Sorry, but can you even point out what is so "fantastic" about the Windows GUI and what sets it apart from KDE?
In my opinion, the Windows GUI is pretty simplistic. Sure it's fine if you just use a handful of apps at the same time, but as soon as you have more than 10 or so windows open, you need multiple desktops.
If you search Google for Linux you will find something useful: SuSE, debian, RedHat, etc. Everything a new Linux user needs.
Provincial Linux are exactly that: Provincial and useless for 99.9% of users who don't happen to live in that area.
Even more support to the claim that Microsoft is tainting the search results.
I don't know what algorithm MSN uses to search it's results, but I can hardly think of any that would put provincial organizations on top and worldwide Linux distributors to the bottom - unless MS has some penalties for suse.com, debian.org, etc.
First of all, in the Indian search engine those featured and sponsored links don't exist.
Then, those "featured" and "sponsored" links use the same formatting like all the other links and the featured and sponsored text is so tiny and light grey that I didn't see it on first sight. In stark contrast Google uses different colors to distinguish sponsored links.
Then, "featured site" does NOT mean ad, it means sites chosen by MSN to get shown for some search term. D'oh, that's exactly what this story is about: Microsoft "featuring" anti-linux sites as top results.
The reason that "leaked" screenshots of the new version of Windows gets posted on/. is because, no matter how much we try to deny it, we probably envy the strides made in UI that just aren't being done in Linux (yet).
That's nonsense. I've tried MacOSX, WindowsXP and the new "Keramik" theme in KDE. And they all suck. Icons and decorations are way too large and take up way too much space.
I am always coming back to the classic KDE designs and icons, those are much more efficient to work with, you can actually distinguish the 16x16 icons.
Plus you want to keep pushing the GUI that made it popular in the first place.
Yeah, right. As if DOS wasn't popular.
The Windows GUI was very late in the game, Unix, Amiga, Apple and most others had it long before them.
What DOS/Windows made popular was cheap price (of the HARDWARE, not the software). With Linux now available on the same hardware, this argument is gone and Microsoft looks exactly like the Unix-vendors in the 90's, trying to delay the inevitable with references to TCO and how "the price is irrelevant compared to salaries".
Micrsoft's revenues are mostly spent on shareholder's profits, expensive useless prestige projects like XBox and MSN and above all marketing.
The costs to develop the stuff is quite low, especially in the case of Windows and Office where there isn't any real development anyway, just bugfixing, retheming and repackaging.
Um, not to be a Microsoft apologist or anything, but at least in the case of MSBlast, they DID fix the problem.
I think the original poster meant fixing it before shipping it.
But as long as nobody complains about the wasted time downloading and patching the systems weekly, I guess Microsoft is fully correct when they use their customers as paying beta-testers.
Actually, there are rumors that safety systems that would have prevented such widespread failure were running on Windows and were down because of blaster.
If those rumors are true, then the worm didn't cause the power failures, it just disabled the systems that would have prevented them. That this happened at around the same time is just a coincidence, - or maybe minor power failures happen frequently and were just prevented from spreading?
Do most of us geeky smart asses ingest a higher proportion of meat in our diets than the average dummy?
I don't want to insult anyone, but for me it's far more likely that lack of creatine (= vegetarian diet) is causing redused brain abilities than Creatine boosting brain power.
Seems more logical to me. They should have had test-groups various levels of Creatin doses, I would bet that only the lowest levels have a reduced intelligence while the rest is average.
I figure that today alone, due to lost productivity, salaries, benefits etc.... this company lost $250k from this worm.
And I ask: When will costs for virus scanners, patching constantly and the lost productivity due to viruses/worms/crackers be mentioned in TCO analysises?
I certainly remember all of this, so I say screw those who didn't patch. What's better, installing a patch that screws your system when you can blame that on MS, or not installing the patch and having no one to blame but yourself?
As soon as you play the "blame game" you have already lost, and you know it.
The virus writers win because they get the attention they wanted, Microsoft wins because they saved billions by releasing quick-n-dirty designed software early.
Yes, I agree with all of that. My only question is what else could Microsoft do?
Microsoft has 2 choices:
Design software securely and test it before release
Make more money by doing quick-n-dirty designs and let the users be beta-testers, let the PR-department handle the security.
Actually, I think Microsoft made the right decision, it's not their wasted time when users have to patch their systems weekly and there are enough morons out there that will defend them with stuff like "what else could Microsoft do".
Face it: If you make yourself utterly dependent on one single organization, you also lost all respect from that organization. And it doesn't matter if that company's name is Microsoft, Apple, IBM or Sun.
As soon as they realize that you would have to face serious switching-costs, they will treat you like servants.
I can imagine the day when the unknown security hole of the future comes careening through that expansive windows network and microsoft hasn't made a patch yet.
SubjunctiveSam's strategy (saying how childish it is to write viruses and hope nobody does it again) will sure prevent that from happening.
This whole thread just shows that the Microsoft crowd still thinks of security as a pure PR-problem that will go away with blaming someone else than Microsoft.
Just listen to them: "It's the admin's fault!", "It's the virus writer's fault!"
All true, but it won't solve the problem at hand.
Actually one universal rule for all problems is: Whenever someone goes into "blame-someone" mode he doesn't have a solution.
The only reals solution to Windows-security would be market pressure (people actually stopping using Windows because of security), but understandably the Winlots hate that solution and prefer to play the blame-game.
If you ever used Loki-games you would know that those would install and be started just like in Windows.
Anyway, the problem with games on Linux is chicken-egg. Linux will go the same way like WindowsNT, which was also used for many years on the corporate desktop before it was adopted by gamers in the form of WinXP.
You sound like a stupid moron who has bought a rackmount-system for desktop use and complain that your new 3D-graphics card doesn't fit into it. Wait, actually you more sound like a MS-tool who just parrots stuff that he heard.
Slashdot Mirror
How does that make Windows better?
In my opinion, the Windows GUI is pretty simplistic. Sure it's fine if you just use a handful of apps at the same time, but as soon as you have more than 10 or so windows open, you need multiple desktops.
If you search Google for Linux you will find something useful: SuSE, debian, RedHat, etc. Everything a new Linux user needs.
Provincial Linux are exactly that: Provincial and useless for 99.9% of users who don't happen to live in that area.
Even more support to the claim that Microsoft is tainting the search results.
I don't know what algorithm MSN uses to search it's results, but I can hardly think of any that would put provincial organizations on top and worldwide Linux distributors to the bottom - unless MS has some penalties for suse.com, debian.org, etc.
Then, those "featured" and "sponsored" links use the same formatting like all the other links and the featured and sponsored text is so tiny and light grey that I didn't see it on first sight. In stark contrast Google uses different colors to distinguish sponsored links.
Then, "featured site" does NOT mean ad, it means sites chosen by MSN to get shown for some search term. D'oh, that's exactly what this story is about: Microsoft "featuring" anti-linux sites as top results.
And finally:
Just because you have a spine and refuse to do business with Microsoft and/or the mob, doesn't make you a "zealot".
That's nonsense. I've tried MacOSX, WindowsXP and the new "Keramik" theme in KDE. And they all suck. Icons and decorations are way too large and take up way too much space.
I am always coming back to the classic KDE designs and icons, those are much more efficient to work with, you can actually distinguish the 16x16 icons.
Yeah, right. As if DOS wasn't popular.
The Windows GUI was very late in the game, Unix, Amiga, Apple and most others had it long before them.
What DOS/Windows made popular was cheap price (of the HARDWARE, not the software). With Linux now available on the same hardware, this argument is gone and Microsoft looks exactly like the Unix-vendors in the 90's, trying to delay the inevitable with references to TCO and how "the price is irrelevant compared to salaries".
In the end, cheap always wins.
D'oh, d'oh indeed.
Mod +1 funny
And Windows shouldn't crash. And there should be no war and no hunger. And there should be no need for any patches in the first place.
Linux will go the same path.
Sorry, but no, it isn't.
Micrsoft's revenues are mostly spent on shareholder's profits, expensive useless prestige projects like XBox and MSN and above all marketing.
The costs to develop the stuff is quite low, especially in the case of Windows and Office where there isn't any real development anyway, just bugfixing, retheming and repackaging.
Even smaller countries could easily afford it.
I think the original poster meant fixing it before shipping it.
But as long as nobody complains about the wasted time downloading and patching the systems weekly, I guess Microsoft is fully correct when they use their customers as paying beta-testers.
The sorry fact is that Micrsoft's complete Internet infrastructure would immediately break down without Unix/Linux.
Remember when microsoft was offline for half a week? They migrated their DNS-servers from Windows to Akamai(Linux)
Now they migrated the whole load-balancing and caching system.
The only thing left is their measly webserver-box, so it seems.
If those rumors are true, then the worm didn't cause the power failures, it just disabled the systems that would have prevented them. That this happened at around the same time is just a coincidence, - or maybe minor power failures happen frequently and were just prevented from spreading?
Sorry, but with Microsoft being forced to support TCP/IP and HTML, they have lost the browser wars. The current domination of IE won't hold for long.
I don't want to insult anyone, but for me it's far more likely that lack of creatine (= vegetarian diet) is causing redused brain abilities than Creatine boosting brain power.
Seems more logical to me. They should have had test-groups various levels of Creatin doses, I would bet that only the lowest levels have a reduced intelligence while the rest is average.
And I ask: When will costs for virus scanners, patching constantly and the lost productivity due to viruses/worms/crackers be mentioned in TCO analysises?
As soon as you play the "blame game" you have already lost, and you know it.
The virus writers win because they get the attention they wanted, Microsoft wins because they saved billions by releasing quick-n-dirty designed software early.
Microsoft has 2 choices:
Actually, I think Microsoft made the right decision, it's not their wasted time when users have to patch their systems weekly and there are enough morons out there that will defend them with stuff like "what else could Microsoft do".
Face it: If you make yourself utterly dependent on one single organization, you also lost all respect from that organization. And it doesn't matter if that company's name is Microsoft, Apple, IBM or Sun.
As soon as they realize that you would have to face serious switching-costs, they will treat you like servants.
SubjunctiveSam's strategy (saying how childish it is to write viruses and hope nobody does it again) will sure prevent that from happening.
This whole thread just shows that the Microsoft crowd still thinks of security as a pure PR-problem that will go away with blaming someone else than Microsoft.
Just listen to them: "It's the admin's fault!", "It's the virus writer's fault!"
All true, but it won't solve the problem at hand.
Actually one universal rule for all problems is: Whenever someone goes into "blame-someone" mode he doesn't have a solution.
The only reals solution to Windows-security would be market pressure (people actually stopping using Windows because of security), but understandably the Winlots hate that solution and prefer to play the blame-game.
Sure, it can be done, but you really shouldn't complain when it doesn't fit your needs out of the box and needs tweaking.
There is a good reason KDE/SuSE and not Gnome/Redhat was tested in the usability report.
Anyway, the problem with games on Linux is chicken-egg. Linux will go the same way like WindowsNT, which was also used for many years on the corporate desktop before it was adopted by gamers in the form of WinXP.
You sound like a stupid moron who has bought a rackmount-system for desktop use and complain that your new 3D-graphics card doesn't fit into it. Wait, actually you more sound like a MS-tool who just parrots stuff that he heard.
And how exactly is this better than "K3b (cd burning program)"
You obviously have never used any semi-recent version of KDE. All KDE programs have short description right beside the name in the K-menu.