OK, this is a gratuitous M$ bashing, but relevant to the merits/detriments of developing software under the OSS model (and funny). Putting a bunch of paid programmers together in the same company isn't always efficient.
I saw a great letter to the editor by James K. Sayre in Silicon Valley Tech Week of Feb 22. In it, Mr. Sayre points out:
"At the ongoing Federal antitrust trial of Microsoft Corp., an MIT economist testified for the defense that Microsoft spent $500 million to create their Internet Explorer browser. For the sake of argument, let's assume each computer programmer at Microsoft received $50,000 per year, meaning about 10,000 programmer-years of labor was needed to create the Microsoft browser. This must be the most inefficient process of software development in the history of computing."
If you'd taken the time to "sift through" his entire essay (which is probably considerably smaller than the incredible volume of flame mail that angry, immature Slashdotters can generate) you might have found plenty of useful gripes as well, including advice to read and think carefully before you flame.
How about a survey or article about the gadgets that geeks who make $50K/year use? Sure, every executive has a Palm V to go along with his solid gold golf tees, but one doesn't mean much more than the other. You can tell when a piece of portable tech is >really cool by how many people who shouldn't be able to afford it somehow find a way to. Pre PalmV's would definitely make it onto this list. Richocet modems as well, where available. What other toys would you still keep in your arsenal even if your salary were cut in half?
The Palm V is not aimed at/.ers. It is almost completely a cosmetic thing, with a higher version number, to sell at an inflated price to the same people who drive the biggest SUVs while talking on the smallest cell-phones. These people don't care if it sucks technically. They probably wouldn't even notice if it had 8mb of RAM. They probably won't ever install an app that doesn't come pre-loaded or on the CD. They just want it to show off on the golf course. That it costs too much is actually a selling point for its target audience. The rest of us who can read and care about specs are being served by the Palm IIIx.
You forgot the $20 client access licenses to access an NT server. That gets expensive on a big network, especially considering that NT's inneficient use of resources and lack of scalability means you'll maybe need to pay that fee several times over for the extra NT boxes needed to do what one *nix box can do.
The real big deal is not whether or not MkLinux is a bit faster than Mac OS X on the same hardware. The real deal is that OS X seems to give Unix-like stability and Unix-like performance, but you don't have to be a/.er to set it up. Any Joe Idiot can now setup and run a near-GNU quality web server. If you want to talk price/performane, letting Joe Idiot take 4 hours to install the server and having him maintain it in his spare time is a LOT cheaper than hiring Mr.Guru to set up and run a Linux+Apache box. The cost of the OS and server hardware is totally miniscule compared to the relative salaries of these two. OS X could cost $10,000 and it would still pay for itself twice over in a year for most small to medium sized businesses.
If you just want to use it for Web crawling and programming, don't get an integrated system. Integrated systems just make it that much more expensive to upgrade later. (Which you *will* want do do if you program much...)
Unless you're planning on doing crazy VR stuff or buying a 50" monitor (both of which remove you from the bargain category), today's mid-range video and sound cards are about as good as you'll ever need. Buy them once and recycle them through a series of faster motherboards and chips.
This thread is probably of more relevance to Linux on laptops than for the sub $500 PC.
As long as W2000/NT5 are broken, buggy, moving targets with an indefinite release date, nobody in their right mind would introduct a new, high-performance application that needs to work *now* for the platform.
Nice to see companies finally waking up. After years of "We can't trust our critical apps to anybody but Microsoft because they might not still be in business next year," finally we get the truth: "We can't trust our critical apps to Microsoft because WE might not be in business next year."
Slashdot Mirror
I saw a great letter to the editor by James K. Sayre in Silicon Valley Tech Week of Feb 22. In it, Mr. Sayre points out:
"At the ongoing Federal antitrust trial of Microsoft Corp., an MIT economist testified for the defense that Microsoft spent $500 million to create their Internet Explorer browser. For the sake of argument, let's assume each computer programmer at Microsoft received $50,000 per year, meaning about 10,000 programmer-years of labor was needed to create the Microsoft browser. This must be the most inefficient process of software development in the history of computing."
LOL!
If you'd taken the time to "sift through" his entire essay (which is probably considerably smaller than the incredible volume of flame mail that angry, immature Slashdotters can generate) you might have found plenty of useful gripes as well, including advice to read and think carefully before you flame.
How about a survey or article about the gadgets that geeks who make $50K/year use? Sure, every executive has a Palm V to go along with his solid gold golf tees, but one doesn't mean much more than the other. You can tell when a piece of portable tech is >really cool by how many people who shouldn't be able to afford it somehow find a way to. Pre PalmV's would definitely make it onto this list. Richocet modems as well, where available. What other toys would you still keep in your arsenal even if your salary were cut in half?
Embedded systems that run a standard OS?
Transmeta is developing an ultra low-power chip?
Total world domination! Linux in your car, linux in your palmtop, linux on your desktop....
The Palm V is not aimed at /.ers. It is almost completely a cosmetic thing, with a higher version number, to sell at an inflated price to the same people who drive the biggest SUVs while talking on the smallest cell-phones. These people don't care if it sucks technically. They probably wouldn't even notice if it had 8mb of RAM. They probably won't ever install an app that doesn't come pre-loaded or on the CD. They just want it to show off on the golf course. That it costs too much is actually a selling point for its target audience. The rest of us who can read and care about specs are being served by the Palm IIIx.
You forgot the $20 client access licenses to access an NT server. That gets expensive on a big network, especially considering that NT's inneficient use of resources and lack of scalability means you'll maybe need to pay that fee several times over for the extra NT boxes needed to do what one *nix box can do.
The real big deal is not whether or not MkLinux is a bit faster than Mac OS X on the same hardware. The real deal is that OS X seems to give Unix-like stability and Unix-like performance, but you don't have to be a /.er to set it up. Any Joe Idiot can now setup and run a near-GNU quality web server. If you want to talk price/performane, letting Joe Idiot take 4 hours to install the server and having him maintain it in his spare time is a LOT cheaper than hiring Mr.Guru to set up and run a Linux+Apache box. The cost of the OS and server hardware is totally miniscule compared to the relative salaries of these two. OS X could cost $10,000 and it would still pay for itself twice over in a year for most small to medium sized businesses.
If you just want to use it for Web crawling and programming, don't get an integrated system. Integrated systems just make it that much more expensive to upgrade later. (Which you *will* want do do if you program much...)
Unless you're planning on doing crazy VR stuff or buying a 50" monitor (both of which remove you from the bargain category), today's mid-range video and sound cards are about as good as you'll ever need. Buy them once and recycle them through a series of faster motherboards and chips.
This thread is probably of more relevance to Linux on laptops than for the sub $500 PC.
in Microsoft's coffin.
As long as W2000/NT5 are broken, buggy, moving targets with an indefinite release date, nobody in their right mind would introduct a new, high-performance application that needs to work *now* for the platform.
Nice to see companies finally waking up. After years of "We can't trust our critical apps to anybody but Microsoft because they might not still be in business next year," finally we get the truth: "We can't trust our critical apps to Microsoft because WE might not be in business next year."