we strongly advise that each new PC that will be running a Microsoft Operating System be pre-installed with an OEM version
Do you plan on running a Microsoft Operating System? No? Then this statement doesn't apply to you. I'm sure they'd LIKE you to buy a MS OS, but this is a very reasonable statement.
I don't like their whole approach, but this section of it makes perfect sense.
It sounds great that you are taking about companies, but that isn't what the topic is.
Really? It explicitly talks about 'benefit to the company.' There isn't even a really clear allusion to 'your own free time,' but this is about the more general subject of contract terms and their relation to free software. This certainly includes free work done on your own time, but this question actually limits it to the right to contribute to free software projects so long as it benefits the company they work for....
I think that work on free software is great, but it's going to be a very, very hard sell to many, if not most employers. Someone brought up hardware drivers - that's a good way to spread your hardware to more OSs. But for software-only/mainly companies that don't want the service-oriented model of Red Hat and others, which is still quite young and unproven, vs. the (at least so far) more profitable and proven closed-source route, it's no contest.
It's not about them getting the source, it's about everyone having the same freedom. Nobody's asking anyone to give their stuff to public domain here.
That sounds great, talking about 'freedom,' but if you actually read the GPL, in effect, you could sell only one copy of your software, and everyone else could just copy it. I know that's not the intent of the GPL, but that's the net effect.
It really is too bad employers don't see the value in GPLing all of their code so that their competitors could obtain the source. Sick twisted world, isn't it?
The lesson that "No, you don't have to give up all your rights to your work in exchange for publication anymore" is one that musicians could stand to learn as well.
Sure, those idiots, why can't they just see, it's so simple! Why don't they boycott the monolith that feeds them? Or they could sign with a minor label with no distribution or advertising budget. It's just so simple to fix.
It's a little easier to protest when you've got tenure.
"Since 99% of computers can be found in embedded applications, an Open Source victory in this sector could deal a major blow to Microsoft."
No, not really. Did you even read the article before you posted this?
From Technology Review: In what must be a humbling experience for the Great Software Monopoly in Redmond, WA, Microsoft's offerings constitute mere slivers of a pie chart along with such geeky names as VxWorks, QNX Neutrino, LynxOS, pSOS and VRTX.
This could deal a minor blow to a tiny fraction of Microsoft's business at best.
VirTouch, an Israeli company has developed a 'braille mouse' of sorts, which allows you to feel graphics on the screen and interact with GUI environments. This would clearly be useful to blind programmers and users alike.
Yeah, I've read that article, as well as many other little 'gems' by DKE, like his 'Unix isn't an OS' crap. This is exactly what I would consider heresay, and that's being extremely generous, as 1) there are no supporting links, and 2) he has a clear agenda. His big problem is the speed mixing with lower speed devices, so you should use Firewire, which can vary from 100Mbps and will expand to 1600Mbps in the near future. Same problem. And there is no justification for the 1/N bandwidth sharing, which is actually mostly refuted in the WSJ link with the discussion of isocronous/bulk transfer guarantees. And since the 2.0 standard wasn't set until late last year, it's kinda hard to debunk something that doesn't exist, isn't it?
I have no idea what axe you're trying to grind but neither do I particularly care.
Just looking for the 'truth.' Sorry.
As to trying to bait me with "Which company is better" or even "which OS is better" or "Look how bad (whatever) is" - sorry, won't work. You seem to have glommed on to MacOS as a counteragument for me but I simply corrected you since you were wrong:
I wasn't baiting you - I simply corrected you since you were wrong.
Plus, you had better call Apple. They've got their OS roadmaps and redirects all screwed up, and you know what they should have set up.
I believe that MS uses it's roadmap as a tactical weapon when competing in the market
You mean they aren't dreaming of gumdrops and lollypops and helping other companies push them out of business? Gosh, they sure are nasty, those Redmond boys. I'm sure glad nobody else ever uses roadmaps and technical announcements as a business weapon. Why, when Apple said they would "leapfrog...other 'modern' operating systems, such as NT," and "The first release of Rhapsody is expected to be launched to developers in mid to late 1997 and to customers within 12 months," they were merely stating facts without any hidden agenda.
I believe there is a consistant & generally unremarked discrepancy between what MS projects to be in a product & when it will ship and what actually does & when.
Once again, you make statements singling out Microsoft. They're true, absolutely - but they apply to virtually everyone out there, so why bother making them? I'm not saying Apple sucks, ha ha, It's just that every problem you seem to have with Microsoft is universal to the industry.
I believe that MS "Windows" is as 'fragmented' (broad, varied, whatever) as the *nix market is often portayed.
OK, so we've got Windows 3, 3.1, 3.11, (mostly the same), Windows NT 3.51 and 4, Windows 95, 95B, (mostly the same), Windows 98, 98SE (mostly the same), 2000, ME, and WinCE. I'm supposed to believe that's more fragmented than Unix/FreeBSD/OpenBSD/NetBSD/Caldera/Corel/Debian/M andrake/LinuxPPC/Yellow Dog/RedHat/Slackware/SuSE/TurboLinux (and something over 100 more distros)/IRIX/MINIX all the RTOS/embedded ones, etc. on x86, PPC, 680x0, MIPS, Alpha, etc. with just a few flavors of NT on other platforms? You seriously believe that? This is less/equivalently fragmented than Microsoft?
BTW, yes, I know some programs even work on more than one Linux, and many distros are based on other distros, but the fragmentation there is unreal!
Now, you may have some desire to see MS portayed in some way or not in another...
Look, I saw someone bashing Microsoft for being a business and doing what the others do. If you had asked for a roadmap for all major commercial OSs (since you obviously don't have an accurate one for Apple) to document how they all kinda do the same thing (in this area), that would be one thing. But it's as if you're insisting the Democrats are evil because they've broken campaign promises in the past, and are bought out by special interests. When someone points out that the Republicans have done the exact same thing, you have a fit, and try to distort their own literature into proving they're squeaky clean.
But please don't go try dragging me into some asinine OS or company war.
Hey, there are plenty of valid criticisms of Microsoft, but it seems silly to focus on the industry-standard crap they pull, since 'everyone else is doing it.'
Once I've got some material put together I can test my hypothosis & discover the validity of my premises. In the meantime it's just so much hot-air & frankly your style doesn't appeal to me anyhow.
Well, I already have plenty of links off of Apple's own website to support my argument. I'm sorry if my style of 'arguing with someone who is clearly distorting a company's image to further his own agenda' and 'correcting fallacies' is bugging you. Or was it the 'showing you you were wrong' or 'supporting my argument with links rather than brag about the links I was GOING to provide eventually?'
Regarding the Apple server-redirects, likely because most customers are interested in the desktop OS & not the server OS.
Precisely. If they went looking for Rhapsody, they were looking for the desktop OS, which early reports describe as 'media rich' and 'next generation OS,' not 'new server offshoot thingy.'
If you read the press release that announces Rhapsody, they talk about the 'next generation OS' which will "improve multimedia capabilities" and be great for consumers and developers alike. The release for MacOS Server always refers to it as a 'server OS,' never as 'the next generation OS,' or 'Rhapsody.' So they kluged together a portion of what was destined to become OSX and released it only sorta late. That wasn't even close to what Rhapsody was ever meant to be. And until they update iTunes to fully work under OSX (i.e. not in 9.1 emulation mode and with CDRW, DVDRW, and for Chrissake DVD play ability) they haven't even really finished, particularly since instead of improving multimedia capabilities, they have crippled them significantly.
Hey, by your logic, Microsoft is never late - they just release 'iterative fractional' versions of their roadmaps too! The funny thing is, that Mac is the one fragmenting at this point, and Microsoft aims to unify in the near term.
Why do virtually all of the links on the fact sheet for Rhapsody now redirect to OS9.1, and not MacOS Server? I thought Rhapsody was 'delivered' as MacOS server. OS9.1 isn't a server OS. If the true heritage of Rhapsody was MacOS Server, wouldn't it point to a Mac OS Server 1.0 page, or at least to OSX Server?
And you didn't answer my question as to how failed deliveries will lead to fragmentation. Actually, Mac OS Server seems to be a hint of evidence of this phenomenon, but I fail to see it in Microsoft's future, at least any fragmentation due to announcements/failed delivery on their part.
I was (perhaps unclearly) referring to USB1.x. I am still interested in finding a solid reference (i.e. not a mac advocacy site extolling the virtues of Firewire) that documents the 1/N absolute maximum bandwidth division limitation of N units on USB of any flavor.
Obviously, if N devices with the same priority are communicating at the same time, you have 1/N bandwidth, but what if N-1 are (nearly) idle?
If Mandrake 8 comes out before Red Hat 7.1, I just might jump ship (and I'm thinking that's more likely at this point). I got a bit comfy with Nautilus, which apparently doesn't run (1.0 that is) on Mandrake 7.2, so there really was a bit more to the story. Thanks for the suggestion, though.
While USB 2.0 defeats some of the problems, such as evenly slicing your bandwidth among devices no matter what they need
I've heard this several times from mac advocates, yet a friend taking USB programming classes insists that it's not true, and I've never seen it outside of what I'd consider 'heresay.' Could you point to any documentation on this?
Slashdot Mirror
You assumed a position suggested by some stranger in a cab, and wonder how you got screwed? Sheesh....
That doesn't sound regular to me....
The 2 camps (TurboCare vs. LinuxLinux) were in a deadlock, and neither side was budging....
Do you plan on running a Microsoft Operating System? No? Then this statement doesn't apply to you. I'm sure they'd LIKE you to buy a MS OS, but this is a very reasonable statement.
I don't like their whole approach, but this section of it makes perfect sense.
Man, half the time I'm not even sure I'm looking at the right song.
And yes, someone nuke NBCi.
Really? It explicitly talks about 'benefit to the company.' There isn't even a really clear allusion to 'your own free time,' but this is about the more general subject of contract terms and their relation to free software. This certainly includes free work done on your own time, but this question actually limits it to the right to contribute to free software projects so long as it benefits the company they work for....
I think that work on free software is great, but it's going to be a very, very hard sell to many, if not most employers. Someone brought up hardware drivers - that's a good way to spread your hardware to more OSs. But for software-only/mainly companies that don't want the service-oriented model of Red Hat and others, which is still quite young and unproven, vs. the (at least so far) more profitable and proven closed-source route, it's no contest.
That sounds great, talking about 'freedom,' but if you actually read the GPL, in effect, you could sell only one copy of your software, and everyone else could just copy it. I know that's not the intent of the GPL, but that's the net effect.
It really is too bad employers don't see the value in GPLing all of their code so that their competitors could obtain the source. Sick twisted world, isn't it?
Thanks for the link, but the site was slashdotted before I could read more.
MonkeyTalk live support is touted on the front page - is this their version of Clippy? Please, say it isn't so....
Sure, those idiots, why can't they just see, it's so simple! Why don't they boycott the monolith that feeds them? Or they could sign with a minor label with no distribution or advertising budget. It's just so simple to fix.
It's a little easier to protest when you've got tenure.
Hugs and kisses, Microsoft
Suddenly, the MI5 becomes a bigger bombing threat than the IRA.
No, not really. Did you even read the article before you posted this?
From Technology Review: In what must be a humbling experience for the Great Software Monopoly in Redmond, WA, Microsoft's offerings constitute mere slivers of a pie chart along with such geeky names as VxWorks, QNX Neutrino, LynxOS, pSOS and VRTX.
This could deal a minor blow to a tiny fraction of Microsoft's business at best.
Please, no pr0n references here.
You might want to start by asking people who could afford a $50,000 web site. Not here. Keep moving.
Yeah, I've read that article, as well as many other little 'gems' by DKE, like his 'Unix isn't an OS' crap. This is exactly what I would consider heresay, and that's being extremely generous, as 1) there are no supporting links, and 2) he has a clear agenda. His big problem is the speed mixing with lower speed devices, so you should use Firewire, which can vary from 100Mbps and will expand to 1600Mbps in the near future. Same problem. And there is no justification for the 1/N bandwidth sharing, which is actually mostly refuted in the WSJ link with the discussion of isocronous/bulk transfer guarantees. And since the 2.0 standard wasn't set until late last year, it's kinda hard to debunk something that doesn't exist, isn't it?
...used to make Keanu seem like an emotionless "dude-bot," rather than his typical Shakespearean self. Very believable.
Just looking for the 'truth.' Sorry.
As to trying to bait me with "Which company is better" or even "which OS is better" or "Look how bad (whatever) is" - sorry, won't work. You seem to have glommed on to MacOS as a counteragument for me but I simply corrected you since you were wrong:
I wasn't baiting you - I simply corrected you since you were wrong.
Plus, you had better call Apple. They've got their OS roadmaps and redirects all screwed up, and you know what they should have set up.
I believe that MS uses it's roadmap as a tactical weapon when competing in the market
You mean they aren't dreaming of gumdrops and lollypops and helping other companies push them out of business? Gosh, they sure are nasty, those Redmond boys. I'm sure glad nobody else ever uses roadmaps and technical announcements as a business weapon. Why, when Apple said they would "leapfrog ...other 'modern' operating systems, such as NT," and "The first release of Rhapsody is expected to be launched to developers in mid to late 1997 and to customers within 12 months," they were merely stating facts without any hidden agenda.
I believe there is a consistant & generally unremarked discrepancy between what MS projects to be in a product & when it will ship and what actually does & when.
Once again, you make statements singling out Microsoft. They're true, absolutely - but they apply to virtually everyone out there, so why bother making them? I'm not saying Apple sucks, ha ha, It's just that every problem you seem to have with Microsoft is universal to the industry.
I believe that MS "Windows" is as 'fragmented' (broad, varied, whatever) as the *nix market is often portayed.
OK, so we've got Windows 3, 3.1, 3.11, (mostly the same), Windows NT 3.51 and 4, Windows 95, 95B, (mostly the same), Windows 98, 98SE (mostly the same), 2000, ME, and WinCE. I'm supposed to believe that's more fragmented than Unix/FreeBSD/OpenBSD/NetBSD/Caldera/Corel/Debian/M andrake/LinuxPPC/Yellow Dog/RedHat/Slackware/SuSE/TurboLinux (and something over 100 more distros)/IRIX/MINIX all the RTOS/embedded ones, etc. on x86, PPC, 680x0, MIPS, Alpha, etc. with just a few flavors of NT on other platforms? You seriously believe that? This is less/equivalently fragmented than Microsoft?
BTW, yes, I know some programs even work on more than one Linux, and many distros are based on other distros, but the fragmentation there is unreal!
Now, you may have some desire to see MS portayed in some way or not in another...
Look, I saw someone bashing Microsoft for being a business and doing what the others do. If you had asked for a roadmap for all major commercial OSs (since you obviously don't have an accurate one for Apple) to document how they all kinda do the same thing (in this area), that would be one thing. But it's as if you're insisting the Democrats are evil because they've broken campaign promises in the past, and are bought out by special interests. When someone points out that the Republicans have done the exact same thing, you have a fit, and try to distort their own literature into proving they're squeaky clean.
But please don't go try dragging me into some asinine OS or company war.
Hey, there are plenty of valid criticisms of Microsoft, but it seems silly to focus on the industry-standard crap they pull, since 'everyone else is doing it.'
Once I've got some material put together I can test my hypothosis & discover the validity of my premises. In the meantime it's just so much hot-air & frankly your style doesn't appeal to me anyhow.
Well, I already have plenty of links off of Apple's own website to support my argument. I'm sorry if my style of 'arguing with someone who is clearly distorting a company's image to further his own agenda' and 'correcting fallacies' is bugging you. Or was it the 'showing you you were wrong' or 'supporting my argument with links rather than brag about the links I was GOING to provide eventually?'
Precisely. If they went looking for Rhapsody, they were looking for the desktop OS, which early reports describe as 'media rich' and 'next generation OS,' not 'new server offshoot thingy.'
If you read the press release that announces Rhapsody, they talk about the 'next generation OS' which will "improve multimedia capabilities" and be great for consumers and developers alike. The release for MacOS Server always refers to it as a 'server OS,' never as 'the next generation OS,' or 'Rhapsody.' So they kluged together a portion of what was destined to become OSX and released it only sorta late. That wasn't even close to what Rhapsody was ever meant to be. And until they update iTunes to fully work under OSX (i.e. not in 9.1 emulation mode and with CDRW, DVDRW, and for Chrissake DVD play ability) they haven't even really finished, particularly since instead of improving multimedia capabilities, they have crippled them significantly.
Hey, by your logic, Microsoft is never late - they just release 'iterative fractional' versions of their roadmaps too! The funny thing is, that Mac is the one fragmenting at this point, and Microsoft aims to unify in the near term.
And you didn't answer my question as to how failed deliveries will lead to fragmentation. Actually, Mac OS Server seems to be a hint of evidence of this phenomenon, but I fail to see it in Microsoft's future, at least any fragmentation due to announcements/failed delivery on their part.
Obviously, if N devices with the same priority are communicating at the same time, you have 1/N bandwidth, but what if N-1 are (nearly) idle?
If Mandrake 8 comes out before Red Hat 7.1, I just might jump ship (and I'm thinking that's more likely at this point). I got a bit comfy with Nautilus, which apparently doesn't run (1.0 that is) on Mandrake 7.2, so there really was a bit more to the story. Thanks for the suggestion, though.
I've heard this several times from mac advocates, yet a friend taking USB programming classes insists that it's not true, and I've never seen it outside of what I'd consider 'heresay.' Could you point to any documentation on this?
s/proof/evidence/ ;)