UI customizability or function (or lack thereof) has nothing to do with why i like OS X.
So many seem to get caught up in what OS X looks like, but its what's underneath that makes it work for me. Shit like the services menu, applescript, automator, and hardware that i don't have to fuck with to make work.
If anything, I actually dislike a lot of aspects of the Apple UI (fucking window resizing!!!), but there's a lot to like underneath.
"Unstable" in debian terms has never been about crashes. Its "unstable" in the sense that your platform that you installed this morning on one machine may not actually be the same as the machine you install this afternoon (assuming you're pulling packages with APT).
And yes, if you're willing to live with occasional short term breakage on your desktop, unstable is just fine and always has been.
If you're running a server, you better be prepared to get your hands dirty (or live with downtime until the SNAFU is fixed) when it all goes horribly wrong if/when you happen to be updating.
I use ubuntu occasionally also. I was helping build an ISP with Linux 1.2 way back when.
Eventually there comes a point where the tasks you're doing are platform agnostic - and if ubuntu or whatever other OS provides the quickest easiest way of getting shit done, then that's what gets used.
I couldn't give a fuck if the UI is customizable, theme-able or whatever. So long as it provides a stable application platform and an xterm, it is usable.
However... on another tack.... If bitching about lack of UI customization is the biggest problem, there's a serious "why the fuck isn't linux on every desktop?" to be answered.
Its free (beer), open source (free as in RMS) and clearly the biggest problem is the user interface (or so people would have you believe).
If your browser doesn't slow to a crawl and have the UI lock up when a dodgy script runs (like uh... chromium doesn't) then you don't really need to block scripts explicitly.
Gold (as an example) is a useful resource. It is used in electronics, military hardware, to impress women with shiny things, etc. If i own it, the world's currencies can totally collapse, and I still have something of value that I can trade for food, labor, etc. Ditto for land, diamonds, steel, wood, etc.
If the bitcoin currency crashes, i'm left with what exactly? I have no resource - nothing to show for it.
The "value" of physical resources only fluctuates wildly due to the actual currency it is valued in varying. Yes, there may be trends over long periods of time as the resource is unavailable due to shortage or highly available due to new discovery or manufacturing process, but those events can't reduce the value to zero in any short period of time.
I'd rather give up the ability to electronically transfer, than potentially give up all ability to recover any physical asset tied to the currency i'm trading with.
Ubuntu is not targeted at you, nor people like you. You're already a linux user, whether or not ubuntu exists or not.
Its targeted at the other 95% of the population who don't even know or care what Linux is.
Ubuntu gaining more users is a good thing for Linux market share (and thus, leverage regarding hardware support) whether or not you personally end up using it or not. Ubuntu attracting less technical users doesn't mean the rest of the Linux world "loses".
Pretty much this. Linux will never get significant hardware driver/vendor support unless it has significant market share.
However, one Linux does not fit all. Trying to make a single distribution of it fit everyone is never going to work. Ubuntu fulfills a niche; those users out there who don't CARE whether its Linux (or Windows, or anything else for that matter). They don't CARE whether or not the UI is theme-able. They don't care to be configuring every aspect of their system.
They want something they can just boot up, log in to (optionally) and just use to connect with people, read their email, watch funny cat videos and pay their bills.
However, if that is built on top of Linux and gains significant share, there's nothing to stop the community taking the "good" (or perhaps, "useful" is a better word) parts and making a more focused network tech of programming nerd distribution out of it for those who want more control.
If Ubuntu was to get 50 million (or some other large number of) users, that would be an awesome win for everyone else in the Linux community, due to the increased level of hardware vendor driver support for the underlying kernel.
If you have an enterprise license for Windows (as you get to a certain size, it gets cheaper to go this route) then MDT is included for free. Essentially you end up with a server machines can network boot off and install a standard operating system image that you customize.
Spend the time building your custom image and reinstalls are pretty painless.
Have fun running Surpac, minecad, or a million other industry specific de-factor standard apps on your linux box.
Operating systems are tools. If you need a particular OS (tool) then figure out how to make it work. Bitching that it doesn't work like Linux is not going to get the job done.
But, its the same as with the Mac or Linux or any other OS. People try the way of doing things, find it doesn't work, and then bitch about it.
This was meant to read: But, its the same as with the Mac or Linux or any other OS. People try the [insert other OS] way of doing things, find it doesn't work, and then bitch about it.
You're doing it wrong. There are plenty of tools out there to automate / speed up windows roll outs. And you seriously do not need 10 reboots. I know this, because I build/maintain our Win7 SOE images.
If its a personal machine, its a once off. If you're a business with more than 10-20 people you should seriously consider setting up a deployment server and maintaining an image.
I can go from borked machine to reinstalled OS with all updates in about 1 hour, including keeping of all the user data (assuming the OS is clean enough to boot and get onto the network). Out of that 1 hour, only 5 minutes of work is involved to set up the reinstall. And thats without using SCCM to automate the process entirely.
I think a large problem with Windows in the mind of the average slashdotter is that they aren't exposed to the proper enterprise tools. If you're a windows shop with an enterprise agreement, there are a whole heap of management tools that make things much, much easier.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a unix person at heart and given the choice would be on a BSD box (preferably a mac actually) for my desktop in a heartbeat. But there's so many examples of people trying to do stuff on Windows the brain damaged way and then complaining that it's brain damaged it's not funny.
But, its the same as with the Mac or Linux or any other OS. People try the way of doing things, find it doesn't work, and then bitch about it.
Tell me why i should use bitcoins instead of real gold. I find the idea of some currency that has an artificially imposed (vs reality imposed) limit to supply a tad... wrong. Why should we burn cpu power to generate bitcoins when that could be put to better use solving actual problems?
What's your point? Thats basically what i suggested. If you run as root on a linux or bsd box (not suggested, neither is running as admin on windows), you're going to eventually get tripped up. At least windows uses code signing, I'm not aware of Linux perfoming any code signing checks on binaries that an end user downloads from their web browser before enabling them to run it.
I don't give 80% of my windows users admin access. I don't have a high volume of machines getting owned. Unfortunately Windows' results are skewed by the fact that it is the most common home user operating system (i.e., the non-technical end user is also the administrator, and logged in as such) by at least an order of magnitude.
Yes, sure. However my point is that both machines were specifically targeted (i.e., here's a mac, here's a windows box, try and own them both - at a hacking convention). In the real world, the market share of OS X is not worth bothering with, when you can get 85-90% of desktops by targeting windows. The effort expended is not worth the potential return.
Thus, although in theory, on the test bench windows is more secure - in reality, there are a lot more Windows boxes getting owned, simply because the volume of expoits out there being developed, and the prevelance of them on the internet is much greater.
Look, i'm not disagreeing with the results you presented. I'm merely suggesting that in the real world you're a lot less likely to stumble across a trojan/exploit for your OS X box, because Windows is the focus of so much more exploit development.
Ditto for those still running, say Windows 98 or OS/2. No one codes exploits for it any more because its market share is so close to zero - yet its architectures is FAR less secure than Windows XP or 7.
In reality, that was a targeted attack. Most people don't get owned by targeted attacks. And due to market share, OS X is nowhere near as common a target. So even though in theory the exposure is less on Windows, it has many many more people attempting to breach it. And as such, a higher number of breaches.
Slashdot Mirror
So many seem to get caught up in what OS X looks like, but its what's underneath that makes it work for me. Shit like the services menu, applescript, automator, and hardware that i don't have to fuck with to make work.
If anything, I actually dislike a lot of aspects of the Apple UI (fucking window resizing!!!), but there's a lot to like underneath.
"Unstable" in debian terms has never been about crashes. Its "unstable" in the sense that your platform that you installed this morning on one machine may not actually be the same as the machine you install this afternoon (assuming you're pulling packages with APT).
And yes, if you're willing to live with occasional short term breakage on your desktop, unstable is just fine and always has been.
If you're running a server, you better be prepared to get your hands dirty (or live with downtime until the SNAFU is fixed) when it all goes horribly wrong if/when you happen to be updating.
I use ubuntu occasionally also. I was helping build an ISP with Linux 1.2 way back when.
Eventually there comes a point where the tasks you're doing are platform agnostic - and if ubuntu or whatever other OS provides the quickest easiest way of getting shit done, then that's what gets used.
I couldn't give a fuck if the UI is customizable, theme-able or whatever. So long as it provides a stable application platform and an xterm, it is usable.
However... on another tack.... If bitching about lack of UI customization is the biggest problem, there's a serious "why the fuck isn't linux on every desktop?" to be answered.
Its free (beer), open source (free as in RMS) and clearly the biggest problem is the user interface (or so people would have you believe).
Why isn't it dominating the desktop?
Hint: its not the UI fluff.
Ditto to that. Also to the fact that if Office was included with Windows or anything else, it would be considered "Bloat".
Its not like they're removing it from the repository.
Then spend the 20 dollars on an 8 gig memory stick.
Google Chromium is NOT CHROME.
If your browser doesn't slow to a crawl and have the UI lock up when a dodgy script runs (like uh... chromium doesn't) then you don't really need to block scripts explicitly.
Gold (as an example) is a useful resource. It is used in electronics, military hardware, to impress women with shiny things, etc. If i own it, the world's currencies can totally collapse, and I still have something of value that I can trade for food, labor, etc. Ditto for land, diamonds, steel, wood, etc.
If the bitcoin currency crashes, i'm left with what exactly? I have no resource - nothing to show for it.
The "value" of physical resources only fluctuates wildly due to the actual currency it is valued in varying. Yes, there may be trends over long periods of time as the resource is unavailable due to shortage or highly available due to new discovery or manufacturing process, but those events can't reduce the value to zero in any short period of time.
I'd rather give up the ability to electronically transfer, than potentially give up all ability to recover any physical asset tied to the currency i'm trading with.
Ubuntu is not targeted at you, nor people like you. You're already a linux user, whether or not ubuntu exists or not.
Its targeted at the other 95% of the population who don't even know or care what Linux is.
Ubuntu gaining more users is a good thing for Linux market share (and thus, leverage regarding hardware support) whether or not you personally end up using it or not. Ubuntu attracting less technical users doesn't mean the rest of the Linux world "loses".
Pretty much this. Linux will never get significant hardware driver/vendor support unless it has significant market share.
However, one Linux does not fit all. Trying to make a single distribution of it fit everyone is never going to work. Ubuntu fulfills a niche; those users out there who don't CARE whether its Linux (or Windows, or anything else for that matter). They don't CARE whether or not the UI is theme-able. They don't care to be configuring every aspect of their system.
They want something they can just boot up, log in to (optionally) and just use to connect with people, read their email, watch funny cat videos and pay their bills.
However, if that is built on top of Linux and gains significant share, there's nothing to stop the community taking the "good" (or perhaps, "useful" is a better word) parts and making a more focused network tech of programming nerd distribution out of it for those who want more control.
If Ubuntu was to get 50 million (or some other large number of) users, that would be an awesome win for everyone else in the Linux community, due to the increased level of hardware vendor driver support for the underlying kernel.
How about: remove the line that craps out (for no good reason) rather than attempt to run.
If you have an enterprise license for Windows (as you get to a certain size, it gets cheaper to go this route) then MDT is included for free. Essentially you end up with a server machines can network boot off and install a standard operating system image that you customize.
Spend the time building your custom image and reinstalls are pretty painless.
Have fun running Surpac, minecad, or a million other industry specific de-factor standard apps on your linux box.
Operating systems are tools. If you need a particular OS (tool) then figure out how to make it work. Bitching that it doesn't work like Linux is not going to get the job done.
No safari, no Opera, no IE9. All of those browsers are recent enough, but the script craps out rather than attempt to run. Poor form.
This was meant to read: But, its the same as with the Mac or Linux or any other OS. People try the [insert other OS] way of doing things, find it doesn't work, and then bitch about it.
If its a personal machine, its a once off. If you're a business with more than 10-20 people you should seriously consider setting up a deployment server and maintaining an image.
I can go from borked machine to reinstalled OS with all updates in about 1 hour, including keeping of all the user data (assuming the OS is clean enough to boot and get onto the network). Out of that 1 hour, only 5 minutes of work is involved to set up the reinstall. And thats without using SCCM to automate the process entirely.
I think a large problem with Windows in the mind of the average slashdotter is that they aren't exposed to the proper enterprise tools. If you're a windows shop with an enterprise agreement, there are a whole heap of management tools that make things much, much easier.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a unix person at heart and given the choice would be on a BSD box (preferably a mac actually) for my desktop in a heartbeat. But there's so many examples of people trying to do stuff on Windows the brain damaged way and then complaining that it's brain damaged it's not funny.
But, its the same as with the Mac or Linux or any other OS. People try the way of doing things, find it doesn't work, and then bitch about it.
Integrated management tools. I don't run it, but it plugs into sccm where you have all your other windows network configuration.
Guess what? My esx hosts need updating and rebooting too. There's hot migration for that. Migrate VMs. Reboot host. Repeat.
Well duh. Microsoft is in the business of selling operating systems. What do you expect, for them to kiss and make up with their largest competitor?
Tell me why i should use bitcoins instead of real gold. I find the idea of some currency that has an artificially imposed (vs reality imposed) limit to supply a tad... wrong. Why should we burn cpu power to generate bitcoins when that could be put to better use solving actual problems?
What's your point? Thats basically what i suggested. If you run as root on a linux or bsd box (not suggested, neither is running as admin on windows), you're going to eventually get tripped up. At least windows uses code signing, I'm not aware of Linux perfoming any code signing checks on binaries that an end user downloads from their web browser before enabling them to run it.
I don't give 80% of my windows users admin access. I don't have a high volume of machines getting owned. Unfortunately Windows' results are skewed by the fact that it is the most common home user operating system (i.e., the non-technical end user is also the administrator, and logged in as such) by at least an order of magnitude.
Thus, although in theory, on the test bench windows is more secure - in reality, there are a lot more Windows boxes getting owned, simply because the volume of expoits out there being developed, and the prevelance of them on the internet is much greater.
Look, i'm not disagreeing with the results you presented. I'm merely suggesting that in the real world you're a lot less likely to stumble across a trojan/exploit for your OS X box, because Windows is the focus of so much more exploit development.
Ditto for those still running, say Windows 98 or OS/2. No one codes exploits for it any more because its market share is so close to zero - yet its architectures is FAR less secure than Windows XP or 7.
IN theory, sure.
In reality, that was a targeted attack. Most people don't get owned by targeted attacks. And due to market share, OS X is nowhere near as common a target. So even though in theory the exposure is less on Windows, it has many many more people attempting to breach it. And as such, a higher number of breaches.
Give them root access / log them in as root for a fair comparison to the typical windows user's setup and see how long that lasts.