Most of the apps aren't stable? Just what are you running that's taking down your system? I've been using an alpha copy of an X-Server for my video card, and I constantly burn CD's while playing MP3's, surfing the web and running a server. And if any app actually does crash (the only one that ever really crashes is Netscape), it's a simple kill -s 9 to blow that app out of the system, and then I restart.
As for PPP connections and Windows 95/98, remember a little, struggling company named Trumpet? In the day of Windows 3.1, almost everybody relied on the Trumpet Winsock TCP/IP stack to connect to the Internet. Sure Microsoft created a real user-friendly PPP interface, but they stomped all over Trumpet. Most people don't even think about something like that, they just say "Look how easy it is to connect now! Screw that registration screen that always popped up!" Christ. That's all:-)
There's an enormous difference between supporting xDSL on Linux and Windows. Windows:
Your IP address isn't being configured automatically? OK, right-click on Network Neighborhood. Yep, now goto the DLink adapter that we gave you, and click Properties. Now choose the radio button "Obtain IP Address Automatically". Radio button. Yeah, the little dot. Now click yes when it asks to restart your system. Thanks, good day.
Linux:
Your IP address isn't being obtained automatically? Okay, try loading the DHCPCD daemon. Oh, it coredumps? All right, download the tarball for the daemon, look for the string "dhcp" on Freshmeat. Ungzip, and then untar it. Run configure, run make, run make install. Or download the RPM, the DEB, any package. Make sure that other packages aren't conflicting. Download everything that DHCPCD needs. Open the kernel source, and type make config, make menuconfig, make xconfig, and find our Ethernet card. Oh, it's not there? Try an NE2000 clone, that might work. Build the kernel, reboot, and see if your card is detected. It's not? Try a Lance driver, that's the chipset used....
Support for *nix systems is a little more extensive, and needs a hell of a lot more training.
I take a relational database class at my college, and SELECT...SQL is our reference book. It's actually not too bad. ISBN number is 0-02-386693-4. Check it out.
Though I don't have as impressive uptimes as the previous person (mine is only 27 days), I can tell you that I've used Windows 98 for the past three hours, and I've had to reboot FOUR times! I've never had my Linux box tell me to reboot, and the only times I do are when I rebuild and reinstall the kernel. If I change simple network or multimedia settings under Windows it forces me to restart everything, which even on a P2-300 takes forever.
Linux on my old P-90 may take a long time to boot up, but I only have to do it once a month.
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Most of the apps aren't stable? Just what are you running that's taking down your system? I've been using an alpha copy of an X-Server for my video card, and I constantly burn CD's while playing MP3's, surfing the web and running a server. And if any app actually does crash (the only one that ever really crashes is Netscape), it's a simple kill -s 9 to blow that app out of the system, and then I restart.
As for PPP connections and Windows 95/98, remember a little, struggling company named Trumpet? In the day of Windows 3.1, almost everybody relied on the Trumpet Winsock TCP/IP stack to connect to the Internet. Sure Microsoft created a real user-friendly PPP interface, but they stomped all over Trumpet. Most people don't even think about something like that, they just say "Look how easy it is to connect now! Screw that registration screen that always popped up!" Christ. That's all :-)
Windows:
Linux:
Support for *nix systems is a little more extensive, and needs a hell of a lot more training.
Though I don't have as impressive uptimes as the previous person (mine is only 27 days), I can tell you that I've used Windows 98 for the past three hours, and I've had to reboot FOUR times! I've never had my Linux box tell me to reboot, and the only times I do are when I rebuild and reinstall the kernel. If I change simple network or multimedia settings under Windows it forces me to restart everything, which even on a P2-300 takes forever.
Linux on my old P-90 may take a long time to boot up, but I only have to do it once a month.