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German Company To Install Linux On 10,000 PCs
jfruhlinger writes "Linux proponents used to proclaim that the era of Linux on the desktop was just around the corner. That may never come to pass, but there are still occasional wins. For instance, a German insurance giant will be moving 10,000 employees to Linux-based desktop and laptop machines."
The real question is, will it be worthwhile if some/all the employees have to learn to use a different OS all over again?
when you install linux, you're installing communism
I'm skeptical about the frequently discussed difficulty of adoption if it's well planned. If most of the companies tools are web-based (and not forced to use MS due to dependencies on ActiveX, and the like) then it's entirely feasible that you wouldn't need to retrain employees much at all. The next major hurdle is email and document publishing. I'd be curious to see their adoption plan and the results.
IIRC Lowes has all of their machines running some KDE-using distro...
The Foreign Ministry left Linux back to windows just a little while back:
http://cuduwudu.com/2011/02/germany-bids-farewell-to-linux/
I think the Munich government is still on it but may be wrong.
The real question is, will it be worthwhile if some/all the employees have to learn to use a different OS all over again?
Perhaps Munich can provide some insight:
"LiMux project management, "We were naïve""
http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/LiMux-project-management-We-were-naive-958824.html http://linux.slashdot.org/story/10/03/19/1633241/The-Woes-of-Munichs-Linux-Migration
There are tens of thousands of government users of Linux in SA and Brazil. Linux is also used extensively in the North American and European banking sector. There is no good technical reason why any large corporation cannot use Linux. The problem seems to be an IT training problem, not a user training problem. Corporate IT people do not know Linux and therefore cannot deploy and support it.
AT THE SAME TIME!!!
Linux is dead now. See, it will never beat Microsoft for PC.
I just helped a lot of people (>3K) adapt to W7 from XP. I know some stuff about enterprise stuff.
It's all about the apps. There are hundreds of enterprise line-of-business apps that are custom crafted to work with IE6 and its plugins. Getting them to work with a different version of IE is a nightmare. We put it over, mostly, but we had to brute force a lot of it. Some of it just would not go and was writ off as a cost of staying current. That story's not over yet, as some critical apps conflict with each other in W7.
If they had cared to craft their line-of-business apps with a server backend and a standards-compliant browser front end, we'd have saved a few hundred thousand dollars. But they didn't, they still don't, and they won't.
Go ahead - standardize on the next version of this crud. The unit cost goes up every year. Making it work is a grind, but if you didn't take it up, we'd have little work. That Linux and iOS stuff just works and there's no service money in that for me.
Help stamp out iliturcy.
There are free and paid support enterprise distros over a popular but unstable (and as far as I know still a home user focused) distro?
The only thing i can think of is that Canonical is a stable company (unlike Novel) and can undercut RH or do they want to move into the cloud.
I would think that suse/RH would have better security, package management, hardware compatibility with opensuse(my impression have no proof on this) and everything else that you want for a large company.
The power of a Linux distribution means that any company can have a massive install of Linux on their host workstations and their virtual machines can run a base clone image of a Microsoft Windows that isn't carved out of System Hardware Specifications.
Seriously, Microsoft needs to allow their OS to be more portable for upgrades and hardware swaps. At-least a VM makes the hardware look all the same, and that's just what Linux can do by helping Windows be that much easier to maintain and run and re-vision.
The company will rush into this without any care to what is actually involved, will get frustrated when switching to a different OS will actually take some investment, and will eventually switch back when the short-term cost of training outweighs the recurrent cost of Windows licenses.
Now, *that's* what I call a Beowulf cluster.
Good luck to the helpdesk people. Our hearts go out to you.
And where IS that god damn start button?
That's pretty much it: where is the economic interest in getting end user apps migrated? Linux works great in a datacenter and works great for end users who are experienced with it. But where's the economic incentive to adapt users? If most everyone used linux in their homes that would kill off virtually Hundreds of thousands of jobs supporting the crap. No more $70 mom and pop shop reloads, no more field service calls that are resolved by running virus cleaner and repairing an infected machine, no more recycled machines that get put back into circulation simply because the owners perceives an infected machine as a hardware failure or simply not worth the investment in repair over an opportunity to "upgrade."
I use linux more than a decade now, and I can't imagine the hell of having to use windows again. And I feel kinda sorry for all those people out there who really don't know any better, who think windows is the only solution because they hate macs and believe the nonsense about linux sucking as a desktop. But I'm sure not going to go out of my way to convince them of their delusion.
I mean, they probably just use Office Suites (which linux has), and i they use some sort of proprietary software they'll have to modify it a bit if it wasn't written in java or something.
I honestly don't see why many companies don't just switch really. If you don't need a windows box to run windows software, you can get better results with a Linux machine.
In one place of work, we managed to get Firefox added to the new standard build by the simple expedient of writing lots of in-house web apps that didn't work in IE. (The tool used by about 20 people every day they worked there, which was broken in IE for six months with no-one noticing ...)
This is also the same way we kept Vista at bay.
http://rocknerd.co.uk
If most everyone used linux in their homes that would kill off virtually Hundreds of thousands of jobs supporting the crap.
Broken window fallacy spotted.
Besides, people will need tech support no matter what OS they use. Otherwise Apple wouldn't have the Genius Bar or whatever it's called, and Ubuntu wouldn't have their forums.
I am a programmer for small business management. In my experience companies are only interested in the program they use for work functions. They aren't interested in anything else. Lately, I invariably propose ubuntu linux and the only difficulty that I find are related to some peripherals (printers and scanners), but less and less. After the initial probationary period all employees said they were extremely happy. In one case I had to revert to Windows 7 for reasons more political than technical.
I also installed edubuntu in 5 schools and even in this reality, the responses were extremely positive. With 5000.00 € I restored 5 laboratories with 20-30 thin-client each.
Linux is great on the desktop, but when you sleep/resume cycle it 10 times, strange things start to happen. Also when moving around and connecting weird USB thingies.
They should leave windows on the laptops. The reason that they can switch to Linux is that the OS is mostly irrelevant for the end user. So it makes sense to use the OS that's best for the hardware.
My mother is a senior bureaucrat in her early 50s. She uses computer every weekday, usually 8-12 hours a day and has been doing so for many years. Everything she does is done by MS Office products (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook), by web browser or by a few inhouse applications for managing official documents (versioning, distribution, etc.). She can also use her smar phone for checking e-mail, etc... So in general, she is pretty decent with technology when compared to the average person in her age category. A smart woman, too (good project management skills, university education, etc.).
After all that background... A few weeks ago she asked me for technical support. She had a big folder with loads of documents and wanted to organize it to subfolders but didn't know whether it was possible or not and how would one go doing it. I walked her through the steps ("Right click... create new folder... click and right click the new folder, rename, write a new name and press enter... drag and drop some files there... repeat...") several times but I could bet that an hour later she would no longer remember how it was done. The thing is that despite her using computer over 40 hours a week, her work doesn't include that relatively rare task so she had never done it before and doing so felt alien to her. And, as said, she is probably more technologically literate than your average middle aged person that doesn't work in IT.
Now... Making 10 000 people like her switch to a completely new OS and completely new set of office products? There is no such thing as "Similar enough". The users will need massive amounts of training after the UI of the word processing product changes. Even worse, if they are confused by something and ask a relative at home to explain how something is done, they'll see it done in a different looking system and only get more confused.
It might be a good idea to switch in the long range as each generation is more familiar with computers than the previous one and small changes become easier to endure. In 20 years this problem might nearly disappear. Until that, it's a lot more complicated than you seem to think.
People will indeed. But Ubuntu forums are free, and viruses alone are a major fraction of all problems encountered by "people". I know Windows Defenders (tm) will allege that Windows isn't intrinsically insecure or unstable, but historically, Windows is insecure and unstable. So much for the people -- in the corporate environment the real issue is scalability. Linux is enormously, absurdly, cheaply, scalable in a sensibly run enterprise environment. Standardize on a reasonably small set of hardware platforms, and things like kickstart and yum make it possible for one sysadmin to support far, far more people than one sysadmin can support in any Windows environment I've ever heard of. Automated installation is easy, automated upgrade is easy, security is easy and effective (because the Unix-derived client-server networking model has always been reasonably secure) viruses are all but unknown and with standard root vs user privilege control ordinary users can't really infect their systems with viruses that matter.
Linux has two or three problems. One is hardware support. In a wide-open home/laptop/desktop environment, it is difficult to guarantee that any particular piece of hardware is going to run, or at least be easy to get to run, under linux. But there is a more than spanning set of hardware to choose from that does run, and run well, and a skilled systems person can usually get almost all of the rest to work (eventually) with some effort. In a corporate environment, all this really means is that you should shop carefully for systems, something that you should do anyway even with Windows, and test prototypes to make sure that they will install and run well.
Another is marketing -- Microsoft has an enormous staff of people devoted to promoting their product, cutting deals that maintain their lock on various markets, advertising on television and in other media, and sowing FUD about any and all competing products. I can't find online statistics on this, but I'll bet that Microsoft has at least two marketing/business people for every software engineer or technical support person. Linux has virtually none.
The third is software. Like it or not, there is plenty of software in the Universe that only runs on Windows platforms. Not Linux, not Macs. Just Windows. There is far more software that runs on Linux (often only on Linux) these days -- there are literally tens of thousands of programs and libraries available, nearly all of them free, most of them of remarkably high quality. However, most corporate software, game software, and commercial software is written for Windows (or written by Apple for Apples on a proprietary basis). The reason here is obvious as well -- you make a lot more money with a proprietary package written for the most common operating system, especially when there is relatively little free software available for that system. If you try to write proprietary software for Linux systems, you face user resistance (everything else they use is free, why should they pay for your application?), you have to watch encumbrances such as GPL viral code or libraries, you risk being functionally cloned by your users in short order, and the "brilliant idea" underlying your application may well already be written and working fine under Linux, given its vast already existing library of free software.
If your business doesn't need proprietary packages -- just e.g. straight up office software, browsers, web servers, databases, and not this or that specific accounting package or word processor, then enterprise level Linux will save you a fortune. Even if you do, it is probably cheaper and simpler to still run enterprise level Linux everywhere and confine Windows to VMs only on those desktops that need it.
rgb
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
That is a load of shit. GNU/Linux has support needs just like Microsoft Windows. That isn't to say it isn't cheaper for both customers and small mom and pop shops supporting it. You just don't see it. Microsoft cuts into what I make. If I have to include a $100+ license for Microsoft Windows with every PC I sell that takes all the profit out of it. Compare that to a $249 computer where I MAKE $100. Then you also get to sell services on top of this. People only have so much money and GNU/Linux is cheaper. That means both customers and small mom and pop shops make more not less. We don't sell Microsoft Windows computers period. It just isn't profitable.
I hope they secure their sensitive data on those laptops
There would be just as much work for supporting end user Linux machines as there is with Windows. There is one problem that would remain the same, and that problem is the users.
Does it really matter to the user if the information is in NIS, LDAP, the variant of LDAP known as Active Directory or even there at all if they use the same desktop machine or laptop all of the time?
The only thing they care about is if they can log in and get their stuff.
There are many ways to do that. MS Windows may be the new boy on the block at that game with the fancy GUI tools but it's an old problem with a huge number of solutions.
In my experience, Windows support tends to entail fixing things that don't work as expected, while Linux support tends to entail adding useful features that don't already exist. It's actually quite profitable, for everyone, to be able to tell a client that Linux is limited only by your imagination and your budget, and that anything that doesn't work exactly as you expect can be modified. There's a reason IBM makes lots of money on Linux services, and creates lots of value for happy customers in the process.
"I assumed blithely that there were no elves out there in the darkness"
See http://www.muenchen.de/limux
and http://www.muenchen.de/Rathaus/dir/presseservice/2011/Pressemitteilungen/481205/fsfe_preis.html
In Google translation
excellent project LiMux - Document Freedom Day
(03/30/2011) For its commitment to open standards and free software is replaced by the city of Munich as part of the global campaign "Document Freedom Day" by the Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE), an award that was contrary to Munich's mayor Christine Strobl IT now . "The city of Munich shows a model that can reach a large German Government on Free Software. With the project LiMux Munich is in the use of open standards is a pioneer in Germany and in Europe. We hope that this modern and open attitude by many imitators, "pointed Karsten Gerloff, president of FSFE, emphasized at a small ceremony in Munich's town hall, attended by the municipal IT managers Gertraud Loesewitz, head of IT, Karl -Heinz Schneider, LiMux project leader Peter Hofmann, staff of the LiMux project teams, departments and representatives of the Open Source community took part in Munich. "Munich is a citizen-driven, flexible and open city. This is also reflected in the use of open standards and free software. With the use of open source software, we also strengthen the economy in Munich, by giving the many Munich-based IT service providers the opportunity to participate in the development "explained Mayor Strobl Munich motivation for LiMux.
"LiMux" is presently the largest Linux project in the public sector. With it, the state capital Munich to 2013 about 80 percent of its 15 000 PC workstations on the free operating system Linux. All PC workstations are already equipped since 2009 with an open communication office (OpenOffice.org, Thunderbird, Firefox) and almost 6,000 computers have been converted to the Munich-based Linux operating system. The state capital also has the single document template system, developed WollMux 'which is as free software under the European Union Public License (EUPL) published and other users for free as an open standard available (www.wollmux.org).
I would still call that a success, even if they were initially naïve in some respects.
Yep, this is really about this sort of change exposing all the very poor IT decisions done before. A migration to Linux shows many of these problems but even migrations to the next version of Windows often brings a lot of them to light. Companies seem to have a never-ending ability for short-sightedness. Look at all the places that did their entire websites in Flash or coded for IE6 not to mention Small/Medium business's prolific use of Quickbooks.
US Banks (in the USA) a few years back required MS-Java in order to use their website. When MS settled with Sun and pulled MS-Java there was no easy way to get MS-java (had to hunt around for hours for a client to find and install of an old version that worked) so new online banking customers could not access the site. This lasted about 6 months as I recall until their new online banking site was done. I'm sure that decision cost them a good bit of coin and annoyed / chased off several new customers. This is pretty much par for the course for many large companies.
Even now most firms talk about following standards but ditch that idea for cost or aesthetics or implement the purchase (and acceptance) procedure so poorly that don't actually get standards compliance in the end. This of course is not helped by things like ISO treating OOXML as a standard. Now more than ever companies need good IT people to plan for tomorrow, I just wish there were more of them. It often baffles me that the corporate world even functions what with the mass of solutions held together with chewing gum and bailing wire.
For mailing files from a webbrowser out onto the web, to a public "remailer" (e.g. yousendit, or others like it out there online), back to yourself whereever that email address may be (which can be temporary like gmail, rocketmail/yahoo mail, or even hotmail accounts). USB sticks & stallling access to them for end-users won't prevent them from doing THAT to steal data. In the case of malware attack as well, that again holds true also. You can stop access to USB thumbdrives to help stop malware making its way onto any system that way, but the other ways in (usually via social engineering or HTML email with malicious urls in it) will work for hackers/crackers too (unless you educate users, and then there's always the "disgruntled employee" who is possibly also a "short timer" (about to be let go) who will go and click on the "FREE VIAGRA" emails too, and infest the company that way).
Are you fucking kidding? Move all those clueless people to Linux and they'll all still get viruses and rootkits. It will take a fuckload more security measures that cannot be worked around to secure these people. As long as most people are clueless about computers there will be the $70 reloads.
I think Ubuntu 10.04 is a pretty stable desktop, but what is going to happen in 2013 when support runs out for it? I just don't see businesses moving the desktop over to unity or gnome 3.
D
Windows security has gotten better. In the 9x days, it was laughable. In XP, it became merely pathetic. With seven, it could be promoted as far as 'poor.' But the problem remains: Windows is made to be all things to all people, and specifically for non-technical users. Ease of use comes at the expense of security, and means the users stay dumb.
Most employees won't have any problems with an IT rollout with the applications installed. It takes little effort to learn where the Ubuntu Start Button is. Using Firefox to launch the company's cloud computing is not difficult.
The year of Linux is slowly being ushered in. I'm seeing much more computer hardware being listed on the retail shelf as Windows, Mac OSX, and Linux compatible. I'm seeing this on mice, cameras, sound and video capture devices, headsets, etc. Linux is slowly making an appearance in the mainstream. I like seeing Tux on the boxes.
The truth shall set you free!
& still spinning the uninfected code today. the stock markup scams of the '90's~ seem to have obliterated any real notion of 'community', but the clean free code for everyman dream lives on admirably. after stallman et et does the requested bug report on dc etc..., we'll have some answers? that & the teepeeleaks etchings, should settle the records straight. on to photonics.
Most people would prefer a car with a sound system that works albeit with a few bugs, than a car without a working sound system.
Only a few enthusiasts would be happy for the "opportunity" to build their own in-car sound system from scratch.
that was the 'old' days. much friendlier now, excepting maybe (learn) the ongoing failings re: wireless laptop drivers (ndissed) etc... as some of those issues are created by hardware manufactures' iron claws rulers, still, to this day, of open honest communications & commerce..
If they had cared to craft their line-of-business apps with a server backend and a standards-compliant browser front end
Which browser was standards-compliant when IE 6 was released in late 2001? Netscape of the day was Netscape 4.
If they had cared to craft their line-of-business apps with a server backend and a standards-compliant browser front end, we'd have saved a few hundred thousand dollars.
we managed to get Firefox added to the new standard build by the simple expedient of writing lots of in-house web apps that didn't work in IE.
Were these apps standards-compliant or Firefox-specific?
This is also the same way we kept Vista at bay.
Mozilla Firefox runs fine on Windows Vista and Windows 7. What exactly are you talking about? Are you talking about intentionally developing applications that don't run on Windows Vista because they break Microsoft's guidelines?
But Ubuntu forums are free
So are fan-run Windows forums.
and viruses alone are a major fraction of all problems encountered by "people".
How does this happen? Windows Vista and Windows 7 use UAC to control access to Administrators-group privileges. Without these privileges, viruses can't infect programs in the Program Files folder, which is writable only by users in the Administrators group. A virus running on Windows 7 would need to show a UAC prompt not unlike that of gksudo under Ubuntu. Or are you referring to users of Windows XP who haven't created a limited user account?
One is hardware support. In a wide-open home/laptop/desktop environment, it is difficult to guarantee that any particular piece of hardware is going to run, or at least be easy to get to run, under linux. But there is a more than spanning set of hardware to choose from that does run, and run well
The existence of working hardware doesn't help if you have donated hardware and zero budget to replace components with components from the spanning set. This affects three installation cases: ex-Windows PC, birthday present, or in-kind donation.
all this really means is that you should shop carefully for systems
I went to an electronics store, and none of the inkjet printers had a penguin logo on the box or had a column in system requirements for Linux. Not even the HP products.
Even if you do, it is probably cheaper and simpler to still run enterprise level Linux everywhere and confine Windows to VMs only on those desktops that need it.
Until you end up needing a VM and a Windows license for this or that package on half the machines in the company.
So you sabotaged your employer with a logic bomb to promote Firefox and older versions of Windows?
This is really not such a big deal. I know a dormitory where one copy of StarCraft was installed on over 6000 computers over an eight year period.
I'm pretty sure they were all using the same copy of Photoshop too.
The amazing thing about this story is that the 10,000 Linux machines were all installed legally.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Are android tablets, or rather chrome tablets, not a close equivalent of linux desktops ?
Insight into much, Influence over nothing !
I'll admit to liking that "emergency chance" to fiddle with files with some open/save dialog in flux. It's my quick chance to go fix something when I'm mainly doing something else. However, it's not my primary way to deal with files when I am "dealing with files".
Here's another spin on your post though. I'll call "lynchpin" when one fairly modest little change to something suddenly creates mental blocks that everything else jams up behind. Here's mine, for Linux: Why isn't all the cool stuff on Right Click? In Windows, as a quick phrase to teach a low skill user how to use Windows, I said that "when you get stuck, Right Click and see what shows up." A quick glance just now gives me (create) new (file of ) X type, view icons by detail lists, cut copy paste rename delete, properties, extract zipped files, open-with (some non-default program), and more.
My big logjam preventing me from slinging stuff in Linux is the lack of all those essential features off the right click menu. Some of them are there in one desktop-environ, some are in another, but not all of them. Do you know the backbone answer? Is it a big patent from MS "means of putting ____ function on a right click button" or did the desktop-environment people somehow not use that stuff and therefore never put it there?
I'm a fan of plugins & extensions, so even if it's not there natively, I'll kludge my way with a plugin. I might be one of only 1% who hated the MS Excel Ribbon so much that I did something about it. I downloaded a plugin, paid a few bucks, and kept on doing work.
if you know of really powerful "Windows-ize Linux" plugin I would really like to know. Then I can start making Rosetta-Stones and really learning. The only thing stopping me so far is I keep reaching for Right Click and time and again something I need isn't there.
My first Journal Entry ever, in 8 years! http://slashdot.org/journal/365947/aphelion-scifi-fantasy-horror-poetry-webzine
There are basically 3 types of businesses that tried adoption:
1) Businesses that had never developed a Windows culture. Burlington Coat Factory, Pep Boys, Autozone.... They were able to switch easily. ... Some were failures and some successes. Generally failure.
2) Businesses with a tech culture that was windows based but were highly motivated. Oracle, IBM,
3) Businesses with a standard end user culture but highly motivated. Midsized on down successes have been known, I don't know of any large corporate successes.
Windows embeds itself in so many places. Its very addictive to the enterprises and they find it harder then they ever imagined to kick the habit.
She's been on XP on an older machine and had been playing a few games that kept her there. She just recently started complaining about WinXP acting "weird" and having firefox hanging up. I slapped Suse 11.4 KDE on her machine and told her to let me know if something didn't work.
First day in and her words were: "I don't see what's different" and "It looks the same".
I was away at work. She installed Quicken via Wine and didn't even realize that it was any different than being in WinXP. But then came some coupon printer she's been using. That doesn't work. I'm looking at running a virtual machine just for that purpose.
As I'm typing this, she just plugged in our camera for the first time.
"This won't work in here huh?"
"Plug it in, you'll see"
Up pops the camera application and away she goes without further prompting.
She's not very tech savvy. But she's not on the job either and can wait for me to show her how to get stuff done.
Posted from my Win7 machine in Pale Moon
*ducks*.
The naive thing referred to the complexity of the migration effort at large. And has nothing to do with the used target OS and office suite. They did three things at once:
a) Migration from a decentralized mostly tinkered system to a centralized IT strategy and a uniform installation model.
b) They transformed old business processes to new leaner processes
c) They switched the OS and the application stack
And they underestimated the problems with b and the influence that had on a and especially c.
Did you look at VMware's Thinapp (bundled with its VDI VMware View product or sold separately)? We've used it to Thinapp IE6 and run IE6 dependent apps in Windows 7. Jumps pretty seamlessly between IE8 and IE6 depending on the site being accessed without the user even noticing.
Certainly saved me some grief.
Linux distros need exposure. 10g of exposure? Not to bad. It brings a tear to my eye to say that Linux will never supplant WinBlows however. Most people purchasing a computer never factor the cost of the OS because as far as they are concerned its part of the PC. All they want is the thing to turn on, boot up, get to the internet and surf porn and bit torrents. To bad really.
No, he's saving costs for his employer by reducing vendor lock-in. (Don't get me started on quirksmode.)
I have a hard time believing everyone in the company will be switching. After having worked at a couple insurance/financial companies, I can tell you Excel is a mainstay and no actuary (or accountant) worth their salt would be without it. And please spare me the OpenOffice Calc argument, it doesn't even come close to being as powerful.
To be charitable in a left-handed way, some of the users would stay dumb no matter what operating system they use. But most can be educated and hand-held to limited functionality with a certain set of tools, even if you still find them only using the five or six menu entries you showed them in a give GUI tool four years later...
rgb
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
Until you end up needing a VM and a Windows license for this or that package on half the machines in the company.
/vm/winimage newhost:/vm" and waiting a bit.
Except that the VM is free, every license saved is money saved, and VMs can be locked and cloned to make installation a matter of "rsync -avz
That's part of the "one sysadmin can manage 2-3 times as many linux systems as Windows systems" bit that you ignored.
HP printers don't have a penguin or systems requirements because they don't need one. They just install and work. Don't even need an "install CD".
rgb
Even when the experts all agree, they may well be mistaken. --- Bertrand Russell.
Excel, including VB macros work just fine in CrossoverOffice, ie Wine.
Note the purpose here is not to stop them running Windows apps, just to stop the base machine getting porned every 5 minutes
than a car without a working sound system.
Tell that to my kids who watch shows on Ubuntu on a regular basis, and watch them look at you like an idiot.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
Could you cite some examples of the poor security? I would rate Windows 7 in the fair or even good category of security. Homegroups now give home users the ability to lock down and encrypt their traffic over their network. Bitlocker provides disk encryption options. UAC can help end users from accidentally clicking on things they shouldn't. Most people find it annoying and disable it, but that's not Microsoft's fault. Built in firewalls have been getting better, and you won't find nearly as many exposed machines on the net because of the Home/Work/Public selection option when you connect to network.
Compared to other versions of Windows, 7 (and even Vista) are leaps beyond what they were before. Samba in Win9x was ridiculously insecure, but all of those holes have been plugged.
It's not very often that I hear about a zero day exploit taking down networks like we had with the worms in the early 2000s. The words "MS Blaster" would strike fear into the hearts of any admin who had to deal with it. I haven't seen anything wreak havoc like it since.
Most network security issues, in my experience, are due to poor network administration rather than holes in the operating system itself. I can't help but feel that the parent comment is a somewhat empty statement.
So you sabotaged your employer with a logic bomb to promote Firefox
To call "standards-compliant app" a logic bomb is to not understand what a logic bomb is.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
Reports from web analytics are that iPad usage in just one year has already passed 20 years of linux on the desktop installed base.
It that trend continues, then linux on tablets, not desktops, might be the path forward.
The only way it'd be more of a Beowulf cluster is if it were in Denmark herself.
UAC is a bit of a joke, but this can be blamed as much on third-party devs as Microsoft. The dialog pops up so often, users - even the more technical ones - just get into the habbit of clicking OK and ignoring it. I have it do the chime-and-grey-screen thing every time I open a RAR file. Don't know why. It's a nice try, but just not quite there. In large part because many windows devs are used to just assuming admin access would always be there. We've been through this once before, when migrating from each app storing config in it's own directory (c:\program files\app, usually) which played hell when networked desktops started becoming common and users no longer were running as admin. The devs got used to the new, tidier convention of appdata, but it took a while. Compare to *nix, where it's been known for decades that the only programs that can be expected to run as root are those that actually need to.
A lot of it is little things. Like embedding icons in executables (Yes, seven still does it, I'm looking at some right now) together with hideing file extensions by default. Just perfect for tricking users.
IE is still terrible, because it's designed to be maximally functional. For one example, script on a website can access the clipboard. Wonderfully useful for things like web-apps, which is why it's there - but it can also be used by a malicious script which just submits the contents secretly to it's master. Snag enough clipboards, sooner or later you'll get something juicy like a bank number. To contrast, firefox does support this functionality, but it's disabled by default - you have to change an obscure option yourself to enable it, and even then you can limit it to some domains only.
Seven is leaps beyond XP, but it's still got a long way to go. It's not so much actual holes that can exploited as poor design choices made to maximise either useability or functionality. There is a fundamental conflict between making software do what it should and making software not do what it shouldn't - MS leans heavily towards the former.
So are fan-run Windows forums.
The Ubuntu Forums are ran/owned by Canonical
Or are you referring to users of Windows XP who haven't created a limited user account?
You didn't know there's still a large number of XP users out there?
But not all PCs will survive this conversion, as many have incompatible hardware.
That's what live distros are for, testing.
Case in point: an eight-year-old Microtek ScanMaker 4850 USB flatbed scanner was listed as unsupported when I checked SANE's web site earlier this month.
You should also just try it anyway...sometimes the documentation is not updated often.
I went to an electronics store, and none of the inkjet printers had a penguin logo on the box or had a column in system requirements for Linux. Not even the HP products.
I know you've got Aspergers, but you are WAY too literal minded. Just because something doesn't mention Linux support, doesn't mean it doesn't work.
Case in point, are the HP printers, which work fine, and have done so for years. my first Linux distro back in 2002 worked fine with the HP printers I had, and it was a modified Red Hat 6 on the PS2 no less. HP itself releases software for it's printers for Linux, ever hear of HPLIP?
http://hplipopensource.com/hplip-web/index.html
Another example is this Bluetooth dongle, which works just fine in Linux even though the neither the package or documentation mentions LInux:
http://www.walmart.com/ip/IoGear-Bluetooth-2.0-USB-Micro-Adapter/10299060?sourceid=1500000000000003142050&ci_src=14110944&ci_sku=10299060
Heh heh. I added the Linux wedge by finding two parts of the network that could only communicate one way (don't ask) and setting up an ssh reverse tunnel so I could mount all of the cifs shares on a Linux box on one end and then access them from the other Linux box on the other side. Could it have been done another way? Sure. But where's the fun in that. And I have two Linux boxes at work strutting their stuff now.
The soylentnews experiment has been a dismal failure.
Would mean this is not even a notable story.
Are you sure they are yours?
Hopefully they are not as rude and stupid as you.
Heh sorry that I'm an asshole.
My excuse: just spent some hours doing taxes, and my PM is announcing an "email for all" system that he claims isn't going to cost taxpayers money but rumours are the company doing it will charge government departments money per email... Stupid stuff that looks more suitable for an "april 1st" announcement.
There is a type of business it works for quite well. I know because I used to work for such a business.
The business type is one where a large number of staff have simple requirements based around a small handful of apps, none of which depend on Windows. The company was a major UK insurance broker with around 300 branches nationwide.
For the most part, the branch staff only needed access to the system which generated quotes and stored customer policy data - a legacy system dating back 20 years or more that was terminal-based. Email was web-based (Outlook Web Access on Exchange 5.5 IIRC). The branches ran IBM PCs which booted from the network. Some of the earlier PCs had been purchased as a custom build without hard drives or Windows licenses; later PCs were cheap enough that it wasn't worth the custom build, they were just configured in the BIOS to boot from the network. The company had two call centres, these used a similar system.
The Unix support team was around four people, who were if anything somewhat underworked.
I can only speak for the Gnome 2 I'm using right now, but all of those show up (plus create folder, make link (shortcut), make archive, and others in your "and more"), depending on whether you're right-clicking on a file, a folder, or an empty space in the Nautilus side pane or viewer pane. That's slightly different than Windows, and it seems a little too context specific for my tastes (but the right click is intended to pop up a context sensitive menu, after all). I don't find it to be a problem at all, as it is trivially easy to discover the action I'm looking for. The only issue I have is if I instinctively try to click on an empty space when the file browser window is full.
Replying to myself, but to be fair I should clarify.
Staff in non-customer facing roles (finance, IT, regional managers) had Windows desktops. They didn't even try to migrate them to Linux.
Essentially, the company replaced their dumb terminals with Linux rather than replacing Windows with Linux. Which is a much easier task ;)
If most everyone used linux in their homes that would kill off virtually Hundreds of thousands of jobs supporting the crap. No more $70 mom and pop shop reloads, no more field service calls that are resolved by running virus cleaner and repairing an infected machine, no more recycled machines that get put back into circulation simply because the owners perceives an infected machine as a hardware failure or simply not worth the investment in repair over an opportunity to "upgrade."
There's more to these jobs than reloads and virus cleaning. We'd still be good; in fact, since it's Linux, we might even charge more. :)
Didn't some gov agency do this and decide it was a major mistake and switch back to windows?
... this guy gets 1 by trolling, while I, as AC, often get 0. Serious trouble with the mind of /. admins, if you ask me.
> By all means lets jump on the USSR bandwagon when it comes to examples of aviation advancement.
Well, they had the ekranoplans; do you have them? Also, what has eventual poor quality to do with a simpler unit system? Bad quality is to be expect from US units (not English nor Imperial, since Englan uses metric, don't push _your_ mistakes on others).
> The day the US makes the total conversion is the day when someone forces them
Yeah, because getting wise and taking such an easy decision certainly is not a USA characteristic, so it would happen only by force (note for the feeble of mind, I'm saying US' folks are stupid... got that?).
> and I don't see that happening anytime soon.
Yeah, like the US will wake up one day and say: "Ok, from now will be smart." Prove me wrong, I dare you.
> Either measurement standard can do the job
And marriage and rape lead to children, so what's your point? I'd rather do metric than that US' foot in the mouth, thanks.
> of course the main reason most of the world uses metric is because the US doesn't.
95.5% of the world people is outside US: why would I care about you? Besides, in any purchase, I can always point at US corporations and say: "What confidence do you have on projects based of feet, fingers and the like?" It's low, but you know, in business and war...
but the right click is intended to pop up a context sensitive menu, after all
conventional context menus are such a dumbass thing, though. The amiga got it right - sure, make menus sensitive to context, but ghost out the inapplicable actions, don't jiggle menu items around by hiding items completely so you can't learn to use muscle memory based on a consistent position to hit them rapidly.
Who is going to try to form an alternative to Windows using Linux with a serious decade long effort, in emulation of Apple?
Control your systems top to bottom and you can have the best system you can create for your best business results. Apple has shown one way. Linux another. Dell showed another, albeit merely in low/est cost hardware.
The lesson of the last 10 years is easily that 1st cost of hardware and software is not the total cost of personal computing. Support costs can easily be HUGE and security cost from the lack of same have cost untold billions in both direct losses and indirect losses from wasted expensive time.
The day will come when the OS is virtually free on a major section of "PCs", as already started by Apple & Linux. Just a matter of time.
Except that the VM is free
Not if you're using VirtualBox in a company and an application needs the Guest Additions, such as an application that connects to a peripheral device. The Guest Additions are free for personal use; otherwise, they're free for "a few weeks" until the Personal Use and Evaluation License expires.
a Windows license for this or that package on half the machines in the company
every license saved is money saved
Not once you get past the number of licenses needed to make a sitewide volume license worth the money. I seem to remember reading, I forget where, that this tipping point is around half the machines in a company.
That's part of the "one sysadmin can manage 2-3 times as many linux systems as Windows systems" bit that you ignored.
But wouldn't one still need the Windows sysadmin to manage the Windows VMs?
HP printers don't have a penguin or systems requirements because they don't need one. They just install and work.
How should one have learned this? Say I want to learn about the general level of Linux support for each major printer manufacturer (OK, tread carefully, or don't bother). For example, you claim HP would be an "OK" manufacturer. Is such a list available? Must one carry a smartphone to the electronics store to check the make and model of each printer in stock in the desired price range against the printers on the HCL of a particular distribution's version of CUPS? Or must one just accept the higher cost of HP consumables compared to everyone else's as the cost of freedom?
That's what live distros are for, testing.
I understand this. So what's my recourse once I use a live distribution and the test ends up resulting in failure?
HP
Is there another manufacturer with thorough Linux support, preferably one with less expensive consumables? Google linux printer cheap ink pulls up this comment, which claims that Kodak's printers don't work with CUPS on Linux. So HP works with Linux but has expensive ink, while Kodak has more affordable ink but works only with non-free operating systems. Is this a tradeoff that one must accept just because, cheap ink or Linux support, never both, just like indie or local multiplayer, never both?
On a related note, I had the opportunity to help a Linux on the desktop noob the other day and was embarrassed by how bad software installation still is for users. on Windows you stick the CD in and double click the "setup.exe" icon. He can manage this. But he has this new Linux (Mint) laptop his brother gave to him and still needs to run some Windows software for work. Here was a chance for me to show him how easy Linux has become.
So While I'd like WINE to be installed by default, I realize that is not always going to be the case. And while I'd like Linux to automatically recognize .exe files and offer to do the right thing (install WINE and run them in response to user command) I recognize it isn't there yet. But at very least I figured I could walk him through opening the package manager GUI, searching for WINE, and installing it. No such luck, as WINE only had a placeholder in the package manager. So on to the Website and click the link for Ubuntu... oops, Mint despite claiming compatibility doesn't know what to do with that. So it's back to apt on the command line which leaves him totally confused and out of his element and afraid to install software on his new machine. So one to the Windows software. Stick the CD in the drive and double click the exe. Nope no luck. it won't run claiming it needs to be executable. So I click properties and try to make it executable. Nope, fails at that too. Back to the command line to find out the non-existent metadata would be stored on the CD so it needs to be copied locally first. Finally it is installed, but no shortcut is in the launch menu and I have to dig through the WINE files to find a shortcut and put it on the desktop. And after all that, WINE can't find the USB ports for some reason. That is when we gave up for the night and started heavily drinking.
My point here isn't that Linux on the desktop sucks. It is that while it might be great for managed installations with set applications, I don't think it is very usable for the home user yet and there are a lot of really obvious areas for improvement. Hopefully Canonical will keep up the good work.
Or are you referring to users of Windows XP who haven't created a limited user account?
You didn't know there's still a large number of XP users out there?
I am aware of this. I still use Windows XP. This was the first Windows operating system for the home market to introduce the concept of a "limited user" who lacks administrative privileges. How does a limited user on Windows XP catch a virus?
I have experienced the 'computer-literate' generation.
You think seeing them click away Facebook, Games and Apps would somehow make them much better at learning an Accounting Package or Inventory Management Package? Or diagnosing that the 'printer problem' is really an out of paper problem? That little Johnny and his iPod magically know how to write a Purchase Order or even know what a Purchase Order is? ROFLMAO!
The old school luser just stops and bitches to tech support. The new 'computer literate' luser will keep hacking away deep, and change settings on the entire cloud, all the servers, the routers, everything and anything, and make a big mess, but hey, he changed the screen colors back. All bow to the new hero. He fixed what IT effed up.
It gets better!
It is extremely difficult to correct the 'computer literate' generation.
You are just some crusty old fart telling little Johnny iPod for the first time in his life that he is not perfect. You can easily make him cry!!
What you consider pointing out that the batch is not balanced is considered bullying.
Raise your voice, tell the youngster he fucked up royally and cost the company and a ton of money. He'll quit and you'll be hearing from his lawyers.
Yep. I am over generalizing to make a point.
It's great to have the energy and fresh brains of young people in the workplace. A joy.
But don't believe stupid users will ever go away. You're just in for a whole new batch of stupid. And you need new people skills to deal with them.
MSOffice is only used in the rare cases they receive a docx that can't be opened by OO
Say a user of OpenOffice.org or LibreOffice wants to send a docx to a user of Microsoft Word, and he wants to give it a once-over in Microsoft Office so that it won't be unreadable in the recipient's software. Are the Office file viewers run in Wine reliable enough for this task?
Also Open Office(currently Libre Office) is used by many companies in my country
Is this also true of my country, the United States of America?
Also I believe you are trolling, because of what your question implies.
What do you think I was trying to imply?
I think the problem with linux is not is its design or abilities. Rather it is the amount of human input required to get it to work - especially in a business environment. Being a linux fan I have tried to shoehorn it into many a windows network but found that it requires a great deal of time to get it to run compatibly with windows apps. Even in a full linux environment you would still run into trouble with people needing to run one windows app or another.
Tolerance is to let others live like they want.
No, it's not. But you've got to admire those Politically Correct Bastards who insidiously twisted the original meaning of the word...
Tolerance \Tol"er*ance\, n. [L. tolerantia: cf. F.
tol['e]rance.]
1. The power or capacity of enduring; the act of enduring;
endurance.
[1913 Webster]
Diogenes, one frosty morning, came into the market
place, shaking, to show his tolerance. --Bacon.
[1913 Webster]
2. The endurance of the presence or actions of objectionable
persons, or of the expression of offensive opinions;
toleration.
[1913 Webster]
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
Not that I have used. Lexmark printers have been terrible (or at least for what I've used). I've also have not bought an inkjet printer for several years - I have an old HP Officejet and a small Xerox laser printer that both work wonderfully under any OS.
I'm starting to think GNU is the problem with "GNU/Linux" these days.
Might install in the future is "rumor for nerds" not "news for nerds".
The Ubuntu takeover stalled and crashed beginning 5 years ago.
Despite a fine desktop and the great Debian package system the takeover failed because the Ubuntu Install CD has a single 500 + megabyte compressed install file.
Unpacking that install file forces a Windows computer with a Windows marginal quality CD drive to operate beyond it's tested limits.
Even with 15+ years experience, multiple machines and a big name brand DVD drive, I had the install CD failure. I am talking about what went on 5 years ago.
I have a computer buddy who used to build and sell PC's using two storage lockers full of new obsolete hardware typically bought in lots from computer retailers. He has long since given up trying Ubuntu. He says, hey I just stick a Windows Install CD in the drive, hit go and I'm done.
The cause of the Ubuntu failure to take over the computer desktop, in part, is the inability of the Ubuntu designers to comprehend the utter confidence destroying humiliation that their Install CD inflicts on would be newbies.
That's the first class. Businesses that never developed a windows culture. Yes they are easy to convert and Linux has been a huge success for them.
If most everyone used linux in their homes that would kill off virtually Hundreds of thousands of jobs supporting the crap.
.I use linux more than a decade now, and I can't imagine the hell of having to use windows again. And I feel kinda sorry for all those people out there who really don't know any better.
It doesn't matter whether you look at the stats from Statcounter, W3Schools, Net Applications....
all tell the same story and it is a story the geek does not want to hear, much less try to understand.
Microsoft Windows is everyone's first choice as an OEM system install.
It is a strong seller retail boxed. It is pirated everywhere and outperforms Linux in the thieves markets and bazaars of the third world.
Microsoft Windows is not crap. It is not a hell for its users. 1 to1.5 billion users world-wide.
The Windows client is a purely commercial, market oriented, OS whose primary focus has always been on the needs and desires of the non-technical end user.
It makes no concessions whatever to the FOSS zealot's notion of ideological purity or political correctness.
MS Office Home. Paint Shop Pro. Inkscape. Irfanview. Scribus. Microsoft Security Essentials. IE 9 and IE 10 Platform Preview.
Skype.
Netflix and Silverlight. Machinarium, The Complete National Geographic and Adobe Flash. Kindle for the PC. Pandora.
AIM. Windows Live!
The Infocom Adventures. The Dig. Baldur's Gate. Planescape: Torment.
Bioshock. Dragon's Age. Mass Effect. Batman: Arkham Asylum. Tales of Monkey Island.
174 programs monitored by Secunia PSI alone.
16 years of running Windows as a home user beginning with a hand-me-down Win 95 Packard Bell P70 with 8 MB of RAM.
I have never spent a dime on technical support or service. Never been in the least unconvinced by the rare exposure of malware on my system.
I have never found a FOSS app of the remotest use or interest to me that hasn't been ported to Windows or which began as a native Windows app.
You clearly have little exposure to the real world of computer users.
So what's my recourse once I use a live distribution and the test ends up resulting in failure?
Try another one. If Ubuntu doesn't, try Fedora, and vice versa. If those don't work try other ones.
Google linux printer cheap ink pulls up this comment, which claims that Kodak's printers don't work with CUPS on Linux
One of your problems is that you're too literal and your reading comprehension sucks. You go about finding info in an overly baroque way that often gets you outdated info...like that blog post, dated 2009. You could have gone to Kodak's website, checked their current models and then gone to openprinting to check compatibility. There you would have found about
http://www.openprinting.org/driver/c2esp
I took Kodak's little quiz and the printers it recommended to me, work with that driver.
So HP works with Linux but has expensive ink, while Kodak has more affordable ink but works only with non-free operating systems.
Well, you could always pick up an older Laserjet, cheap, that's what I did (I have a LaserJet 1200), since I rarely need color output. And if I do, I can print to the the PSC 1315. One can also refill cartridges, either personally or take them to someplace like Walgreens and save money.
Also if a company does support Linux, shouldn't we show our appreciation for that company?
Is this a tradeoff that one must accept just because, cheap ink or Linux support, never both, just like indie or local multiplayer, never both?
There are always tradeoffs, you're never going to get EVERYTHING you want.
> If most everyone used linux in their homes that would kill off virtually Hundreds of thousands of jobs supporting the crap.
That's an application of the broke window fallacy ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broken_window_fallacy ).
The constant 'supporting the crap' thing? That's the broken windows you're constantly having to replace. If you had to do less of that, you could be doing something else; it's not as if IT is composed of nothing but that, right? You'll just be supporting whatever the new weakest link in the infrastructure is - and since theoretically without their stuff breaking all the time, everyone else will be more productive, you'll have MORE of that other stuff to do than you had before. I'm doing a poor job of wording it well, but what I'm trying to say is those jobs don't go away in a buggy-whip-manufacturer kind of way, they just shift workload to other parts of IT, because IT's tasks are endless.
(Also, some of those 'hundreds of thousands of jobs' are call centers in some other country; as far as the locals are concerned, those are jobs that were already lost years ago)
Try another one. If Ubuntu doesn't, try Fedora, and vice versa. If those don't work try other ones.
And get the copies from a local LUG, correct?
One of your problems is that you're too literal
I think some of that comes from having read statutes and case law to support positions in some of the tech policy discussions here on Slashdot. How do I become not so literal?
You go about finding info in an overly baroque way that often gets you outdated info
When I have only a hammer, I treat everything as a nail unless I can somehow find other tools. How do I become better at finding new tools?
...OVER 9000!
There is a fundamental conflict between making software do what it should and making software not do what it shouldn't - MS leans heavily towards the former.
Microsoft also pursues a similar option: "making software not do what it should"; witness the broken lower-cost versions. Reaching back to NT 4, the only difference between "server" and "workstation" versions was a single Registry entry. They've "learned" since then (to differentiate the market, need many more changes), but the fact still remains that they're selling crippled products only in order to entice users to pay more for uncrippled products.
I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.
So you sabotaged your employer with a logic bomb to promote Firefox
To call "standards-compliant app" a logic bomb is to not understand what a logic bomb is.
Exactly! As an example, your sig contains a logic bomb.
I feel fantastic, and I'm still alive.
OpenOffice.org writter can save in (word 95/97/2000/Xp).doc
I am aware of this. But just as OpenOffice.org/LibreOffice import of Word .doc/.docx is imperfect, I imagine that its export of the same formats is also imperfect. That's why for the most important documents, where one wants both correct appearance and editability, I imagined that one would review them in Microsoft Word or at least Microsoft Word Viewer before sending them out in order to see them exactly as the recipient would.
If I responded 'not long', 'long', or 'very long', witch are the possible answers to your question, it still assumes there are lines of people to access this computer witch is not true. The reality is that, this computer is rarely used.
I would have answered "most of the time, no waiting".
I am aware of this. But just as OpenOffice.org/LibreOffice import of Word .doc/.docx is imperfect, I imagine that its export of the same formats is also imperfect.
At least at this point in this particulary company, this is a non issue, since I still give support to them, and this problem never happen. To be truthful they used MSOffice at a very basic level without any of the very advanced features(as I believe most office users do), so I really don't know the the perfection of saving advanced doc features in OOffice as a MS Office document. There is an issue with background images when they (wrongly) are embebed in MS Word document, with no margins.
That's why I've kept the MSOffice Box. But like I said in my original post, and becouse of the lack of problems they had on this transition, I belive the people adaptation problems are a myth or exaggerated.
Actually, you have it backwards. They sell crippled products to users who don't need all the functionality of the more expensive versions. Why should people pay for features they're not using?
They LOWER the price of crippled versions, they don't raise the price of the more capable versions.
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You shouldn't be getting a UAC screen when opening a rar file. That doesn't even make any sense. Winrar opens files in a read-only mode. If you mean when you extract a rar, then the reason you're getting a UAC prompt is because your folder permissions are net set correctly, and the user you are using doesn't have write permissions to that folder.
Embedded icons do not cause uac prompts either. All executables have embedded icons, and this is a good thing (Apple does the same thing). The icons are read from the file, not written to them.
IE also has not allowed unrestricted clipboard access since IE6. Since IE7, there has been a popup for untrusted web sites that you have to say yes to allow clipboard access. This is what IE Security zones are for.
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The Ubuntu forums are filled with people who can't get their sound working. Is that just a figment of his imagination?
If you need web hosting, you could do worse than here
Most users don't give shit about any operating systems period. They do care about applications and games. A user moving to a new OS might bitch about different things being presented by the OS but would eventually get the hang of it. On the other hand if their favorite applications were missing or problematic they would complain.
And what is so special about Canonical forums. There is more information on windows and specifically windows development on the net that you would be hard pressed to run into a problem and find no one else who hasn't had the same problem and provided the information to correct the problem. That's not counting the MS published information for developers.
Burlington, Pep Boys, and Autozone all use Linux as POS devices. Basically, just appliances. Linux works well for that. When a computer has a single purpose, such as being a terminal to a single app.. then it can run anything as long as the app runs.
When a computer has to be a general purpose computer, and do multiple tasks.. then the user has to know how to use the OS. And, more importantly, you now have to have multiple apps that all work on the OS. The more apps you add to it, the greater the chance you will find one that doesn't have a Linux version.
If you need web hosting, you could do worse than here
http://www.opentrends.nl/2011/04/24/lvm-versicherungen-met-10-000-ubuntu-werkplekken/
https://launchpad.net/~tspindler/+archive/ubuntu-network-manager-lvm
https://launchpad.net/~tspindler/+archive/ubuntu-kernel-lvm
I think, they don't want to do it, they have done it!
Second, buisiness:
Buisiness is like Apple, lesser Hardware means lesser support -> tested Hardware recommended, other on your own support/risk
What do you belief, is happening, when they need new Hardware (in mass)?
Is that just a figment of his imagination?
Possibly... :)
All I know is that sound works on my two Linux PCs, and nothing had to be built from scratch.
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
They actually have a lot of apps. But were coming over from SunOS or SCO, they weren't windows apps to begin with. That's the point about never having developed a Windows culture. If there was only a windows version they weren't using the application before the shift.
And my experience is that one of the few workplaces were end users take advantage of network transparency.
"Works for me" seems to be the motto of the Linux crowd. I guess that makes sense. If it didn't work, you'd probably hate Linux too.
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Companies wanting to save money will make the switch. Companies wanting better security will make the switch. There are some people who are really ticked off that the software on the computer they bought doesn't belong to them. The computer they own, the software is a 'lease', and when the company says 'jump!', they have to ask 'how high?'. A lot of companies want to see what they are getting. There are some companies who are saying "If this is what powers Android, why am I not running it on my computer too?" Its those pesky companies who don't like forced upgrades, license fees and endless patch cycles. Go figure!
YES. This is it exactly. Linux support is about making things better and moving forward.
Windows is about cleaning up a mess. And in my experience, although Linux needs support to get the ball rolling, once in motion, it takes care of itself. Window's on the other hand, well, the work is never done, there is always more to do, more to fix.
No. It just does not seem to happen. Every family member, friend, and colleague just seem to quit having problems once they are using Linux. For some reason, once moved away from windows, the problem seems to away.
I suspect it's because the rar files are mostly on a network drive, but I havn't got anything strange going on in the config. It's just a plain network share with rar files on. Windows classifies it as an internet zone thing though, so is suspicious of anything on there.
Embedded icons are not related to UAC, that's a seperate issue. The problem comes when they are combined with hiding extensions. That means that it's easy for someone to take some malware, call it 'Holiday photo.exe' and change the icon to the default image for a jpeg. Now, to casual inspection, it looks like an image file. Why? There is no practical benefit to executeables with custom icons at all.. It's pure eye candy.
I was not aware they'd fixed the clipboard access. That they ever allowed something so obviously abuseable at all still shows the problem though - MS's policy of functionality over security. This isn't some obscure little buffer overflow exploit, it's a function that it should be obvious to anyone with five minutes thought would be ripe for easy exploitation, and they put it in anyway.
An interesting POV indeed, yet one I don't agree with.
>It doesn't matter whether you look at the stats from Statcounter, W3Schools, Net Applications....
Popularity, although generally a good indicator of quality is not always. For example, I know
a great number of people (men, I never go in the ladies' bathroom) don't wash their hands
after peeing/#2ing yet that's hardly a better thing to do than actually washing your hands.
A great number of people smoke, eat fast food, don't exercice, lie, speed, waste and
throw things in the wild. Arguably, the aforementioned items do have some "benefits":
smoking makes you look cool in high school, eating fast food saves you the hassle of doing
the groceries and cooking, exercising can be excruciating, etc. Yet, in all the previous cases,
popularity isn't necessarily a good indicator of quality (the fact that many people do it doesn't
_imply_ it's the right thing to do).
>all tell the same story and it is a story the geek does not want to hear, much less try to understand.
>Microsoft Windows is everyone's first choice as an OEM system install.
I know I'm stoopid (pun intended) for asking (as I doubt normal people actually post comments to receive answers and discuss),
but may you explain me how 'OEM system install' and 'choice' can go together? Last time I checked, OEMs (at least in North America) don't let you choose your OS to be OEM installed. It is Windows [version of the year], no comments allowed (and having tried getting a refund myself I can tell you it's not something that can be done without a moderate legal incentive).
>It is a strong seller retail boxed. It is pirated everywhere and outperforms Linux in the thieves markets and bazaars of the third world.
A good point, but, on the other hand, GNU/Linux is mostly free and is the underdog. I doubt there are many examples were such an item would
have a high value on the black market.
>Microsoft Windows is not crap. It is not a hell for its users. 1 to1.5 billion users world-wide.
>The Windows client is a purely commercial, market oriented, OS whose primary focus has always been on the needs and desires of the non-technical end >user.
>It makes no concessions whatever to the FOSS zealot's notion of ideological purity or political correctness.
That's arguable and I'd have a lot to argue about it. But let's assume, for the purposes of being terse and staying on subject that you are right.
>I have never found a FOSS app of the remotest use or interest to me that hasn't been ported to Windows or which began as a native Windows app.
Wonder why? Because Free Software developpers (and every OSS devs I know of) care about freedom of the user: so if the user wants to run the app on Windows,
they won't stop people from porting the app. But then, that idea gets misinterpreted as "FOSS zealot's notion of ideological purity or political correctness". Be happy you can have it both ways: enjoy F/OSS products and spit on its developpers for not being ready to abandon the ideals that made the product possible in the first place.
It isn't a "choice", it's a lack of choice.
Try not to be a moron. No one needs to 'pirate' linux. It's free.
this is your opinion. Most users DO NOT KNOW that there are alternatives, let alone how much less hellish the alternatives are.
Non sequitur. Look it up.
Either these are available natively on linux (Inkscape, Scribus), or alternatives are available. And the rest of your rant is of similar quality. Why bother to post if you haven't the first idea of what you are talking about?
Tempora mutantur, nos et mutamur in illis
"(...) That said, last year the Swiss canton of Solothurn went back to Windows 7 after hitting turbulence in a long-running Debian/GNU migration." Linux Is Not For Idiots...
Recipes for USA bankrupt - http://tinypaste.com/0d66f dd = dollar deluge (printed in the infinity)
I dumped Ubuntu and went to OpenSUSE. They have the best hardware support of any Linux distro. They lag ubuntu in packages available, but they are catching up.
Cheap storage VM.
Sounds like a specific distro, Mint, is not very usable for the home user yet. Your points were:
- WINE is not installed by default
- WINE is not automatically installed by default
- WINE was not listed in the package manager
- WINE for a different distro was not installable on your distro
- Windows CD was not recognized as executable
- installing Windows program failed to install a WINE shortcut
I would like to claim that the majority of these would be solved by Ubuntu, but perhaps someone else can verify my claim. I use Kubuntu; not sure how different that is wrt WINE. I don't recall having to install WINE; certainly it would be installable by package manager. You wouldn't have that distro incompatibility problem --I guess Linux Mint is Ubuntu based, but not sure how compatible that makes it. As for installing Windows software, I am not as familiar, but certainly it automatically added shortcuts to my "Start" menu (not to my desktop, but I seem to recall that was because I asked it not to clutter my desktop with start shortcuts).
My point here is that we should be addressing specific distros. I think Ubuntu probably has the best first-time-user experience, but even they as well as other distros are finding that it takes a lot of work to get things to work smoothly, hence my own preference of sticking to large distros with critical mass rather than smaller distros that may scratch an itch but not have the manpower to address issues that are minor to developers but significant to first time users.
404555974007725459910684486621289147856453481154 in hex is "You sank my Battleship?"
[GPG key in journal]
VHS was more popular than Beta. The worst video cassette format though.
It is a strong seller retail boxed. It is pirated everywhere and outperforms Linux in the thieves markets and bazaars of the third world.
Just curious though, why would you expect FOSS software to be pirated?
The shepherds did so well protecting the flock that the sheep no longer believed that wolves existed.
What a douche. Those are the ones always getting nailed for doing unethical shit.
No, I would do what I do now: only trust open source software from reputable repositories. I would nto think twice about my kid installing ANY software included in the default ubuntu repos (for example). Even if something goes wrong, because of the way linux is built I still would be easier to clean up the mess.
They have great documentation. I used to use it all the time. The problem was all that documentation was hidden behind an incredibly brittle search feature, and they would CONSTANTLY be reorganizing the site so that their own fucking links would break. So, at least half the time it would take me fucking HOURS to find some piece of info about their own goddamn apis.
That alone would not have been so bad had they not, with every new release, broken shit so nothing would be backward compatible. I write a js app that works great on a machine with msie5 and js engine whatever, install 5.5 and now the fucking thing is broken. It was a constant cycle of fixing shit that used to work before they "improved" things.
I have scripts on this machine I wrote 6 years ago that still work perfectly. This is why moving from MS to linux would cause thousands of monkeys to lose their jobs... no more planned obsolescence.
Millions of people buy shit music that collects "awards" at ceremonies that celebrate their popularity and "contribution to the music industry" (ie profits generated).
Popularity is not a measure of quality. Never was, still ain't.
I would do what I do now: only trust open source software from reputable repositories.
Over my years of using free software (in the GNU sense) on Windows and Linux, I've found a few classes of software for which I don't see open source or free software taking over any time soon.
Games are one of them because they're made of more components than just a computer program, and the authors of high-quality other components don't yet discovered free culture motives to the same extent as programmers. Even if the engine itself is free, developers of the meshes, textures, audio, and scripts that sit on top of the engine still need to eat. What is an emulator without ROMs, or Doom without WADs, or ScummVM without the original LucasArts data files? And though selling support works for some kinds of business software, games that aren't massively multiplayer tend to need far less support from the publisher.
Tax preparation will also probably remain proprietary because "ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY", as several free software licenses put it, just doesn't cut it. The big tax preparation software companies (Intuit and H&R Block) stake their corporate reputations on the accuracy and timeliness of their translations into machine-readable form of the unending changes to the tax codes in dozens of jurisdictions.