I have not read all of the other comments and apologize if this has been covered before.
That being said, starting the wild fox project is a horrible idea. H.264 and other patented softwares are left out of firefox with good reason. Writing a program that is open source but implementing closed source softwares such as the H.264 codec create license tainting issues for the open source project.
Another good issue is why would someone want to support softwares which are not open. I do not like the idea of ever having to use software in which I have zero input on the outcome of the product. If the H.264 codec were to do something stupid such as run code in the kernel such as Windows 7 fonts were doing, that could have catastrophic outcomes. Being able to alter my own copy then submit the changes to the dev group for inclusion into the main project is a great comfort to me.
I remember Windows Millennium Edition (WinME). The first ever computer I owned came with that installed from the factory. I had just got the box, opened it up, hooked everything up. OOH SO SHINY AND NEW! I turned it on and it started to boot up. YES MERE MOMENTS FROM PERSONAL PC BLISS! Then it happened the bsod during boot. Then I restarted a few times and it happened every time, then I used the discs that came with it to reformat it and install fresh, and it still did it. Then I had to wait a few weeks for my next paycheck and had to put off some bills to go buy a copy of Windows 2000.
Except Vista already is stable. Maybe it's because I only use my PC for games and the Internet, but Vista (SP1) has been nearly flawless.
No, really it is not. I have Vista on my laptop, it shipped with it. It came shipped with a bunch of useless software like ANY store bought Windows machine does. I went to remove some of it and it caused severe problems to the system. An example of this would be when I went to remove the 90 day Norton trial. Vista wouldn't even boot. I had to boot safe mode and restore my machine to before the uninstall for it to boot again. THAT does not show me STABILITY.
FROM BELOW:
Now let me ask again, do you actually *use* Vista?
I actually use on a regular basis GNU/Linux(various distributions), Vista, XP, and OSX (i don't keep up with versions, but I know it is the latest). I haven't done much to try and break OSX but it seems to me to be more stable than Vista, but XP and every GNU/Linux I've ever tried I have put through the ringers and are many times more stable than Vista.
Now you may be asking me, if I've used (and do use on a regular basis) all of these Operating Systems, where do my loyalties lie? The answer to that is actually with GNU/Linux. I don't need to state the reasons, every other GNU/Linux user has said them a million times already.
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I have not read all of the other comments and apologize if this has been covered before. That being said, starting the wild fox project is a horrible idea. H.264 and other patented softwares are left out of firefox with good reason. Writing a program that is open source but implementing closed source softwares such as the H.264 codec create license tainting issues for the open source project. Another good issue is why would someone want to support softwares which are not open. I do not like the idea of ever having to use software in which I have zero input on the outcome of the product. If the H.264 codec were to do something stupid such as run code in the kernel such as Windows 7 fonts were doing, that could have catastrophic outcomes. Being able to alter my own copy then submit the changes to the dev group for inclusion into the main project is a great comfort to me.
Except Vista already is stable. Maybe it's because I only use my PC for games and the Internet, but Vista (SP1) has been nearly flawless.
No, really it is not. I have Vista on my laptop, it shipped with it. It came shipped with a bunch of useless software like ANY store bought Windows machine does. I went to remove some of it and it caused severe problems to the system. An example of this would be when I went to remove the 90 day Norton trial. Vista wouldn't even boot. I had to boot safe mode and restore my machine to before the uninstall for it to boot again. THAT does not show me STABILITY.
FROM BELOW:
Now let me ask again, do you actually *use* Vista?
I actually use on a regular basis GNU/Linux(various distributions), Vista, XP, and OSX (i don't keep up with versions, but I know it is the latest). I haven't done much to try and break OSX but it seems to me to be more stable than Vista, but XP and every GNU/Linux I've ever tried I have put through the ringers and are many times more stable than Vista.
Now you may be asking me, if I've used (and do use on a regular basis) all of these Operating Systems, where do my loyalties lie? The answer to that is actually with GNU/Linux. I don't need to state the reasons, every other GNU/Linux user has said them a million times already.