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Interview with Tony 'Say No to Windows' Bove
An anonymous reader writes "XYZ has an interview with Tony Bove, author of the upcoming book, "Just Say No to Microsoft". From the article: 'With this book Bove intends to help readers rid Microsoft from their life- this is easier said that done, but it is certainly possible. The book goes on to list alternatives to the Microsoft programs on which people have become dependent and probably think they cannot give up.'"
From experience, any thing more than 11 steps is not worth it!
And from the average user's perspective, anything more than 0 steps is too many.
MS and Windows is not all Bad. Not to mention how much software is avaialable for special industry only on windows not linux or macs.
Most of us can't, and don't really want to "just say no". For example I have clients that are lawyers and doctors that are very happy with their windows software.
Stuff that isn't available in linux. The just say no or linux only group always propose stuff for you to get by without ms, but some of us need to do more then use word and excel, or don't want some custom jerry rigged solution.
...a replacement for Microsoft Exchange. His only mention is how "...Microsoft designs its software products -- especially Outlook and Exchange -- to lock people into using it...". Until a good replacement is found for Exchange you will have a hard time prying it from the cold, dead hands of thousands of businesses worldwide...
(And I work in a shop where most of us do dev work on linux boxes... but we all have windows partitions for Exchange. So damn handy for scheduling meetings, knowing who is in and who is out of town...)
-everphilski-
I dont believe its about riding of Microsoft, I believe its about giving a fair chance for alternatives. Only with competition will the end user benefit. If Microsoft isnt the one that everyone is supposed to hate it would have been another company. I am not a fan of Microsoft either as I do NOT run any windows software at home, but it was because of Microsoft's so called "crappy software" that pushed the open source community to create these great alternatives such as openoffice.org, linux etc ...
GL HF!
1) It assumes there's a good reason for people to abandon MS. Security is close, but as we've seen with recent holes in Firefox/Mozilla, as other tools get popular, their security will come under attack, too. The price, perhaps, but 'free' versions of anything lack meaningful support, which kills it for a significant number of end users. Therefore, if there were a convincing reason for everyone to change (other than personal bias), this would be much more meaningful.
2) It assumes that it's the MS programs holding people back, when many desktops are tied because of third party software. For example, in my every-day job, I support dozens of workstations with Macromedia and Adobe software installed - neither of these run natively under Linux, and they run horribly under emulation. Yes, you can find replacement photo editors, but not really replacement video editors that are on par with After Effects, or replacements for Flash that have 95%+ installation base.
Mooniacs for iOS and Android
Which will make being enslaved in the corporate underground salt mines that much more pleasant.
The baby's fine -- please stop sending business cards.
I can understand if you prefer Linux to Windows or don't like Word or something (I **hate** Powerpoint), but the whole not using any Microsoft products for the sake of feeling alternative/rebellious is just really immature and annoying. Microsoft makes a lot of good software.
I really wish that the Linux community wouldn't sink down to the level that Microsoft has reached. Releasing subjective papers on what works and what doesn't will not do anything for people except cause political arguments. Since most TCO and benchmark data is skewed one way or another, releasing whitepapers and books becomes irrelevant. Most budget managers and IT managers realize this. The people in charge (given that they know what they are doing) researches data from other companies. They ask questions like it worked for Company A so could it work for us? They do not look at opinions and unreliable sources. IMHO, this is one reason why Linux has not made it to the desktop - many companies are scared to move their user base over to a radically different interface. Not many companies have made the move, so everyone else is scared to jump first. They are not scared to move their servers over, since only a small handful of people interface with it - provided the services retain a high level of reliability.
Victory shall be mine!
to make our lives easier? I mean Linux has come around to make it easier for user to work to an extent (I still don't see anything as friendly to computer newbies on the linux systems as windows, but it is getting closer and closer), but to go 100 percent away from Microsoft is almost unrealistic for most people. Remember most people don't even know that you can network iTunes for playback with out buying the songs. Nor do they know what a MKV is, what the different of an OGM and XVID is, or what TCP/IP settings are needed to use a VPN (the last one puzzled me for a couple days.. turned out I was given the wrong IP... from a tech guy)
Microsoft might be a monolpolistic company but for many people it makes their lives easier. I'd love it if they didn't have the same business practices as they currently do but let's not make our lives more inconvient.
This interview sounds like another ranting guy. But yes I don't support Microsoft wholy (I got my Windows heavily discounted from school, I don't use Microsoft Office at home (At work we get it through Compaq, so it's already paid for) but going insanely against them will not help save anyone. Apple would love to step up and set themselves up as the next Microsoft. I'm sure their a little piss with what Microsoft did (with grabbing Apple's own Windows style technology, that they in turn took from Xerox who took it from their programmer who created it), and if they could trade places they would love to be the next giant, and with their love of "Apple approved" hardware, I'm sure could find some ways to close off competition. (remember if Apple was in charge, ATI and NVIDIA wouldn't compete like they do now, each trying to make radical strives, nor would there be any other sound cards except for the one or two companies apple approves of)
Besides all his problems with Microsoft seem to stem from either hatred, or the fact that people who use Windows are stupid. (claiming never to get a virus on a mac isn't a small miracle, I never get virii on PCs... Why? Because I do the same shit he does. I have a anti virus program that has been completely dorment since installation, except when I actually test it, and it performs perfectly then)
Maybe I'm wrong but I don't see why this is "news", when a guy writes a book or something about this stuff, let's hear info about book, not his ramblings..
And my one quote from him?
But if there is a monopoly, let's get out the rocket launchers and take our shots, please!
advocating wholesale violence... tsk tsk.
Eliminating Microsoft is a good way of increasing your computer costs.
It might be hard to see from the end user perspective, but it's crystal clear from a developer perspective. But don't take my word for it, take Joel's:
If someone's going to do a new application, it's much more likely to be a Windows application. If someone's going to offer technical support services, they're much more likely to focus on Windows support. If someone's going to make hardware, they're much more likely to focus on getting Windows supported first.
This all means if you're not using Windows, you're going to pay for it with time or money.
(Read the whole article at http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/fog00000000 51.html)
They act like drug dealers. They let people copy their software "illegally" for years until it became almost ubiquitous. Then they cracked down after everyone was already "addicted" to make huge profits.
Developers: We can use your help.
Microsoft Project is the most widely used project management software that corporations use, and it's only available for one platform: Microsoft Windows. Not OSX, Not Linux, Not BSD, Not Sun, Not Palm, Not Amiga, etc. This means that anybody who manages work in a company *has* to use Windows. And yes, I know that Microsoft Project actually sucks for complex project management, and that there are better Project Management packages out there, but most of them only work for Windows also and they don't have the base or support that Microsoft has. Until that lock is broken, its going to be very hard for companies to switch.
Tristan Yates
There isn't a "drop-in" replacement for exchange because the protocols are binary and not documented.
If you will be a little less lazy, there are Outlook plugins for both Kolab and OpenExchange that will let your users use the same client while you replace the server, they should not notice anything different at all.
But there is no way you are ever going to just replace the server and do nothing else. It is impossible - that is why the Outlook/Exchange combo is so horrible, it is not compatible with anything.
too fragging lazy
Those are the operative words. And please note, I said 'average user' meaning the general public. By the way, I have been using linux as my main desktop since the days when hanging yourself sometimes seemed like a better option than using linux.
There's nothing about being a doctor or lawyer that intrinsically requires a MS operating system or software.
You're right to a point. Being a doctor or lawyer does not mean you need MS software.
But if you want to use one of the many of industry-specific, specialized software libraries, you might just have to run Windows.
Before I get flamed on this, I just wanna point out that there is a big difference between being an advocate and being a fanatic against Microsoft. Now you want to tell people not to use MS because the corporation is a pig... ok fine. I can agree that Windows is a poor operating system because of all the patches and the fact that it is based off of DOS, instead of a rock solid, open solution like *nix. That said, do you really expect your average user that "Just uses MS Word to edit lists, or if the list has two colums, use MS Excel" to have any clue about using Linux? Granted that in recent months the Linux world has gotten mush easier to handle, for example Ubuntu 5.10 installs like a dream, with 3D acceleration supported out of the box! But to your average user in general, having config scripts everywhere is just not reasonable. Linux is not ready for the masses. Sorry. Not yet anyway. On the other hand you have Mac OS X, which IMO is a much more viable, and even preferred solution. "It just works" is so true. When you have the prettiest looking user interface of all time, and you build your own hardware (don't have to worry about drivers) and write your own software to work on it, not to mention a rock solid *nix base that's easy to use, then you have the perfect computing solution. Everybody is capable of running a Mac, and it has the perfect mix of *nix to make the geeks happy, and eye candy and functionallity to make anyone happy. OS X is your winner.