We hear the TV networks blame Nielsen. The music companies blame P2P. "The fault dear Brutus lies not in the stars but in ourselves". Music sales dropped when there was little new worth buying. Male TV viewership dropped when they stopped making compelling programs or content that could compete with the Web.
Network and music execs want a sure thing and so they clone shows that get any traction and kill interesting new concepts before an audience has a chance to develop. They aim at the least common denominator. They try to look at demographics and surveys and manufacture what they think will interest us, instead of giving innovation and creativity a chance.
I have seen a huge drop in my TV viewing because with 100 channels I find little mete with my inline options. TV and music execs can do better, but denial and blame are easier than creating,
This naswer from McNealy should surprise no one. McNealy has never been a fan of or actively cooperated with any initiative that didn't give Sun a proprietary edge and hopefully, some control.
Do people remember the "Open SPARC" fiasco. SPARC was going to be open. Anyone could build systems that were compatible and run Sun's OS. Well, such systems got built. Resellers started carrying the systems because they were eqyual to SUn's and cheaper. McNealy closed done the initiative.
Remember how Sun fought against Motif? It did everything it could to kill it (except share its technology) and then "discoverd" and adopted Motif when more than 50% of its customers had switched to Motif, rejected Sun's solution and were demanding Sun provide support.
Remember how Sun's attemp to control UNIX, with its AT&T deal forced its competitors to form the Open Software Foundation and actually cooperate (for a while).
Remember that Sun built an x86 verison of its OS and was selling it. As the Intel platform became a serious server challenge to Sun's proprietary hardware, Sun dropped the product.
Get the idea? Expect no cooperation from McNealy. And, if he ever seecooperating, be VERY, VERY, VERY suspicious.
I'm not surprised that there is another bug. It is software and even software that aims to bring us security is written by programmers who are human and make mistakes.
What this does show is that claims that open source code is inherently more secire because it is more widely reviewed and vetted are simply not true. Whether it is Microsoft or open source, we will be living with security flaws and bugs for the forseeable future.
I'd really like to see the end of the open source is more secure than closed source flame wars on/. All software is built by fallible humans and no process is 100% effective in preventing such flaws from being introduced into programs.
The RIAA will say that the increase in slaes is due to their lawsuits and the publicity that they have generated. RIAA will tell you that these suits have led to a decrease in use of P2P and they have some studies that show this. They are partially correct.
But one other thing has changed - $1 song downloads. The rise of iTunes and other $1 per song services demonstrate what everyone knew and the RIAA kept denying. If users have choice and can buy songs they want at a reasonable price and conveniently, they will buy and not steal. The record industry finally listened to the customers and adopted new business models and surprise, customrs responded by buying more music.
We also have to consider that the record industry is a cyclical business. There are years with little new and interesting music. In years where the new product is crap, people don't buy. Record companies, like TV channels, see some trend and then try to find 1000 ways to clone it, because cloning is easier than creating. Nora Jones is selling a lot of albums. She is original. Yet another gangster rap guy wearing baggy pants and spewing profanity and hate is just boring! We buy new and interesting not boring.
It is time to stop the religuous falme wars about "my OS is more secure than your OS".
We all know Windows has bugs, becuase people revel in revealing Microsoft's weaknesses. Hackers love to attack Windows because it is ubiquitous and so it is also the most attacked.
What this report points out, with all its flaws, is the the Linux system has problems too. Linux supporters have turned a blind eye to this and have loudly trumpted Linux as secure, while Windows is not. This simply wasn't true, but made Linux supporters feel goos about themselves. And even if it is a bit better, that isn't the point.
There will be bugs in Linux and Windows and other OS'es as long as new development continues. Further, as long as humans adminster the boxes, admins will do silly things and create vulnerabilities.
This is truly useless software. Is anyone who calls support happy? If you are, are you after wading through 100 voice menus and waiting 30 minutes to get to a real person? And, can you be happy when you talk to someone who knows absolutely nothing, transfers you and your call gets dropped?
A better solution is for companies to simply provide good technical support staffed by knowledgable and competent people.
Intel has made the mistake of believing their own press instead of the market. The x86 architecture which Intel created has achieved such ubiquity and market prentration, and there is such an industry infrastructure around it, that Intel has lost control of the market. Intel did such a good job at racheting up the performance of the architecture that the volumes and infrastructure for x86 effectively destroyed all other chips or relegated them to tiny niches.
Look at Sun. They *hate* the x86/Intel, well actually they hate anything they didn't invent and control, but even they have recently recognized the inevitability of x86 and the lack of enough revenue being available for continued investment in other architectures. But Intel still thinks that they can dictate to the market and that it is Intel and not the architecture that drives the market.
It is just silly to assume that someone would buy the Itanium to run x86 apps slower and at higher cost than they can run them on a Pentium. As for running 64 bit apps, well folks already have architectures for those apps. Why would you move off your SPARC or Power systems to Itanium, which are proven, reliable 64 bit platforms on which mature (read as 'less buggy') 64 bit software already runs.
AMD saw the change in the market and did what made sense. They extended x86 to 64 bits and made 32 bit apps as fast on the 64 bit chips as they are on the leading 32 bit chips. We can use the same bus, drivers, OS's apps, etc and add new 64 bit apps and OS's as we need them. And the AMD part is competitive with the fast Intel 32 bit parts. Why not buy the AMD part now, use as a 32 bit fast processor, but be able to leverage 64 bit apps in 18-36 months. You get more value and future protection for the same price as an Intel 32 bit part.
It is very hard for companies, especially technology companies, when the market says, we don't want new and innovative, we want the same but faster and cheaper. IA-64 may have all kinds of cool stuff for compiler geeks, but it has no benefits to end users unless Intel can deliver 100% compatibility with 32 bit apps, performance of 32 bit apps at the same speed as the top 32 bit processors and sell the chip for the same price as the 32 bit processors, or at a VERY small premium.
Thi is yet the latest example pointing out that the USPS is woefully ill equipped to deal with software and Internet relted papents. A completely new process and new staff are going to be required, but who in COngress will take up the cause. It will take some large companies (IBM, Cisco, Microsoft) banding together and raising a ruckus to fix this.
The entire CMM argument is just a marketing tool for these firms. CMM describes process not result or whether people actually found the software produced useful and usable. And the real issue is often not IT and its process, but that the line of business people and politics do not let internal IT shops practice the process.
A lot of the problems of US IT groups and projects is that with programmers down the hall and senior level line of business (LOB) guys able to threaten and yell at and IT execs and get them fired for being honest, a US based IT shop often has to do a lot of changes on the fly, delvier before something is ready, etc. With a remote operation, a specification gets written and a contract gets attached to the spec. The senior business execs sign off but now THEY CAN NOT CHANGE things without renegotiating and visibly accepting responsibility for the schedule and quality impact of the changes.
They can not pressure the Indian firm to make a change and still hiold the schedule. When you are in IT and work for a company, you are always powerless and the senior management listens to the line of business folks and gets angy at or ignores the process or schedule or deailed explanations about why a change will cost 5x as much, slip 1 year, etc.
The distance and the contractual relationship put the discipline where it is needed - on the line of business folks. That isn't to say that there aren't bad I folks, bad plans, silly promises and the like. But a lot of the problem is line of business people who buy a pitch from some software comapny whose product can't deliver the benefit promised, that will take 2x and cost 10x to implement ans the like. It comes from them refusing to understand why the stuff they legitimately need can't be delivered when they want it.
So, the discipline of the Indian companies isn't in the CMM stuff, it comes from the arms length contractual relationship protecting them from the stuff that screws up projects. It comes from the distance keeping the line of business execs from demanding constant change. Most IT shops know about process, and reviews and the discipline. The problem is that the CEO's and line of business people will not let their in house teams practive these techniques.
Folks, everyone keeps focusing on technology and that is not the real problem. Our systems ensures that you can vote in secret and that no one will know how you voted. Your boss can tell you to vote for John Kerry, but you can go to the polls, vote for Clark, and then tell your boss you definitely voted for Kerry. He can't ever find out.
With Internet voting, your boss can say, "Vote into my office and vote for John Kerry". Sure it may be illegal, etc, but will you risk your job to report the boss? Maybe she isn't explicit. Maybe she sayd , "Well, if CLark gets elected, I'll have to start laying folks off. Where as with Kerry, jobs are secure". With the boss lookng over your shoulder, what do you do?
The polling place and its security and anonimity are essential elements of secret balloting!
There are a vast number of products that are sold at different prices in different markets. It used to be standard practice, in the days of minicomputers, for the price to eb 10,000 dollar i the US and 10,000 pounds in England. If I am not mistaken, prices for movie DVDs varies by country.
What is new is that the Internet and sites like/. make it very obvious to consumers that this is going on. There doesn't seem to be a consistent pattern. Sometimes the pricing needs to reflect widely varying taxes and operating costs. Sometimes, a market is poorer and a company must change less in that country to sell at all.
If we are truly moving to a global market that removes protective tarrifs, then the Internet will level the pricing differentials except for the differences in taxes. And it will become really obvious to consumers how much their country's taxes ar raising their costs.
I think one of the results of the rise of Linux and the press for other Open Source software in 2004 will be that it will create a new opportunity for Microsoft! Microsoft can use the developments in Linux / Open Source to argue:
The server market is a separate and distinct market from the desktop market. Microsoft does not have a monopoly position in this market. The rise of Linux demonstrates this. And since the competition is free software, Microsoft may need to create product offering to try to compete. For example, a bundle of Win2k3 server / SQL server. hey will point to the use of Linux/MySQL or Linux/Postgres as the competition and the model they must compete with. Since this bundle benefits the consumer and since MS does not have a monopoly in the market, they may get to do this, legally. This kind of bundle could be devastating to Oracle and IBM in the DB business.
MS may also use the recent events in Israel and China to make moves on the desktop. They may need to go back to the judge and get approval, but they will have a stack of articles by experts and decrees by governments to use to convince the judge that there has been a radical shift in the market and that they should be free to make various technical moves / changes to the desktop OS.
The bottom line is that as Linux grows in 2004 it gives MS the legal basis it needs to counter-attack. More acquisitions. More bundles. Ties of OS and database. There are lots of things you can think of and the Redmond folks have a lot of good business minds to seize this opportunity. The short term impact of an MS counter-attack will likely be on its commercial competitors.
In the end, the market could move to more of a Microsoft / Open Source market, with the other commercial folks getting crushed. let's face it, no software company's business model is safe from open source. Right now some commercial folks see Open Source as a way to rein in MS. But we may also see folks start to team up with MS because and against Open Source because they will see that their own businesses are threatened.
It will start in 2004. 2005 will be the interesting year!
The Kernighan & Plauger book "Elements of Programming Style" dated 1979 talked extensively about the need to validate all inputs to subroutines and from the user. This is *not* new, it is just that few programmers have the discipline to follow the rules.
The issue is making *no* assumptions about anything. The programmer *thinks* the file will be written be another piece of code that a team member is writing. But that program has a bug. or three years from now, other programs are creating the file and don't know abut some verbal discussion about field data. It takes great dligence and paranoia and management that allows you the time in the schedule to do this.
Right now, there is no *hige* Linux market, especially on the desktop. If Microsoft offered Office for Linux, they might help expand the Linux market, but that expansion would come at the expense of Windows. So why would Microsoft want to do this?
And I really didn't udnerstand the comment about "the only way I can see Microsoft making money anytime soon..". Have you looked at Microsoft's financials. They make lots of $$ in the OS business.
Su didn't invite GCC developers to the meeting becuase Sun wants control, like they tried to have with Java. Just look at the history and how Sun fought, tooth and nail, to avoid letting anyone else have any input.
This effort is all about Sun trying to gain some new market edge and control. The HPC market is one in which MS is not currently a player. It may be the only market left where Sun doesn't have to compete against MS. In this market Sun competes with Cray and IBM and thinks that they know how to beat those guys.
Hopefully, IBM and Cray won't be fooled. They've competed with Sun for year and, even though the evidence is contrary, perhaps they've now learned not to trust Sun at all.
Like so many, you focus on the technology and its benefits. That is *not* where the problem lies. It isn't technology that corrupts the system, it is people.
If we allow voting at locations other than the polling place, we open the system to more fraud and misuse. Imagine the boss who tells his workers that he wants them all to vote from the office and he will just happen to make the machine in hios offce available to be used, with him looking over people's shoulders. People might feel imtimidated and worried about losing their jobs if they don't vote at the office and let the boss see and possiby vote the way the boss likes.
Imagine "get out the vote" campaigns picking up people on the street and offring them food or booze or whatever to get votes for their candidate.
I'm certain that there are much more clever schemes. After all, this has been done before, in our past, and if we open up the system to this we offer the opportunity it can happen again. It isn't technology that corrupts the system, it is people!
The author of this review is clearly a Linux adherent. There was no good and honest comparison with the MS desktop. The only comparisons were with other Linux desktops, and this one didn't do very well.
Why would any corporation want to subject its users to this desktop. So many inconsistencies, glitches, etc. The support costs will overwhelm any difference in price for MS apps. And there are a raft of reviews that point ot that Star Office is *still* not ready to replace MS Office, even older versions, in the Enterprise.
Reading this review, I'd advise my corporate clients (and I consult for some very large ones) to not waste the effort in even evaluating this. They'd be better off just using Slackware and the drop-line stuff to get a GNOME desktop.
It seems to me that the thrust of this article is that Linux isn't there yet for the desktop and with a bunch of work, maybe it will be where Apple and Microsoft are now. Maybe a yar or more? But in the meantime, Apple and Microsoft, who already have professional quality desktop systems, integration, ease of use, etc. wil have advanced the state of desktop computing and, once again, Linux will be viewed by the masses, and especially non technical users, as inadequate when compared to the commercial alternatives.
This fervor about desktop Linux is driven by hatred for Microsoft and not user need. You can list all of the problems that MS desktops have, but many are the result of success. Don't kid yourself and think that there are no Linux security holes. They exist, but hackers choose not to exploit them, and even when they do, because Linux has such a small installed base, the attacks cause little disruption.
In the end, most users see the desktop PC as a tool, don't mind paying a reasonable price to use it, and could care less about the religuous wars that rage between Gnome and KDE, Debian and Fedora, GPL and apache, Linux and UNIX.
There's a lot I don't like about MS and Windows. I also run Linux, But I find that, as much as most of you zealots don't want to hear it, Windows is just a better desktop. Linux is a better server. Put your efforts where we need them, on the back end. leave the desktop alone. When the back ends are all Linux, the desktop will have to play nice and follow the rules.
What too many hard core Linux folks forget is that diversity and choice in the desktop isn't what most of the market wants. The vast majority of users see a computer as a tool and don't care about all the nuances of GNOME versus KDE. They want an integrated package with a few tweaking options and are happy to have a vendor pick a single stack and deliver it.
Microsoft does this and has 90+% of the market. Apple tightly controls their stack, including tight hardware control, and while their share isn't growing, they've tuned to their users and hold their base. But most Linux folks are developers or hobbysists. Many care passionately about what are inconsequential differences between KDE and GNOME.
Each technical point about everything is debated and the choice is usually no choice but another splinter project or variation. So much god work, but also a tremendous amount of wasted energy. MS and Apple are businesses. They look at alternatives and make choices and compromises to meet market needs. Linux is a hobby. The purpose os to tweak, customize and change, not to have the same Linux as everyone else.
The Enterprise / back office stuff is different. There the IT staffs are customers. They do want to tweak and customize the stack. Even though most of the time they really don't need to, they have the skills and time and $$ to do this so that they get the kind of custom IT shop environment they want.
These folks are not the home user / desktop user. They are geeks just like the folks who make Linux. They speak the same language and often care passionately about the same minor and irrelevant issues. And since this is where the $$ are for Linux (Red Hat's recent announcements confirm this)this is where the paid Linux folks will spend their energies. A different Linux is worth $$ here.
Why can't people accept that Linux on the desktop is just like APple. There is a niche market, geeks/hobbyists, and they want Linux on their desktop. The rest of the world doesn't care. Windows is just fine for them.
Why is this news? VoIP is a proven technology. Folks like Avaya and Cisco have been selling VoIP systems to commercial customers for a while. In Japan, Softbank has something like 3+ million customers running on a VoIP phone network. These are folks who aren't techies, but hust your average home user. They get great service and cheap prices.
IBM already has a huge, dedicated network of satellite and leased lines, so this is just a straightforward decision to use proven technology and existing infrastructure to save $$. Maybe the fuss is because while IBM may sell some leading edge stuff, they are pretty trailing edge internally and culturally.
Commercial companies like Red Hat have to make commercial decisions. They have to go where the $$'s are. They made the right business decision for Red Hat. Slackware makes the right decisions for users becuase that is who "owns" the distribution.
Slackware has been around for 10 years and will likely be around for another 10 years. It has an automatic update tool (swaret), an active project to have GNOME and its components running and auto-installed, all the packages you want, a site to track the latest packages (www.linuxpackages.net), etc. You'll even find a tool to convert most Red Hat rpm's to be installed on Slackware.
From the summary of claims one has to wonder how this was ever granted. First, as other posters have pointed out, the person who posted the article misunderstood the claiims. But the applicants and the USPTO also demonstrate ignorance.
Before the date of the filing, there were online backup products which met the claims presented here. They let you store information and settings and then restore them on new machines. There are products that did software distribution that also included the claims present here.
Maybe there is something novel here, but if so, it is minor and the claimants didn't really identifiy it and the PTO should have done a better job of rejecting this amd making them refile a decent application.
But, as/.'ers know, the PTO is completely incompetent when it comes to vetting SW patent clains. Sigh.
Netscape had great early success and teremendous Silicon Valley buzz. They suffered from a flaw that many startups fall prey to - they started believing their own PR. They started spouting stuff about becoming the platform and replacing Microsoft and conquering the World. Netscape made Microsoft the competition. They challenged Microsoft to a fight.
True, Microsoft was asleep at the switch wrt the Internet. But the first rule of walking in the woods is - don't kick the sleeping bear! And Netscape not only kicked it, but tey taunted the bear. Microsoft, when roused, can be a fearsome competitor. Gates and Ballmer didn't get to where they are becuase thy are nice guys. They are as aggressive a team as any business has ever seen. And when you challenge them, trash talk them and threaten their business, you should expect them to fight back.
But worse, netscape's arrogance was not just in the business side but on the technical side. They innovated early and were way better than IE. Everyone told them so. Everyone agreed. They just assumed that Micorsoft could never catch them. Ask those of us who has to write HTML and Javascript for a living about NS 4. Incredibly buggy, finicky, just a piece of crap. All the pages I ever created worked in IE 4 and alwys had to be tweaked for NS. No, I didn't try to use ay of the IE special stuff. IE just ot better and Netscape stayed the same
Netscape put all their efforts into other businesses and forgot that the business that would make or break them was the browser. And they let the browser to hell. They were arrogant and wouldn't support ActiveX controls. Rather than make certain Microsoft had no wedge, Netscape just said no. Yeah, there are lots of reasosn not to do them, but I was with a very large SW company and we wanted to use them for Enterprise apps. NS told us we were stupid. Really! So, we told our customers "Use IE", it's a better browser and supports what we need and you want for your apps.
Microsoft probably did set you to destroy Netscape. They were probably unfair and devious. But Netscape did everything they could to help Microsoft destroy them.
Google doesn't challenge Microsoft. Google doesn't claim to be a platform. Google does not threaten the core of Microsoft's business. Microsoft would like that revenue and those eyeballs, but Google doesn' threaten them in any serious way. The thing to remember about winning in the software business is that anything someone has built, someone else can rebuild and better, if they have the time, patience and $$, but mostly the $$ and the patience. Microsoft has the patience and the $$. Ask Palm. Ask Borland. Ask the spreadsheet folks at Lotus. Ask oracle, if you can get Ellison to be honest. Go after their home turf and you had better have a few spare billion to spend over then next 3-4 years to fight them.
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We hear the TV networks blame Nielsen. The music companies blame P2P. "The fault dear Brutus lies not in the stars but in ourselves". Music sales dropped when there was little new worth buying. Male TV viewership dropped when they stopped making compelling programs or content that could compete with the Web.
Network and music execs want a sure thing and so they clone shows that get any traction and kill interesting new concepts before an audience has a chance to develop. They aim at the least common denominator. They try to look at demographics and surveys and manufacture what they think will interest us, instead of giving innovation and creativity a chance.
I have seen a huge drop in my TV viewing because with 100 channels I find little mete with my inline options. TV and music execs can do better, but denial and blame are easier than creating,
This naswer from McNealy should surprise no one. McNealy has never been a fan of or actively cooperated with any initiative that didn't give Sun a proprietary edge and hopefully, some control.
Do people remember the "Open SPARC" fiasco. SPARC was going to be open. Anyone could build systems that were compatible and run Sun's OS. Well, such systems got built. Resellers started carrying the systems because they were eqyual to SUn's and cheaper. McNealy closed done the initiative.
Remember how Sun fought against Motif? It did everything it could to kill it (except share its technology) and then "discoverd" and adopted Motif when more than 50% of its customers had switched to Motif, rejected Sun's solution and were demanding Sun provide support.
Remember how Sun's attemp to control UNIX, with its AT&T deal forced its competitors to form the Open Software Foundation and actually cooperate (for a while).
Remember that Sun built an x86 verison of its OS and was selling it. As the Intel platform became a serious server challenge to Sun's proprietary hardware, Sun dropped the product.
Get the idea? Expect no cooperation from McNealy. And, if he ever seecooperating, be VERY, VERY, VERY suspicious.
I'm not surprised that there is another bug. It is software and even software that aims to bring us security is written by programmers who are human and make mistakes.
/. All software is built by fallible humans and no process is 100% effective in preventing such flaws from being introduced into programs.
What this does show is that claims that open source code is inherently more secire because it is more widely reviewed and vetted are simply not true. Whether it is Microsoft or open source, we will be living with security flaws and bugs for the forseeable future.
I'd really like to see the end of the open source is more secure than closed source flame wars on
The RIAA will say that the increase in slaes is due to their lawsuits and the publicity that they have generated. RIAA will tell you that these suits have led to a decrease in use of P2P and they have some studies that show this. They are partially correct.
But one other thing has changed - $1 song downloads. The rise of iTunes and other $1 per song services demonstrate what everyone knew and the RIAA kept denying. If users have choice and can buy songs they want at a reasonable price and conveniently, they will buy and not steal. The record industry finally listened to the customers and adopted new business models and surprise, customrs responded by buying more music.
We also have to consider that the record industry is a cyclical business. There are years with little new and interesting music. In years where the new product is crap, people don't buy. Record companies, like TV channels, see some trend and then try to find 1000 ways to clone it, because cloning is easier than creating. Nora Jones is selling a lot of albums. She is original. Yet another gangster rap guy wearing baggy pants and spewing profanity and hate is just boring! We buy new and interesting not boring.
It is time to stop the religuous falme wars about "my OS is more secure than your OS".
We all know Windows has bugs, becuase people revel in revealing Microsoft's weaknesses. Hackers love to attack Windows because it is ubiquitous and so it is also the most attacked.
What this report points out, with all its flaws, is the the Linux system has problems too. Linux supporters have turned a blind eye to this and have loudly trumpted Linux as secure, while Windows is not. This simply wasn't true, but made Linux supporters feel goos about themselves. And even if it is a bit better, that isn't the point.
There will be bugs in Linux and Windows and other OS'es as long as new development continues. Further, as long as humans adminster the boxes, admins will do silly things and create vulnerabilities.
This is truly useless software. Is anyone who calls support happy? If you are, are you after wading through 100 voice menus and waiting 30 minutes to get to a real person? And, can you be happy when you talk to someone who knows absolutely nothing, transfers you and your call gets dropped?
A better solution is for companies to simply provide good technical support staffed by knowledgable and competent people.
Intel has made the mistake of believing their own press instead of the market. The x86 architecture which Intel created has achieved such ubiquity and market prentration, and there is such an industry infrastructure around it, that Intel has lost control of the market. Intel did such a good job at racheting up the performance of the architecture that the volumes and infrastructure for x86 effectively destroyed all other chips or relegated them to tiny niches.
Look at Sun. They *hate* the x86/Intel, well actually they hate anything they didn't invent and control, but even they have recently recognized the inevitability of x86 and the lack of enough revenue being available for continued investment in other architectures. But Intel still thinks that they can dictate to the market and that it is Intel and not the architecture that drives the market.
It is just silly to assume that someone would buy the Itanium to run x86 apps slower and at higher cost than they can run them on a Pentium. As for running 64 bit apps, well folks already have architectures for those apps. Why would you move off your SPARC or Power systems to Itanium, which are proven, reliable 64 bit platforms on which mature (read as 'less buggy') 64 bit software already runs.
AMD saw the change in the market and did what made sense. They extended x86 to 64 bits and made 32 bit apps as fast on the 64 bit chips as they are on the leading 32 bit chips. We can use the same bus, drivers, OS's apps, etc and add new 64 bit apps and OS's as we need them. And the AMD part is competitive with the fast Intel 32 bit parts. Why not buy the AMD part now, use as a 32 bit fast processor, but be able to leverage 64 bit apps in 18-36 months. You get more value and future protection for the same price as an Intel 32 bit part.
It is very hard for companies, especially technology companies, when the market says, we don't want new and innovative, we want the same but faster and cheaper. IA-64 may have all kinds of cool stuff for compiler geeks, but it has no benefits to end users unless Intel can deliver 100% compatibility with 32 bit apps, performance of 32 bit apps at the same speed as the top 32 bit processors and sell the chip for the same price as the 32 bit processors, or at a VERY small premium.
Thi is yet the latest example pointing out that the USPS is woefully ill equipped to deal with software and Internet relted papents. A completely new process and new staff are going to be required, but who in COngress will take up the cause. It will take some large companies (IBM, Cisco, Microsoft) banding together and raising a ruckus to fix this.
The entire CMM argument is just a marketing tool for these firms. CMM describes process not result or whether people actually found the software produced useful and usable. And the real issue is often not IT and its process, but that the line of business people and politics do not let internal IT shops practice the process.
A lot of the problems of US IT groups and projects is that with programmers down the hall and senior level line of business (LOB) guys able to threaten and yell at and IT execs and get them fired for being honest, a US based IT shop often has to do a lot of changes on the fly, delvier before something is ready, etc. With a remote operation, a specification gets written and a contract gets attached to the spec. The senior business execs sign off but now THEY CAN NOT CHANGE things without renegotiating and visibly accepting responsibility for the schedule and quality impact of the changes.
They can not pressure the Indian firm to make a change and still hiold the schedule. When you are in IT and work for a company, you are always powerless and the senior management listens to the line of business folks and gets angy at or ignores the process or schedule or deailed explanations about why a change will cost 5x as much, slip 1 year, etc.
The distance and the contractual relationship put the discipline where it is needed - on the line of business folks. That isn't to say that there aren't bad I folks, bad plans, silly promises and the like. But a lot of the problem is line of business people who buy a pitch from some software comapny whose product can't deliver the benefit promised, that will take 2x and cost 10x to implement ans the like. It comes from them refusing to understand why the stuff they legitimately need can't be delivered when they want it.
So, the discipline of the Indian companies isn't in the CMM stuff, it comes from the arms length contractual relationship protecting them from the stuff that screws up projects. It comes from the distance keeping the line of business execs from demanding constant change. Most IT shops know about process, and reviews and the discipline. The problem is that the CEO's and line of business people will not let their in house teams practive these techniques.
Folks, everyone keeps focusing on technology and that is not the real problem. Our systems ensures that you can vote in secret and that no one will know how you voted. Your boss can tell you to vote for John Kerry, but you can go to the polls, vote for Clark, and then tell your boss you definitely voted for Kerry. He can't ever find out.
With Internet voting, your boss can say, "Vote into my office and vote for John Kerry". Sure it may be illegal, etc, but will you risk your job to report the boss? Maybe she isn't explicit. Maybe she sayd , "Well, if CLark gets elected, I'll have to start laying folks off. Where as with Kerry, jobs are secure". With the boss lookng over your shoulder, what do you do?
The polling place and its security and anonimity are essential elements of secret balloting!
There are a vast number of products that are sold at different prices in different markets. It used to be standard practice, in the days of minicomputers, for the price to eb 10,000 dollar i the US and 10,000 pounds in England. If I am not mistaken, prices for movie DVDs varies by country.
/. make it very obvious to consumers that this is going on. There doesn't seem to be a consistent pattern. Sometimes the pricing needs to reflect widely varying taxes and operating costs. Sometimes, a market is poorer and a company must change less in that country to sell at all.
What is new is that the Internet and sites like
If we are truly moving to a global market that removes protective tarrifs, then the Internet will level the pricing differentials except for the differences in taxes. And it will become really obvious to consumers how much their country's taxes ar raising their costs.
I think one of the results of the rise of Linux and the press for other Open Source software in 2004 will be that it will create a new opportunity for Microsoft! Microsoft can use the developments in Linux / Open Source to argue:
The server market is a separate and distinct market from the desktop market. Microsoft does not have a monopoly position in this market. The rise of Linux demonstrates this. And since the competition is free software, Microsoft may need to create product offering to try to compete. For example, a bundle of Win2k3 server / SQL server. hey will point to the use of Linux/MySQL or Linux/Postgres as the competition and the model they must compete with. Since this bundle benefits the consumer and since MS does not have a monopoly in the market, they may get to do this, legally. This kind of bundle could be devastating to Oracle and IBM in the DB business.
MS may also use the recent events in Israel and China to make moves on the desktop. They may need to go back to the judge and get approval, but they will have a stack of articles by experts and decrees by governments to use to convince the judge that there has been a radical shift in the market and that they should be free to make various technical moves / changes to the desktop OS.
The bottom line is that as Linux grows in 2004 it gives MS the legal basis it needs to counter-attack. More acquisitions. More bundles. Ties of OS and database. There are lots of things you can think of and the Redmond folks have a lot of good business minds to seize this opportunity. The short term impact of an MS counter-attack will likely be on its commercial competitors.
In the end, the market could move to more of a Microsoft / Open Source market, with the other commercial folks getting crushed. let's face it, no software company's business model is safe from open source. Right now some commercial folks see Open Source as a way to rein in MS. But we may also see folks start to team up with MS because and against Open Source because they will see that their own businesses are threatened.
It will start in 2004. 2005 will be the interesting year!
The Kernighan & Plauger book "Elements of Programming Style" dated 1979 talked extensively about the need to validate all inputs to subroutines and from the user. This is *not* new, it is just that few programmers have the discipline to follow the rules.
The issue is making *no* assumptions about anything. The programmer *thinks* the file will be written be another piece of code that a team member is writing. But that program has a bug. or three years from now, other programs are creating the file and don't know abut some verbal discussion about field data. It takes great dligence and paranoia and management that allows you the time in the schedule to do this.
Right now, there is no *hige* Linux market, especially on the desktop. If Microsoft offered Office for Linux, they might help expand the Linux market, but that expansion would come at the expense of Windows. So why would Microsoft want to do this?
And I really didn't udnerstand the comment about "the only way I can see Microsoft making money anytime soon..". Have you looked at Microsoft's financials. They make lots of $$ in the OS business.
Su didn't invite GCC developers to the meeting becuase Sun wants control, like they tried to have with Java. Just look at the history and how Sun fought, tooth and nail, to avoid letting anyone else have any input.
This effort is all about Sun trying to gain some new market edge and control. The HPC market is one in which MS is not currently a player. It may be the only market left where Sun doesn't have to compete against MS. In this market Sun competes with Cray and IBM and thinks that they know how to beat those guys.
Hopefully, IBM and Cray won't be fooled. They've competed with Sun for year and, even though the evidence is contrary, perhaps they've now learned not to trust Sun at all.
Like so many, you focus on the technology and its benefits. That is *not* where the problem lies. It isn't technology that corrupts the system, it is people.
If we allow voting at locations other than the polling place, we open the system to more fraud and misuse. Imagine the boss who tells his workers that he wants them all to vote from the office and he will just happen to make the machine in hios offce available to be used, with him looking over people's shoulders. People might feel imtimidated and worried about losing their jobs if they don't vote at the office and let the boss see and possiby vote the way the boss likes.
Imagine "get out the vote" campaigns picking up people on the street and offring them food or booze or whatever to get votes for their candidate.
I'm certain that there are much more clever schemes. After all, this has been done before, in our past, and if we open up the system to this we offer the opportunity it can happen again. It isn't technology that corrupts the system, it is people!
Well, I don't advise them to use any Linux desktop. I don't think they are there yet for the majority of users.
The author of this review is clearly a Linux adherent. There was no good and honest comparison with the MS desktop. The only comparisons were with other Linux desktops, and this one didn't do very well.
Why would any corporation want to subject its users to this desktop. So many inconsistencies, glitches, etc. The support costs will overwhelm any difference in price for MS apps. And there are a raft of reviews that point ot that Star Office is *still* not ready to replace MS Office, even older versions, in the Enterprise.
Reading this review, I'd advise my corporate clients (and I consult for some very large ones) to not waste the effort in even evaluating this. They'd be better off just using Slackware and the drop-line stuff to get a GNOME desktop.
Check this article
It seems to me that the thrust of this article is that Linux isn't there yet for the desktop and with a bunch of work, maybe it will be where Apple and Microsoft are now. Maybe a yar or more? But in the meantime, Apple and Microsoft, who already have professional quality desktop systems, integration, ease of use, etc. wil have advanced the state of desktop computing and, once again, Linux will be viewed by the masses, and especially non technical users, as inadequate when compared to the commercial alternatives.
This fervor about desktop Linux is driven by hatred for Microsoft and not user need. You can list all of the problems that MS desktops have, but many are the result of success. Don't kid yourself and think that there are no Linux security holes. They exist, but hackers choose not to exploit them, and even when they do, because Linux has such a small installed base, the attacks cause little disruption.
In the end, most users see the desktop PC as a tool, don't mind paying a reasonable price to use it, and could care less about the religuous wars that rage between Gnome and KDE, Debian and Fedora, GPL and apache, Linux and UNIX.
There's a lot I don't like about MS and Windows. I also run Linux, But I find that, as much as most of you zealots don't want to hear it, Windows is just a better desktop. Linux is a better server. Put your efforts where we need them, on the back end. leave the desktop alone. When the back ends are all Linux, the desktop will have to play nice and follow the rules.
What too many hard core Linux folks forget is that diversity and choice in the desktop isn't what most of the market wants. The vast majority of users see a computer as a tool and don't care about all the nuances of GNOME versus KDE. They want an integrated package with a few tweaking options and are happy to have a vendor pick a single stack and deliver it.
Microsoft does this and has 90+% of the market. Apple tightly controls their stack, including tight hardware control, and while their share isn't growing, they've tuned to their users and hold their base. But most Linux folks are developers or hobbysists. Many care passionately about what are inconsequential differences between KDE and GNOME.
Each technical point about everything is debated and the choice is usually no choice but another splinter project or variation. So much god work, but also a tremendous amount of wasted energy. MS and Apple are businesses. They look at alternatives and make choices and compromises to meet market needs. Linux is a hobby. The purpose os to tweak, customize and change, not to have the same Linux as everyone else.
The Enterprise / back office stuff is different. There the IT staffs are customers. They do want to tweak and customize the stack. Even though most of the time they really don't need to, they have the skills and time and $$ to do this so that they get the kind of custom IT shop environment they want.
These folks are not the home user / desktop user. They are geeks just like the folks who make Linux. They speak the same language and often care passionately about the same minor and irrelevant issues. And since this is where the $$ are for Linux (Red Hat's recent announcements confirm this)this is where the paid Linux folks will spend their energies. A different Linux is worth $$ here.
Why can't people accept that Linux on the desktop is just like APple. There is a niche market, geeks/hobbyists, and they want Linux on their desktop. The rest of the world doesn't care. Windows is just fine for them.
IBM already has a huge, dedicated network of satellite and leased lines, so this is just a straightforward decision to use proven technology and existing infrastructure to save $$. Maybe the fuss is because while IBM may sell some leading edge stuff, they are pretty trailing edge internally and culturally.
Commercial companies like Red Hat have to make commercial decisions. They have to go where the $$'s are. They made the right business decision for Red Hat. Slackware makes the right decisions for users becuase that is who "owns" the distribution.
Slackware has been around for 10 years and will likely be around for another 10 years. It has an automatic update tool (swaret), an active project to have GNOME and its components running and auto-installed, all the packages you want, a site to track the latest packages (www.linuxpackages.net), etc. You'll even find a tool to convert most Red Hat rpm's to be installed on Slackware.
From the summary of claims one has to wonder how this was ever granted. First, as other posters have pointed out, the person who posted the article misunderstood the claiims. But the applicants and the USPTO also demonstrate ignorance.
/.'ers know, the PTO is completely incompetent when it comes to vetting SW patent clains. Sigh.
Before the date of the filing, there were online backup products which met the claims presented here. They let you store information and settings and then restore them on new machines. There are products that did software distribution that also included the claims present here.
Maybe there is something novel here, but if so, it is minor and the claimants didn't really identifiy it and the PTO should have done a better job of rejecting this amd making them refile a decent application.
But, as
Netscape had great early success and teremendous Silicon Valley buzz. They suffered from a flaw that many startups fall prey to - they started believing their own PR. They started spouting stuff about becoming the platform and replacing Microsoft and conquering the World. Netscape made Microsoft the competition. They challenged Microsoft to a fight.
True, Microsoft was asleep at the switch wrt the Internet. But the first rule of walking in the woods is - don't kick the sleeping bear! And Netscape not only kicked it, but tey taunted the bear. Microsoft, when roused, can be a fearsome competitor. Gates and Ballmer didn't get to where they are becuase thy are nice guys. They are as aggressive a team as any business has ever seen. And when you challenge them, trash talk them and threaten their business, you should expect them to fight back.
But worse, netscape's arrogance was not just in the business side but on the technical side. They innovated early and were way better than IE. Everyone told them so. Everyone agreed. They just assumed that Micorsoft could never catch them. Ask those of us who has to write HTML and Javascript for a living about NS 4. Incredibly buggy, finicky, just a piece of crap. All the pages I ever created worked in IE 4 and alwys had to be tweaked for NS. No, I didn't try to use ay of the IE special stuff. IE just ot better and Netscape stayed the same
Netscape put all their efforts into other businesses and forgot that the business that would make or break them was the browser. And they let the browser to hell. They were arrogant and wouldn't support ActiveX controls. Rather than make certain Microsoft had no wedge, Netscape just said no. Yeah, there are lots of reasosn not to do them, but I was with a very large SW company and we wanted to use them for Enterprise apps. NS told us we were stupid. Really! So, we told our customers "Use IE", it's a better browser and supports what we need and you want for your apps.
Microsoft probably did set you to destroy Netscape. They were probably unfair and devious. But Netscape did everything they could to help Microsoft destroy them.
Google doesn't challenge Microsoft. Google doesn't claim to be a platform. Google does not threaten the core of Microsoft's business. Microsoft would like that revenue and those eyeballs, but Google doesn' threaten them in any serious way. The thing to remember about winning in the software business is that anything someone has built, someone else can rebuild and better, if they have the time, patience and $$, but mostly the $$ and the patience. Microsoft has the patience and the $$. Ask Palm. Ask Borland. Ask the spreadsheet folks at Lotus. Ask oracle, if you can get Ellison to be honest. Go after their home turf and you had better have a few spare billion to spend over then next 3-4 years to fight them.