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Vista Runs Out of Memory While Copying Files
ta bu shi da yu writes "It appears that, incredibly, Vista can run out of memory while copying files. ZDNet is reporting that not only does it run out of memory after copying 16,400+ files, but that 'often there is little indication that file copy operations haven't completed correctly.' Apparently a fix was scheduled for SP1 but didn't make it; there is a hotfix that you must request."
If you are using Vista as a server, you pretty much deserve what ever happens to you.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.
It probably is 16384.
"16400" is clueless technical writerspeak for "The developer said '16,384', and the style guide says to use three significant digits".
(Alternate explanation: "The developer said '0x4000', and the style guide says 'convert to decimal' as well as 'if it's not a round number, use three significant digits'")
There are enclued technical writers, but 16400 is so close to 16384 that it makes me suspect that the author of the MSKB article isn't one of them.
How the F%$^ can this be a problem? A file copy is a simple operation. There's simply no excuse for this... This should have never been a problem in the first place. What pisses me off is that I need to buy a new laptop, Vista is now forced down my throat, and I have no option to get XP pre-installed.
I don't think there has ever been a version of Windows that could deal with large numbers of files. Particularly if you are using the GUI interface. The whole thing is a toy operating system, really.
A few years ago, while investigating a similar problem with a production server (a SERVER not a client machine) the machine would gradually grind to a halt doing the copy, while still responding (but slowly) to other operations.
I found that the "copy" command did much better than a drag and drop operation, but still would have a problem eventually. Finally, I found that this was a known problem, and that to solve it, a dedicated MS employee had written a utility called "robocopy" the "robo" not being for "robot", but for "robust" (really, it said that!).
Using that usually got the job done, much more slowly than it should have, but at least I didn't have to re-boot the machine daily to clear things up.
Now that Gates is too busy with other things to take tours of the data center, really, Microsoft should do itself a favor and ditch the VMS underpinnings of Windows (some of which they have probably forgotten how to maintain) and build your nice GUI on top of BSD or something similar. That way you won't break your budget (in manpower and electricity) trying to match the Google server farms.
Once that's done you will have the experience needed to do the same on the desktop. You will be doing the world, and yourselves a favor. Thanks in advance!
Very few files have data streams, so the vast majority of users won't ever see a problem. Kaspersky choses to pollute every single file with a stream, however, which is why systems with it installed exhibit the problem.
So it's Kaspersky's fault that alternate data streams are apparently no longer supported by Vista, despite being a basic part of NTFS?
The original rant may be found here.
Funny, I thought he just bought the OS from someone else - didn't lay it out at all.
"We returned the General to El Salvador, or maybe Guatemala, it's difficult to tell from 10,000 feet"
"Very few files have data streams, so the vast majority of users won't ever see a problem. Kaspersky choses to pollute every single file with a stream, however, which is why systems with it installed exhibit the problem."
Yeah, that's the typical Windows world attitude.
The operating system is specified to do certain things. It doesn't do them. Well, if not many people use this feature, so what? One of the way we make the feature list long is by including lots of features that don't work, but we figure nobody will use them and nobody will find out...
"Waiter, there's a fly in my soup."
"What kind of soup?"
"The orange scented celery puree.
"Oh, hardly anyone orders that. You should expect flies in it. It's your own fault for being foolish enough to order it."
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!