can't be any other reason, they know that if software runs on both platforms business will move to a the more stable of the two, so it could only hurt their OS sales. Unless they are planning to transistion to Linux and are going to use MONO as a migration path.
--OS X is doing very well, so building a propietary GUI over an open kernel isn't unheardof. Plus MS has always followed in the footsteps of MacOS. I think it has something to do with Gates wishing he were as cool as Jobs.
--Microsoft's security woes would be largly taken care of. All services are handled below the GUI, so they could just get rid of most of their buggy *cough* IIS *cough* software. And, since user accounts wouldn't own the entire system, viruses would have a harder time propagating.
--Why would MS encourage the porting of the
I know it sounds pretty far-fetched, but I think that within two years, we're going to see a version of Windows built on Linux (or possibly BSD).
A reputable, moral company doesn't do this kind of direct product comparison. This is exactly because it introduces too many temptations for exactly this sort of dishonest FUD. A good company leaves it to third parties.
When I was working at HP (pre-Carly) this was strictly against company policy (the HP-way), exactly because HP wanted to be a company whose reputation people could rely on.
I guess I don't really need to convince anyone here that MS isn't a reputable, moral company though.
I'm just in shock! Microsoft lying to further their own product? Naw....I mean, they are only supposed to do what's in the public good, right?
:P
Oh wait.
on the other hand, the paragraph " For OEMs considering or planning to enter the server appliance market, the choice between Linux or Windows for a server appliance operating system involves critical trade-offs between platform functionality, incremental engineering and development effort, overall cost, and, most importantly, time-to-market. Ultimately, the OEM's goal is to select an operating system and tool set that enable them to get to market quickly, limit development cost, and differentiate their appliance, all on a reliable platform that delivers superior price-performance. In addition, OEMs want an operating system that delivers proven value from a reputable vendor who will support them for the long term." makes me wonder if they aren't secretly using linux on their servers.
It's been a long time.
That's GNU/Herd :-)
I agree with everything you've said.
While I don't think that MS should be allowed to get away with it, what they are doing is the same slimy marketing that most companies do. (Not an excuse...a fact.)
In short: They highlight thier weaknesses as if they weren't true. (Or in this case, make thier competition's strengths thier own.)
As a rule of thumb, if an advert or spokesman says one thing, I reverse it to see if the opposite is more likely. This is a quick way to ID a lie.
Words are powerful, and this is yet another case where MS is hoping that the majority of people won't see what we know MS is legendary for; FUD and lies.
They've already entered the death spiral. Most of their income was from OEM sales. Those have been gone since the recession started and PC manufacturers are warning that we haven't hit the bottom of that slump. But even back when times were good, that company had to start witholding dividends, avoiding taxes, and generally cooking the books. BillG's not going to be at the helm. Notice the timing of his departure? Notice the shift from R&D to marketing, litigation and legislation? This is how a death spiral starts. To preserve revenues, a company raises prices, which leads to lower volume which leads to ...
-- Scientist: You aren't going to leave me here, are you? Boagh! Thump...
How can they even justify things being close to cheap. You buy one MS product and you're forced to buy the other 800 just so everything will work "correctly". That must be what Ballmer means when he says "We may have a high price on this one, but look at the additional value and how that value actually leads to a lower cost of ownership despite the fact that our price may be higher" I really love this comment though..."We haven't figured out how to be lower priced than Linux. For us as a company, we're going through a whole new world of thinking" Perhaps they're actually considering using the word "quality" in their design dicussions now?
-- Scientist: You aren't going to leave me here, are you? Boagh! Thump...
this is not text, the subject says everything, this is only here to avoid the lame lameness filter.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
This happens every time a court gets close to announcing a verdict with respect to Microsoft's anti-trust actions. Look back when Jackson was getting ready to announce his verdict - the same thing happened: MS announces that "Linux is pretty good - not as good as Windows, but pretty good."
Now: cat MS_statements | subtext.filter
"See, we have competition, and it is doing pretty good. So we cannot be monopolists, and if you so rule, we will appeal and point to this as evidence of bias."
cat MS_statements | subtext.filter | ms2english
"Bias against Microsoft = disagreeing with anything that makes Microsoft money"
www.eFax.com are spammers
First of all, puting winshit on a real computer, with Linux on a virtual machine will yield an incredible speed difference. The Linux system will have less ram, and less processing power.
The Linux vm will be affected by winshit's memory management and other issues. If the winshit system crashes, Linux will come down with it.
Look into Broadcast 200, midi synth, and audacity. All of which are included with Linux Mandrake.
Buy a real computer for it to make Linux run faster.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
This is a great example of pure FUD being spewed by Microsoft, they are blatantly misrepresenting the facts. In this case it's pretty much an outright lie.
Talk about lack of professionalism! Microsoft is a many billion dollar company, you'd think they'd have more professionalism by now. Then again, look at the current U.S. economy, it seems a lot of large companies these days lack professionalism, they're run by money grubbing greedy bastards.
Sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken - Tyler Durden
Well, I guess Microsoft decided to give the Linux developers a checklist of things to implement or improve over the next few years in Linux. So, they can have a more "competitive edge" on MS.
:-)
Thank you Microsoft.
~ kjrose
He also addressed the licensing changes that the company put in place over the last year, calling them an important part of a long-term simplification strategy.
"I personally reviewed most of the key decisions that went into that, and I personally will take most of the blame, credit and responsibility that goes along with it," he said.
This is explained by this.
I just spent a minute to quickly read the Linux cons on M$ page... really funny. I understand they won't update it once Linux improves a point, but many things there don't make sense. Of course, Linux doesn't do ASP .NET... nobody at all does :P Seriously, any M$ product should be considered a standard? What are they thinking?
is "The Register has also covered this story in an easier to read fashion."
Heaven forbid someone should actually have to spend more than thirty seconds reading about significant issues of the day.
The Register: When USA Today is just too complicated for you.
Is in fact an excellent, well performing webserver. Despite having to pay for it, it's a quality piece of software and runs on a variety of platforms.
Gates knows modern coding! I argued with him 20 mins.
I have the transcript here somewhere, but basically he was 100% versed in all high tech activities in the engineering community, including all negative points against apple.
He loves to debate non-emloyees and I got him to throw papers onto the ground in excitement of the moment.
It was a wonderful 20 mins, and as a non MS user, most of my life, I have to say I was shocked that Bill Gates is extremely competant.
He is one of only 15 different high tech computer companies founded by a programmer that did not replace himself early on with a businessman.... he held on and made an example of what happens when a typical programmer is in charge of a fast growing publishing company.
Gates knows his stuff, really. I have to admit it.
And it was rejected.
I guess Slashdot editors have something against me.
Go figure.
Expert Java EE Consulting
We have prided ourselves on always being the cheapest guy on the block--we were going to be higher volume and lower priced than anybody else out there, whether it was Novell, Lotus or anybody else.
Bull-fucking-shit. Read it as:
We were the mother-fuckers who tried to drive out the competition by selling below the profit line, by employing prisoners and enslaving governments of different countries, by changing our file formats and then charging for upgrades. We are also the guys who try to shove some grass-fucking shit down your throat even if you don't want it. If you fuck with us, we're going to sue your damn asses.
Yeah they noticed Open Source and Linux! Why?People tend to notice better things, things that do actually work and things that are alternatives to that Redmond-user-friendly-piece-of-fucking-cloud-mixe
1. "we havent learned how to be lower priced than linux."
You are forgeting the fact that the cheapest dual 1Ghz G4 cost 2,999.00 U$ and that is only for hardware and OS. Ad at least 459.95 U$ for the Office v. X for Mac that your Mom would like to use and you get ~3,300.00 U$ box. Well i don't know your Mom but mine would newer go for it. But on the other hand my Mom is very happy with her Linux box running "buggy GNOME" and so am I.
Apparently the only way to compete against MS is to not be a company
that generates income enough to compete on the same level of developemnt
as MS. To be a company means to be attacked by MS with their
anti-competitive practices.
So a bunch a independant freesoftware developers who represent "freedom"
is the only force to counter the ongoing "constraints" of MS.
It the same group of freesoftware developers that are responsible for
getting MS to at leat claim they are going to start producing quality
software?
Microsoft is a criminal, proven in court, and now they are using the money
they got while being criminals, to do what?
What better way to defeat freedom, creativity and innovation than to put
constraints on it.
So MS thinks constraining others is better than the freefom of others....
PS - my Linux box has been running for about a year now. My wife runs the oh-so-stable Win2K at work and has to reboot once a day. Yeah, that time is free.
Fucking moron.
Its funny, in almost every every comparison on M-Softs list, it read to me like "Linux has this, but ". With the exception of ASP support, almost all of the features that are supported on Windows are also supported in Linux, as --->FREE--- (this word was omited from just about everything in the Linux column) add-ons mind you. And the funny thing is, it seemed to me that the whole comparison was done based on a Windows network (ie. Linux supports SMB via Samba...), which most of these features wouldnt be necessary if there wasnt a need for Windows connectivity on the network... Basically what I got from the page was if I want to set up a Windows based network with Active Directory running IIS for ASP support, I should probally run Windows, if I have a Windows server, Linux can act as a client with a bunch of add-ons, but if I wanted a less expensive network with little to no tech support that I wouldnt use anyway (after all, checking the various FAQs and LUG's on the web prove to be more helpful than some pimply faced intern whos reading from a script on screen anyhow) I can run Linux, which has the capability to be backwards compatible via add-ons with the Windows network that Im throwing out... Thanks M-Soft, thats all the reassurance I need...
Oh... and by the way... M-Soft, with all the great features of Windows, forgot to mention that when you go with Windows as your higher priced native alternative to the less compatible with Windows networks Linux, your also getting your enterprise locked into M-Softs licensing scam... after all Mr Balmer, who Im sure is missing lots of sleep over this issue, if your execs cant figure out a way to make Windows cost less than the competitors free OSS alternative, just lock your customers into slavery with legal trickery and evil EULA's....
As I almost did while I was laughing really hard at this statement:
"Windows 2000 Advanced Server supports load balancing clusters of up to 32."
As opposed to the load balancing cluster of 10,000 (yes, ten thousand) Linux machines that Google uses.
Ballmer, speaking Monday at Microsoft's Fusion 2002 partner conference in Los Angeles, said in this new competitive landscape, the software giant relies even more heavily on the expertise, contacts and value-added-services of its business partners to compete effectively against the Linux threat.
Translation: They know more people, have more customers, and throw more money at their sales force.
Not a great long-term strategy, if you ask me -- relying on your existing bulk to carry you through. Many companies have been shot out of the water because they thought they had more momentum than they did.
So what happened? Predictable: businesses stopped buying upgrades!
Coupled with this, it turns out that the consumer market is largely saturated. In other words: most people that would tend to want a computer at home (at least in their current form-factor) already have one.
The result? Predictable: people stopped buying new computers!
Now add to this mix the dot-bomb and other economy-slowing incidents of late.
All of this, of course, would have a tremendous impact on Microsoft's bottom line. MS depends on the never-ending upgrade cycle and new consumers for cash flow. What to do? What to do? Ah! I have it! Force customers into a "you don't buy it, you rent it" licensing scheme, thereby insuring steady cash flow!
This is why Microsoft changed their licensing scheme, pure and simple. I'm not fooled. Anybody that understands MS, MS' structure and the computer business isn't fooled. My boss wasn't fooled, and that's why we're actively working to move away from Microsoft and MS-based solutions toward Sun Solaris, Linux and, perhaps, Mac OS X.
Classic example. People will pay $200 for a cat, but if you try to give them away, nobody wants one!
Even Balmer knows that you can't go below zero, and even Balmer can try to say something funny once in a while (surprised?)
Then he repeats what MS has always said: the TCO is lower.
And that is true: the number of linux/unix machines a single admin can handle is nothing compared to the number of windows machines a single admin can, for example.
Training users for windows machines is a breeze (and productivity is higher) because everything works exactly the same way, compare that to linux's 1001 different user interfaces, and the complete lack of anything that resembles decent online help in 90% of the apps and tools. What open source folks don't seem to realize is that help and docs should be written with those who need them in mind, instead of as a reference for the ones who already know how it works.
In the company division where I work (100 employees) there's one admin dealing with all servers and all workstations, including buying, configuring and installing all new hardware and software, and doing all training.
PC's are being replaced all the time, and there's no standard setup because each gets different software depending on the job it's for.
That's a part time job, he's also charged with some non-IT tasks to fill up his time.
The total number of admins in the entire company (500 employees) is one per division, which brings the total to 4. We would easily be able to do with half of that, if the buildings weren't located 100 km and more apart.
An OS is something you buy once, but people have to be fed all the time, so even if you can do with a single IT staffer less, windows is cheaper than linux in the long run.
All the time a user spends on getting proficient with the software (and OS) he's using is wasted time, and that's ten times longer for unix/linux than for windows, meaning it's costing money.
That's a great thing to note, but in actuality, when an OEM or developer builds an application that is competing with other open source applications, it's at a big disadvantage if its source is closed. Certainly it's an option, but who when you've got a dozen choices for (good) open solutions, why would you be interested in a closed one?
The requested URL
I don't have any idea how well Windows does SMP (the only report I've gotten firsthand from a friend was with NT 4.0 SP5 vs. Redhat 5.2 with a custom-built kernel on a dual-Celeron box, but Redhat creamed NT back then... don't know if the story's changed).
The threading implementation bit, however, I can say is complete FUD. At the moment the threading implementation is slightly less than *twice* as good as WinXP's implementation, which was an improvement over Win2K's.r y/l-rt7/.
Here's a good article (good series of articles, in fact, comparing many low-level features of Windows and Linux) http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/libra
AFAIK, the "thread implementation" FUD got started from an article that stated that at the kernel level Linux managed threads the same as lightweight processes... the part the FUD-mongers *don't* tell you is that the article went on to say that the deal was not that threads were slowed down to the point of LWPs, but that LWPs on Linux executed much faster than threads on either Solaris or Windows.
Hope this has done a good job disabusing you ;)
In post-9/11 America, the CIA interrogates YOU!
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/Embedded/sak/eval uation/compare/advantage.asp
straightforward licensing...
Industry-leading scalability and performance...
Proven reliability...
a more secure environment...
an array of licensing complexities around the General Public License...
Does microsoft get karma for being funny?
I mod down anyone who says "I will be modded down for this", regardless of the rest of their comment
That Register article was way too biased.. I expect that from slashdot not from an internet news si-- oh wait nevermind.
1) Crashes more often than Linux
2) Attracts more hackers and viruses than Linux
3) Forces you to upgrade more often
Linux is free. Windows costs money. You get what you pay for, right?
This space left intentionally blank.
"but now simply states what 'Windows does better.'"
So is it just a blank page?
"I can't drive 55. It only goes 38."
According to the Microsoft page, Windows can do NFS. Is that true? How well can it do NFS? What versions of Windows can do this? Does anybody know anything about this? Seriously that would be a really cool thing to see, no matter how poorly it did it.
> Linux is free.
Free as in freedom, not as in price. You need to pay for it through training, but that training pays itself off.
Picture it this way:
In windows, when you have a problem, first you need to learn ancient Sumerian then learn Sumerian magic, but once you learn it, you can do most anything.
In MS Windows, when you have a problem, you go to a one of many Druid wizards and beg them to help you. If they feel like it, they will and things are all roses. If they don't or if you can't find one that has the skills you need, you're stuck. And don't *ever* try to get around these wizards for they are quick to anger and will smite down your operating system at their whim.
Microsoft:
Better business alignment with straightforward licensing and clarity of intellectual property ownership.
Yeah like, "Once you use our product we own both you and your children."
"With sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine." -- RFC 1925
I just think it's rather amusing that, in more than one part of the article, Microsoft uses the argument that certain solutions in Linux "tie" you to a specific distribution. ...which makes perfect sense. Look at all of the different versions of Winders that you can run SQL Server 2000 or Exchange 2000 on.
There are so many flaws still remaining in their arguments that it makes me brain 'urt, but at least they're fighting with jabs and uppercuts instead of rabbit punches and shots to the groin.
Behold, the power of fleas...
To GPL and RMS or whoever invented GPL:
FUCK YOU!
And also that they have a settlement with the SEC [sec.gov] in which they have been ordered to cease and desist "cookie jar" accounting practices?
Exactly how many times is the government going to order Microsoft to obey the law before pressing the big red button labelled "Nuke"?
People should go read the original VARBusiness article and not just the 'summary' at The Register. Ballmer only admits that you pay less for Linux then for Windows. He'ld be stupid not to admit that since anyone who can count can tell that. He still claims that you get more value out of Windows. He even invokes "lower cost of ownership". All this means is that Microsoft is switching to use the same arguments against Linux that Sun, Oracle, and others have tried to use against Microsoft over the years. This probably means that they are losing on the 'basically suitable for task' technical discussions. That in itself should be considered a win for Linux and Opensource.
From the VARBusiness article:
Instead of leading with price, the company has changed its
go-to-market strategy to present a value proposition to customers and
partners to explain why a solution from Microsoft delivers more
capability at an appropriate price.
"We are actually having to learn how to say, 'We may have a high price
on this one, but look at the additional value and how that value
actually leads to a lower cost of ownership despite the fact that our
price may be higher,'" he said.
havent we been saying this all along?
/. as well :)}
hasnt the world been agreeing with us lately?
$5 +0 = 0 (Cd costs to burn them for linux)figured making a spare set just in case
$100 + 100 + 100 + 100 +100 +100 +100 +100 +100 (licenses for Windows clients) (figured conservitavly)
well, not just the world, I am sure the aliens read
then I wouldnt have to start that partition..ever
Microsoft OLE DB Provider for ODBC Drivers error '80004005'
/templates/GlobalItems/HomePageFunctions.asp, line 3
[Microsoft][ODBC SQL Server Driver][SQL Server]Login failed. The maximum simultaneous user count of 150 licenses for this 'Standard Edition' server has been exceeded. Additional licenses should be obtained and installed or you should upgrade to a full version.
thelocust[dot]org
I'm not very keen on the marketing half-truths in the MS document. (Disclosure - I use Windows mostly and Linux occasionally.)
The obvious thing for the Linux community to do is to build a point-by-point rebuttal and counter argument to the MS document.
Does anyone have some Wiki space that they would like to donate?
Regards,
Jeff Veit
If microsoft is really going to stoping spewing nonsense, and start dealing in reality, maybe they will drop their lawsuit against Andersen and Pella for using the term, "windows."
How ya like dat?
With Linux growing and improving at unprecidented speed and Apple's new aggressive attitude Microsoft may be in for a really hard fight. The MS execs are right about the cancer reference, at least in regards to Linux. Linux is spreading to everything it comes in contact with. Apples new aggressive marketing tactics and new products are VERY compelling and in your face. I don't think its inconceivable(sp) to see talks about licensing the Mac OS in the not to distant future(if they can figure out how to do it and not get raped).
Microsoft is in for some tough competition from some very difficult directions. I like it. All this competition meens we are going to get some really great technology and some really bitchen deals. Bring it on!
Mike
I read through that nice new comparison page. I laughed most of the way through because of Microsofts claims of increased time and cost for developing the integration of almost everything they comared. I find that most hilarious since when I install most Distributions right now, they come with most if not all of those features already enabled and integrated. Now I don't know how Microsoft came up with these claims of increased costs, my guess is they took someone at Microsoft that has never heard of or even tried Linux and said make a server that compares to our Windows 2000 Server offerings and write us a report on it.
If I was an OEM/System Integrator, once I have setup a working server for one customer, with the features MS Compares against Linux, I would be able to configure further servers for other clients with a lot less time involed. Microsoft makes it sound like with Linux you have to learn how to integrate software over every time you install a system.
Regards,
Ryan Pritchard
Fun Extends All Basic Life Expectancies
Microsoft just raised the price of their software.
And with their new licensing plan, you have to pay for it again, and again, and again. Every year. You don't know what the price will be next year. Microsoft might raise their prices next year. They might raise their prices again, and again, and again. And there's nothing you can do about it.
Shouldn't you be using Linux?
That's what I get when I try to read the story. Only MS IIS gives that message, apache doesn't have that message.
Hehe, that gives a great punch to the story on theregister 'it costs more because its worth more'. Yeah, right, server too busy, it can't even handle a little bit of web load.
--- Hindsight is 20/20, but walking backwards is not the answer.
Linux is not Windows. Quoting ZD...give me a break. I wish they would just go back to making Office.
"However, these add-on clustering solutions come from various sources, do not conform to any set standards, and are often implemented on a particular Linux distribution."
What are they talking about?
Hmm, MPI and PVM are standards, more so they are _the_ standards, and are supported in Linux beowulf clusters.
Even if it were true, with Linux clusters in the top50 (not a typo) of supercomputers, whatever they use for clustering is a standard on its own. Beowulf so widely used that it is a de facto standard too.
The MS stuff is not a standard and only implemented on a particular MS distribution...
Actually, LSF runs on RedHat, Suse, OpenLinux, TurboLinux (LSF v4.1), Debian, and Suse. It even says 'tested with', so it doesn't even force you to use one of those. So which particular Linux distribution did they miss (ok, mandrake and gentoo)? And which "potentially financially unstable Linux vendor" does that bind you to if it'd very well possible to run it on the other distributions, just not tested by the supplier?
Maybe MS thinks clustering is mainly failover, but that's much less valid for stable operating systems.
This new page will not survive long either.
--- Hindsight is 20/20, but walking backwards is not the answer.
4 people in IT :.)
500 employees
HA HA HA HA
I'm sorry but you are so full of crap.
-
Looking beyond that fact, yes there are more choices with
linux but the admin can choose ONE and thats what
everyone will run, unless a geek wants to run something
else. Choose KDE or Gnome. end of discussion.
- The cost of virus prevention doesn't fit into
your formula.
- I can set up a system running LTSP for 500
employees for an incredible price that will handle
99% of the day to day activities a typical employee
needs. Power users need special consideration and
more powerful systems, maybe integrate ONE windows
file portability issues. Still need more than 4 admins.
- Microsoft product upgrades usually also force
hardware upgrades. Linux or BSD do not.
-Training people that already have experience using
microsoft products is a breeze. For complete newbies,
there are still a LOT of issues people have when
learing how to use a computer whether its running
linux or windows.
-Training is NOT a waste of time. Until computers
can communicate with workers using ESP, all employees
will need training to do their job. Period. Ten times
longer for linux?? Look we're not talking about
training people to become admins. We are training
people how to; log in, get email, start office suite,
print. With the GUI interfaces for unix out today
those tasks are not much more difficult than on
a windows machine.
I don't know if anyone else noticed this (and not that a different OS would always respond any better), but the Slashdot effect created the "final words" on this subject.
/sections/News/breakingnews.asp
Following the text of the article was:
error 'ASP 0113'
Script timed out
The maximum amount of time for a script to execute was exceeded. You can change this limit by specifying a new value for the property Server.ScriptTimeOut or by changing the value in the IIS administration tools.
I think Mauve has the most RAM. --PHB (Dilbert Comic)
My alzheimer patients have the same problem. Over
and over, I have to tell them how to do things.
Sour grapes is often used as a synonym for jealousy. This is incorrect. In fact, the term originated in the fable "The Fox and the Grapes". The fox, upon realizing that he will be unable to reach the grapes, decides that they were probably sour anyway. Thus, "sour grapes" isn't an expression of jealousy, but a justification of failure.
For instance, if you have a new Porche roadster, and I will never be able to own one myself, I would merely be jealous. But, if I attempt to steal your roadster, and fail to do so successfully, I can justify the failure by deciding I didn't like the color. This would be "sour grapes" precisely.
I assert ownership of all trademarks and copyrights on this page.
If it was not for Linux there would be a few $$$ with IIS
The original target of this bundling was Netscape (when MS noticed netscape was making up for lost browser revenue with server sales). It probably remains as a free bundle because of Linux/Apache but they weren't the original motivation.
>Free as in freedom, not as in price. You need to pay for it through training, but that training pays itself off.
the only training you need is a 39 dollar linux book
Microsoft:"Better business alignment with straightforward licensing and clarity of intellectual property ownership. "
Just think of it as Microsoft saying "MINE, MINE, MINE, MINE! It is all for ME. I get all the rights to the property and licensing in my terms.
MINE, MINE, MINE, MINE! If you want to know the current rules just go to me because it is ALL MINE, MINE, MINE, MINE! "
See Microsoft is being honest. "From a certain point of view.", Obi Wan. IT IS THE BETTER BUSINESS ALIGNMENT FOR MICROSOFT.
The drivers are and have always been plentiful. But not always very reliable. In fact, that used to be MSFT's own defense for the Blue Screen of Death: third party drivers crapping out windows. So their solution? The whole MSFT certified drivers program, which is fine, but if I had to rely only on MSFT certified drivers I wouldn't be able to use my current video card, printer and network card (all from well known manufacturers). So, the moral of the story: MSFT can claim to have wider support for consummer hardware (not that it matters that much in the server market) but "reliability" that's another story all together...
If Microsoft point out the faults of Linux it allows the open source community to fix these faults, thus levelling the playing field.
Last I checked, ALSA had a driver for some of MOTU's MIDI timepieces.
I believe there's some support for high-end audio cards such as those from (Hammerfall???) too.
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
The significance of this is as a milestone: by their own admission, MS can never again be considered the ONLY choice.
I'll admit I lean Linuxward. But I don't require that MS die, be ground to ashes, and be scattered across the moons of Pluto. All I want is a fair playing field, and genuine competition. No "I win because it's my ball." No "embrace, extend, take over." Just "Whoever has the best product for the job gets the contract, ready, set, GO!"
I submit that Linux has improved markedly during the years that they suddenly realized they were competing against Microsoft: we got richer desktops, a more complete SAMBA package, performance improvements in networking and SMP, etc., etc., as a direct result of trying to catch up with the front lines of competition. Way to go, folks! [insert applause.wav here] Three cheers. Because now there is competition, and MS now has to pay attention to what Linux is doing in return.
To me that is the ultimate compliment. It means Linux has achieved its most significant goal: MS can't just do whatever it wants in the future. They also have to react to what the rest of the world thinks. MS and Linux can't help but both benefit from this kind of competitiveness. And the real winners will be the computer-using public.
"He also addressed the licensing changes that the company put in place over the last year, calling them an important part of a long-term simplification strategy."
Yes, It makes it much simpler for Microsoft to take a larger portion of our money!
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
That's because Linux is the bare *kernel only*, not the distro of applications that run on top of the kernel.
I'd say 50% or more of the things MS says are not "integrated" are default installs on most distributions. Almost all of the rest are easy. I'd call that integrated... Samba, for example, if not default, is an option that can be installed with a single "click" in the installer. Same with Apache. Same with Sendmail.
Want a mail server solution under Windows? oops, gotta buy Exchange. Doesn't seem that integrated to me there... A fully functional MTA (usually sendmail, sometimes qmail or another mail daemon in security-conscious distros) is in nearly every single distribution as a default install.
No single logon??? Hmm... pam_smb? Or going the other way, SAMBA as the domain controller.
Better? Yes. Still full of FUD and twisting of the truth? Come on, it's Microsoft.
Now, of course, when making the distinction between kernel and distribution, the line IS blurry for MS - SMB and IIS ARE heavily integrated into the Windows kernel. But is that necessarily a good thing? Many who care about security and stability don't consider it to be so.
All someone has to do is set up a distro the right way (Not necessarily the end user - A distro creator could do this) that addresses nearly every single one of MS's points.
Oh, ASP not native? Maybe because there's a better solution? PHP, mod_perl, how many other options that blow away ASP? (Maybe not ASP.NET from what I've heard...)
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Well certainly competing with an open source product is difficult and probably a losing proposition. The only thing that you can do is to ensure that your closed source product is much better than the competing open source product. As the open source community continues to improve their product the closed source product will have a harder and harder time remaining superior.
As one individual put it: Tough. Adapt or die!
Open source is here to stay so software vendors will just have to adapt.
The race isn't always to the swift... but that's the way to bet!
Microsoft:
Better business alignment with straightforward licensing and clarity of intellectual property ownership.
Which is why people in the embedded community are avoiding MS like the plague. Of course, "straightforward" isn't the best word to describe your relationship with MS when you license their products. I think "bentoverforward" is more accurate.
But look what Ballmer goes on to say:
"We are actually having to learn how to say, 'We may have a high price on this one, but look at the additional value and how that value actually leads to a lower cost of ownership despite the fact that our price may be higher,'" he said.
I disagree. The GPL says that if you take GPL'd source code, modify it, and then distribute binaries compiled from that modified source, then you have to release that source back to the community. This means that if a piece of software is GPL'd or a piece of software uses GPL'd code, then you can always get that source code. If you can get the source code, you can compile the binaries. If you can compile the binaries, you can use the software for free. Of course, you may not be able to obtain all of the resources that program needs if they were proprietary (e.g. movies, maps, databases) so you may not be able to _use_ it as you would the proprietary distribution that includes that software, but the software _itself_ would still be free. Quake and Quake II are good examples of this. The source is free, the data files are copyrighted.
Also, the GPL does allow you to _use_ the software for free. The "community service" part comes in as a stabilizer in the case that you want to use the code. It ensures that if you take from the community (using their coding time to your advantage) you have to give back to the community (allowing them to use your coding time to their advantage).
I'm confused about throwing paper to the floor and having a transcript...
Reading this you have to belive that they are just going to start telling nothing but lies and half-truths...I mean what Linux user can't take every one of those points and counter-point without thinking for a second.
They used to be able to bring up some valid points
Wonder why? Well, they're probably tired of having everything they say being thrown back in their face. So, they have decided they aren't going to win over the server room, and they are aiming for the business side.
This is probably preaching to the choir, but M$ rules through fear, and Linux has no "target"...What company do they aim for...Redhat? SUSE? IBM?.
This is what scares M$ the most...Linux can not "die"...even if they killed it today, it could come back anytime...even 10 years from now, stronger and better than ever.
If register were an anti linux site you would never quote it, it would be a "rumor monger," or a FUD spreader. but because it bashes MS, it is a credible source.
double standard.
Is might be flamebait and I might lose some precious karma but, I must speak on this.
Who cares.
We all see this on a day to day basis everyday on slashdot. How MS is this and how Linux is that. We all know Linux is better. We know it. We have seen it so who cares if MS changes a webpage. This news site is becoming like a bridge club where we all gossip about who did what. I wanna see reviews on the latest GPL'd software. I want endless information of the latest greatest hardware. I WANT A GIRL WITH A BEER AND WEARING ONLY A THINK GEEK BABY DOLL T THAT READS "L337 H4X04"
That is just my two cents.
~Char Lander
Brothers and sisters I have none, but this mans father is my fathers son
This might be the site you're thinking of. It contains quite detailed consideration of the structure of MSFT's finances.
I think the complaint about "configurations of individual permissions" refers to some additional refinement of permissions in Windows. In reality, the Unix permissions scheme adapts fairly well to real-world issues, providing good security without too much inconvenience. The Windows permission scheme, in contrast, appears over-complicated, poorly understood by Windows admins, and frequently ignored/bypassed.
I wouldn't be so quick to dismiss this point. Windows does offer finer-grained permissions control than UNIX, and this is important for certain types of collaborative situations. The Windows user interface implementation is pretty awful, and makes them hard to set and administer, but we shouldn't discard the book's premise just because it has a poor cover.
Ka-Ping Yee gives an elegant example, and a somewhat less elegant sample solution, in section 4.8 of this paper.
*> CSection 1: "Seamless integration into heterogenous environments"
... thus the OEM must focus
claim: Linux does not deliver comparable heterogenous interoperability.
For example:
No support of SSO, thus requiring end users to use at least
two logon names and passwords - one for Windows and one for
Linux/Unix
This very first claim is laughable. Linux supports many more authentication
mechanisms then Windows. It's the Windows client that doesn't support SSO.
Linux supports Kerberos, NIS, and PAM for plugging in any of a number of
authentication mechanisms.
claim: Support for CIFS but only via SAMBA
resources on development, integration, testing, and ongoing
maintenance of the OS, increasing development cost and slowing time
to market.
The reality is that in the case of Windows, the OEM (Microsoft) does this
development, integration, testing and ongoing maintenance. In the case of
SAMBA, somebody else does this. The cost is in fact somewhat higher for
the SAMBA development team, since Microsoft changes the underlying protocol
without documenting it, and doesn't make it fully public and/or unencumbered.
That cost, however, is born by the SAMBA team (the only visible aspect of
this is that some features may take longer to be supported).
claim: aside from compatability issues with W2K, Samba has known backwards
compatability issues with the underlying Linux OS (cites Linux file
system quota interface differences between various kernels).
The reality is such issues get resolved and fixed. Microsoft itself has
had compatability problems between various versions of Windows with SMB
(er CIFS).
claim: Linux does not support trust relationships across domains or
forests and thus cannot act as a trusted alement in Novel Directory
Service or WinNT Domain based networks. This makes it difficult to
integrate Linux based server appliances into such heterogenous
environments.
This is another laughable claim. Microsoft makes a proprietary extension
to Kerberos, so no other player can act as the server, and then they claim
that the folks who support Kerberos are the ones with interoperability
problems? This is just disingenuous. Windows clients should be fixed to
use PAM authentication, and we should be allowed to pick and choose
authentication mechanisms. Microsoft's the system that's limited in this case.
Section 2: "Industry-leading scalability and performance"
This whole section is not worth dealing with. There are plenty of real
world examples that one can point to to debunk scaleability and performance
claims. How many of the top 500 supercomputers run Windows vs Linux? How
many of the top 500 clusters run Windows vs Linux? How many Windows based
mainframes are there? How many Windows based appliances are there, compared
to Linux? Unless somebody thinks there are valid arguments in this section,
I won't bother addressing it at all..
Section 3: "Comprehensive application support"
claim: (paraphrased) Linux doesn't directly support ActiveServerPages or
ASP.NET
counterclaim: Windows only supports ASP and ASP.NET. Linux has many different
ways of providing web services, and dynamic wep pages. Cold Fusion, Chili-soft
and others provide lots off capabilities that meet or exceed those provided by
Microsoft's ASP.
claim: Linux has no available framework for developing distributed or web-based
applications and no integrated implementation of COM, DCOM, Enterprise
Java Beans, etc..
counterclaim: Windows has no available framework for developing EJB, CORBA,
real JAVA apps, etc. This one is almost laughable. There are several IDE's
(unlike in the MS world, where Microsoft's dominates) to choose from. In the
Java case Sun itself provides Forte which runs just fine under Linux. There
are more possibilities in the Linux world, so I'm not sure I understand
what they are actually trying to claim. Surely they aren't just lying...
Section 4: "Proven reliability with enhanced recovery and data protection"
claim: Linus now has over five options for a JFS (journalled file system).
thus the OEM has to spend time and effort choosing and testing.
counterclaim: Unlike Microsoft, which has 1, and if it doesn't work the
way the OEM needs it to, no amount of effort can be made by the OEM to
resolve the problems. The OEM will need to test no matter what. The
difference is that if testing fails in the Microsoft case, the OEM is out
of luck. In the Linux case, the OEM can try one of the other JFS systems,
and/or fix the code if necessary.
I don't really see a need to do much else with this section, the OEM choosing
either system is going to need to do testing. In the Windows case, it either
works, or the OEM has to work around whatever doesn't work, in the Linux case
they can try alternatives, and/or fix problems. I'm not sure how Microsoft can
really turn that into an advantage for Microsoft, no matter how hard they try.
Their last bullet is the only true claim I'm encountered so far:
claim: driver availability and certification can be inconsistent in Linux.
Many of the drivers have received little if any testing and are offered
as non-supported drivers.
of course, in the Microsoft case, source code to none of the drivers is
available, so the OEM is out of luck if things don't work correctly, in the
Linux case they have a fighting chance. The driver availability in Linux
could certainly be improved upon, and will as it gains popularity.
I'll skip several sections to save time. There last section, and claims
are related to how the GPL will magically suck away the OEM's intellectual
property. Do we need a rehash of Microsoft's deliberate misinformation campagin
with respect to the GPL? The GPL is a lot shorter and more concise than the
licenses you accept to use the Microsoft kit. The FAQ explains it quite
compeltely, and debunks the myths that Microsoft is trying to propogate.
There example is ludicrous. If someone uses GPL code, and decides they
don't want to abide by the GPL, they can rewrite it to not do so (as in
the NVidia example they provide). If they had availability to the Microsoft
code (via their "shared source" license) and done the same thing, they would
have been hauled into court, fined, and much nastier. The GPL folks simply
pointed out NVidias mistake, and it was resolved without going to court. I'd
say that's a far cheaper proposition..
They are selling the xbox for $150 less than the cost of manufacture. If they can just get the cost down to $150, then they can give them away for free! That must be how they are learning to beat the price of Linux.
Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see. - Mark Twain
perhaps it was just me, but it seemed that all of microsoft's arguments for windoze were based on the fact that you trust microsoft more than the open-source community i may be way off base, but i know I, for one, DON'T!!
Base 2 yields only ARTIFICIAL Intelligence
<looks-like-flamebait>
This is really, really going to sound like flamebait, but it is actually a serious question.
Is there really a difference between distributing free GPL'ed Linux and dumping? Could MicroSoft or someone take you to court for distributing an OS for free?
It gets murkier if you take MS out of the picture... Say you have Company A and Company B. They produce (say) competing recipe management tools. Company A also sells advanced CAD/CAM software. If Company A GPLs their recipe management program and distributes it for free in an attempt to destroy Company B while A lives off CAD/CAM revenue, can B cry foul?
</looks-like-flamebait>
I still hate the way X handles copy/paste.
The problem is I can't select text- select a new text - paste over that text.
Windows:
Select text, copy, select new text, paste.
X:
Delete new text, select text, paste over new text... aaarg, the text is gone and i don't know where to past!!!?!!
This is a problem I encounter many times, the way ctrl+c/v/x is just BETTER for me.
When that is said Gnome2 and KDE3 handles ctrl+c/v/x just fine between each other.