"Let's suppose the Microsoft Trolls are correct, that the TCO for Linux is higher than Windows. "
There are no Microsoft Trolls here, there are only realists.
"Even if they're spending 3X for local support of FOSS software, most/all that money is going back into the local economy. "
To a certain point, yes.
"Why pay Redmond to develop its software industry, when you could develop your own instead? FOSS sounds like a winner to me."
Except your paying 3X more, which is inefficient and ultimately hurts the country in it's ability to compete.
No, for FOSS to be a winner, it must be cheaper than commercial software both in acquisition and support. And then for FOSS to be a winner in Brazil, the country must create a software market that encourages Brazilians to contribute towards the development of the software.
I agree with the ultimate goal of spending the money locally, but one can't do this through protectionist measures designed to prop up inefficient modes of production.
But that's not how socialist/communist countries work. Instead Brazil will likely prop this up with government spending, ignoring the creation of a software market economy within the country, and ultimately end up exactly as they are right now... a country struggling to get out of "developing" status.
This FOSS move will set back their progress by a good 5-10 years or more, just as the similar computing laws they passed in the 1980's to encourage hardware manufacturing in country set back their progress.
What's becoming clear here is the damage that has resulted to the computer industry as a result of the Free Software Zealots.
What's needed in most cases, certainly in the case of balloting machines is for software to be open source, not in the sense of unrestrictive license, blah blah blah, but simply that the source is available for review.
The Free Software Zealots have disallowed this more pragmatic solutions to problems by mandating that all software should be given away for free, in addition to the source simply being available for review.
That's the problem when you broaden your argument, you lose all the time instead of getting what is important.
Definately. I don't know what the hell is up with this moronic argument on slashdot.
Look people, the problem is not the open source/closed source argument.... THE PROBLEM IS USING THE FUCKING COMPUTERS IN A MANNER WHICH PROVIDES NO CLEAR METHOD OF AUDITING BY HAND!
Any voting system which doesn't involve paper, can't be trusted... Period, end of story. You can open the source and review it all you want, but if it's electronic it's easy as hell to manipulate the records.
Use the computers, if you want, but print the results on paper such that the voter can see what they selected and verify it recorded correctly. The most recent suggestion I heard was to have a printer next to the balloting machine, when you hit submit it printed off the results in a little plexiglass display and gave the voter a chance to review it. Then the voter hits 'approve' and it cut the sheet off and spat it into a sealed ballot safe.
He wants Office Pro not just Office. So it is not $120.
Oh yeah, I forgot. This is advocacy, we've got to put forth the most ridiculous argument we can against something... otherwise we can't possibly win on merits of honest discussion alone.
P.S. Pro costs $500. He really needs Access and Publisher? The Student/Teacher edition is more than adequate with Word/Excel/Outlook/Powerpoint.
Next I imagine you're going to tell me that Office is bloated and nobody needs all that functionality anyway, and really dig this argument into a bizarre hole.
"I hope you don't mean pirate. Yes you can try and find a good deal, but also remember that once you buy it you will continue to pay for it over the years. In some cases you may be FORCED to upgrade."
Piracy? Naw, I was talking about academic editions, or discounted prices, rebates, all sorts of wonderful discounts available.
Oh my GOD! You're telling me that copy of Office 95 I have, I'm going to be FORCED to ugprade it!? Oh no! What shall I do.
Wait a minute, it's running fine on my parents 486 with Windows 95. Why am I being forced to upgrade it?
Oh yeah, I forgot... you're an advocate, you have to put forth the most ridiculous argument.
"At the end of the day free is well... free. Microsoft or any software vendor for that matter, can compete with free on cost."
At the end of the day all that really matters is whether or not you were able to get your work done. Linux can't compete on cost when the issue is does it work.
"That is also a valid point. But you still need to factor in the continual cost of doing business with Windows, and my argument is mostly on Microsoft as a whole."
No, you're argument is mostly fabricated to make you feel fluffy about Linux.
I'm sorry, but I outgrew this advocacy bullshit about 10 years ago. What's the point if you can't get your work done?
Hmm. You seem to be ignoring the fact that I used to develop on Linux years ago.
There is nothing at all compelling about the platform, so I see no reason to switch back.
BTW, I suspect your personal web page runs on Linux, which means your biased. The fact that you're wasting your skills on Perl indicates to me that you're willing to promote any FUD you can to continue your job security.
"He will spend $600 for Office, $100-$300 for Windows XP."
Why? He could get Office for $120 or so, and Windows XP is $99 tops.
"Wouldn't you like to have all that stuff? I do with the money I saved by not running Microsoft Office and XP at home."
And then you pointed out all the cool games his friends are going to play on their PCs that you can't, because you're running Linux.
Right?
Look, I think arguments on cost are very compelling, but I think you need to be honest with people and admit that there are ways to obtain Microsoft products that don't involve paying full list price.
Few people in this world pay full retail price for anything. That's why God created Wal-Mart and other discount stores.
This is a hole the Linux community dug for itself, and now Microsoft is going to defend their record against the Linux record. If the Linux record doesn't fair well based on the facts, then maybe you shouldn't be making the ridiculous claims?
Or did you think that by repeating the mantra, "Well of course Linux is more secure" you weren't going to ever have to face up to reality?
Listen, when you realize you're in a hole, stop digging!
MS doesn't have much of an interest in changing the big boys' COBOL machines. They're helping to migrate business apps off the Mainframe, but it is in the form of complete rewrites of apps to a web enabled platform, not COBOL migration.
Back in 1996 when we first moved to Windows NT, the Mainframe developers were excited at the prospect of running MicroFocus COBOL. Not because they had any intention of migrating code off the mainframe, but because more often than not had need to write utilities or tools for the desktop.
Since they already knew COBOL very well, it made sense to them to write these programs on the desktop using what they knew well.
Microsoft understands this market better than you think. It's about interoperating.
What I find so interesting is that Linux advocates think that they need a convicted monopolist to buy up Linux companies in order to compete against a johnny has-been named SCO.
"What does Wordperfect, Quattro Pro, Caldara and SCO got to do with Novell?"
Back in the early 90's when Novell thought they were the shit with the only major file/print server for LANs, they went and spent like $6 billion acquiring Wordperfect, Quattro Pro and I think Dbase or Paradox... anyway a whole suite of applications.
They were going to take on Microsoft, defeat the behemoth using their mighty Utah wisdom!
A few years later, they sold the lot of 'em to Corel for about $20 in canadian currency.
Then in the mid 90's, SCO bought the Unix trademark and started promoting Unixware, the alternative to SCO. That failed too. So then they worked out a deal with SCO.
Meanwhile Ray Noorda, the genius behind the $6 billion loss on Wordperfect went off to found Caldera, promoting Linux to the masses.
What would be REALLY interesting would be a study on common liberal misperceptions (like Arafat is NOT corrupt, US killed more Iraqis than Saddam did etc...)
Those aren't liberal misconceptions. Those are conservative misconceptions about liberals.
Making the USPTO cover costs would simply push those costs onto the tax payer.
Docking the pay of a person who accepted the patent would pretty much guarantee you'd have nobody working at the USPTO.
I'm assuming that no money can be accepted for consultation, modification, documentation, assistance, etc. of the Free Software either. Otherwise it's really not a hobby, is it?
When I go visit friends and family I often am asked to sort out all kinds of problems, that for you or I would be simple.
And there you have it boys and girls...
You searched the world over looking for the Microsoft Community and found out that you are part of it.
So I think that your idea that "the majority of the internet is a MS community site" is bullshit.
It's ok for you to think that, but you'd be wrong.
There is no one website devoted to the Microsoft community. Instead it is divided into thousands of websites, each with unique purpose, a unique niche.
Some might define that as the best software. If it meets all your needs, then it probably is the best software for you.
Some might, but the typical enduser has no interest in ripping open source code and modifying or fixing it.
This is one of the problems Open Source zealots need to get over.
I think that only NASA can claim to write bug free software AFAIK.
Considering the number of problems NASA has had as a result of software bugs, not even NASA can claim to be perfect.
However, in my experience, like you say, there are ways around things in Open Source. I have found the ways around much more difficult in closed source.
And you're also more willing to put up with crap that's free than if you paid for it.
People should stop drinking the kool-aid and start being honest with one another.
The objective of Open Source (Linux in this example) is to make the best software possible it just so happens that this model also believes that open code is the best code.
If that's the objective of Open Source, then it has failed utterly.
I would say the objective of Open Source is more making software that is good enough that people can tweak easily to meet their specific needs...
With Open Source, buggy software is bad, because the objective is to make the best software possible.
Dude, put the kool-aid down. Most Open Source software is buggy, but it's written with developers in mind. If the bug is really annoying you fix it yourself, if not you figure out a way to work around it.
If anything people are more willing to put up with bugs in something they got for free, than something they paid for.
The fact that the author of the article is a FUD machine whose claims are both unreasonale and sometimes outrageous?
Prove this assertion. I've read Enderle's articles and I find no evidence of that.
The fact that you made claims about Apache that are untrue, and were corrected, but also modded up to 5 despite your attempt at FUD?
What claims might that be, and what corrects might those be?
I don't talk out of my ass, when I make a claim regarding Linux, that claim generally sticks because it is rooted in fact. The claim I made regarding Apache is that slashdot does not post Apache security problems to the front page, this is fact, not FUD. The claim I made regarding KDE was that particular issue was touted on the main/. page as having been fixed quickly, when reality was it took two months to get the fix out to endusers. That claim was also never corrected, because it is fact, not FUD.
"What was Enderle right about? I am a Windows user, and it is not like I haven't defended and promoted closed-source software on Slashdot. "
In this particular case Enderle was right about the difference between Pro, Priest and Zealot and how the Zealots do more harm to Linux.
As far as you defending closed source software, that's great. I'm glad you can sometimes be open minded.
"So what kind of zealot am I?"
The good old fashion trolling kind.
"You still haven't answered the question, but instead you try to cloud the issue with ridiculous outbursts that are totally irrelevant to tis discussion. Just like someone who is out of arguments and grasping for straws."
Ridiculous outburts?
Oh you mean like how your response to every message has been to claim everybody is spewing FUD and bullshit?
And then you go and try to mischaracterize my arguments as being FUD and untrue, despite no facts on your behalf to support these claims?
The typical Windows user has never had any experience with Linux. I>
Well considering I started using Linux in 1992, that would not be me.
They are "postconceived", they come from an in-depth experience with both systems.
Really. Where would I go in the registry to find the DLL location of a COM class named Genx.Genx?
I once thought like you, I defended Windows and saw no reason to use Linux, but once I started to learn more about Linux I gradually changed my opinions.
I once thought like you, I defended the piece of shit Linux and thought it was really cool. Then I realized what a horrible kludge it was and how most of the people shilling for it didn't have much experience with computers.
Today I defend Linux strongly, but I always do it on a fact-by-fact basis, never dropping my logical arguments to call someone a zealot or whatever.
Slashdot Mirror
"Let's suppose the Microsoft Trolls are correct, that the TCO for Linux is higher than Windows. "
There are no Microsoft Trolls here, there are only realists.
"Even if they're spending 3X for local support of FOSS software, most/all that money is going back into the local economy. "
To a certain point, yes.
"Why pay Redmond to develop its software industry, when you could develop your own instead? FOSS sounds like a winner to me."
Except your paying 3X more, which is inefficient and ultimately hurts the country in it's ability to compete.
No, for FOSS to be a winner, it must be cheaper than commercial software both in acquisition and support. And then for FOSS to be a winner in Brazil, the country must create a software market that encourages Brazilians to contribute towards the development of the software.
I agree with the ultimate goal of spending the money locally, but one can't do this through protectionist measures designed to prop up inefficient modes of production.
But that's not how socialist/communist countries work. Instead Brazil will likely prop this up with government spending, ignoring the creation of a software market economy within the country, and ultimately end up exactly as they are right now... a country struggling to get out of "developing" status.
This FOSS move will set back their progress by a good 5-10 years or more, just as the similar computing laws they passed in the 1980's to encourage hardware manufacturing in country set back their progress.
No, if Brazil really cares about this, they'll foster the creation of a software industry within their own country.
Run Linux, save money, lower taxes. Sounds like a good combination to me.
Absolutely, but if you want to save money that means government shouldn't hire developers to work on Linux and artificially support a market.
What's becoming clear here is the damage that has resulted to the computer industry as a result of the Free Software Zealots.
What's needed in most cases, certainly in the case of balloting machines is for software to be open source, not in the sense of unrestrictive license, blah blah blah, but simply that the source is available for review.
The Free Software Zealots have disallowed this more pragmatic solutions to problems by mandating that all software should be given away for free, in addition to the source simply being available for review.
That's the problem when you broaden your argument, you lose all the time instead of getting what is important.
Definately. I don't know what the hell is up with this moronic argument on slashdot.
Look people, the problem is not the open source/closed source argument.... THE PROBLEM IS USING THE FUCKING COMPUTERS IN A MANNER WHICH PROVIDES NO CLEAR METHOD OF AUDITING BY HAND!
Any voting system which doesn't involve paper, can't be trusted... Period, end of story. You can open the source and review it all you want, but if it's electronic it's easy as hell to manipulate the records.
Use the computers, if you want, but print the results on paper such that the voter can see what they selected and verify it recorded correctly. The most recent suggestion I heard was to have a printer next to the balloting machine, when you hit submit it printed off the results in a little plexiglass display and gave the voter a chance to review it. Then the voter hits 'approve' and it cut the sheet off and spat it into a sealed ballot safe.
He wants Office Pro not just Office. So it is not $120.
Oh yeah, I forgot. This is advocacy, we've got to put forth the most ridiculous argument we can against something... otherwise we can't possibly win on merits of honest discussion alone.
P.S. Pro costs $500. He really needs Access and Publisher? The Student/Teacher edition is more than adequate with Word/Excel/Outlook/Powerpoint.
Next I imagine you're going to tell me that Office is bloated and nobody needs all that functionality anyway, and really dig this argument into a bizarre hole.
"I hope you don't mean pirate. Yes you can try and find a good deal, but also remember that once you buy it you will continue to pay for it over the years. In some cases you may be FORCED to upgrade."
Piracy? Naw, I was talking about academic editions, or discounted prices, rebates, all sorts of wonderful discounts available.
Oh my GOD! You're telling me that copy of Office 95 I have, I'm going to be FORCED to ugprade it!? Oh no! What shall I do.
Wait a minute, it's running fine on my parents 486 with Windows 95. Why am I being forced to upgrade it?
Oh yeah, I forgot... you're an advocate, you have to put forth the most ridiculous argument.
"At the end of the day free is well... free. Microsoft or any software vendor for that matter, can compete with free on cost."
At the end of the day all that really matters is whether or not you were able to get your work done. Linux can't compete on cost when the issue is does it work.
"That is also a valid point. But you still need to factor in the continual cost of doing business with Windows, and my argument is mostly on Microsoft as a whole."
No, you're argument is mostly fabricated to make you feel fluffy about Linux.
I'm sorry, but I outgrew this advocacy bullshit about 10 years ago. What's the point if you can't get your work done?
Hmm. You seem to be ignoring the fact that I used to develop on Linux years ago.
There is nothing at all compelling about the platform, so I see no reason to switch back.
BTW, I suspect your personal web page runs on Linux, which means your biased. The fact that you're wasting your skills on Perl indicates to me that you're willing to promote any FUD you can to continue your job security.
How's that strike ya?
"He will spend $600 for Office, $100-$300 for Windows XP."
Why? He could get Office for $120 or so, and Windows XP is $99 tops.
"Wouldn't you like to have all that stuff? I do with the money I saved by not running Microsoft Office and XP at home."
And then you pointed out all the cool games his friends are going to play on their PCs that you can't, because you're running Linux.
Right?
Look, I think arguments on cost are very compelling, but I think you need to be honest with people and admit that there are ways to obtain Microsoft products that don't involve paying full list price.
Few people in this world pay full retail price for anything. That's why God created Wal-Mart and other discount stores.
This is a hole the Linux community dug for itself, and now Microsoft is going to defend their record against the Linux record. If the Linux record doesn't fair well based on the facts, then maybe you shouldn't be making the ridiculous claims?
Or did you think that by repeating the mantra, "Well of course Linux is more secure" you weren't going to ever have to face up to reality?
Listen, when you realize you're in a hole, stop digging!
MS doesn't have much of an interest in changing the big boys' COBOL machines. They're helping to migrate business apps off the Mainframe, but it is in the form of complete rewrites of apps to a web enabled platform, not COBOL migration.
Back in 1996 when we first moved to Windows NT, the Mainframe developers were excited at the prospect of running MicroFocus COBOL. Not because they had any intention of migrating code off the mainframe, but because more often than not had need to write utilities or tools for the desktop.
Since they already knew COBOL very well, it made sense to them to write these programs on the desktop using what they knew well.
Microsoft understands this market better than you think. It's about interoperating.
What I find so interesting is that Linux advocates think that they need a convicted monopolist to buy up Linux companies in order to compete against a johnny has-been named SCO.
So much for ideology, I guess.
Interesting. What changed in 2001?
Wesley Clark is also quite fond of his Blackberry. During commercial breaks in debates, he'll quickly check messages.
Clark is also an avid watcher of sci-fi movies.
"What does Wordperfect, Quattro Pro, Caldara and SCO got to do with Novell?"
Back in the early 90's when Novell thought they were the shit with the only major file/print server for LANs, they went and spent like $6 billion acquiring Wordperfect, Quattro Pro and I think Dbase or Paradox... anyway a whole suite of applications.
They were going to take on Microsoft, defeat the behemoth using their mighty Utah wisdom!
A few years later, they sold the lot of 'em to Corel for about $20 in canadian currency.
Then in the mid 90's, SCO bought the Unix trademark and started promoting Unixware, the alternative to SCO. That failed too. So then they worked out a deal with SCO.
Meanwhile Ray Noorda, the genius behind the $6 billion loss on Wordperfect went off to found Caldera, promoting Linux to the masses.
All these things are interconnected.
What would be REALLY interesting would be a study on common liberal misperceptions (like Arafat is NOT corrupt, US killed more Iraqis than Saddam did etc...)
Those aren't liberal misconceptions. Those are conservative misconceptions about liberals.
Making the USPTO cover costs would simply push those costs onto the tax payer.
Docking the pay of a person who accepted the patent would pretty much guarantee you'd have nobody working at the USPTO.
I'm assuming that no money can be accepted for consultation, modification, documentation, assistance, etc. of the Free Software either. Otherwise it's really not a hobby, is it?
When I go visit friends and family I often am asked to sort out all kinds of problems, that for you or I would be simple.
And there you have it boys and girls...
You searched the world over looking for the Microsoft Community and found out that you are part of it.
So I think that your idea that "the majority of the internet is a MS community site" is bullshit.
It's ok for you to think that, but you'd be wrong.
There is no one website devoted to the Microsoft community. Instead it is divided into thousands of websites, each with unique purpose, a unique niche.
It's sites like this.
Or this.
What is it you need help on? Antivirus?
Who funds slashdot?
As near as I can tell it's OSDN and Microsoft.
I think the loss of life is less now by far than it was when sadam was in charge. But you don't care about that kind of stuff.
That's an interesting point, and actually I do care about such stuff.
What are the numbers?
Stop being a patsy of the negitive media. Wakeup and get educated.
Well as someone who is educated, most surely you have numbers to back up a claim rather than just leaving us with "I think it's true..."
How much are we wagering?
Some might define that as the best software. If it meets all your needs, then it probably is the best software for you.
Some might, but the typical enduser has no interest in ripping open source code and modifying or fixing it.
This is one of the problems Open Source zealots need to get over.
I think that only NASA can claim to write bug free software AFAIK.
Considering the number of problems NASA has had as a result of software bugs, not even NASA can claim to be perfect.
However, in my experience, like you say, there are ways around things in Open Source. I have found the ways around much more difficult in closed source.
And you're also more willing to put up with crap that's free than if you paid for it.
People should stop drinking the kool-aid and start being honest with one another.
The objective of Open Source (Linux in this example) is to make the best software possible it just so happens that this model also believes that open code is the best code.
If that's the objective of Open Source, then it has failed utterly.
I would say the objective of Open Source is more making software that is good enough that people can tweak easily to meet their specific needs...
With Open Source, buggy software is bad, because the objective is to make the best software possible.
Dude, put the kool-aid down. Most Open Source software is buggy, but it's written with developers in mind. If the bug is really annoying you fix it yourself, if not you figure out a way to work around it.
If anything people are more willing to put up with bugs in something they got for free, than something they paid for.
The fact that the author of the article is a FUD machine whose claims are both unreasonale and sometimes outrageous?
/. page as having been fixed quickly, when reality was it took two months to get the fix out to endusers. That claim was also never corrected, because it is fact, not FUD.
Prove this assertion. I've read Enderle's articles and I find no evidence of that.
The fact that you made claims about Apache that are untrue, and were corrected, but also modded up to 5 despite your attempt at FUD?
What claims might that be, and what corrects might those be?
I don't talk out of my ass, when I make a claim regarding Linux, that claim generally sticks because it is rooted in fact. The claim I made regarding Apache is that slashdot does not post Apache security problems to the front page, this is fact, not FUD. The claim I made regarding KDE was that particular issue was touted on the main
"What was Enderle right about? I am a Windows user, and it is not like I haven't defended and promoted closed-source software on Slashdot. "
In this particular case Enderle was right about the difference between Pro, Priest and Zealot and how the Zealots do more harm to Linux.
As far as you defending closed source software, that's great. I'm glad you can sometimes be open minded.
"So what kind of zealot am I?"
The good old fashion trolling kind.
"You still haven't answered the question, but instead you try to cloud the issue with ridiculous outbursts that are totally irrelevant to tis discussion. Just like someone who is out of arguments and grasping for straws."
Ridiculous outburts?
Oh you mean like how your response to every message has been to claim everybody is spewing FUD and bullshit?
And then you go and try to mischaracterize my arguments as being FUD and untrue, despite no facts on your behalf to support these claims?
Look in the mirror buddy, you are a Zealot.
People called you on your bullshit and FUD, but you still didn't get modded down.
And there we have it boys and girls... If the facts don't support your preconceived notions, it's bullshit and FUD.
Thank you for clarifying that for us. Enderle most certainly was right.
The typical Windows user has never had any experience with Linux. I>
Well considering I started using Linux in 1992, that would not be me.
They are "postconceived", they come from an in-depth experience with both systems.
Really. Where would I go in the registry to find the DLL location of a COM class named Genx.Genx?
I once thought like you, I defended Windows and saw no reason to use Linux, but once I started to learn more about Linux I gradually changed my opinions.
I once thought like you, I defended the piece of shit Linux and thought it was really cool. Then I realized what a horrible kludge it was and how most of the people shilling for it didn't have much experience with computers.
Today I defend Linux strongly, but I always do it on a fact-by-fact basis, never dropping my logical arguments to call someone a zealot or whatever.
It's too bad you don't show any evidence of that.