Looking Back At Microsoft's Rocky History In Storage Tech

nk497 writes "Following the demise of Windows Home Server's Drive Extender, Jon Honeyball looks back on Microsoft's long, long list of storage disasters, from the dodgy DriveSpace to the Cairo Object File System, and on to the debacle that was WinFS."

Comments

Missing ADS

[EdIII]

I would have to include NTFS alternate data streams as well. It sounded like a good idea, but in practice it just left huge security holes.

Re:Missing ADS

[TheRaven64]

ADS was introduced for one reason: to allow NT servers to support Apple clients, without the server needing to do some crazy transforms (like MacOS does when writing to a FAT drive, which make it trivial to break the files if you touch them with a non-Mac system). The problem was that most of the rest of the system was not updated - it was an operating system feature written for a single application, which is a pretty good way of introducing security holes.

Re:Missing ADS

[bit01]

ADS was introduced for one reason: to allow NT servers to support Apple clients, without the server needing to do some crazy transforms

Umm, ADS is doing crazy transforms. Some would say giving it a different name and use different OS calls to access different data is worse than using different names and the same OS call to access the different data.

Some people, programmers or otherwise, can't tell the difference between giving something a different name/label and actually doing something different.

This problem is endless in the computer software industry, mainly because of the amorphous nature of software. e.g. redoing OS apps inside a web browser or reinventing file systems inside databases or reinventing hierarchical file systems inside XML and calling it all "new" and "innovative". While there is some invention going on in web browsers, databases and XML, most is just reinventing the wheel. Such software is often necessary for compatibility reasons but recognizing that it is a compatibility layer and putting that compatibility layer at the appropriate interface is the important skill.

Or in other words meta-data is data. Sorry, but until you understand that in your bones you are not a decent programmer.

---

Has the Least Patentable Unit reached zero yet?

Re:Missing ADS

[drinkypoo]

Umm, ADS is doing crazy transforms. Some would say giving it a different name and use different OS calls to access different data is worse than using different names and the same OS call to access the different data.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but can't applications access alternate streams by doing something so simple as accessing a different filename?

Re:Missing ADS

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes.

fopen("file.txt:streamname", "r");

Gee, that was hard.

Re:Missing ADS

[obarthelemy]

I'm actually unsure. Isn't it like saying format info is like the text it formats, or maybe even that a program is like the data it accesses ?

Re:Missing ADS

[nmb3000]

I would have to include NTFS alternate data streams as well. It sounded like a good idea, but in practice it just left huge security holes.

Ignoring the fact that alternate data streams are incredibly useful, how exactly are they "huge security holes"? That doesn't even make a little sense.

The only argument might be that it makes it easier to hide things from a user, but if that's the case you could just bury a file somewhere in the filesystem, protect the parent directory with ACLs (so it can't be found by searching the filesystem), and be done with it.

ADS is not a security problem. If you have rights to the ADS, you have rights to the main file. If malicious software has gained rights to the user's files, that user has already lost.

Re:Missing ADS

[nmb3000]

Or in other words meta-data is data. Sorry, but until you understand that in your bones you are not a decent programmer.

Metadata is data, yes, but it is not the data. Users largely don't care if metadata is lost because a file is copied to an incompatible filesystem on a flash drive, synced to Dropbox, emailed to a friend, or maybe even printed out.

Things like ADS provide a way to store data about a file which doesn't have an integrated mechanism to store metadata (e.g., EXIF). Keeping it in a separate name and using an alternative API call makes sense from a compatibility and a simplicity point-of-view. Should old software break when encountering an ADS-tagged file? Should calling ReadFile() really return every single data stream in an object? I doubt the user would care very much for either option.

When it comes down to it, users only care about the data proper; metadata is second-class data and fluff. Losing a last-modified date might be annoying, but losing the 200 page thesis is unacceptable.

Re:Missing ADS

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

MS crap storage development doesn't bode very well for their hopes to catch up with VMware's 6-year tech lead against Hyper-V, does it?

Storage and networking, things MS is either negligent, ignorant or haphazard at understanding and delivering, are key to a fully abstracted virtual environment. The MS plan seems to amount to having Citrix solve these issues - when they manage to think of these technologies at all.

Storage partners will stay married to VMware, and occasionally take MS cash to compensate themselves for producing solutions with a limited audience - who like MS, see virtualization through server-centric glasses.

Re:Missing ADS

[bit01]

Things like ADS provide a way to store data about a file which doesn't have an integrated mechanism to store metadata (e.g., EXIF). Keeping it in a separate name and using an alternative API call makes sense from a compatibility and a simplicity point-of-view.

No it doesn't. It increases the complexity of every program that deals with the file, makes both the files and the accessing programs less portable, hides things from the user they may need to know (mystery program behavior anyone?) and generally just puts a spanner in the works.

Things like ADS provide a way to store data about a file which doesn't have an integrated mechanism to store metadata (e.g., EXIF). Keeping it in a separate name and using an alternative API call makes sense from a compatibility and a simplicity point-of-view.

No it doesn't. Storing the "metadata" under a separate name/label (ie. in a file with a related file name) may make sense but using a separate OS call doesn't because the OS is providing no additional service. OS calls are expensive and non-portable and should be kept to a minimum. If you insist on trying to hide such attributes from calling programs then it should be a compatibility layer on top of the OS, not in the OS itself.

Users largely don't care if metadata is lost because a file is copied to an incompatible filesystem on a flash drive, synced to Dropbox, emailed to a friend, or maybe even printed out.

Actually they do. So-called metadata is often just as important as the data itself for everything from backups (users are going to be real happy if they discover their data missing because the incremental backup lost it due to bad file dates) to file names (users are real happy when they try to type in or copy some file name/label in their native language and the OS comes back with some cryptic error message) to sorting (users are real happy if they have to deal with a thousand out of order items due faulty character set handling). As just one example amongst many VFAT's poor preservation of metadata like file hierarchies, character sets and links has caused problems for millions.

but losing the 200 page thesis is unacceptable.

Losing all user data is unacceptable, whether it's called metadata or not. You're right that some data is more important than others but metadata is there for a reason and deleting it causes all sorts of user-visible furfies. And that is bad. Computer interfaces are unusable enough as it is without introducing even more problems.

---

Are you one of those programmers who expect their users to be mind readers? Think about how your code is going to be used step-by-step!

Re:Missing ADS

[man_of_mr_e]

I'm sorry, since when does VMWare have any major file storage technology? And what does Hyper-V have to do with data storage?

Microsoft happens to have a pretty good SAN system called Windows Storage Server. I don't know of any VMWare product that is storage related. True, VMWare products like vSphere *USE* storage, typically via SAN LU's but their products are not themselves Storage related technology.

VMWare is still ahead of Hyper-V in a lot of ways, but that gap has narrowed a great deal in recent years. If Hyper-V gets memory over-commit and page de-duplication then it will be largely on par with vSphere.

Re:Missing ADS

[man_of_mr_e]

Hmm.. nobody noticed the article was published 2.5 months ago?

Re:Missing ADS

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

You don't know of the storage technology in VMware, nor of the value of the cooperative storage ecosystem that SAN and NAS players have invested hundreds of millions into.

This really removes the basis on which you make your further claims.

In short, VMware is successful as the most capable solution of enterprise-scale, exactly because it virtualises not just server hosts, but brings a virtual model to storage - not to mention networking. There is nothing comparable in the MS world, which seeks to leverage existing cluster technology from Server2008 to present a model for VHD storage.

Review VMFS for starters:
http://www.vmware.com/products/vmfs/
https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/VMware_VMFS

Microsoft has a sad hack to commit memory in a way that shaves a fraction off of the VMware machine density advantage. They are still competing with a 2006-era VMware - they have no clue how to get out of this, aside from dumping a billion dollars into compete marketing efforts.

The massive executive and senior-engineering exodus from MS is a clear sign that -- even in the halls where sacred Kool-Aid is draughted -- the days of leadership are over, almost before they were enjoyed.

Re:Missing ADS

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

And look at this. I have never seen a technology so completely dominate the upper right corner of a Gartner quad in years. MS is admirable to be above the horizon in 3-4 short years, but there is no contest, nor will there really ever get to be one.

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/cloud/Gartner-VMware-Magic-Quadrant.pdf

Management? MS will still try and convince you of SCCM and the broken DCM.

Security? IPSec isolation everywhere - which your failover times on the IKE renegotiation!

HyperV is a great, cheap QA and Dev lab solution, because it's free with 4 v-instances on Enterprise SKUs. But if you have to tool dev/test different for deployment that you do production? The savings are a false economy.

http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/cloud/Gartner-VMware-Magic-Quadrant.pdf

Re:Missing ADS

[man_of_mr_e]

Why are you attributing SAN and NAS technology to VMWare? They didn't invent it, they *USE* it. The same technology the Windows uses.

VMFS has a few nice features, but also a ton of limitations. Hell, it didn't support directories until VMFS3, and even now still limits file sizes to either 256MB or 2TB.

It's a special purpose filesystem designed for a single use, store Virtual Machine disk files. Because of that, it doesn't have to have the same characteristics of a general purpose filesystem.

It's only real advantage is the ability to share the filesystem with multiple servers (clustere file system). But it lacks in a lot of other areas. If all you can trot out is VMFS, then I think you've proven my point for me.

Re:Missing ADS

[man_of_mr_e]

There's a reason they call it the "Magic" quadrant, because they do a lot of hand waving and ordering you to ignore the man behind the curtain.

It's all just marketing bs. Yes, we all know that VMWare is ahead of all the competition in many ways (but not all of them). I personally use vSphere myself because the memory over-commit and page de-duplication is critical. However, once Microsoft adds those features to Hyper-V, it's going to be a significantly more level playing field.

Microsoft is basing Azure on Hyper-V, which is generating a lot of impetus to improve the technology. They've already largely caught up the virtual networking aspect (VMWare used to be ahead there) and in the management area (VMM is getting quite advanced).

There's a reason Amazon, Rackspace, and most other commerical "cloud" services are based on Xen rather than VMWare.

Re:Missing ADS

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Where does it lack?

VMFS is an ESX native, cluster filesystem - Hyper-V nor Windows have such.

ParaVirtualzed SCSI (PVSCSI) with certification and support from every major storage player.

Vendor integration, with specialized solutions for ESX that are unavailable Hyper-V.

No LUN dedication per VM (!) to enable failover and migration.

Of course, the killer is Storage vMotion - where ESX abstracts the storage location from the actual arrays, etc.

There is no reasonable comparison of Hyper-V's deficiencies to ESX capability.

Re:Missing ADS

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Whatever.

When MS produces an equivalent to the DVS, and has basic FT like muti-path uplink, I'll pay them some attention. They have no clue about network virtualization, beyond local resource abstraction. They want to scale on VLAN tags and IPsec. Good luck.

Re:Missing ADS

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

Maybe Gartner is marketing BS. I know they have a LOT more of their bread buttered by MS, than they do by VMW.

You wan to jump from datacenter-oriented storage and network capability to cloud abstraction? That's not really an argument as it is a diversion. :-)

> Microsoft is basing Azure on Hyper-V,

Red herring. Azure is PaaS. The comparison is like saying TiVo is based on Linux. In this case the service-orientation of the IaaS layer (HyperV) services the cloud data center operators, not the end customers.

> There's a reason Amazon, Rackspace, and most other
> commerical "cloud" services are based on Xen rather
> than VMWare.

Whoa! You already split your line of evidence down one separate path - yet you want to fork the argument again?

1) Rackspace resells Amazon technology. They are not a multiplier.

2) Amazon spent hundreds of millions of dollars to develop cloud management and operations frameworks around Xen, their commodity hypervisor of choice (free). If you want to strip virtualization value down to the core, Ring-0 technology and develop your own cloud service for similar costs, go right ahead. Amazon had a business model to develop, not a technology choice. And, I wish 'em good luck in achieving security and compliance targets. That said? Great customer choice for cheap, elastic, "bursty" raw compute cycles. They will thrive as a part of hybrid cloud architectures with application standards.

Re:Missing ADS

[man_of_mr_e]

I have not heard that Rackspace resells Amazon. If they do, I find it odd that their datacenters are in different locations, and that their services offered are so different (Rackspace is way behind Amazon).

In any event, you seem to have misunderstood my point. My point was that Azure was going to drive Hyper-V development through the roof, not that azure was a replacement for Hyper-V or whatever you seemed to think I was talking about.

We are talking about the VMWare technology vs the Microsoft technology when it comes to virtualization here, I fail to see why discussing the factors that will drive technology changes is forking an argument.

Re:Missing ADS

[EdIII]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but can't applications access alternate streams by doing something so simple as accessing a different filename?

No. It wasn't. The AC that responded to you did not answer your question and was being incredibly simplistic.

It is not as simple as accessing a different filename. While the AC may have been correct that is how you accessed a different stream, that is not a different filename. At most you could see as a different index to the same file. Like abc.txt[1] instead of abc.txt[0] (default).

The problem at the time was that the majority of all programs and system calls did not make use of the API calls to enumerate alternate data streams for files. Notably, Windows Explorer and the DIR command did not provide any information.

For a while, all of the standard programs gave no information about ADS and they were not even included when calculating total disk space used. More problematic was how the anti-virus and security programs had to play catch-up since in the beginning they did not inspect them.

So as a programmer you had to make a conscious decision to enumerate ADS, display it, and work with it. It never gained traction because no legacy programs supported it, and it was incredibly easy to break. Why store data in ADS when just about every other program, including some of the system calls, would ignore your ADS and just drop it? It was not easily portable from one system to another.

ADS would not have been a problem if it was incorporated in the very beginning of the OS. Doing so later without full OS support was just a recipe for disaster, not to mention to the gaping security holes that were present for quite some time. Hence why I mentioned it should have been included in the list.

Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[antifoidulus]

Seriously, drive extender's "features" that Microsoft couldn't get to work right include stuff that has been standard in the Unix world for over a decade. Tell me again why people even bother with windows, especially a "server" edition? It's not nearly as functional as Linux but you get to pay a ton of money for it and get DRM as a bonus! Wow, where do I sign up?

Microsoft's new slogan: We are pushing the boundaries of what the rest of the computing world was doing 20 years ago.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Zombie Ryushu]

Because Windows Server has Active Directory and Group Policies. and Linux doesn't. Thats what sells Windows Server 2000/2003/2008. When there was a proposal to incorporate OpenLDAP auto confguration policy into KDE - it was rejected. That is why Linux lost the war for the Enterprise desktop.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[PixetaledPikachu]

Seriously, drive extender's "features" that Microsoft couldn't get to work right include stuff that has been standard in the Unix world for over a decade. Tell me again why people even bother with windows, especially a "server" edition?

To name some of them: Active Directory & Exchange, Sharepoint, and ProClarity/Performance Point.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[antifoidulus]

What good is any sort of enterprise policy on an OS thats trivial to hack? Not to mention that all that group policy bullshit is proprietary, they don't even use open authentication methods, NTLM is just WAITING to be hacked.

There's a reason Google has banned the use of the toy OS for development machines, they don't want their information being stolen by hackers. There are also other, easier ways to do what group policy does. I never found it to be even remotely useful, or even remotely make up for all the extra time necessary to manage Windows machines over their Linux and Mac counterparts.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you change defaults and use outdated NTLM in an enterprise environment instead of recommended Kerberos?

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[DurendalMac]

What good is any sort of enterprise policy on an OS thats trivial to hack?

It isn't if the sysadmin and netadmin know what the hell they're doing.

Not to mention that all that group policy bullshit is proprietary, they don't even use open authentication methods, NTLM is just WAITING to be hacked.

Because MS has never implemented Kerberos, right? And most companies don't give a shit if MS has proprietary bullshit if it has all the features they need, like the aforementioned group policy, Exchange, Active Directory, etc.

There's a reason Google has banned the use of the toy OS for development machines, they don't want their information being stolen by hackers.

Because external threats are the only kind that exist! Oh, wait, there's also employee ineptitude, like plugging in a petri dish of a flash drive and opening up more gaping backdoors than you'll find at a massive gay orgy. Guess what? That's far less of a concern on a server as your sysadmin likely isn't going to be that stupid.

There are also other, easier ways to do what group policy does. I never found it to be even remotely useful, or even remotely make up for all the extra time necessary to manage Windows machines over their Linux and Mac counterparts.

Let me guess: The servers you've worked with never served more than 30 people, tops. Come back when you've actually worked in an enterprise setting. I'm not a huge fan of Windows Server (it can be a bitch to administer), but quite frankly, it does a lot of things far better as a workgroup server than Linux or OS X unless you can afford some in-house developers.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[thegarbz]

What good is any sort of enterprise policy on an OS thats trivial to hack?

Because not everyone in your organisation is a hacker? Group policies are applied for the most part to bring idiots in line with company security policy. This is similar to blocking traffic to certain ports on the firewall. It stops a few people from firing up MSN at work, but does nothing to the guy with a Linux box somewhere off in the internet providing SSH tunnel for endless amusement. That said these single "hackers" of corporate policy are easy enough to keep an eye on.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[antifoidulus]

Because external threats are the only kind that exist! Oh, wait, there's also employee ineptitude, like plugging in a petri dish of a flash drive and opening up more gaping backdoors than you'll find at a massive gay orgy. Guess what? That's far less of a concern on a server as your sysadmin likely isn't going to be that stupid.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA, I find it hilarious that you use this example as an example SUPPORTING Microsoft. You are aware that it was ONLY FUCKING MICROSOFST that had autolaunch and until extremely recently that it was even possible to completely disable it. Real operating systems(and not toys like the ones Microsoft makes) have had ways to disable that shit for eons before Microsoft even realized it was possible. If you are trusting critical data to a Microsoft product you are asking to be hacked.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

So IOW it sells to people who don't understand how to manage users and groups?

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Zombie Ryushu]

Group Policies allow for LDAP based control of the Windows System Registry.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[shutdown -p now]

drive extender's "features" that Microsoft couldn't get to work right include stuff that has been standard in the Unix world for over a decade

"Drive extender" in WHS is, essentially, RAID that can be hot-extended - you plug a new hard drive into your server, and your storage (which shows up as a single disk) grows immediately. I don't know about the Unix world, but I certainly haven't seen any Linux distro that was configured that way. Can you name some names?

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[batkiwi]

Please name a linux based solution, apart from 100% proprietary Unraid, which allow for me to do what drive extender does. I'm serious. I refuse to install WHS, and thus far the closest I can find is going Unraid, which feels dirty to me, or nexentastor.

What drive extender does, in a nutshell:
-all of your hard drives show up as one big storage pool.
-100% of disparate drive sizes can be used (excluding copies/parity obviously). So if you have 3 old 1tb drives, 2 old 1.5tb drives, and 1 2tb drive you'll have 8gb of storage
-configurable redundancy such that any single disk failure, no matter the size, all files are still available
-if two drives fail, you only lose the files that were on those two drives, not the entire array
-take any one drive out of the array, plug it into ANY windows vista or higher PC (new NTFS version), have access to all the files that were stored in that drive.
-add a drive, get that much more storage (excluding copies/parity obviously)

ZFS comes DAMNED close, but you cannot grow the number of disks in a raidz array, you have to add an entire extra array (meaning 3+ disks) to the pool. You also lose the entire array if 2 (or 3 with raidz2, or 4 with raidz3) disks die, and cannot have direct file access just by plugging in 1 disk of the array, but that honestly doesn't bother me that much.

Oh, and ZFS isn't on linux except through fuse.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

There is no advantage to "control of the Windows System Registry" except for windows users, so your logic appears a bit circular. You do know that there are Linux LDAP servers, right? Because so often discussing technology with microsofties is like trying to talk about good food with McD's addicts. They often have no frame of reference with which to discuss these things.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

ADS is mostly a convoluted attempt to control a problem that doesn't exist in UNIX/Linux/Mac - the Windows Registry - which is a problem totally of Microsoft's own doing.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Zombie Ryushu]

Let me give you an example. Lets say that I had a Linux OpenLDAP Server with Heimdal Kerberos (I do.) and I wanted to make it such that whenever a specific user logged in, he/she/it saw a specific background, and had specific Mail settings, and had specific stuff setup for them, and I wanted this to follow them everywhere. There is no facility in KDE to do that. I cannot tell KDE: "This user has this background wallpaper, their FireFox home page is: www.egroupware.com Their start up sound is iora.wav, etc." I can set that up on a per machine basis, but I can't store that information in OpenLDAP so they can use regardless of what their machine is, because KDE doesn't know to retrieve that information.

In Windows this is called Group Policy.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[blincoln]

So IOW it sells to people who don't understand how to manage users and groups?

Group Policy is a very powerful tool for applying policy rules across an entire organization. It has very little to do with managing users and groups, other than that the criteria for who or what the policies apply to is often based on membership in a group.

I've worked with Unix and Linux on and off over the years, and I am not aware of an equivalent in the Linux world, at least not a standard package that works on multiple major distributions. Obviously it's possible to build a crappy quasi-equivalent for one's own organization out of shell scripts, but it would be a lot of work to build and maintain, and it wouldn't be as flexible or as reliable.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[uglyduckling]

Surely that sort of thing has been done in UNIX using .rc files and other . configuration files in the user's home directory since the mid-70s, or does KDE ignore those?

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

Man, UNIX systems have been doing that for almost 50 years - never heard of LVM?

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

You're right, he does appear to be describing something we easily achieve with a crontab entry, or by manually using rsync.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

Obviously it's possible to build a crappy quasi-equivalent for one's own organization out of shell scripts, but it would be a lot of work to build and maintain, and it wouldn't be as flexible or as reliable.

Oh I don't know about that. Cron and rsync are pretty well proven to be quite reliable and flexible. Of course it does require some competence, no pointy-clicky...

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[antifoidulus]

Yup, LVM FTW. you fail it.

I especially like your #1:
-all of your hard drives show up as one big storage pool.

Not only does EVERY unix do that, it's the ONLY way it can be done. Mixing up the logical and physical partitions in such a convoluted way is a Microsoft only type of deal. Drive letters were thrown out in real operating systems decades ago. Again, Windows: Failing today to do what Unix successfully did decades ago.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[DarkOx]

Nobody is saying you can't do that stuff on *NIX but its hard to do that on stand alone machines. When you are talking about shared machines or terminals where everything can be handled with NIS and home directories reside on an NFS share used by all hosts the facilities to manage user experience exist.

As soon as you start having laptops and desktops running all around the office you can't manage the settings the user is talking about anymore. Yes you can do it at deployment time. Sure you could write init scripts to go fetch and overwrite/update rc files and stuff but you'd have to do all of it yourself and it would be a security nightmare to try and get correct without putting a lot of resources into it.

GPOs make it really easy change all the CSRs home pages to the new customer service portal, and set all the sales reps wall paper to the latest product sheet instead of their embarrassing personal photos any time its needed. It also makes it possible to do things like yes your screen saver is going to turn on and the desktop will be locked after 15min, no exceptions. Sometimes that sort of thing gets required for PayCardIndustry rules and the like, and those things change every now and then.

Got a way for me to change your screen saver settings on every Ubuntu box in the company? Yes I know I can run a sed script to go into each home directory and alter the config file for whatever desktop environment is being used, I still have to find away to do it to every box.

Trust me I have been doing this for some years and this is one place where Windows gets it right, so right in fact that it in some ways justifies the use of Windows even though its otherwise a really inferior platform.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[DarkOx]

Actually Microsoft only released it as an update to XP recently, to change the default setting. You have always been able to turn off autorun by modifying the registry directly and there have been group policy templates to do it almost as long.

If anyone wanted auto run off in an enterprise setting it was trivial to do, you just through the switch in GP or put a couple lines in the logon script if you were not using GPOs for some reasons like you were in a non domain environment or whatever.

The only persons experience being changed by that recent update is Joe Sixpack's who was not going to edit his registry. As far as anyone in industry if they had any clue how to do their job as an admin this has always been a non issue.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[batkiwi]

Sweet, so LVM provides redundancy? Or I still need to use software raid for that, which reqires all disks to be the same size in order to get full usage out of them?

And if I create an LVM array, and 1 disk dies, I no longer lose everything, the filesystem is easily mounutable and I only lose the files that were on that disk and weren't redundant (which you've also assured me LVM handles for you?)

And who mentioned drive letters? You're telling me that every unix will combine all of my storage devices into one pool, as opposed to having to mount them discretely in mount points? So if I have 5 disks, by default all of my files, regardless of location in the filesystem, will get nicely distributed across said disks? That's great to know as well! Last time I checked (about 2 seconds ago, from the ubuntu box I'm posting this from) you have to choose a mount point for any volume (logical or physical), and it only provides storage to that section of the filesystem. If my /var/log is full, and I just throw in another 1tb disk, /var/log does not get access to that new storage.

I asked a serious question. I really am interested in a set of technologies that have the same capabilities as unraid (which is linux based but NOT open nor free) and drive extender. LVM and software raid are in no way comparable.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[batkiwi]

I've heard of LVM, and used it in all of my linux servers. It's a life saver when it comes to dynamically resizing storage pools. But it's in no way comparable to drive extender. Read the post you replied to and tell me which of the points LVM ticks off. I know which ones, but i'll leave it to you to decide.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

Got a way for me to change your screen saver settings on every Ubuntu box in the company?

Are you joking? If I want to lock down and sync desktop configurations for all users/workstations or for groups of users/workstations in any *nix it could not possibly be easier, more reliable, transparent, or trouble-free using simple command-line tools . And maintaining that is as easy as invoking the contab editor.

I'm beginning to think the people who say that AD is a kludge for dealing with the registry are probably pretty much correct. It doesn't appear to offer much in the way of real benefits except to people who already use windows.

BTW, you know how I get my users (nearly all of whom were migrated from windows) to run my scripts? I give them an icon to click on :)

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Zombie Ryushu]

No, The Windows world had that way of thinking with Roaming Mandatory Profiles where "System Policies" were "files" and "scripts" copied from shares. It was utter catastrophe. The Unix 'copy the rc folder method is NT4 level thinking and not Acceptable in today's world. If it is to be acceptable in today's world it must be database driven and granular. This is why MySQL is so popular, and this is why Linux's directory services have gained no market or mind share.

The best thing anyone could do is force KDE and Gnome to adopt OpenLDAP.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[jellomizer]

And how many technologies fail on FOSS systems. I just got a patch last year that allowed my wifi to connect in under 5 minutes. While Mac and Windows did it very fast for year. (2002 from my experience). Sure we like to see Microsoft fail because it is a huge company and has a strong foothold in our technology, and during the 90's it seemed to the media it could do no wrong. But looking at it's failures and saying Microsoft is all bad while I zealiously promote an other product ignoring it deficiencies. Is really a stupid idea that doesn't help either side.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

No, The Windows world had that way of thinking with Roaming Mandatory Profiles where "System Policies" were "files" and "scripts" copied from shares. It was utter catastrophe.

Yes, well it works very well in the *nix world -- the NT failures you cite do not affect us at all.

The Unix 'copy the rc folder method is NT4 level thinking and not Acceptable in today's world.

Huh? No-one can seriously brag about the *registry*, it's the Achilles' Heel of windows! This can only mean you've never seriously used any other OS.

If it is to be acceptable in today's world it must be database driven and granular. This is why MySQL is so popular, and this is why Linux's directory services have gained no market or mind share.

MS has indoctrinated you well, but you don't appear to know enough about *nix to really participate in this discussion. Of course, it can easily be argued that I do not know enough about windows to participate in it, so perhaps we're even :)

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Zombie Ryushu]

I'm a staunch Linux User. I hate Windows. But I also know LDAP is a good idea.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[kantos]

Honestly.... this argument is stupid, Group Policy arose because on Windows everything is a COM object with an ACL and it was neigh impossible to manage to provide even a modicum of security without some sort of system policy at a high level. Linux of course doesn't need this because it operates in a fundamentally different manner where everything is a file and the file system permissions (group based) determine if a is executable or not. Thus the Linux kernel doesn't need to know what specific COM+ handler needs to be loaded, but rather if a file is a supported executable format or not, and what to do from there. Both systems have fundamental advantages, Linux is deceptively simple leading to a power on the command line that is daunting for many users. Whereas Windows can be easy worked with to extend using COM and the registry (The registry was never designed to hold most of the crap that people shove in there... it was designed to be a central repository of information for COM objects).

If anything this model shows MS's lack of foresight into the importance of networking and their focus on the single standalone box.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

HellOOO! "Active directiry" and "Group policies" are ways in which windows is trying to tack on the features UNIX has built-in. That is all. In Linux we create custom groups with custom perms and add the users we want to have that profile to those groups. It's secure, simple, elegant, and built-in to the OS. Windows doesn't have that; the closest you can get is ADS.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

Microsoft neither invented nor has a monopoly on the ability to use LDAP.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Rennt]

LVM is supported by every major distro out of the box. And it actually WORKS, which is more then you can say for Drive Extender.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[DarkOx]

Right its a crontab entry, fine easy. Now change the value on all systems a to something else a year later. Ahh not so easy now is it.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

Antifoidulus' zealotry is blinding him to your question

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow, you really don't know anything at all about being a linux admin, do you? :D

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[jimicus]

You still need to roll a LOT of your own scripts - there's nothing built into any desktop environment to say "members of group A get this config file, members of group B get that config file".

There's also no easy way to state "This is the base configuration. In addition to this, apply these rules from group A and those rules for group B."

Sure, you could script all of this yourself - but when discussing Linux on the desktop, the question being asked is not "can you somehow persuade the system to get configuration for virtually everything from a single, central location and then tweak that configuration on a per-group basis?", it's "does the system support some efficient means of doing all that out of the box?".

As far as Linux goes, the answer to the first question is obviously "yes". But the answer to the second question is "no, it'll require a fair bit of work and most of that work will have to be done by someone who knows what they're doing rather than some cheap fresh-out-of-college Windows technician. And if you want that person to put things together in such a fashion that future configuration changes can be made by the cheap fresh-out-of-college Windows technician without having to train the Windows technician up to the level where they can demand substantially more money, the cost involved is going to wipe out any savings several times over".

This more-or-less eliminates Linux on the desktop in anything other than organisations where you can nail the desktop down for 60% of the staff so it doesn't require that level of detailed per-group configuration in the first place. Even then, you'd probably find Windows on the desktop of the other 40%.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

antifoidulus just got pwned!

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Pinky's Brain]

It's on the fly data duplication with a union filesystem ... which has completely different failure modes than RAID (also much lower throughput but for a media server striping isn't necessary). Greyhole is the only comparable system on *nix, and it's very rough still.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Pinky's Brain]

A LVM span only has a single underlying filesystem, if you lose a drive you're fucked.

You'd need a union filesystem to be able to take out any number of drives and still be left with a functioning array (minus some files). None of the union filesystem supports automatic duplication though.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

Stop awfulizing it -- scripting this is elementary in *.nix, and if you can't do it you're not a competent *.nix admin, period full stop.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

Oh, also: what the devil does all your ranting about "the desktop" have to do with it? The rest of us are talking about admining servers.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

> Ahh not so easy now is it.

huh? seriously- wtf are you talking about? um, yes, the second time around it would probably take you 30 seconds to do.
maybe less.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

I'm a staunch Linux User.

Maybe, but if so you've still got a lot to learn. Like how to admin without KDE or gnome, for instance. :)

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[jimicus]

If we're talking about replicating something as highly polished as group policy, a script that runs on login to pull in configuration files isn't the hard bit. The hard bit is providing a central, consistent GUI-fied means of tweaking all those configuration files that reduces the configuration to tick-boxes, eliminating the risk of a typo causing havoc when an application tries to read an invalid configuration and if you're lucky reverts to default. If you're unlucky, the application is broken.

Realistically, you'd probably store the actual configuration information in a database of some sort then use that database to write out config files accordingly. Which means that now you have something almost as complicated as Active Directory, except you can't go out and hire people who already know it - which will make any self-respecting IT manager very nervous indeed. And it'll require quite a bit of ongoing maintenance because every time an application upgrade requires updates to the configuration file, your system will need tweaking too.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[jimicus]

News to me.

Quoting Zombie Ryushu in this comment:

Lets say that I had a Linux OpenLDAP Server with Heimdal Kerberos (I do.) and I wanted to make it such that whenever a specific user logged in, he/she/it saw a specific background, and had specific Mail settings, and had specific stuff setup for them, and I wanted this to follow them everywhere. There is no facility in KDE to do that. I cannot tell KDE: "This user has this background wallpaper, their FireFox home page is: www.egroupware.com Their start up sound is iora.wav, etc." I can set that up on a per machine basis, but I can't store that information in OpenLDAP so they can use regardless of what their machine is, because KDE doesn't know to retrieve that information.

Doesn't sound like a server task to me.

Quoting DarkOx in this comment (which is the very comment you replied to that triggered this discussion in the first place)

As soon as you start having laptops and desktops running all around the office you can't manage the settings the user is talking about anymore. Yes you can do it at deployment time. Sure you could write init scripts to go fetch and overwrite/update rc files and stuff but you'd have to do all of it yourself and it would be a security nightmare to try and get correct without putting a lot of resources into it.

GPOs make it really easy change all the CSRs home pages to the new customer service portal, and set all the sales reps wall paper to the latest product sheet instead of their embarrassing personal photos any time its needed. It also makes it possible to do things like yes your screen saver is going to turn on and the desktop will be locked after 15min, no exceptions. Sometimes that sort of thing gets required for PayCardIndustry rules and the like, and those things change every now and then.

How is that discussing server admin?

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

eliminating the risk of a typo causing havoc when an application tries to read an invalid configuration

After spending way too much time digging around in ridiculously nested, not-always-logically-named/placed checkboxes in the GP GUI, I think I'd rather risk the typos.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

What about Greyhole?

What Greyhole offers
JBOD concatenation storage pool Configure as many hard drives as you'd like to be included in your pool. You're storage pool size will be the sum of the free space in all the hard drives you include. Your hard drives can be internal, external (USB, e-Sata, Firewire...), or even mount of remote file systems, and you can include hard drives of any size in your pool.

Per-share redundancy For each of your shares that use the space of your storage pool, indicate how many copies of each file you want to keep. Each of those copies will be stored in a different hard drive, in order to prevent data loss when one or more hard drives fail. For very important files, you can even specify you'd like to keep copies on all available hard drives.

Greyhole is similar to RAID-5. Advantages over RAID-5 are:

You can use JBOD concatenation in Greyhole; in RAID-5, you need to use same sized hard drives, which makes upgrades costly.
Greyhole can sustain multiple hardware failure without loosing data, if you configured it to keep more than 2 copies of your files.
In Greyhole, you can decide the level of redundancy per share, thus allowing you to better protect important files by using more space, and not protect files you don't really care about, to save space.
Greyhole doesn't need reconstruction to recover data; you can mount all individual drives, and recover data from them very easily.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[DAldredge]

What can my Linux boxes do that my Windows Server 2K8 R2 boxes can't?

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

The hard bit is providing a central, consistent GUI-fied

FAIL

Why should a server (or an embedded device) run a windowing environment? Idiot... Besides, as others have pointed out, there is nothing exotic or desirable about ADS -- it's just a kludgey attempt to tack-on a permissions system which is already part of every UNIX-like system ever.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

Well frankly, I don't think you're managing a lot of users from a desktop. Might I suggest you spend more time reading so you'll be qualified to post?

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[DAldredge]

What about the registry is so bad?

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[cratermoon]

Stay up without a reboot every 2^32 seconds?

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[DAldredge]

2^32 seconds is 136 years 2 months 9 days 10 hours 28 minutes 16 seconds

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[profplump]

AD is useful, as you note, insofar as it's standardized so you can learn about it on any system. And the distribution method is pretty reasonable; it's not that complicated and MS doesn't do anything terribly stupid to muck it up. It's not a bad system, and given that MS doesn't have a /etc folder that I can easily sync among systems it's a huge improvement over other options.

But being a GUI is not a benefit, at least not in the way you describe. I think it's worth having a GUI -- having a GUI provides a lower barrier to entry an can help teach you how things work. It's just that I think the GUI should output a text file (or some equivalent human-readable config in a database if that's your preferred distribution method).

Given the chance of a typo versus missing a checkbox somewhere in the hundreds of hierarchal screens in the policy manager, I'll take the text config file any day. And that's not even considering things like copying bits of a configuration among systems, which is clearly much easier with copy-and-paste than with GUI data entry.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[profplump]

Group Policy is useful in that it's standard. There's a lot of value in that, particularly in finding new people already familiar with it. And it addresses one of the key management problems with Windows -- the registry -- which is good because before AD it was nigh on impossible to deal with that mess.

But you can't honestly believe both that it's "more standard" and "more flexible" at the same time. Those goals are mutually exclusive. It might be flexible enough for your purposes, or even for most anyone's purposes, but it's certainly not more flexible than a custom script.

Also, you can say things like "no package...works on...multiple major distributions" and expect anyone to take you seriously. There is no such tool for Windows either -- AD is only available on the MS Windows distribution and no other system supports it at all. However, if you limit yourself to a single OS like you did for Windows there are in fact standard OS management tools built-in that can do many if not all of the things you want, and people with training and experience that know how to run them before they've ever seen your systems. All the "major distributions" now have very standard, config-driven systems and like Windows try very hard to keep you from modifying the underlying scripts directly.

/ Which drives me nuts -- it's good for configuration management but bad for actual configuration

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Hatta]

Please name a linux based solution, apart from 100% proprietary Unraid

If Unraid is unacceptable because it's proprietary, then Microsoft solutions should be unacceptable too.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[jimicus]

I take your point regarding the GUI. But without a GUI - or at the very least a standardised way of describing the configuration that is consistent across all your applications - you haven't really got an AD clone. You've just got a few scripts making judicious use of rsync.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[clang_jangle]

Yes, but because that's really all that's necessary. The features of ADS you seem to feel are missing in *nix are simply unnecessary because we already have fine-grained control over user and group permissions built into the OS. The rest is merely syncing user data. We can do that easily enough with rsync.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Roman Mamedov]

See mhddfs.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

+10.

People need to realize just because you "can" do something under UNIX doesn't mean there couldn't be an easier way. There are a lot of things Windows actually does to make life easier ; want to see all the services running on your computer? The Services program under Administration tools will show you, and let you start/stop/pause "graphically".

Now, the MS implementations are so poor they don't work reliably (or stay working). But don't crap on the easy of use, or the fact if some of these "niceities" existed, desktop penatration could be higher.

If you're a sysadmin with lots of work, do you really want to be jacking with crontabs and rc scripts? The UNIX way is often bubble-gum + tape approach, handing of responsibility of one task to another program or script. It worked 20-30 years ago, but it's long in the tooth.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

You're an idiot. Please don't post here anymore.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Anonymous Coward]

The UNIX way is often bubble-gum + tape approach, handing of responsibility of one task to another program or script. It worked 20-30 years ago, but it's long in the tooth.

Says the person trumpeting the benefits of tacking missing UNIX functionality onto windows. Sorry, but your perspective is either based on ignorance or you're a shill. The "long in the tooth" methods you ignorantly dismiss are still, to this day, the primary power of the networks we all depend upon daily, and are exactly what ADS is trying to implement. If it's "long in the tooth" it's because it's stood the test of time. Unlike Redmond's server products, which perhaps have a niche among amateur users who admin small, low-demand servers (SOHO), but in the enterprise the track record tends to be rather dismal...

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[man_of_mr_e]

This is such a typical comment from people that have no idea what Drive Extender is (or was). It's not RAID. RAID has a ton of issues to deal with. You can't just add more drives to raid and have the volumes magically get bigger, not without some serious rebuilding (often taking 10+ hours on larger volume sizes). Even then you have to extend your partitions manually.

DE just works. You plug in a new drive, of any size, and you get additional redundant storage, instantly, without rebuilds or partition extending, or any of the other headaches the come with RAID. Also, if your motherboard fails, you don't have to reconfigure RAID on a new computer.. you can just access the files from any computer, since the files were stored on normal NTFS filesystems, without the need to create drive sets.

When WHS first came out, i tried to explian how useful Drive Extender was, and just got blank looks from the unix guys.. saying "it's just raid". It was like trying to explain DVR's to people that had only used VCR's. They just didn't get it until they used it.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[man_of_mr_e]

LVM is only part of what DE did. LVM doesn't do data de-duplication, nor does it provide redundancy like DE did (yes, you can stripe volumens and mirror them with LVN, but that's just doing software RAID). DE used drive balancing, which copied data between drives to keep them balanced and redundant. This way, if a drive fails, and you have enough storage, the system will just rebalance (assuming you have more than one drive) without any degradation of performance (like you would see in RAID-5).

Let's say you have 5 1TB drives, and you have 50% of the capacity used. That will mean you have 50% free on all drives (or about 500GB). If you lose one drive, then the system will rebalance between the 4 drives (so you will now have 250GB free on 4 drives), if you lose another drive, it will rebalance over 3 drives.. etc.. until you no longer have enough free storage to compensate. Add more drives, and it will rebalance across those drives.

This system is not as robust as RAID, in that if you lose a drive before a rebalance can occur, you might lose data... but it's far more flexible and easy to use. It was designed for home users who may not understand RAID, but are technical enough to be able to pop in a new hard drive if they need more stogage.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[man_of_mr_e]

Greyhole comes a lot closer, but it's still pretty experimental, and it's relatively recent... which goes against the claim that DE is doing what Linux or Unix has done for decades.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[man_of_mr_e]

mhddfs only provides spanning of volumes, it doesn't do the rest of it.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[drsmithy]

Oh I don't know about that. Cron and rsync are pretty well proven to be quite reliable and flexible.

Rsync and - even less so - cron don't solve the problem.

Of course it does require some competence, no pointy-clicky...

You are conflating "incompetence" with a lack of interest in continually reinventing the wheel.

I'm quite capable of implementing something that can achieve probably 90% of the functionality of GPOs. I have zero interest in doing it, however, because I'd rather spend my time productively.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[drsmithy]

Group Policy is useful in that it's standard.

No. The single most important feature of Group Policy is the simple fact that it exists and works.

Sure, you can cobble together something in a Linux environment that probably comes close to providing the functionality of GPOs. You might even be able to leverage puppet or cfengine and save yourself a lot of work. But a) you've just wasted weeks to months of time doing it, b) you now have to maintain not only the policies, but the mechanism for enforcing them, and c) when you move on to a new environment you have to do it all over from scratch again.

Ie: it's a textbook example of reinventing the wheel, and while I understand that's the sort of busywork old-school sysadmins *love* doing so they can look and feel busy, the people paying the bills now expect more from their employees.

However, if you limit yourself to a single OS like you did for Windows there are in fact standard OS management tools built-in that can do many if not all of the things you want, and people with training and experience that know how to run them before they've ever seen your systems. All the "major distributions" now have very standard, config-driven systems and like Windows try very hard to keep you from modifying the underlying scripts directly.

Which Linux distribution has anything close to Group Policy ?

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[drsmithy]

There is no advantage to "control of the Windows System Registry" except for windows users, so your logic appears a bit circular.

The logic is fine, the terminology is poor.

Group Policy provides a mechanism and comprehensive set of capabilities for central configuration management of Windows machines. "Control of the Registry" is merely an irrelevant implementation semantic.

Central configuration management is - amazingly, given its age - functionality significantly lacking from Linux/UNIX. IME this is largely due to traditional Linux/UNIX admins taking great pride in how awesome they are at continually reinventing the wheel (and castigating those who try to minimise it - the common complaint being it would make things "too easy").

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[drsmithy]

Yup, LVM FTW. you fail it.

LVM doesn't meet all the functionality described. In particular, the most important aspects relating to data redundancy.

Not only does EVERY unix do that, it's the ONLY way it can be done. Mixing up the logical and physical partitions in such a convoluted way is a Microsoft only type of deal. Drive letters were thrown out in real operating systems decades ago. Again, Windows: Failing today to do what Unix successfully did decades ago.

You have completely misunderstood what "one big storage pool" means (LVM does do it, but that is not what you are describing, which is the single-rooted hierarchy).

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[drsmithy]

What can my Linux boxes do that my Windows Server 2K8 R2 boxes can't?

Flexible software RAID and logical volume management.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[DAldredge]

Define "Flexible software RAID" and "logical volume management" so I know exactly what you are referring to.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[WuphonsReach]

Software RAID does not require that all disks are the same size. If you have (3) 1TB drives and (2) 1.5TB drives, nothing says you can't create a RAID-10 across the first 1TB of all 5 drives and put a 0.5TB RAID-1 array across the back half of the 1.5TB drives.

LVM2 handles everything else (it will also do redundancy if you want). And you can migrate LVs between PVs using the migration tools. So if you have a portion of your volume group on a RAID-1 array and decide that it belongs on the RAID-10 array in the same volume group, you just do an on-the-fly migration to the other PV.

You can even do things like migrating LVs off the active disks so that you can rip them out and replace them with larger / faster / better disks, then migrate it all back.

Without having to take the server down.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[Roman Mamedov]

True, but its spanning is better than with LVM. You get what the parent asked, "1 disk dies, I no longer lose everything, the filesystem is easily mounutable and I only lose the files that were on that disk".
And for redundancy, one can use mdadm RAID on the underlying devices.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[batkiwi]

This sounds EXACTLY like what I"m looking for. Googling/etc now, I appreciate the info.

Re:Makes me glad I quit Windows years ago

[drsmithy]

Define "Flexible software RAID" and "logical volume management" so I know exactly what you are referring to.

For RAID: Support for RAID6 and RAID10. Stripe size customisation. Layered RAID devices (to create, for example, a RAID50).

For LVM: Adding and removing underlying physical volumes is much easier.

I'm not bashing Windows, this is just something that Linux does quite well, and Windows barely does at all (and in fairness, most of the times you'd want to be doing this with Windows, you'd probably have a SAN that does most of it for you).

What's wrong with NTFS?

[wiredlogic]

I fail to see why the fact that NTFS is still around essentially unchanged is a problem. It serves its purpose well. While MS's internal factionalism has hurt their position in the massive storage arena, the continued stamina of NTFS is a good thing.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Billly Gates]

Compared to WinFS, ZFS, and the upcoming BTFS it looks quite dated. Infact NTFS is really HPFS from OS/2 with a few extra features.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[markass530]

it not open source?? Someone more knowledgeable then me on the subject can expand this im sure. I just know that I recently started trying to learn linux, it not being able to read my windows partitions if f'n annoying.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[NJRoadfan]

MS actually has a very good history with in-house designed file systems. NTFS is pretty damn good, it even accommodates classic Mac resource forks (from the days NT had AppleTalk support). HPFS was very good as well...one of Microsoft's greatest contributions to OS/2 before the IBM split up. Heck, look at Apple's HFS+, its been around since 1997 and is really just an extension to the circa 1985 HFS file system.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[smi.james.th]

Linux can actually read NTFS partitions, some don't come with support enabled by default though. Which distro have you got? IIRC, the package that you need is called NTFS-3g. I run Linux Mint, and it works out of the box, so I haven't needed to tinker with it for a while though.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Anonymous Coward]

What's wrong with NTFS?

Many, many things. The MFT (Master File Table) which contains all your file system info... may also contain actual files if they are small enough to fit into the remaining space (i.e. disk block sizes matter). Why is this a problem? file wiping software usually won't go near the MFT since you twiddle the wrong bits in the MFT and the entire file system is likely to go poof. Oh the MFT is also basically not documented properly, I actually had an MS employee that owed me a favor try to find the docs on it and he couldn't.

http://www.berghel.net/col-edit/digital_village/aug-06/dv_8-06.php

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[SuricouRaven]

It's not just closed source, but closed standard. Microsoft keeps the specification officially secret (Though I believe you can see if it you agree to an agreemet saying you won't disclose or actually impliment it). That linux can use NTFS is a tribute to many hours of dedicated reverse-engineering and various tidbits of information that escaped until a full picture could be assembled,

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[markass530]

yea I know about the work around read only solution. It's just horseshit that MS doesn't supply a read/write driver or whatever for every OS. (ubuntu)

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Drakino]

Sadly NTFS is still behind HPFS in some ways. One major one is data fragmentation. Defragging manually is a joy only NTFS users have, as HPFS really never needed it.

I know a Windows admin by day that is so used to defragging, he bought an OS X defrag utility, because the concept of a filesystem avoiding massive fragmentation was new to him. He was quite shocked when I explained most filesystems don't have the fragmentations issues NTFS does. And informing him HPFS also lacked the need for manual defragging kinda lowered his faith in MIcrosoft a little. They had access to the HPFS tech, and failed to copy it properly into NT.

True Windows only people are interesting when you reveal to them how behind Microsoft is, and always has been. Said admin is slowly dabbling with Unix like systems, with his Mac helping him to dip his toe in while keeping a nice and consistent GUI. His want to explore scripting has him appreciating Unix ways a little more, and now he's also using Powershell. The 20 year late answer from Microsoft to the unix command line toolbox and bash.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Guy Harris]

What's wrong with NTFS?

Many, many things. The MFT (Master File Table) which contains all your file system info... may also contain actual files if they are small enough to fit into the remaining space (i.e. disk block sizes matter). Why is this a problem? file wiping software usually won't go near the MFT since you twiddle the wrong bits in the MFT and the entire file system is likely to go poof.

The fact that NTFS doesn't happen to conform to a particular naive model of "how file systems work", namely "all file data is stored in blocks separate from file headers", might be an annoyance to developers of third-party file wiping software, but I wouldn't consider that to be something "wrong" with it. If Microsoft don't supply a file-wiping API that allows user-mode code to request that all the data in a file be wiped, regardless of how that data might happen to be stored for particular files on a particular version of a particular file system, one might consider that to be something "wrong" with Windows, but that's another matter.

Oh the MFT is also basically not documented properly, I actually had an MS employee that owed me a favor try to find the docs on it and he couldn't.

That's not a problem with NTFS, it's a problem with Microsoft's software development practices (although it's probably not the only piece of software for which the documentation of the data structures lags behind the current data structures).

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Anonymous Coward]

Everyday portion of bashing Microsoft makes us feel much better.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Riceballsan]

actually write support has worked in many distributions of linux for years, it's full access at this point, in ubuntu just go to the software center and install ntfs-3g, it will give read and write support.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[bertok]

NTFS still doesn't have shared cluster filesystem capability. This has a bunch of flow-on effects, which basically means that Windows Server clusters are actually "Failover Clusters". The key part of that being the "Fail".

Really basic services like the file shares are impossible to make truly highly available using Windows, because neither NTFS nor SMB support transparent fail-over of open files. There isn't even a way of doing a clean administrative cluster fail-over, such as a drain-stop. The only option is forcibly closing all open files, potentially corrupting user data, and forcing users to click through dirty error messages that their PCs may or may not recover from.

I've tried things like Polyserve, which is a third-party filesystem that has proper cluster support, but it's still hamstrung by SMB. What's doubly ridiculous is that Microsoft basically re-engineered SMB for Vista, and called it "SMB2", but it still can't do clean fail-over!

Similarly, SQL Server can't do proper failover of cluster nodes, nor can it do proper active-active database clusters that share a single database file, because of the limitations of the underlying filesystem. It can no active-active clustering for read-only files, but that's only rarely useful.

Even within Microsoft, workarounds had to be found to make some of their key products somewhat resilient. Both SQL Server and Exchange now use software mirroring for cleaner failover. Ignoring the cost of having to purchase twice as much disk, mirroring has other issues too, like becoming bottle-necked by the network speed, or limiting the features that can be used. For example, if your application performs queries across two databases in a single query, then you can't use Mirroring, because there's no way to specify that the two databases should fail over in a group.

VMware has become a multi-billion dollar company in a few short years because a single non-clustered Windows Server on a VMware cluster is more robust than a cluster of Windows Servers!

  "Enterprise Edition" my ass.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[smi.james.th]

Um... No, it's not a read-only solution. I've got full read/write on my NTFS. No horses or their respective shit within sight.

here is even a link to get you started. I wish you all the best.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Anonymous Coward]

I regularly install different distros of *nix on my machines, and I've only found a few that didn't have read/write ntfs support on a fresh install. Now reading ext2/3 filesystems on win7.. (I know there are ext2/3 drivers, but last I checked they borked miserably when installed on win7)

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you think that NTFS-X is somehow more prone to fragmentation than e.g. extX your knowledge about filesystems isn't really good.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm so lost. You don't need to install anything to write to an NTFS partition in Ubuntu with a standard LiveCD. I imagine that is true also of an install although I haven't tried a dual-boot in years. I know I personally back up and restore to NTFS disks using GNU/Linux because Microsoft's own operating system fails half the time. It is slow, leads to data loss, and is generally unbearable.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[FuckingNickName]

Would you mind explaining carefully and precisely why you think that OS X's filesystem (and others) aren't prone to fragmentation? It's true that many filesystems incorporate techniques to reduce the likelihood and effect of fragmentation, but it still happens, and it's still possible to optimise the position of data on rotating media - as any good defragmenter will do.

Filesystems which claim not to suffer from defragmentation concern me more because people end up not noticing the decrease in performance over time. For a machine not in 24/7 operation, a scheduled defrag run is always a good idea; otherwise, slowly doing the same during less busy moments should be mandatory.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Anonymous Coward]

What about the lack of relative links? (Though there are rumors they exist somehow).

NTFS is one of MS's least controversial contributions to storage, but for a company that prides itself on enterprise level support, it's fairly inadequate to the notion of clustering or seamless activity.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[rts008]

Try a more recent version of Ubuntu[from your comment later on/further down].

I run Kubuntu, which is Debian-based Ubuntu with a KDE user interface, instead of Ubuntu default Gnome desktop envoirment/user interface.
The full read and write ability for NTFS has been present in the default install since 8.04, IRC.
I remember downloading NTFS-3g from the repository in 6.06[?] Dapper Drake for read only, but don't remember having to do so with 8.04.

Currently I am running 10.10, and the default install has read-write support enabled for NTFS, and has been the same since 9.04, for certain.

What you're probably running into is not having your Windows partitions mounted.
If they are not mounted, they won't even show up in your file manager. (Nautilus)

Without knowing more, here are some helpful links:
Pick your distro. Ubuntu has good tech support doc's and forums.
"Mounting Windows partitions" for 9.04 search results from the above link[I randomly selected 9.04]
Here is what you're looking, for most likely.; top answer from the above search results.

That info took about 1 minute to find, starting with a google.com search for 'Ubuntu', BTW.

Admittedly, there is a 'learning curve'/mindset change going from from Windows to *nix, but it's not different from just starting with Windows originally.
Remember when you first started using a computer?
Well, going from Windows to *nix is actually a lot easier if you really want to make the jump.....

*first-strike dibs on pedants*
I started with a Win95 PC in 1996, and migrated to Kubuntu 6.06 when I ran afoul of WinXP WGA with a legitimate copy of XP Pro in 2004.
I was heavily into gaming and upgraded hardware often, and either due to 'key-gens' on the net, or HW changes in my PC, I could not re-activate my retail copy of XP without buying a new copy from Microsoft. I had been dual-booting XP and Ubuntu since Ubuntu 5.04, so it was a 'no brainer' for me. YMMV

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's like saying the problem is that you didn't wear a condom while you raped the kittens. No... the problem is that you are raping kittens.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[iserlohn]

Come on.. proper data structure design is stuff that they teach in first year at university in CS courses...

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Guy Harris]

Come on.. proper data structure design is stuff that they teach in first year at university in CS courses...

Presumably you mean "properly keeping the documentation of the data structures up to date", as there's nothing at all improper about stuffing the data of small files into the same data structure as the file metadata (nor, for that matter, anything unique to Microsoft or NTFS about it).

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[shutdown -p now]

What about the lack of relative links?

Relative symbolic links are fully supported in Win7. And I don't think there's even such a thing as a "relative hard link", in any OS or FS, since hard links don't use paths by definition.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[clang_jangle]

Pure MS BS. I have Linux and BSD systems running for years on their original native FS with no more than 4% fragmentation and often mere tenths of a percent for ext3. With NT on NTFS you're lucky to get that out of a fresh install, much less after a defrag.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[thegarbz]

You say horseshit, I say it's commonsense that you wouldn't provide a driver for your competitor, so the competitor can peacefully co-exist and read the data in your proprietary partition exclusively for the benefit of your competitor. Microsoft have no vested interest in Linux, there's nothing they can gain from providing support for their file system, and all that would happen is it gives people an option to use a non-microsoft product.

It would be absolute madness to release a driver, let alone dedicate resources to creating one.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[DarkOx]

You are correct about many things you point out. I don't see mirroring as a problem if you need an HA environment. Frankly if you are using a shared storage cluster, be it active-active or failover you still have a single point of failure the storage. That is kinda of a deal breaker if you are looking for 5 nines.

VMWare clusters do a good job but are only really HA if you have the right kind of storage to back them up or are remotely replicating them (which is not going to give your clean failover either).

I keep seeing these SMBs buying two or three high end servers and tieing them to starter SAN solutions like MSAs, Lefthand servers etc. These do have lots of redundancy around the most common points of failure but only the disingenuous marketing robots would claim they are fully redundant.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[FuckingNickName]

You haven't actually answered the question - you could have at least tried to explain how ext3 tries to minimise fragmentation, at which point I'd have given you a list of scenarios where its techniques won't work over time and linked to a few reports about it. Nor does your example of a couple of machines "running for years on their original native FS" tell us anything at all (except maybe that your use is sufficiently light that you've never needed to upgrade). What are the systems doing from day to day?

Finally, do you actually understand what percentage fragmentation represents? IOW, can you think of particular servers which may have horrible performance due to high fragmentation but a very low "percentage fragmented" statistic?

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Anonymous Coward]

What's wrong with it? Are you kidding? Sure, it's a reasonably modern file system, but there are some fundamental problems that even the end-user can easily identify. For example, if I have a file open in one application, I can't rename it with another. If I have a file open in a folder, I can't rename the folder, and so on. You've never seen the message:

"Cannot rename [filename]: The file is in use by the following program:

[Program]

You must close the file before proceeding."

The same thing sometimes happens if you simply have an Explorer window open or a file open on an external device and you try to eject it, except that you have to *guess* which program still has a file open.

That kind of blocking operation is archaic. I can't think of any UNIX-like filesystem that has limitations like that unless the file is actually being *written* at the time, not merely read. Not even Macs have that problem with HFS+. NTFS is an adequate filesystem in a lot of ways, but some basic features are pretty darn clunky.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[clang_jangle]

In the real world there is need to port windows problems to *nix. :)

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Jesus_666]

OS X self-defragments HFS+ volumes but that can fail if the volume is excessively full for prolonged time. I've experienced that once, ending up with a volume the largest contiguous block of which was about ten megabytes in size. (My remedy: Moving everything off and back onto the partition. That was faster than a full defrag run.) Of course that problem can be avoided by not filling the volume to near capacity - something most file systems can't handle without some kind of performance degradation.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[tomhudson]

Many distros only enable full read/write support to Windows partitions for the root user.

After all, letting just anyone delete all those files Windows hides from everyone shouldn't be made too easy. But it's handy when someone complains that Windows is unable to delete a file or directory tree, to use a boot linux cd, log in as root, and delete the files.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[obarthelemy]

I'm wondering by what magical way an OS would not fragment. Apart from knowing beforehand which files will get written and deleted, how can this be done ? Actually, you also need to know which files will be read, 'coz any good defragger will put those in the speediest parts of the drive.

If it's a background process that does the defragging, I wouldn't really count this as a file system feature ?

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[obarthelemy]

I have a 20 yo ZX81 and it's never had fragmentation either !

But, in the real world, usage might have a tiny impact on fragmentation ? like deleting and writing files ? disk saturation ?

Anecdote is not the singular of data.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, in DOS and windows. Otherwise, not so much. Unix-like systems handle disk writes with a lot more integrity that anything from Redmond.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[dryeo]

While HPFS is resistant to fragmentation it will fragment in a couple of cases. Close to full disk. Applications that don't tell the file system how much space they need, and files that grow.
An example of HPFS fragmentation,
E:\Mozprofiles\Thunderbird\Profiles\htc8i1pf.default\Mail\Local Folders\ffmpeg Comprises 260 extents.
While most of this drive is not fragmented, the Mozilla profiles are very fragmented, to the point that I'm going to move them to a different partition then back to defrag them.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[Anonymous Coward]

Read this.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[westyvw]

LOL this is the thing that just kills me, if you suspect any system of fragmentation you dont need a defragment tool, you simply copy the content out and move them back in. Fairly straight forward, and easy to do in a Nix envrionment I might add.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[LoztInSpace]

I'd be interested to know if on a busy server fragmentation is even that much of a bad thing when you're not just loading files into memory such as a database. With dozens of jobs all using different bits of different files, the heads are going to be all over the place anyway. Hell, a fragmented file might accidentally cause a few wins if occasionally bits of it are close to whatever else was just read.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[man_of_mr_e]

Actually, that kind of blocking operation is by design. THe purpose is to prevent well-known security issues, particularly in audit-trails.

If you can rename the log files while they're open, or even better, delete them.. while open... that means an attacker can do something like this:

* Make a copy of the audit log file
* Delete the current audit log file
* Do nasty things that get written to the delted log file (because the filehandle is still open, it keeps writing to the deleted file)
* Rename the copied logfile back to the original name
* Nobody knows you were there, because the log file seems to be fine.

You can't do that in windows, because logfiles are kept open by the OS, and never closed while the OS is running, so the log is tamper proof. Yes, you can delete the log, but then someone knows someone deleted the log.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[antdude]

Is MS ever going to release WinFS that was supposed to be in Vista? Or are we going to be on NTFS for a very long time/forever?

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[drsmithy]

Compared to WinFS, ZFS, and the upcoming BTFS it looks quite dated. Infact NTFS is really HPFS from OS/2 with a few extra features.

False. NTFS and HPFS are not even remotely similar.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[drsmithy]

Sadly NTFS is still behind HPFS in some ways. One major one is data fragmentation. Defragging manually is a joy only NTFS users have, as HPFS really never needed it.

NTFS's "fragmentation problems" are grossly exaggerated. Outside of pathological or corner case usage profiles, the performance difference between a "contiguous" and "highly fragmented" NTFS volume is essentially zero.

Re:What's wrong with NTFS?

[LO0G]

Actually the decision to allow deleting a file which is in use is up to the application. If the application opens the file with FILE_SHARE_DELETE, the OS will allow the open file to be renamed or deleted.

Very few applications take advantage of this because they don't tend to like having their files deleted underneath them. But an application can be built which allows this.

Drive Letters

[pushing-robot]

IMHO, Microsoft worst offense in storage is drive letters, which provide no information about either the type and structure of the underlying disks or the data they contain, and have caused untold headaches from applications (and the OS itself) being reliant on paths that are arbitrarily assigned, subject to change, and often out of the user's control.

Admittedly, Microsoft didn't invent the system, but the fact that drive letters still exist in 2011 is entirely their fault.

Re:Drive Letters

[Anonymous Coward]

Short names and the tunnel-cache are the worst offenses (http://www.osronline.com/article.cfm?article=22)
In NT, drive letters are just junction points used for app-compat. You can re-mount your drive anywhere you want.

Re:Drive Letters

[SuricouRaven]

That would be very hard to change, as so many applications would need to be altered.

Re:Drive Letters

[ocdscouter]

That would be very hard to change, as so many applications would need to be altered.

And backwards compatibility/legacy support for third party software is certainly not always a given (speaking as a generally satisfied MS customer).

Re:Drive Letters

[itsdapead]

That would be very hard to change, as so many applications would need to be altered.

...but surely it is not beyond the whit of man to emulate drive letters (ln -s /D: /home anybody?) for legacy apps while dragging the rest of the file system into the 1980s?

Instead, the more modern "logical" file system in Windows (as used by the desktop) still feels like an emulation sitting on top of drive letters, and last time I looked required you to use a proprietary GUI.

Still - it could be worse - with all the ex-DEC people involved in Windows NT, they could have gone for the VAX filing system. Actually, that seems to have been the basic philosophy behind WinFS: "Hey, who needs a disc filing system when you can have a DBMS instead" (ans: people who want to use a different DMBS?)

Re:Drive Letters

[EnsilZah]

I'm no application developer, but don't most apps rely on environment variables like %programfiles% and %userprofile% for their paths rather than drive letters?
And reading and writing to files on the network seems to work fine without a drive letter, I can access a shared folder on this computer as \\ComputerName\FolderName from any app, though I prefer to map it to Z: since it's shorter.
So what exactly would be the problem?

I remember some games in the 90s that used "C:\Program Files\..." as their default install folder rather than use an environment variable but that's about it.

Re:Drive Letters

[Anonymous Coward]

The fundamental problem is that the actual physical drives are represented in the file system in the first place. The Unix filesystem is always transparent and holistic. I can access any path without having to care the least bit about what drive is physically behind this path... ramfs, nfs, samba, lvm, raid, I just don't need to know. A file is a file is a file.

Using environment variables just defers the problem and adds another possible point of failure. It's just a kludge. Drive letters are a braindead remnant from when MS founded its monoply third party, self proclaimed "quick and dirty dos". The fact that SMB is slightly better in this regard is not relevant here.

The article, just like so many from the windows world, acts as if Microsoft had a great innovative idea but simply failed to deliver it, completely ignoring the fact that better solutions have been around for 40+ years. And then they get upset

Re:Drive Letters

[Anonymous Coward]

Admittedly, Microsoft didn't invent the system, but the fact that drive letters still exist in 2011 is entirely their fault.

And I bet that modern CPUs still have an A20 gate, too.

You're asking the wrong question, though. The question is not "does it suck", but rather "does it suck so much that we can justify the suckage it would cause if we fixed it". It'd be a pretty fundamental change; it'd cost time and money, and it'd interfere with legacy applications and all that. All that, just for a minor inconvenience?

Re:Drive Letters

[Nevynxxx]

I would love to introduce you to the internal developers at our place.

"What do you mean I can't write a temporary PDF to c:\ unless I'm administrator? Where *am* I supposed to put it!!!!"

Re:Drive Letters

[Jesus_666]

Well, they have a lot of kludges that only make sense because Microsoft needs to support ages-old software. Which is why some people had hoped that Win 7 would go the way of OS X and just be an entirely new operating system with a cut-down Windows XP inside. That way they could've cleaned up the whole thing without completely sacrificing compatibility.

Of course the way they went is probably easier for them so from now until forever will home users see every drive as a separate filesystem root - because it wil continue being easier for Microsoft.

Re:Drive Letters

[Waccoon]

I see DOS drive letters as the same thing as volumes and mount points under AmigaOS. They're actually a really good idea if used properly.

The problems are requiring them to be used at all times, and inconsistencies with assigning them.

Re:Drive Letters

[man_of_mr_e]

Drive letters have not been required by the OS for nearly 20 years. Apps still use them, Admins still use them.

Admins like drive letters, because end users use them as cue that they're storing their data on the network. Using some kind of path like /user/network/data/joe is less obvious to end users. They still say stuff like "I put that file out on the S: drive".

Re:Drive Letters

[LO0G]

And you know what? That's *exactly* how drive letters are implemented in Windows (NT). There's a symbolic link \Global??\D: which points to \Device\HardDisk0Partition1 (this is from memory, . When the Win32 subsystem parses a file path, it prepends "\Global??\" to the beginning of the file path (among other manipulations like removing "..") before passing it to the low level NT APIs.

You can see some of this with the SysInternals "winobj" tool.

Forgetting about Storage Server?

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft's attempts at turning Windows 2003 and 2008 into a SAN have been even larger disasters. I work in a field where support storage for different vendors, and when a customer attempts to use MS storage server, we flat out tell them it won't work. They simply refuse to follow SCSI/iSCSI standards and hosting something as critical as storage on bloated Windows never works.

Even their unix emulation NFS services fail miserably compared to even the beta versions of Linux distributions from 1996.

Bloody backslashes...

[itsdapead]

How about getting the directory separator wrong? This has indirectly led to a generation of TV and radio presenters having to say "forward slash" when reading out URLs...

Re:Bloody backslashes...

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't often hear non-techies say "forward slash," but I frequently hear them say "backslash" when they mean "forward slash." It makes me irrationally angry.

Re:Bloody backslashes...

[TeknoHog]

Is it wrong or simply different? AFAIK, the first DOS did not have directories, so they were free to choose / as the option prefix. Of course, they later added fancy things like directories and multiuser capabilities, but Windows users still suffer from having to be backwards compatible with a directoryless OS.

Re:Bloody backslashes...

[fnj]

It's a bit tedious to keep pointing this out, but actually nothing FORCES stupid people talking to other stupid people to say "forward slash." "Slash" IS "forward slash". "Backslash" is always "backslash." There is no reason for confusion, mental defects such as dyslexia aside.

Re:Bloody backslashes...

[Anonymous Coward]

Doesn't matter anymore. Forward slashes work perfectly in modern Windows for file paths.

Re:Bloody backslashes...

[Sancho]

Yeah. I thought the real problem was choosing slash as the character signifying an option in so many of their utilities.

Re:Bloody backslashes...

[Anonymous Coward]

Only the idiotic ones. Admittedly, these are legion.

What's really precious is when these announcers say "backslash" but mean a regular slash. WTF?

Re:Bloody backslashes...

[Anonymous Coward]

An interesting tidbit of history: Prior to DOS 5.0, you could set the SWITCHAR variable (in config.sys) to be any single character that you wanted, so that you could do a command such as xcopy -s -e -v %SOURCE% %DEST% However, outside of Microsoft, I don't think anyone ever used this feature, and instead they hard-coded the / as the separator. And speaking of my xcopy example, most (if not all of) Microsoft DOS utilites would take the options in any order, so you could do a xcopy -s %SOURCE% -e %DEST% -v if you really wanted to.

Re:Bloody backslashes...

[Reason58]

You have never done user support on Windows systems. If I had a quarter for every time a user used the wrong slash when trying to access a system (domain\username) I would be a millionaire. It is necessary to stress which slash you mean when talking to the public.

Re:Bloody backslashes...

[man_of_mr_e]

Whether or not Microsoft used backslashes or slashes, there would still be two of them on the keyboard, causing confusion with end users. Microsoft didn't invent the backslash... and it's used pretty heavily for other things (like for escaping in programming).

As long as there is two slashes on the keyboard, presenters will have to diferentiate between them.

Re:Bloody backslashes...

[Anonymous Coward]

AFAIK, the first DOS did not have directories, so they were free to choose / as the option prefix. Of course, they later added fancy things like directories and multiuser capabilities, but Windows users still suffer from having to be backwards compatible with a directoryless OS.

Sorry, your afaik was farther than u thought.

I've been using 'DOS' since MS-DOS first arrived on Trash-80 Model 3.
Always had directories and drive letters as long as it's had drives.

Could be a version of DOS pre-Mod 3, like on the Mod 2, but that was
a different beast altogether?

I used LDOS, which had directories and drive letters too. And I cannot
remember at all what CP/M looked like.

-@|

Re:Bloody backslashes...

[LO0G]

Actually the GP was right. DOS 1.0 didn't have directories, just drive #s. directories (and the "\" character) were added in DOS 2.0 (around 1983 or so).

NTFS from Windows and Linux

[Anonymous Coward]

I am currently developing for both Windows and Linux, so unlike the fanbois for both systems, I can comment on both. Both work. They offer much the same level of functionality.

As a developer, I prefer developing for Windows. Microsoft provides documentation for their system - good, consistent documentation that can be relied on. Trying to find documentation for anything other than the basic system functionality in Linux (manpages!) is damn difficult. It's a lot easier to write code that will run on pretty much every Windows system, because it's consistent and backwards compatible. It's a lot harder to write code that will run on every version of Linux (maybe command-line code - too many choices in GUIs). And don't give me that rubbish about "read the source code" - that doesn't tell me how the code is intended to be used. I do like the more standardised support for C++ and STL in Linux.

Oh, and yes, NTFS-3g does support read-write access to NTFS volumes. I've hit one glitch so far in its support for NTFS on Windows 7 (there's a loop-back in one symbolic link), but other than that, it provides fairly complete support, albeit without complete support for all of these Windows attributes (because they don't map to Linux attributes).

Re:NTFS from Windows and Linux

[seifried]

Please explain to me exactly how the MFT works then.

Re:NTFS from Windows and Linux

[shutdown -p now]

If you want good and extensive developer documentation (and other support), I highly recommend using Qt for your Unix development wherever possible. It's not just an UI toolkit, it's a full-fledged framework that covers a lot of ground - probably about as much as .NET 1.x.

s/GUI/API in line 3

[itsdapead]

s/GUI/API in line 3

So many TLAs, so few brain cells...

LVM2 or raid?

[devent]

I have used LVM2 now for two years with my various notebooks and netbooks. They had various crashes and power downs but I never loosed one bit of data. My small home server is using LVM2 as well with my 3 USB hard disks, serves videos and music to my home.

With my notebooks and netbooks I can grow or shrink my root or home partition and with my server I can just plug in another USB hard disk and grow my partition. No fuss not complicated at all and works all the time.

All that for free, just download Fedora, Debian or Ubuntu and install it in 10 minutes. If you want, setup a FTP server, apache server or what ever you like. Or you get what you pay for with Windows for 100$ or more.

Re:LVM2 or raid?

[batkiwi]

-What happens if you lose a disk?
So you look to install raid
-what if all your disks aren't the same size?
and
-what if you want to upgrade just one disk? Or add a new disk? (I know both are possible with the raid-5 tools, but adding new disks takes HOURS, if not DAYS, depending on the size of your array.... not something I'd call usable to a home user)

MS drive extender and Unraid both have a home-user solution that open source does not match right now. I hope this changes soon!

Re:LVM2 or raid?

[Anonymous Coward]

btrfs?

Truthfully, I'm not sure, but I think these are things that zfs (on BSD varients) has already figured out, and that btrfs (not ready for prime time, yet) is figuring out currently.

Re:LVM2 or raid?

[devent]

MS drive extender and

Well, not anymore do they?

What happens if you lose a disk?

Why, what happens? We are talking about the MS drive extender and with LVM2 you can use such feature with every major Linux distribution since 13 years and that without the risk to loose any data.

If MS only just implemented LVM2 for Windows you would have now a nice space expansion feature which is proven to work.

Raid is not a backup solution anyway so if you care about your data you need to have a backup strategy.

Re:LVM2 or raid?

[Pinky's Brain]

Drive extender gracefully degrades, any single drive contains a subset of the complete data and can be read individually.

Drives used with LVM mirror can not, and the array will catastrophically degrade if any two drives carrying a pair of mirrored extents get corrupted.

Re:LVM2 or raid?

[Anonymous Coward]

If I lose a disk in my RAID 10, I add a new one, preferably even larger than the one I lost, so I can upgrade (by buying a second new disk too). For reference I have an LVM2 on top of two RAID 10s. I usually sell the 'old' drives on ebay anyway, so new drives actually cost me just about half of the price anyway. I alway go with the best MB/$ drives whenever I buy.

Of course my disks need to be same size if I don't want to waste space, but that's OK, totally.

I never want to upgrade just one disk, because I want the promise that my raid gives me. Of course, if don't want that, I could just use LVM2 without raid and I can upgrade just one disk. Buy larger disk, add to VG as a new PV, move data off 'old' drive and remove that PV from my LVM. Done. Doesn't actually take days, even with large drives. Yes, those 1.5T or larger drives take a long time, but they usually have a SATA3 interface, so it will run at 150MB+/sec if you want (remember, we are talking home user, so having zero performance while copying but having a fast copy is OK.

I don't know about ease of use for LVM2/RAID on linux, as I use the command line utilities, so no idea how good the GUI/auto-magicness of current distros is.

Re:LVM2 or raid?

[westyvw]

Thanks. Voice of reason, I was suprised by all those people commenting after the article who had tried the Microsoft way and gotten bitten. I didnt think people would even think of doing that, when free and easy (and robust) technologies already exist. I guess this explains it all: Co-worker: "I finally installed Debian, Apache and PostGres" it really is working! Now I am ready to buy the real version" and he didnt mean support either.

 

Re:LVM2 or raid?

[Anonymous Coward]

-What happens if you lose a disk?
So you look to install raid
-what if all your disks aren't the same size?
and
-what if you want to upgrade just one disk? Or add a new disk? (I know both are possible with the raid-5 tools, but adding new disks takes HOURS, if not DAYS, depending on the size of your array.... not something I'd call usable to a home user)

MS drive extender and Unraid both have a home-user solution that open source does not match right now. I hope this changes soon!

Possibly Greyhole, which can be found in practice in the WHS alternative, Amahi.

ZFS

[Anonymous Coward]

Or better yet, ZFS. The only free fs (until btrfs is ready for prime time) that prevents data corruption and bit rot, supports single/double/triple parity raid, caching, etc.

Re:ZFS

[Big Boss]

ZFS is excellent, but I'm not sure it's a good choice for average home users. They don't understand why they need drives the same size, or build non-redundant arrays and get pissed when one drive takes out the whole array. If you can get them to understand to install new drives in mirror pairs and keep an eye on them so you can replace one when it fails, you might be on to something. A custom distro could be set up to handle this without too much hassle. While I don't like MS tech much, their drive extender thing was ok for home users. WHEN you lose a drive, you can still read the data on the other drives. So it's non-redundant, but it also doesn't lose ALL your data when one drive dies. ZFS and most other raid systems don't either, but try getting most home users to do it right... They will stripe them and think they are so smart for not "wasting" the space.... then scream when their non-backed-up "RAID" dies.

I explain my raidz2 setup to people and the first question when they get the basic stuff is "so you throw away 2 drives?"... sigh... They don't want to spend the $, buy the cheapest USB HDD they can find, then complain to me when that drive crashes and they lose all their data. We can't talk home users into using backups, RAID seems to be completely beyond them. People on /. understand this stuff, but your average home user thinks the computer case is the "hard drive" or "cpu".....

"the debacle that was WinFS"

[Anonymous Coward]

Typical of Big Government, poorly specified projects with bloated funding. They should let Private Enterprise solve the problem.

Eat your words... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

"You are aware that it was ONLY FUCKING MICROSOFST that had autolaunch and until extremely recently that it was even possible to completely disable it. Real operating systems(and not toys like the ones Microsoft makes) have had ways to disable that shit for eons before Microsoft even realized it was possible." - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @05:30AM (#35184792) Homepage Journal

USB Autorun Attacks Against Linux:

http://linux.slashdot.org/story/11/02/07/1742246/USB-Autorun-Attacks-Against-Linux

---

"If you are trusting critical data to a Microsoft product you are asking to be hacked." - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @05:30AM (#35184792) Homepage Journal

Oh, do you mean a "real operating system", like Linux? See the url link I posted above then... & think again!

(Linux is going to see a huge rash of vulnerabilities crop up the more it gains market share/mindshare on the part of users at both corporate and home user levels... how can I say this? Look @ MacOS X - the moment it gained market share, up went the number of attacks on it & vulnerabilities found + abused vs. it... look @ ANDROID (which is Linux) being attacked week after week now that it has "top spot" in terms of usage in the SmartPhone world!)

APK

P.S.=> So much for your statement of "Real operating systems(and not toys like the ones Microsoft makes) have had ways to disable that shit for eons before Microsoft even realized it was possible." though - because THAT makes you eat your words, easily... apk

Re:Eat your words... apk

[antifoidulus]

Nope, you fail it. Linux auto-run was actually possible to totally turn off, fuck it's not even on by default. Microsoft's pathetic excuse for an "operating system" didn't actually allow you to totally turn off autorun, you could disable parts of it, but it was impossible to actually completely turn it off. Nice try Microsoft shill, but you fail it. And also, the number of attacks, even considering the market share, against OS X are a drop in the bucket compared to the cum-bucket that is Windows. Why do you think Google banned windows from it's networks? Because Windows "security" is a joke and always has been a joke and always will be a joke. But Microsoft's repeated failures are finally catching up to it and it won't be relevant in a decade anyway, so...

Honeyball: DriveSpace wasn't DOUBLESPACE

[Anonymous Coward]

Honeyball made a mistake: DriveSpace wasn't the problem in DOS 6.x... DOUBLESPACE was.

The original version of the compression system DOS 6.x had was called DOUBLESPACE & DriveSpace was the corrected version & it was actually QUITE competitive with Stacker (I used both products, Stacker &/or MS DOS with DoubleSpace in v 6.0, & DriveSpace in v. 6.2 - 6.22 of DOS, as well as Stacker from version 6 - iirc, 8, to compare them both...).

APK

P.S.=> Apparently, for all his ranting on the history of Microsoft's storage efforts, Honeyball's "history" isn't 100% accurate (unless he's from an alternate dimension/reality that is, ala "Bizarro World") either... & this is what you get with journalists who are really only that: Writers, instead of being TRUE "Computer Sciences oriented afficianados"...

What I am also additionally "astounded by", is that nobody else here has caught that... but, then again? Most of the folks that seem to hang around /. the past few years now are too young to have even put their hands on the things that "historical critique" type articles use as examples... & my having to cite this needed correction, first here, exemplifies this apparently... apk

Re:Honeyball: DriveSpace wasn't DOUBLESPACE

[blahbooboo]

Honeyball made a mistake: DriveSpace wasn't the problem in DOS 6.x... DOUBLESPACE was.

The original version of the compression system DOS 6.x had was called DOUBLESPACE & DriveSpace was the corrected version & it was actually QUITE competitive with Stacker (I used both products, Stacker &/or MS DOS with DoubleSpace in v 6.0, & DriveSpace in v. 6.2 - 6.22 of DOS, as well as Stacker from version 6 - iirc, 8, to compare them both...).

APK

P.S.=> Apparently, for all his ranting on the history of Microsoft's storage efforts, Honeyball's "history" isn't 100% accurate (unless he's from an alternate dimension/reality that is, ala "Bizarro World") either... & this is what you get with journalists who are really only that: Writers, instead of being TRUE "Computer Sciences oriented afficianados"...

What I am also additionally "astounded by", is that nobody else here has caught that... but, then again? Most of the folks that seem to hang around /. the past few years now are too young to have even put their hands on the things that "historical critique" type articles use as examples... & my having to cite this needed correction, first here, exemplifies this apparently... apk

Thanks for correcting. I am old enough to remember this :) It was quite a scandal in how it destroyed data and later caught at putting out of business Stacker (despite MS losing the law suit. Like most people, I didn't use this technology long as the compression was a pain in the butt, used lots of resources, and after the initial release data loss issues left me not thinking it was worth the trouble...

WinFS != BeOS

[doperative]

WinFS was touted as the next big thing in Longhorn/Vista. They couldn't even do it when they stole the code .. link

Re:WinFS != BeOS

[man_of_mr_e]

Umm.. Your link alleges that Microsoft locked Be out of the market, not that they stole any source code. What's your point exactly?

that's news to me

[doperative]

"ADS was introduced for one reason: to allow NT servers to support Apple clients"

That's news to me, do you have citations to verifiable historical records that say this?

Eat your words, yet again... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

"Nope, you fail it. Linux auto-run was actually possible to totally turn off, fuck it's not even on by default." - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @07:31AM (#35185318) Homepage Journal

Then, why on earth would the Linux camp have to have it turned off then, by default? You're not even making sense.

---

"Microsoft's pathetic excuse for an "operating system" didn't actually allow you to totally turn off autorun, you could disable parts of it, but it was impossible to actually completely turn it off" - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @07:31AM (#35185318) Homepage Journal

You can disable it, easily enough:

---

How to disable the Autorun functionality in Windows

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/967715

---

(AND, once it's disabled, it's not going to work against you (or, for you) anyhow - period!)...

APK

P.S.=> Given the facts above, how can you say I "failed" here then? ... apk

Re:Eat your words, yet again... apk

[antifoidulus]

First and foremost, no, until recently it was IMPOSSIBLE to COMPLETELY disable auto-run, Microsoft's pathetic security really shown through there. Secondly you have shown you know absolutely NOTHING about Linux. Unlike Microsoft there is no Linux "monolith" outside the kernel(and even then). The kernel has nothing to do with autorun. And furthermore, on distros that do enable auto-run it's insanely simple not only to disable autorun, but to remove the functionality from the system. Try removing, not just disabling, autorun from Windows. Go ahead, I can wait..... So yeah, you obviously need to use a real operating system and realize how absolutely primitive Microsoft is before saying anything more to expose your own ignorance.

Re:Eat your words, yet again... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

"And also, the number of attacks, even considering the market share, against OS X are a drop in the bucket compared to the cum-bucket that is Windows." - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @07:31AM (#35185318) Homepage Journal

MacOS X only has a SMALL FRACTION of the market share out there enjoyed by Windows is why... the % ratio is there, & fits pretty well into it by proportion.

However, there's NO DENYING that when MacOS X increased its marketshare/mindshare amongst users, that it was attacked more (despite the ads on TV that Apple used & implied that MacOS X is "more secure than Windows" is)...

Same with Linux, via ANDROID: It's only JUST come out really, and now that it's exploding & taking the lion's share of market on smartphones, it's being attacked & exposed as a "fraud" too, in that it's HIGHLY attackable.

In a strange way? Windows actually enjoys an advantage here, in that because they are the most used they're the MOST attacked, for decades...

(This has given MS the opportunity for correction, & they have done so over time continually! Linux variants &/or MacOS X? They've YET to see such concentrated effort vs. attackers, but ANDROID's only beginning to show us what will happen there on THAT account...)

---

"Why do you think Google banned windows from it's networks? Because Windows "security" is a joke and always has been a joke and always will be a joke.." - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @07:31AM (#35185318) Homepage Journal

Hmmm, & Google's NEVER been "hacked/cracked"? Is that what you're trying to tell us here??

(Perhaps GOOGLE's staff isn't quite as "smart" as you'd like to think, & they do NOT know how to properly secure Windows)

However: Answer that question above I just asked (& I'll come right back over the top of you with proof to that very effect in fact...)

---

"But Microsoft's repeated failures are finally catching up to it and it won't be relevant in a decade anyway, so.." - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @07:31AM (#35185318) Homepage Journal

"Oh, yea, sure" (sarcasm)...

---

"Unlike Microsoft there is no Linux "monolith" outside the kernel(and even then). The kernel has nothing to do with autorun. And furthermore, on distros that do enable auto-run it's insanely simple not only to disable autorun, but to remove the functionality from the system" -

You sure YOU know about Linux? The fact that Linux has more kernel errors present in it than Windows in its ENTIRETY does (because an OS is more than just a kernel/core), seems to say otherwise:

http://secunia.com/advisories/product/2719/?task=advisories

12 outstanding issues on Linux are still there, local exploits only granted, but there...

(ANDROID, however, a Linux variant? Shows plenty of holes, & the ones present are ONLY a "portent of things to come")

Windows 7, by way of comparison? Ok:

http://secunia.com/advisories/product/27467/?task=advisories

Only 6 outstanding issues, & Service Pack #1 (which should seal the last 6) is only 3 days away now...

Now, that's AGAIN comparing the ENTIRETY of Windows (inclusive of GUI shells, & apps etc.), vs. only the Linux kernel - toss on Gnome &/or KDE known issues, you have a LOT more errors/vulnerabilities in Linux than just what's shown in the kernel only.

(And, you said I was "ignorant"? You're trying to compare an OS core ONLY (Linux) vs. an entire OS (Windows)).

---

"Try removing, not just disabling, autorun from Windows. Go ahead, I can wait.." -

Ok, but I don't have to be the one doing it... MS is:

---

Microsoft Kills AutoRun In Windows:

http://it.slashdot.org/story/11/02/09/2331218/Microsoft-Kills-AutoRun-In-Windows

Re:Eat your words, yet again... apk

[antifoidulus]

Yeah, because waiting on Microsoft to fix security exploits is SUCH a good idea, how many 10 year plus exploits have been found for Windows? Way more than any other OS out there, and whenever a whole is found in a major linux package they are fixed within at most days, vs. weeks windows. But yeah, you keep playing with your toy OS, makes it easier for people to own your data!

Re:Eat your words, yet again... apk

[tomhudson]

APK is a know-nothing troll who has never worked in the industry. His only "legend in his own mind" was that he claimed that "his" hosts file could completely secure a windows computer. The only thing that can completely secure a windows computer is a power failure. Or a sledge hammer.

lack of coordination

[v1]

The article does a fairly thorough job of roasting MS over their lack of internal coordination, outlining how one wing starts to work on a new technology and other departments that need to get on board "wanted nothing to do with it'. In any well-managed company, a department that refuses to get on board with a new technology gets hell rained down on them from above until they fall into line.

Take Apple's "spotlight" meta search feature for example. Imagine the team working on the AddressBook app "wanted nothing to do with it"? There'd be hell to pay, and either team managers would change their tune or get replaced. In a large project like an operating system, lack of cooperation simply cannot be tolerated. But it seems that MS is just so large at this point that it doesn't have the power to guarantee their different projects cooperate fully with each other.

I have read from time to time that there was this sort of internal battle going on at MS, where different projects worked in isolation and there was infighting, but I'd never really seen the effects of these issues before. It's interesting to see the result. This appears to be an upper management or communications problem. Whoever is above the Outlook team needs to be asking that team manager "so how's integration with drive extender going?" If they get foot-dragging and complaining and brush-offs, that manager needs to be dragged into the director's office for some "re-education" on cohesive development. If the director isn't asking these questions, THEY need to be replaced. Something of this sort is isn't working properly at MS.

Its like a construction project. You've got all these separate units coming in, doing electrical, plumbing, structural, heating, floors. The general contractor has to make sure these people work together. Refusing to cooperate with one of the other groups simply cannot be tolerated, and it's the GC's responsibility to make sure everything works smoothly. Problems between groups need to be brought to the GC, and the GC needs to settle them immediately. Otherwise the finished building has serious problems. You can't just turn over the house to the owner and say "Oh by the way we removed the heating from the bathroom. The plumbers wouldn't route the pipes around where the heating ducts needed to go. You don't REALLY need heat in such a small room anyway." But that's the sort of thing that MS is pulling from time to time.

I think MS is just taking the cowardly way out. "We can't control our own internal development processes well enough to get this feature integrated properly in with the rest of our technology, so we're just canceling it." The article states simply that companies like Dropbox and DataRobotics (makers of Drobo) that have only one core technology are forced to "get it right", because dropping it simply isn't an option. MS seems to think they have the option to just drop any feature at any time on a whim if it's not going well, instead of going to the additional effort of kicking some butts and making it work. It's not like its an impossible task. This is doable. They just lack the necessary internal management to pull it off consistently.

Bottom line: At MS, with any new project, unless all the key players decide to get on board, the project is doomed.

In other words, the Outlook team manager should not be capable of tanking Drive Extender. But it is, and it did. And THAT is a serious internal management problem that MS has demonstrated over and over. Something's gotta change.

Re:lack of coordination

[Anonymous Coward]

With MS's push towards BPOS, private cloud hosting, and applications as a service, why would they put ANY effort into making local storage management easier for the "end user"? There is no profit incentive for them in maintaining extender for WHS. They obviously want to add storage management as a service, and if storage management is too hard, why they have an app for that. The storage vision for their next iteration of OS's is not in your basement, but in their datacenter.

You can't stop the signal, Mal.

Re:lack of coordination

[0123456]

With MS's push towards BPOS, private cloud hosting, and applications as a service, why would they put ANY effort into making local storage management easier for the "end user"? There is no profit incentive for them in maintaining extender for WHS.

If the future is 'renting software' in 'the cloud', why would anyone rent Microsoft software?

Microsoft live and die by sales of Windows. If they have to compete on application sales when those applications don't have a lock-in to Windows, they're doomed.

Smells like Ballmer

[Anonymous Coward]

It smells like Ballmer decision all over the place

You're welcome (& a note on "resources")... ap

[Anonymous Coward]

"Thanks for correcting." - by blahbooboo (839709) on Saturday February 12, @08:44AM (#35185688)

You're welcome... I was just amazed nobody else caught this, & not just here, but in the comments from other forums around the wire that feature this article (I waited too, to see if ANYONE would "catch this"... nobody has!). Especially in the source article itself (comments for it especially)...

---

"I am old enough to remember this :)" - by blahbooboo (839709) on Saturday February 12, @08:44AM (#35185688)

You must be in your late 30's or better then...

---

"It was quite a scandal in how it destroyed data and later caught at putting out of business Stacker" - by blahbooboo (839709) on Saturday February 12, @08:44AM (#35185688)

Personally? Well - I never had a problem here, with drivespace OR stacker... & the ONLY issue I had with DOUBLESPACE was that it could NOT be "de-compressed" (i.e.-> once you went compression with it, you were STUCK with it).

DriveSpace later corrected for that, & you could uncompress it (Stacker always could, thru all of its versions).

---

"(... Like most people, I didn't use this technology long as the compression was a pain in the butt, used lots of resource...)" - by blahbooboo (839709) on Saturday February 12, @08:44AM (#35185688)

This part was EASY to "get around", via either:

---

1.) QEMM (better than Memmaker by a GOOD margin)

or

2.) DOS' own "Memmaker" program

---

Both memory manager programs allowed for pretty massive "regains" of both conventional (below 640k RAM) & upper/extended memory (the 384k between 640k & 1mb, + beyond 1mb)...

ADDITIONALLY: IF you "knew what you were doing" with both Config.sys &/or autoexec.bat (& even MORESO, via system.ini + win.ini settings once in Windows 3.x)? You could get back even more than those 2 memory managers got you (via "esoteric settings" like FCBS, files, buffers, lastdrive, & more)... apk

U eat ur words again "the bitter taste of defeat"

[Anonymous Coward]

First of all, time to correct you, again, on this erroneous & false statement you made, of:

"First and foremost, no, until recently it was IMPOSSIBLE to COMPLETELY disable auto-run" - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @08:38AM (#35185648) Homepage Journal

Is complete & utter b.s. (you don't know very much on Windows is what this tells me):

You could disable it YEARS ago, if not more than a decade++ or more, really (it is that long actually), by using registry hacks OR tweakUI (a GUI MS "powertoy").

Oh, & by the way, since I didn't mention this earlier? I run Linux (KUbuntu 10.10x) & probably tried Linux before you were even born quite possibly (Slackware 1.02 distro on CD owner here, & that was from 1994 no less).

Your accusations of I don't know Linux only worked against you, because I started taking a closer look at some of your statements here, & that one? Your "linchpin"/fulcrum/foundation?? Weak, & easily overturned & shown as erroneous/false.

Accusations like you've made MY way? They're usually QUITE "telling" & tell me exactly where + how to attack naysayers... you gave yourself away, & "showed your tell", in that YOU don't know Windows.

---

"Yeah, because waiting on Microsoft to fix security exploits is SUCH a good idea" - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @09:51AM (#35186118) Homepage Journal

I don't wait that long, see below!

I.E.-> I security harden my OS, & have since 1996/1997 here in fact, & I also patch conscientiously.

I also only wait 1 month's time for patches too, like other users of Windows (sometimes earlier, via "out-of-band" critical patches &/or workarounds, such as the MHTML bug in Windows which has a valid work-around)!

Heck: Most of what I do (OR, don't do) for security here? It actually "nullifies" even the 6 outstanding issues on Windows 7...

---

"how many 10 year plus exploits have been found for Windows?" - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @09:51AM (#35186118) Homepage Journal

Apparently not as many on current kernel/core versions of Linux are in Windows 7, both being the current "latest/greatest" offerings from BOTH camps!

(Linux kernel 2.6x, kernel only mind you, again, shows more "holes" in it, than Windows 7 in its ENTIRETY no less, w/ Windows showing less known security vulnerabilities than Linux does there at SECUNIA.COM from the links I put up to that effect from a reputable security-oriented website) of Linux, first of all!

Secondly, what 10+ yr. exploits are those on Windows 7??

I posted SECUNIA.COM's stats for your reference in my last post in fact, & "lo & behold", Linux shows MORE exploits possible, period...

ANDROID showing up errors weekly lately, since it's a LINUX variant, only compounds that moreso.

(Lastly - I don't see any that have existed for 10++ yrs. there, because Windows 7 has only been around for a little more than 1 yr.!)

---

"Way more than any other OS out there" - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @09:51AM (#35186118) Homepage Journal

Oh, really? I suggest you see my last post, & the links at SECUNIA.COM then... they seem to tell QUITE ANOTHER STORY!

(Linux 2.6x latest, vs. Windows 7, & Windows 7's also including its GUI shell & attendant default installed app base excluding IE... so, again, addon Linux apps & the GUI shells' errors (KDE/Gnome, & others)?? You get even MORE errors on Linux!)
---

"and whenever a whole is found in a major linux package they are fixed within at most days, vs. weeks windows." - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @09:51AM (#35186118) Homepage Journal

Once more, I suggest you look at the links I put up from SECUNIA.COM, because Linux 2.

Re:U eat ur words again "the bitter taste of defea

[antifoidulus]

Wow, you know nothing, and it shows, and the fact that someone as ignorant as you is writing security guides speaks volumes on Windows security. I have repeated myself I don't know how many times but you refuse to listen, IT WAS FUCKING IMPOSSIBLE TO TOTALLY DISABLE AUTORUN IN WINDOWS UNTIL VERY VERY RECENTLY!!!!!!!!! Why do you think Microsoft finally removed it? Because Windows is such a buggy pile of shit that they couldn't figure out how to allow users to totally disable it without breaking 50 fucking things. You could "disable" it, but that didn't actually totally disable it, it was still incredibly trivial for a hacker to take advantage of it's many, many flaws. And yes, if you totally actually you know, ignore the severity of the holes(which Microsoft LOVES to do) and include EVERY Linux package under the sun, then yeah, Windows has fewer holes. But the ones it does have are so big you could drive a truck through them. You are a Microsoft shill as I said, and I look forward to your clients suing the shit out of you for recommending such a buggy, insecure OS to them. There is a reason that Windows server is losing ground faster than Balmer can throw chairs, nobody wants to take even a remote chance on putting any actual real data at risk with that buggy insecure piece of shit "operating system"(read toy). The numbers speak volumes, Windows is a dead end, and if you value you career I suggest you actually get your head out of Billy G's ass and look at the actual data.

Name me one, ONE serious incident in the past 10 years that was a result of a Unix security bug. I'll just fire off the most notable Windows ones, because I would be writing a novel if I listed every single Windows security failure.

Stuxnet, Conflicker, SQL slammer, the pentagon hacks(which succeeded because of Window's inability to totally disable autorun, see earlier argument), Klez. and the list goes on and on. Not to mention a security incident just waiting to happen, Microsoft's DRM anti-piracy system. It just gives me such a warm fuzzy feeling knowing that I have to prove that I bought that piece of shit OS to Bill whenever he demands that I do. And that if he doesn't particularly like me he can remotely disable my system. Yeah, that's not a security issue at all.

Windows is a joke to hack and you are a shill or an idiot for arguing otherwise. So which is it, shill or moron?

Re:You're welcome (& a note on "resources")...

[obarthelemy]

QEMM ! and DesqView ! I remember fondly multitasking DOS stuff and having access to oodles of RAM thanks to DEVICEHIGH and LOADHIGH. I felt so powerful !

I think with Win7, MS has finally managed to become as reliable as DesqView.

Your name tossing & profanity is not helping U

[Anonymous Coward]

"IT WAS FUCKING IMPOSSIBLE TO TOTALLY DISABLE AUTORUN IN WINDOWS UNTIL VERY VERY RECENTLY!!!!!!!!!" - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @11:56AM (#35186910) Homepage Journal

Are you wasted? Look at the date of this:

http://www.engadget.com/2004/06/29/how-to-tuesday-disable-autorun-on-windows/

(That's from 2004 pal... & you can be SURE it's not "the 1st" posting on how it'd be done to disable autorun, because tweakUI, a MS "powertoy" could do it, & way farther back than that date of 2004!)

Then again also? Look @ Linux having to disable it too, only NOW, recently... it was JUST AS SUBJECT TO EXPLOIT using its autorun features as Windows was!

Plus, via disabling it, per the recommended manual method I put out (or otherwise like TweakUI)? It can't affect a SMART user of Windows.

---

"Windows is a dead end, and if you value you career I suggest you actually get your head out of Billy G's ass and look at the actual data" - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @11:56AM (#35186910) Homepage Journal

Oh, ok: Do you mean data like THIS:

---

USB Autorun Attacks Against Linux:

http://linux.slashdot.org/story/11/02/07/1742246/USB-Autorun-Attacks-Against-Linux

---

OR, how about THIS also:

---

Security Warning Over Web-Based Android Market:

http://mobile.slashdot.org/story/11/02/04/181204/Security-Warning-Over-Web-Based-Android-Market

---

?

Want more? THOSE, mind you, are VERY CURRENT!

---

"And yes, if you totally actually you know, ignore the severity of the holes(which Microsoft LOVES to do) and include EVERY Linux package under the sun, then yeah, Windows has fewer holes" - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @11:56AM (#35186910) Homepage Journal

That's right, FINALLY, on YOUR part... & you had to "admit defeat"...

Plus/again: The 6 remaining KNOWN security errors in Windows? I'm not affected by them, because of either security hardening I do, OR, by not using the adversely affected features, period, and it's only 3 days until they are patched (w/ Service Pack #1 issuing for Windows 7 shortly).

---

"But the ones it does have are so big you could drive a truck through them." - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @11:56AM (#35186910) Homepage Journal

Oh, really? Which ones are those (now that I've shown you Linux in its kernel ALONE has more than Windows 7 does in its ENTIRETY, and SP #1 is only 3 days away too for Win7 to seal those off)??

Clue: Because I don't use some of the features noted in the list of known security vulnerabilities in Windows 7, & because I 'security-harden' my Windows, I am NOT subject to them... neither are others who do the same (which by default in some cases, one does).

Still - bring out the ones that are "so big" & I will show you either valid workarounds, or reasons how/why they cannot affect me (from a technical perspective here too, with programmatic or system related detail)...

---

"Name me one, ONE serious incident in the past 10 years that was a result of a Unix security bug. I'll just fire off the most notable Windows ones, because I would be writing a novel if I listed every single Windows security failure." - by antifoidulus (807088) on Saturday February 12, @11:56AM (#35186910) Homepage Journal

Past events &/or security vulnerabilities do NOT matter... what matters, is the present... & that shows Linux with more holes in its KERNEL ALONE, than Windows 7 has in its ENTIRETY... period!

ADDITIONALLY: Since ANDROID is a Linux variant, the Linux security issues in ANDROID? Those only compound the greater number of security issues in Linux, just like adding KDE/Gnome/xfce etc. shells & apps to Linux, especia

This is new...

[telekon]

Microsoft canned a product because it was buggy and didn't work properly? Must be a first.

Have you done more than I have, "tommy boy"?

[Anonymous Coward]

"APK is a know-nothing troll who has never worked in the industry." - by tomhudson (43916) on Saturday February 12, @11:19AM (#35186644) Homepage Journal

LMAO, oh, really? Try many time Fortune 100-500 employee here.

Of course, I also have these to my credit as well, which tomhudson doesn't:

---

Windows NT Magazine (now Windows IT Pro) April 1997 "BACK OFFICE PERFORMANCE" issue, page 61

(&, for work done for EEC Systems/SuperSpeed.com on PAID CONTRACT (writing portions of their SuperCache program increasing its performance by up to 40% via my work) albeit, for their SuperDisk & HOW TO APPLY IT, took them to a finalist position @ MS Tech Ed, two years in a row 2000-2002, in its HARDEST CATEGORY: SQLServer Performance Enhancement).

WINDOWS MAGAZINE, 1997, "Top Freeware & Shareware of the Year" issue page 210, #1/first entry in fact (my work is there)

PC-WELT FEB 1998 - page 84, again, my work is featured there

WINDOWS MAGAZINE, WINTER 1998 - page 92, insert section, MUST HAVE WARES, my work is again, there

PC-WELT FEB 1999 - page 83, again, my work is featured there

CHIP Magazine 7/99 - page 100, my work is there

GERMAN PC BOOK, Data Becker publisher "PC Aufrusten und Repairen" 2000, where my work is contained in it

HOT SHAREWARE Numero 46 issue, pg. 54 (PC ware mag from Spain), 2001 my work is there, first one featured, yet again!

Also, a British PC Mag in 2002 for many utilities I wrote, saw it @ BORDERS BOOKS but didn't buy it... by that point, I had moved onto other areas in this field besides coding only...

Being paid for an article that made me money over @ PCPitstop in 2008 for writing up a guide that has people showing NO VIRUSES/SPYWARES & other screwups, via following its point, such as THRONKA sees here -> http://www.xtremepccentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=ee926d913b81bf6d63c3c7372fd2a24c&t=28430&page=3

Lastly, lately (this year)?

It's also been myself helping out the folks at the UltraDefrag64 project (a 64-bit defragger for Windows), in showing them code for how to do Process Priority Control @ the GUI usermode/ring 3/rpl 3 level in their program (good one too), & being credited for it by their lead dev & his team... see here -> http://ultradefrag.sourceforge.net/handbook/Credits.html

---

Now - WHEN YOU CAN SHOW US YOU'VE DONE MORE OF GOOD NOTE AND EARLIER THAN I HAVE AS WELL AS MORE TIMES, "tommy-boy"? THEN, you can TALK!

(All YOU ever do, is "talk" though, 'tommy-boy'... lol!)

---

"His only "legend in his own mind" was that he claimed that "his" hosts file could completely secure a windows computer. " - by tomhudson (43916) on Saturday February 12, @11:19AM (#35186644) Homepage Journal

I never claimed a HOSTS file can secure you completely... show me where I have? I want a quote, big talker... you'll never get it, because I never, EVER said that: HOSTS files are, however, a valuable layer of defense for the concept of "layered security".

Seems I can produce more works of good note in the art & science of computing than a NOBODY like you, tomhudson...

(Care to show us you've done more than my list above, big talker?)

APK

P.S.=> We KNOW you can't, 'tommy-boy"... you can't even produce a collegiate degree to your credit iirc... you're just a LOWLY TECHIE, @ best/most, tommy-boy - get over it! apk

Re:Have you done more than I have, "tommy boy"?

[tomhudson]

You haven't received any mentions in the news in a decade. And those old ones, talking about a hosts file that was used to "secure" Windows 95, as a serious line of defense is really, really behind the times.

Which is why you have to post anonymously so often - every troll account you create gets burned.

Then again, who wants to p0wn a Windows 95 box?

Watch tommy boy EMBARASS himself... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35192078

We'll see YOU there, big talker "tommy boy"... I am going to embarass you, dolt, & simply by letting YOU, embarass yourself, by letting you show us all what you've done in the science of computing (which is nothing) that others noted as good stuff, since you came there to that URL above, & trolled me as you like to do...

Tomhudson "talks a big game" & likes to try to "play expert", but when it comes down to proving he's done anything decent in the area of computer sciences? Well... you'll all see how completely LAME tommy boy really is.

(Everyone here KNOWS you haven't accomplished anything in the computer science arena of decent note in the eyes of others, especially those in written publications like books, magazines, newspapers & more (whereas I have, many times & most likely before you were even born...)).

APK

P.S.=> This is going to be hilarious... & remember tommy boy: You started it, coming over to the URL I posted above & trying to "troll me", you pathetic dolt.

(It's going to be hilarious watching you "eat your words" as well as letting everyone see just how "dime a dozen" you really are... and watch you with egg all over your face, lol)... apk

No no tommy boy: What you you, EVER done?

[Anonymous Coward]

See "tommy boy" run everybody, lmao:

"You haven't received any mentions in the news in a decade." - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @10:25AM (#35192302) Homepage Journal

"Tommy boy", please, tell us - When have YOU been EVER "in the news" in this art & science of computing, "tommy boy"??

NEVER? Why?? Because you're a wannabe.

So, again: Show us you've done more of good note than I have in the computer sciences arena, & earlier than I have too. Funny how you ALWAYS "run" from that, eh? LMAO!

By the way: I'd also re-read my PARTIAL list (of some of my "favs" only mind you) again then, "tommy boy"...

(I state that, because you obviously cannot even READ properly, because the dates of some of them ARE in this decade! )

Still: Answer the question above, in my subject-line of this post, "tommy boy"... lol!

---

"Which is why you have to post anonymously so often - every troll account you create gets burned." - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @10:25AM (#35192302) Homepage Journal

What a fool: I post as AC here, always. I don't have (or, need) a "registered luser" account like you do!

(Which only makes YOU easy to track for trolling you back, loser, since you always like to "start up" trouble with me... & you lose everytime, making yourself look more stupid than you are already, lol! You're an undereducated wannabe...).

See, tommy boy - that's simply because I know how to "get around" the "10 posts per 24 hour" limit AC posts have... so, i.e.? I have NO NEED for a "registered luser" acc't. here.

So, why in hell should I bother to be a "registered luser" like yourself (who hasn't done jack shit in the field of computing)?

APK

P.S.=> Watching YOU embarass yourself whenever you troll me as you have here?

Priceless... apk

Hey stupid? Recovery Console can do the same

[Anonymous Coward]

Why did you suggest a Linux distro, which may or may not have write access to NTFS5 as you noted (and may be buggy for that purpose also because it's not from Microsoft)?

You can just use:

1.) Recovery Console bootup from Windows 2000/XP/Server 2003 install DVD/CD's for that purpose dummy. Since Windows has used NTFS5 since Windows 2000, that means that RC will work on Windows Vista, Server 2008, and even Windows 7 because of that access to NTFS filesystems for the purposes you noted (file access).

or

2.) There are also options from Windows Vista, Windows 7, and Windows Server 2008 install disks/CD/DVD that allow COMMAND PROMPT access (yes, there is a DEL command there, just like RC had) to do what you noted.

See here http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows7/What-are-the-system-recovery-options-in-Windows-7

APK

P.S.=> I mean, hey: Are you so STUPID and inexperienced you didn't know that, tomhudson? Apparently so. This only further shows how STUPID you are, tomhudson, you noob... apk

Re:Hey stupid? Recovery Console can do the same

[tomhudson]

All linux distros can read and write ntfs file systems. Too bad windows can't say the same for linux.

Microsoft 2013 HyperV Roadmap - Storage/Networking

[Jeremiah Cornelius]

http://www.vmware.com/support/vsphere4/doc/vsp_40_new_feat.html

Unlike APK, I actually do stuff.

[tomhudson]

Just google barbara hudson linux or barbara hudson open source. You'll get hundreds of thousands of links - fresh links, not like your stale junk.

And that's my limit for today, since I have laundry to do, and I have to walk my dogs and make supper. I guess it's time to set the filter back to +1 or greater for another week. :-p

barbara hudson (your mommy) isn't tom hudson

[Anonymous Coward]

Just google barbara hudson linux or barbara hudson open source. You'll get hundreds of thousands of links - fresh links, not like your stale junk.
And that's my limit for today, since I have laundry to do, and I have to walk my dogs and make supper. I guess it's time to set the filter back to +1 or greater for another week. :-p by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @07:22PM (#35195454) Homepage Journal

I don't see any award winning commercial software in your name tom hudson. In fact, it looks like your mommies' name though, hahahaha. APK does have his work in commercially sold award winning wares though by comparison and he made it many times into commercial wares or software publications of good respected note, and you have not.

You lose tomhudson. Putting up barbara hudson, you mommy, and claiming it's you? Give us a break little boy.

I followed this link from your other posts where you mentioned lawyers and you are outclassed tomhudson, by far. Anyone can build software for their mommy as you seem to do, because barbara hudson is not tom hudson, so she must be your mommy.

Re:barbara hudson (your mommy) isn't tom hudson

[tomhudson]

Award-winning software? Come on, I've been paid to write servers, database applications, point-of-sale system software and all sorts of other stuff for ... well, let's just say a long time.

You obviously never checked my profile. "tom" doesn't stand for what you think it does.

APK, you're very childish. That's why nobody takes you seriously. And now that today's software release is done, I'm going to finish my wine and watch some TV.

Well, which one is it tomhudson you moron?

[Anonymous Coward]

Many distros only enable full read/write support to Windows partitions for the root user. by tomhudson (43916) on Saturday February 12, @11:34AM (#35186738) Homepage Journal

You said that first. Then you said this:

,b>All linux distros can read and write ntfs file systems. Too bad windows can't say the same for linux. by tomhudson (43916) on Saturday February 12, @11:34AM (#35186738) Homepage Journal

Which one is it tomhudson? There is a big difference between 'many' and 'all' tomhudson.

Personally, telling people to use tools they do not need, such as wasting a CD or DVD or even a USB stick on a Linux distro, when tools Windows already has do the job for the job of deleting locked files, is stupid.

I'd also like to see if fsck in Linux can manage to work properly on an NTFS5 filesystem, tomhudson. Does it? Not afaik.

Re:Well, which one is it tomhudson you moron?

[tomhudson]

They're not mutually exclusive. Try taking a "Beginner's english" class. Oops, commercial is over, sorry :-)

Re:Well, which one is it tomhudson you moron?

[Anonymous Coward]

Here it is in bold since that seems to be the only way you understand anything:

All linux distros can read and write ntfs file systems.

Out of "all Linux distros" ...

Many distros only enable full read/write support to Windows partitions for the root user.

Hopefully that's easy enough for someone who uses markup like a 10 year old uses makeup to understand.

I've done that type of work for 18 yrs. now

[Anonymous Coward]

"Award-winning software? Come on, I've been paid to write servers, database applications, point-of-sale system software and all sorts of other stuff for ... well, let's just say a long time." - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @10:00PM (#35196278) Homepage Journal

LMAO - that's what I've been doing for nearly 18 yrs. now, "tommyboy", and for Fortune 100-500 companies, with over 25 "enterprise class" systems that run entire companies information systems. I don't "claim it" as accomplishments, because one generally doesn't make it into respected publications for custom business softwares.

I've been doing it for a lot longer than you have tommyboy, and I don't just state "for a long time", because I've been doing it for nearly 2 decades, on top of writing wares in other software arenas, and doing well enough at it that I made it into magazines, books, newspapers, and more and I can even show I was paid for it, unlike yourself.

DB work? Please... It's nothing impressive. In fact, it's what most coders end up doing (because it's such a "steady eddy" line of work!)

APK

P.S.=>

"APK, you're very childish. That's why nobody takes you seriously. - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @10:00PM (#35196278) Homepage Journal

Funny, but I can actually show I get PAID for my efforts, and that I did well enough at them in shareware, freeware, or commercially sold award winning wares that were finalist level work in the hardest category there is at Microsoft TechEd 2000-2002, 2 yrs. in a row, as well as appearing in respected books, magazines, and newspapers even etc.

----

Windows NT Magazine (now Windows IT Pro) April 1997 "BACK OFFICE PERFORMANCE" issue, page 61

(&, for work done for EEC Systems/SuperSpeed.com on PAID CONTRACT (writing portions of their SuperCache program increasing its performance by up to 40% via my work) albeit, for their SuperDisk & HOW TO APPLY IT, took them to a finalist position @ MS Tech Ed, two years in a row 2000-2002, in its HARDEST CATEGORY: SQLServer Performance Enhancement).

WINDOWS MAGAZINE, 1997, "Top Freeware & Shareware of the Year" issue page 210, #1/first entry in fact (my work is there)

PC-WELT FEB 1998 - page 84, again, my work is featured there

WINDOWS MAGAZINE, WINTER 1998 - page 92, insert section, MUST HAVE WARES, my work is again, there

PC-WELT FEB 1999 - page 83, again, my work is featured there

CHIP Magazine 7/99 - page 100, my work is there

GERMAN PC BOOK, Data Becker publisher "PC Aufrusten und Repairen" 2000, where my work is contained in it

HOT SHAREWARE Numero 46 issue, pg. 54 (PC ware mag from Spain), 2001 my work is there, first one featured, yet again!

Also, a British PC Mag in 2002 for many utilities I wrote, saw it @ BORDERS BOOKS but didn't buy it... by that point, I had moved onto other areas in this field besides coding only...

Being paid for an article that made me money over @ PCPitstop in 2008 for writing up a guide that has people showing NO VIRUSES/SPYWARES & other screwups, via following its point, such as THRONKA sees here -> http://www.xtremepccentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=ee926d913b81bf6d63c3c7372fd2a24c&t=28430&page=3

Lastly, lately (this year)?

It's also been myself helping out the folks at the UltraDefrag64 project (a 64-bit defragger for Windows), in showing them code for how to do Process Priority Control @ the GUI usermode/ring 3/rpl 3 level in their program (good one too), & being credited for it by their lead dev & his team... see here -> http://ultradefrag.sourceforge.net/handbook/Credits.html

----

You? You can't show you've done the same as the above, period, "tommyboy" and CERTAINLY NOT AS MANY TIMES AS I HAVE and BEFORE ME, lmao!

(No, lmao, instead? You post barbara hudson?? That's NOT t

Re:I've done that type of work for 18 yrs. now

[tomhudson]

Well, looks like I've got more experience than you. And not writing shareware, but paid to write software ... including a 3-year project writing 3 different servers in c for bsd and linux because the original 5-man team couldn't hack it, and neither could their replacements.

tomhudson != barbarahudson tom, in case you didn't realize it. If you had any balls, you wouldn't post your momma's software company, but instead, one of your own (and, you can't). Hilarious! apk

My mother has been dead for more than a decade, you insensitive clod. Seriously. And she never had anything to do with computers.

If you had checked my profile, you would have noticed what t.o.m. stands for. Oh wait, you can't - you can't log in. Oh well, guess you'll never know. In the meantime, why not google for barbara hudson open source linux - here's the first link. Read the story lead. Now scroll down and read the paragraph that begins "'I Just Hope OraKill Doesn't Buy Novell'.

tommyboy caught with his pants down? LOL!

[Anonymous Coward]

They're not mutually exclusive. Try taking a "Beginner's english" class. Oops, commercial is over, sorry :-) by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @10:14PM (#35196326) Homepage Journal

Does many = all, tommyboy? No. In fact, let's refer to a dictionary, shall we dumbo?? Here we go:

MANY = 1. Being one of a large indefinite number; numerous: many a child; many another day.

ALL = 1. Being or representing the entire or total number, amount, or quantity: All the windows are open. Deal all the cards

From http://www.thefreedictionary.com/all

Try taking a "Beginner's english" class. Oops, commercial is over, sorry :-) by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @10:14PM (#35196326) Homepage Journal

You told us to take a "Beginner's English" class, dolt? Take your own advice, fool. Especially since you don't understand the words MANY or ALL.

(You lose, as usual, troll boy. Especially since you didn't even realize that all versions of Windows have the ability to do preboot deletes of files before anything else can get a lock on them. You are clearly, a noob)

tomhudson blows it on Windows options?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's why nobody takes you seriously. by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @10:00PM (#35196278) Homepage Journal

He's to be taken far more seriously than yourself, noob. See the link below, for instance:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35193490

In the url above, You didn't even realize that Windows already has boottime tools that can do deletes of files prior to the Operating System or applications placing locks on them.

I don't trust noobs like you. It's types like you, that don't know what the hell they are talking about that are DANGEROUS to companies and often make things worse, just as it seems you have for your clients you noted that are taking you to court tommyboy.

I mean, there, you suggested Linux? You even stated that not all Linux distros have NTFS5 capable drivers, since you said many of them do, but not all initially. When you were confronted on it, you later said all of them do??

(You're not even sure of yourself and when I posted the definitions of all and many?? They are not the same, though you told me to take a "beginner's english class"? You don't even have mastery of it yourself!)

You also quite clearly have not mastered system administration judging by your blunders in that url above where apk shot you down easily on that account.

You shouldn't have come in here trolling apk with lies and libel. It only ended up with him trolling you, and him showing how much of a damned noob you really are. Hope you enjoyed the results, noob. You've shown us how weak, and stupid, you really are.

Re:tomhudson blows it on Windows options?

[tomhudson]

The question of windows placing locks on files is irrelevant if you've booted into linux. You can delete ANY file, even ones that windows can no longer delete because the naming semantics are messed up.

Second, all recent linux distros are able to mount windows file systems, BUT not everyone has a recent distro. All recent distros CAN delete NTFS files, but some only as root.

But real server admins flat-out refuse to run windows for anything critical.

If Windows does it, why use Linux then?

[Anonymous Coward]

The question of windows placing locks on files is irrelevant if you've booted into linux." - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @11:15PM (#35196538) Homepage Journal

LMAO, hey, stupid: Once you use Recovery Console, OR, Windows 7's version of it? They can do the same, & without the added hassle, or possible errors (because Linux's NTFS support has been spotty over time) that you may be introducing with your added complexity outright STUPIDITY!

People like you tommy boy? You're DANGEROUS!

(No small wonder your clients are TAKING YOU TO COURT as you seem to have mentioned here on /. this week!)

They are in a READ ONLY environs off CD/DVD too, and no Win32/64 usermode apps, or the normal full Windows OS can either!

---

"You can delete ANY file, even ones that windows can no longer delete" - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @11:15PM (#35196538) Homepage Journal

Uhm, dummy? That's also EXACTLY what you can do in Windows CD/DVD Recovery Console OR Windows 7's tools for it via its Command Prompt!

They are NOT the same as booting to Windows itself, in case you don't know that, & it's QUITE clear, you do not.

(LOL, so... you show us ALL you're weak on Windows... excellent: Believe-you-me, I will keep this handy, lol!)

You're showing us ALL you're 1 dimensional, & not even GOOD AT THAT (per your posting your mama's software company & trying to pass it off as your own, lol, because tomhudson != barbarahudson whereas I can show that before you were even BORN I was making it into respected publications in this field for excellent programming works! Multiple times no less...)

You can go away now, mama's boy. You tried to troll me, starting up with me here, and you got SHOT DOWN (easily no less on a simple system admin/tech point).

You've shown us ALL how truly INCOMPETENT & "1 dimensional" & not even GOOD at that, that you are

APK

P.S.=> This one? LMAO, takes the cake:

"But real server admins flat-out refuse to run windows for anything critical." - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @11:15PM (#35196538) Homepage Journal

Tomhudson: I've worked many times for Fortune 100-500 companies, & TONS of servers are run on Windows, due to the ease of use & administration that AD gives you alone... this again, only tells myself (and apparently others here) that YOU are a noob...

An "open SORES" noob, no less (one that doesn't even UNDERSTAND all the features Windows already has for system administration, tech work/troubleshooting etc.)... apk

You didn't even REALIZE Windows has tools for this

[Anonymous Coward]

"Well, looks like I've got more experience than you." - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @11:33PM (#35196600) Homepage Journal

1st of all I'd like to see "Fortune 100 - 500" companies in that "alleged" list of yours, as I can produce that much, & rather easily! I'd also like proof that you've been doing this level of work you claim, prior to 1993 when I started.

Show us that. You cannot.

You haven't shown me that, anymore than You could show you've done more of respected note in written publication in books, magazines, newspapers, or MS Tech Ed (with commercial code I wrote that improved it no less, up to 40% in fact) as I have, for starters.

ALSO - Does this "ring a bell" tommyboy??

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35193490

LMAO - YOU didn't even REALIZE that Windows has tools that do deletions of files, before the normal Windows OS bootup can lock them, or, usermode apps too!

You're a NOOB, and you proved that for us all... Your "experience"? Sucks! You proved that above, & anyone can read it... ( & laugh at you!)

---

"And not writing shareware, but paid to write software" - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @11:33PM (#35196600) Homepage

Funny how you're omitting the fact I've done what you CLAIM you do, and yet I also have my works in freeware/shareware too, but also commercially sold award winning code too to my credit... do you?

No. WE KNOW THAT MUCH ALREADY ABOUT YOU, including your outright f'up on Windows tech features shown above.

---

" ... including a 3-year project writing 3 different servers in c for bsd and linux because the original 5-man team couldn't hack it, and neither could their replacements." - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @11:33PM (#35196600) Homepage

That's CHUMPWARE easy, tommyboy. DB work is, & it's MOSTLY tedious as hell imo, but, it pays the bills.

Tommyboy? Do you even have a degree in CIS or CSC??

Do you have ANY idea how many of that type of system I have created since late 1993??

Try 25 of them to my credit here, & there's MORE on smaller systems like you CLAIM to be part of.

(Mine are not just PUNY "POS" systems... but rather, ones that run ENTIRE COMPANIES information systems).

---

"My mother has been dead for more than a decade, you insensitive clod." - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @11:33PM (#35196600) Homepage Journal

Hell - You probably killed her or impoverished her with your outright screwups & her having to bail you out on them, because from what I am seeing from the posts of others here in this exchange?

Apparently, You're being taken to court apparently by one of your customers.

(Not a good showing tommy boy. I've NEVER ever had that happen to me, ever. Then again, I do great work, & can show proof of it... you cannot!)

APK

P.S.=> Shouldn't have come in here & trolled me noobie boy, with you starting up with me and blowing it hugely, here:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35186644

LOL... you got yourself "shot down in flames" easily... "too, Too, TOO EASILY" in fact! Shouldn't "shoot your mouth off" like that Tommyboy. You see the results above, with your NOOBISH screwups!

Heh - next time you "troll me"? Believe you me - this URL:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35193490

With your noobishness showing HUGELY? That above will come into play, showing everyone just HOW MUCH OF A NOOB YOU ARE! apk

tomhudson doesn't even know Windows RC, lol!

[Anonymous Coward]

"The question of windows placing locks on files is irrelevant if you've booted into linux. You can delete ANY file, even ones that windows can no longer delete because the naming semantics are messed up." - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @11:15PM (#35196538) Homepage Journal

What a line of bullshit: File locks from a normal Windows bootup or even locks by apps DO NOT HOLD DURING WINDOWS RECOVERY CONSOLE BOOTUPS, or Windows 7 recovery tools bootups either... dumbass!

---

"But real server admins flat-out refuse to run windows for anything critical." - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @11:15PM (#35196538) Homepage Journal

Are you for real? Unlike yourself, I've worked for MANY a "Fortune 100-500" (YOU have not), and most of them use Windows Servers for MOST things...

AD alone makes that possible, & easy, & far moreso for "mass administration" than anything on Linux, this is certain.

The volume mgt. on Linux, by comparison to the ones in Windows? NOT EVEN CLOSE!

APK

P.S.=> Also, on your utter "the naming semantics are messed up"? WTF are you trying to say there, or are you just trying to play smart??

I am assuming you mean filesystem hassles... well, If there's a problem in the filesystem on NTFS5??? Tommyboy, in case you didn't know it. that's what chkdsk is for, stupid (then again, you've already shown us all you don't know a DAMNED THING about Windows really)...

Also - I'd like to see, again, your proof that Linux's fsck can correct that on NTFS also... apk

Childish? Who came in here trolling WHOM shitbrain

[Anonymous Coward]

"APK, you're very childish" - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @10:00PM (#35196278) Homepage Journal

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35186644

That ring a bell, douchebag?

APK

P.S.=> You came in here, libelling me no less while you trolled me, and you're calling ME "childish"? You stupid little prick! All your bullshit doesn't cover up the fact you came in here trolling ME, asshole...

The rest of what I put up as to proofs I have just outright done more & better than you have in computing and BEFORE you did too??

The "likes of you", an "OPEN SORES TROLL" that couldn't make it in the REAL working world (which is 95% or better in Windows)?? You sure "showed your smarts" (lol, not), here on THAT account:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35193490

Where you show that you didn't even KNOW that Windows has tools that you suggested a possibly buggy NTFS5 support in Linux should be used instead... complexity & risk? Stupid tom, really REALLY stupid, & taking risks that only an idiot would... & you're trying to tell others how to admin or troubleshoot Windows rigs? Wake up dumbass... you SUCK & that URL proves it... easily! apk

t.o.m. = totally obscure MORON? Absolutely!

[Anonymous Coward]

""tom" doesn't stand for what you think it does." - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @10:00PM (#35196278) Homepage Journal

See subject-line. Especially after this blatant fuckup and proof of how damn WEAK you are in Windows:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35193490

You fucking STUPID stooge, you've just "tipped your hand" & whenever you try to "play expert" in Windows again?

  I'll rip you right in 1/2 again, just like I did there in that link above... bank on it!

APK

P.S.=> You like coming in here, lying about me, trolling me, libelling me & more:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35186644

You had BEST not make any more STUPID mistakes like you did above, you pitifully WEAK moron: You earned all of this, you f'ing nobody... & guess what?

It's NOT going to stop you pitiful asshole... not after this (it's not the 1st time your LAME stupid nobody ass tried this & I've had it... watch yourself around here from now on, asshole)... apk

Re:t.o.m. = totally obscure MORON? Absolutely!

[tomhudson]

Keep it up - when you're attacking me, that's time you're not spending attacking someone else. Of course, the fact that you feel you need to attack me because I make fun of your 15-year-old shareware hosts file that does not protect computers is besides the point.

And no, on a really hosed system, windows recovery console cannot delete certain files, which is why every windows user should know someone who can recover their crap by either booting into linux, or yanking their drive and recovering their data.

When's the last time any linux user had to use windows to recover their linux partitions? Windows is crippleware.

The Obscure Moron (tom) can't understand Windows?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Of course, the fact that you feel you need to attack me because I make fun of your 15-year-old shareware hosts file that does not protect computers is besides the point." - by tomhudson (43916) on Monday February 14, @08:19AM (#35198374) Homepage Journal

A 15 yr. old shareware HOSTS file... where'd that come from, Totally Obscure Moron?

Off-Topic again, because I showed everyone here all you have done is write some drivel for a 2nd rate website and 2nd rate Operating System?

(AND, That you get taken to court for your screwups with your customers also?)

It's not MY FAULT you are a 1 dimensional NOBODY who hasn't done a fraction of what I can show in BOTH db related custom programming work, and in the shareware/freeware + COMMERCIALLY SOLD SOFTWARE WORLDS, as I have... & you? LMAO, you have not.

(You're nothing, and you KNOW it.)

---

"And no, on a really hosed system, windows recovery console cannot delete certain files" - by tomhudson (43916) on Monday February 14, @08:19AM (#35198374) Homepage Journal

OH sure... just because Totally Obscure Moron (you) said so? Please... you don't even have a degree in computer science.

(Got documented proof of that from a reliable source? I state that, because you are FAR from some expert reliable source, based on your screwups here already!)

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"which is why every windows user should know someone who can recover their crap by either booting into linux, or yanking their drive and recovering their data." - by tomhudson (43916) on Monday February 14, @08:19AM (#35198374) Homepage Journal

LMAO: Someone like YOU, who has already shown he is WEAK in Windows (the most used PC/Server OS there is, bar-none):

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35193490

(As shown in that URL above I just posted)

---

When's the last time any linux user had to use windows to recover their linux partitions?" - by tomhudson (43916) on Monday February 14, @08:19AM (#35198374) Homepage Journal

LMAO - ok, but when's the last time anyone used Linux? Seems to me Linux is the "last place underdog" out there, a TOY OS for stooges like yourself who couldn't accomplish anything in the REAL software world, of which 95% or more uses Windows... At least with anyone that knows what they're doing, and you?? You have already shown us all you do not.

---

"Windows is crippleware.." - by tomhudson (43916) on Monday February 14, @08:19AM (#35198374) Homepage Journal

That happens to be the MOST USED PC/SERVER OS THERE IS...

APK

P.S.=> tom (the obscure moron): IF Linux is "so great"? How come it's in LAST PLACE?? apk

Seems you attacked him first here, tom

[Anonymous Coward]

Or was this not YOUR post here in this exchange tom:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35186644 tom?

(Seems to me that looks like you, coming here after after Linux was shown to be insecure).

Tell us about how secure ANDROID (a linux itself) is now, won't you??

fsck in Linux works on Windows NTFS5 filesystems?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Many distros only enable full read/write support to Windows partitions" - by tomhudson (43916) on Saturday February 12, @11:34AM (#35186738) Homepage Journal

Answer the question about fsck working on NTFS5 filesystems please.

APK

P.S.=> I mean, hey: After all, you said FULL READ/WRITE quoted above... and if fsck doesn't work on NTFS5 filesystems, you're just telling yet another tomhudson OPEN SORES F.U.D. lie... apk

Tell us how secure ANDROID (linux) is tom, lol!

[Anonymous Coward]

"Windows is crippleware.." - by tomhudson (43916) on Monday February 14, @08:19AM (#35198374) Homepage Journal

Ok, tell us how secure ANDROID (a linux variant) is turning out to be then... lol!

Linux in general is "so secure" too, as can be seen here VERY recently:

---

USB Autorun Attacks Against Linux:

http://linux.slashdot.org/story/11/02/07/1742246/USB-Autorun-Attacks-Against-Linux

---

Want more tommyboy?

(LMAO - When & WHERE Linux outright COPIES a feature from Windows, and "blows it" right off the bat? Oh my gosh, lol, "say it ain't so!", lol!)

Let's see The Obscure Moron TRY to put some "spin tactics" on those and the links below too!

This will be good for a laugh!

Just like tom's showing here was on features Windows has which Linux isn't even NEEDED for:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35193490

Which "tom terrific" (lol, not) absolutely BLEW it on, placing users at the possible risk of NTFS5 errors in Linux, and adding complexity/more moving parts to something that DOES NOT NEED IT?

(YES FOLKS - That's tom for you: Making things more complex than they need to be, lol! Real "efficient design" there, lol, not!)

Even though tom said "Linux has read/write" to NTFS5 filesystems in Windows here:

---

"All linux distros can read and write ntfs file systems. - by tomhudson (43916) on Sunday February 13, @07:16PM (#35195414) Homepage Journal

From http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35195414

Ok then - TELL US HOW WELL Linux fsck works on those NTFS5 filesystems then, won't you?

(Which afaik it does not with fsck as a prime example thereof, proving YET another "OPEN SORES" f.u.d. lie, that misleads others into very possible RUIN, because afaik? fsck doesn't WORK on NTFS5 filesystems, that is, unless The Obscure Moron can prove otherwise (lol, not))

---

Also, witness tom's "mastery" (lol, not) of English here regarding the English language & tom's "mastery" (not, lol) of it, no less also:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35196398

Funny how an online dictionary showed you in error on that very account, eh? LMAO!

So - please: DO Tell us tom, while you're at it trying to put "spin" onto your errors and those in Linux, what does MANY mean... what does ALL mean??

(LOL, wait... you already tried that in the link above & FAILED, as you always do, vs. myself!)

APK

P.S.=> Perhaps THIS VERY RECENT LINK will help "bolster your case" (lol, not), as to the secure systems ANDROID users get:

---

Security Warning Over Web-Based Android Market:

http://mobile.slashdot.org/story/11/02/04/181204/Security-Warning-Over-Web-Based-Android-Market

---

LMAO! apk

Why would windows get hosed?

[Anonymous Coward]

"And no, on a really hosed system, windows recovery console cannot delete certain files" - by tomhudson (43916) on Monday February 14, @08:19AM (#35198374) Homepage Journal

Perhaps Windows COULD be "hosed" as you state, when an "open SORES" codethief like yourself is "at the helm", lol, trying to use fsck to fix NTFS5?

APK

P.S.=> After all, tom, you said Linux distros (first "many" & then "all" later no less, which is NOT true) have read/write access to NTFS5 filesystems in Windows... given that, answer this:

Does Linux' fsck command work on NTFS5 filesystems in Windows?

(See tommyboy run!)

apk

If a known bad site is blocked how can it harm U?

[Anonymous Coward]

"I make fun of your 15-year-old shareware hosts file that does not protect computers is besides the point." - by tomhudson (43916) on Monday February 14, @08:19AM (#35198374) Homepage Journal

Tom, how can a known bad site harm you if you have it blocked off by its domain/host name in a custom HOSTS file then?

E.G.-> If the attacker is using domain/host names, which ordinarily they do, because they are "recyclable/reuseable" by those who make malware & cracks/hacks online (RBN exemplified this in the past, as well as Zeus + SpyEye recently "pooling their resources" this way also even MORE recently), how would they attack you, if you cannot even REACH their malicious links?

Custom HOSTS files do that for you, numbskull, & better than Adblock, WOT, or even Norton SafeWeb (because they are restricted to certain webbrowser ONLY, not all typically, & they don't cover HTML utilizing external to browser email programs like outlook express/full outlook).

Try "make fun of me" now, shitskull... & I will EAT YOU ALIVE, as I have before on that VERY topic!

Funny how you've also disappeared and won't answer the posts I have put up here in reply to yourself, eh?

(By the way, since you're an "open sores" fool? Hosts files also work there, whereas SafeWeb for example, does not afaik!)

APK

P.S.=> It really IS ridiculously easy to make fun of YOU, and your lack of "know how", especially this exemplified in this link below:

http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1992296&cid=35193490

apk

Try the definitions of ALL vs. MANY, moron

[Anonymous Coward]

MANY = 1. Being one of a large indefinite number; numerous: many a child; many another day.

ALL = 1. Being or representing the entire or total number, amount, or quantity: All the windows are open. Deal all the cards

From http://www.thefreedictionary.com

APK

P.S.=>

"Hopefully that's easy enough for someone who uses markup like a 10 year old uses makeup to understand." - by Anonymous Coward on Monday February 14, @12:07PM (#35200562)

Hopefully, the definitions above are easy enough for an idiot that got their ass beat (tomhudson) and now posts in reply as Anonymous Coward, because they screwed up so badly... apk

FULL Linux NTFS5 read/write support? Ok...

[Anonymous Coward]

"Many distros only enable full read/write support to Windows partitions for the root user." - by tomhudson (43916) on Saturday February 12, @11:34AM (#35186738) Homepage Journal

Tell us, won't you, HOW WELL DOES Linux's fsck work on NTFS5 filesystems... lol!

(Tomhudson will outright RUN from that... he has, several times now! The hilarious part is this moronic noobie dolt tomhudson TRIES to ridiculously pass himself off as a "pro" in the field of computing... & I personally find it easy as PIE to catch his stupid errors, everytime... no wonder his clients are taking him to court recently!)

APK

P.S.=> After all, you said FULL read/write support, quoted in BLACK & WHITE ABOVE, from YOUR OWN WORDS... well, how well does fsck work on NTFS5 then?

(Run, beyotch, run...) apk

386Max... remember THAT? NT 3.51... apk

[Anonymous Coward]

Remember THAT?

I loved QEMM, great stuff, thru version 5.0 - 8.0 iirc. Memmaker was good, but I could do NEARLY the same with the emm386.exe &/or Himem.sys DEVICE &/or LOAD commands myself in CONFIG.sys, & autoexec.bat environment trimming, with fcbs, files, buffers, lastdrive, & more... not as much, BUT, close. Those even helped w/ Memmaker, & also QEMM (386Max too).

Additionally - On my subject-line part #1:

386Max was another memmgr, was good, but I always felt Quarterdeck did a better job with QEMM, especially when used with Windows 3.1 - 3.11 & into Windows 95 (98 too, not sure... I got into OS/2 2.1-4, & NT 3.5/3.51 onwards really into Windows 7 today).

LOL, on "powerful": Yea, being able to "hotrod" your Operating System's memmgt & more, IS more powerful. You don't just *think* or feel it... you know it (& you can SHOW it, via winning benchmark contests online, which I used to think was some fun @ times, etc.).

Addendum #2: On my subject-line part #2 - NTFS & NTFS compression especially, multitasking too, GUI, & flat/linear memory mgt.:

Those 16 bit days were cool. I did a lot of learning that paid off in network administration/tech duties alone really, as well as know-how on PC's. Batch "programming" (I don't consider it advanced stuff really) is useful, even today, for myself, in either a technician, administrator, or even programming role.

First thing I recall doing that I & others I knew @ the time that was "cool" on a PC, from a "techie standpoint" though, wasn't memmgt or performance tricks: It was MENU building, lol, via DOS 3,3-6,22 batchfile work (echo & % + FOR command work) in a single batch file... lol, "memories". LOL, this? This ought to make you laugh -> It was a LOT MORE WORK IN DOS 3.3 using that AWFUL "edlin" thing, than it was in later DOS' EDIT command... that's certain, lol! I hope, for your sake, YOU did not do DOS batch work then, lol... it was, more work, lots more. Edlin sucked. VI is better in NIX, if THAT tells you anything!

Later, I did Dosshell. It was mouse driven, gui, and scriptable. I liked it, even though it was only REALLY task swapping, not multitasking.

(I never used Deskview though. There was another called GEM iirc, too, but I didn't use it!)

Then, along came OS/2, with HPFS (which I had a compression system for too, Gamma Tech Utlities iirc OR was it Stacker? Not sure anymore)!

OS/2 also had a "flat-linear memory model". 32 bit larger size than 16-bit, & non-segmented (0-640k - 1024k/1mb, like DOS). Long filenames & more. Lots more. OS/2, to me, was a picture at the core + subsystems in part, of what was coming in NT-based OS from MS. In OS/2, IBM did good stuff w/ MS (& it sort of "evolved" into NT (w/ VMS mixed in)).

NT 3.51 one came along - NTFS compression & flat linear memmgt, I never really "strayed", as I am running Windows 7 64 bit as I write this - good stuff, you're right, it's solid!

(Doublespace, DriveSpace, Stacker? Good stuff for its day... but, today, is NOT that day, & not since 1998 maybe here for myself @ home... Why? NT 3.51 onwards, & here we are, NTFS realtime compression with journalling & all!)

Closing trivia: I still use the Windows NT 3.51 wallpaper in fact. To this very day, I rarely strayed from it. Why? Because THIS is what Windows NT-based OS always SHOULD have been, from day #1, & today's that day - "The Future, is NOW!"...

APK

P.S.=> Lastly - sorry for the rather late reply (bit long, but good subject material - hope you enjoyed it)... Been bit busy, even here, with dispatching a troll that stalks & harasses me here... how can people waste their day being TROLLS intentionally bothering others as they do, I never can understand... it's being intentionally uncool... but, I troll them back, have to. They have it coming, but it takes time I could be using to post to others who are legitimately technically into the

An 1 eyed cunt cyclops says what?

[Anonymous Coward]

APK is a know-nothing troll. by tomhudson the 1 EYED DEFECTIVE CYCLOPS AND REJECTED CUNT (43916) on Saturday February 12, @11:19AM (#35186644) Homepage

Tell us why you are nothing but a stupid cunt, that posts with a man's name, and yet claims to be a cunt. Why do you try to deceive others that way, cunt?

(Is that why your former employer fired you and your customers are taking you to court? Is that why your former employer paid you at a minimum wage rate too for the job you botched recently, cyclops?)

I even found a picture of you online:

http://images2.fanpop.com/images/forum/43000/43474_1254407209334_full.jpg

LMAO!

I know you're a physically defective cunt with only 1 eye from your journals here. This explains why no man wants you cunt. You're a hideous fucking monstrosity that takes the misery of her life and tries to spread it to others. It's not our fault you are a defective reject, cunt.

Go away now, Cyclops. We don't need defective freaks of nature here like you that pretend to be a man online to top your freakishness off.