I have to be honest and say I'm not a huge fan of Linux in general. I recognize it's useful in some situations to be sure, but overall I'm not a big fan. Even further, I actually like Windows (Win2K and XP only, nothing before them!), independant of my feelings about Linux. I've had scant few problems since Win2K came around, yet I've actually had an unsettlingly high number of problems with Linux in various cases.
The only reason I say those things is so I can say what I'm about to say... This article struck me as a couple of Microsoft shills too. I wouldn't be at all surprised if we find out in a couple of days that these two companies were paid by MS to switch, probably had a large force of MS-supplied consultants to help, and that it wasn't as smooth as they claimed and their reasons for switching weren't the fault of Linux at all but of their own lack of expertise.
I cry foul very often when I think MS isn't being treated in a fair way (meaning when they get ragged on when I don't think they actually deserve it in a given instance). And I'll get on the faults I see in Linux just as fast, but it's got to be fair both ways, and this article strikes me as not being legit.
Your right, and it should count for something, but I see too many people that think that one accomplishment automatically entitles them to all the power and sway in an organization. THAT'S what I object to,
I don't have a Ph.D myself, don't even have a college degree actually (for purely financial reasons, although I'm very slowly working to complete it now in my 30's)... Maybe I would feel differently if my parents had been able to afford to send me to school and I had gotten an advanced degree... I like to think not though.
You may not be right for Google, but you sound right for the business world.
You'd be surprised home many of the recently hired at my office are of the Ph.D variety. You'd also be surprised that the vast majority of the projects they are in charge of are failing miserably because they can't simply get things done. Oh, they can draw some kick-ass UML diagrams, and they can use all the latest buzzwords with the utmost proficiency...
Then there are a couple of us that have been around for 10 years or more with the company. We are the ones that frankly get it done in crunch time. We are the ones that have never been part of a failed project because we busted our asses when it came to it (but just generally worked smart throughout the process so it rarely came to that anyway).
Sure, I'm bragging a bit here, but it happens to be true. Theory has to meet experience and proven ability, it can't exist in a vacumn. It's nice to hire MENSA members who can rotate geometric shapes in five dimensions in their head and choose the correct figure, but give me the guy who can read through online docs efficiently and can pound out the code when it counts and I don't care if he has a Ph.D or flunked out of high school.
Look, we can all sit around all day and come up with conspiracy theories about how MS is trying to kill this competitor or that competitor... And some of the time those theories are even going to prove correct because, well, MS *is* exceptionally savy to the point of being bullies and even worse many times... But this article is nothing but FUD from someone on the OSS side of the fence. He might be right in the long-run, but for now it's just a glorified conspiracy theory.
The FUD flows both ways folks, let's not forget that. You think MS is the only one using dirty tricks? The OSS side has a massive contingent of zealots to go along with the truly gifted, intelligent, talented and insightful members of the community, and they many times have a much louder voice than the good ones. MS has plenty of legitimate flaws, but so too does the OSS community. The sooner we all come to that realization, the sooner we might be able to change the world.
This article isn't a good example of fulfilling that goal, indeed it's a good example of what we should be trying to avoid!
Thank you!:) I went and looked him up afterwards (two seconds before would have removed my uncertainty... I plead laziness after being at work all day).
You can draw that conclusion if you wish, but in truth what I am saying is that the comments I listed form a chain that seems potentially illogical.
Either the signal was interesting to warrant further investigation, or it wasn't in the first place, or it was but then they discovered it wasn't.
If it does warrant further investigation, why stop investigating it now? What changed their minds in only a few hours? They certainly didn't expand on why it was hype and blown out of proportion. What are we left with? One day they say it's interesting and will be observed, the next day it's all hype and not being observed.
One of those statements is true while the other is false, OR something changed their minds and they haven't told us.
COULD there be a conspiracy here? Sure, there COULD be. My belief? They probably messed up the P.R. and nothing more.
So, you think my ellipses means "there really IS a consipracy!", but I'm flat-out telling you they actually mean "there almost certainly is not". Either statement fits after the "but", the second one is how I feel though.
This is kind of what I think it is, but a good scientist wouldn't try to cover up their mistake, they would simply explain the mistake and try and learn from it.
So they are either (a) covering something real up, or (b) covering up their mistake and thereby making themselves look worse or (c) just really badly botched the PR side of things, which doesn't bode well for anything that might happen legitimately in the future.
Not sure which *I'D* like to chose in their shoes...
Just to clarify my comments, I certainly don't think they did this on pupose if it was just a mistake. I think they got excited about something, then a few hours later realized it wasn't nearly as exciting as they thought at first.
If that's the case, I'd really like an expanded explanation. If they figured out it's a telescope malfunction, let us know. If they discovered it corresponds with a Pulsar or something, let us know. If they think someone hacked the software, let us know. They way they left it strikes me as a little bizarre is all.
I try to keep the tinfoil hat in the closet as much as possible, but one can't resist...
Yesterday, we get this quote from Dan Wertheimer:
"It's the most interesting signal from SETI@home. We're not jumping up and down, but we are continuing to observe it."
but today we get:
"It's all hype and noise. We have nothing that is unusual. It's all out of proportion."
and we also get Paul Horowitz:
"It's not much of anything at all. We're not investigating it further."
So yesterday the chief scientist for the project says it's the most interesting signal (which in and of itself just means it was a little different than the rest) and that they will continue to investigate it. But now today it's just a bunch of media hype and they aren't investigating it any further (I'm not sure who Horowitz actually is, but it seems a safe assumption, based on his comment, that he's associated with the project".
Yes, it COULD just be a case of "Oh wow!... Oh no, wait, nothing". Or it could be an outright coverup. I suspect it's something in between, but chains of comments like these really do lead a person down a particular path.
Uh, in fact it does... When you install XP (and I think when you first turn it on if it was an OEM install) you are asked to create a new user, which I believe does NOT default to admin equivalent.
Ok, granted, maybe there could be some verbiage explaining why this is a good idea rather than just allowing the Abort button, which makes you use the admin account. But Windows XP does in fact work as you are stating it should.
I've already experienced this "logging" (much to my surprise)... Downloaded an EXE the other day (yes, from a known good source) and clicked it to run... The thing popped up a dialog asking if I wanted to run the file because it's source is not known and might not be trusted, or some verbiage to that effect.
Wah? I thought?
So I clicked a couple more EXE's that were already on my system. Nope, no warning. Copied one over from another machine on my local network. Nope, no warning. Downloaded another EXE. Yep, warning.
I think it could get a tad bit annoying to someone like me that knows what I'm doing, but (a) I think I saw an option to turn it off on the dialog, and (b) it's I think a great idea for someone like my mom, or even the so-called "power users" who just THINK they know what they are doing.
I don't know if that's the logging that's referred to, I haven't done the requisite research to find out. But I suspect it is, and if it is, it strikes me as a good, non-sinister thing.
I guess you'd be right on that. You didn't turn out to be a rant troll as I expected and actually came back with a thoughtful responds so I'm willing to say I stand corrected on that statement.
Now I can say the same of you:)
One advantage of the journalized file system is that they greatly reduce the need for fsck but there are cases where both Linux (such as ext3) and third party JFSs (such as Veritas JFS and the AIX JFS) get screwed up enough that even running fsck doesn't solve the problem. This shows that there's no replacement for a reliable backup system.
I know I've had the same problem with ext3 and ReiserFS, I think those are the only two I've tried. Certainly I've seen NTFS have problems (I have a folder on my start menu now that cannot be deleted no matter what I do, every disk check program I've tried says there is no problem, can't even right-click the thing), but I've never seen NTFS corrupt so bad that the system wouldn't boot, yet I've seen it at least three times with Linux. Like I said, there could have been something I could have done, but at least in my experience it's not as fault-tolerant as far as file systems go (maybe there is a FS that wouldn't have done this, I don't know... certainly there's plenty of choices, one nice thing about Linux).
When Windows 2003 Server came out (I'm a Windows sys admin BTW), one of the changes MS bragged about was that you can pretty much do almost anything you want (admin wise) via the command prompt. In fact, there are many tools that you can only use via command prompt. So even with Windows, you can't really escape from arcane commands.
I certainly don't think command lines are bad, I wasn't trying to imply that. But I've come to appreciate GUI tools after MANY years of fighting against it. I was really against the whole GUI concept early on, having grown up with command line-based computers. If I'm being fair I have to admit that lack of familiarity is the biggest reason I think of Linux as having arcane commands. All it comes down to is that my preference these days is a GUI-based system, and anything that isn't that feels like a step backwards to me, having come from that background. Just personal preference certainly.
Do you have details has exactly what software's (since hardware is ruled out) causing the problem? Are they dealing with customized software here?
I don't have those details, I'm not intimately involved with the process. I just get periodic status reports on the situation. I know that we're talking about RedHat Enterprise, if not the latest than no more than one version back. It's also WebSphere, the latest version as I recall, IBM's Portal Server and whatever supporting components go into that (i.e., JDK, things like that). None of it is customized at this point (it would be down the road, the Portal components anyway). There was also an issue with Oracle crashing the OS completely, but that's obviously not IBM's fault. I know that one was cured by a kernel patch from RedHat, but again, precise details of the problem I do not know.
Considering that Office and Visual Studio costs more than Windows itself, why whould MS bundle it with Windows? And why would anyone install Norton Systemworks? In fact, I'd praise MS if they included all those (minus the Systemworks) software with Windows without increasing the price. And what's stoping MS from shipping with OpenOffice, Sun Java VM (not the bastardised MS Jave VM), Mozilla, and other free applications?
What's stopping them? All the people that would bitch and moan that they are anticompetitive because they are bundling, and the DOJ, so on and so on. Come on, you HAVE to know they couldn't get away with it, regardless of what they did with the price. You wouldn't praise them, MOST ESPECIALLY if it didn't raise the price, because what incentive would there be to go with any alternative then? Absolutely none. You may argue that last part of it, that would be a fair argument, but seriously, would you really praise them? Bluntly, I don't believe you if you say you would.
Is it your companie's policy to hire consultants that can't even get their own products to run? And as for the sudden power failure, I question the competency of sys admins that have setup those Linux servers/workstations without UPSes to protect against sudden power failures, not to mention that a surge usally following such power outages. And an IT expert like youself should know better than to know the true purpose of journaling file systems.
Perhaps I wasn't clear... we're talking about *IBM* having trouble, not the "consultant of the week". Surely you would agree that IBM of all companies should know what they're doing when it comes to Linux? And certainly when dealing with their own products? Is it too much to expect they should have little difficulty getting their product to run on RedHat (not like we picked an unusual distro!)? No, it's obviously not, and it shouldn't take the two months it's going on now. Whether we should or should not have gotten rid of them a long time ago is a moot point (I'm not the one making that decision by the way)... it shouldn't have gone this far, and each problem they've overcome has been tracked to OS problems by the way (every single one thus far has needed a kernel patch... I'm not intimately familiar with the details frankly, but I get daily reports, and that solution has been used a number of times already).
As for the power loss, that's my bad, I should have been more clear... I wasn't referring to servers, not real ones anyway. I'm talking about the test server on my desk. It doesn't have a UPS, nor does my workstation.
But I'll tell you what... I've had power failures a number of times on my XP workstation, and it's started back up without a hitch. Quick scandisk at boot and all is right with the world. The Linux box? At least twice it would no longer boot. It does it's little file system check and locks up there, no progress, no boot, no nothing. Maybe there's a way to fix it, but shouldn't it be able to handle such a thing by itself, especially if an "inferior" OS like XP can pull it off without a problem? I certainly shouldn't have to go spend any time in newsgroups or man pages or doc project sites or whatever to figure out what arcane commands I need to run from a boot disk that the OS should have managed to do itself.
Certainly though, educate me... I thought a journalized file system should be able to reconstruct itself in such a situation. I thought crash recovery was a big reason for such filesystems in the first place. Maybe I don't understand the concept, I'd be more than happy to hear your explain it to me and why my expectations of it are incorrect.
And who should be this "neutral observer"? You? SCO? MS? IBM? Slashdotters?
A fair point actually. What I was getting at was the concensus of the majority of computer users as the neutral observers. I dare say most users don't care about the FOSS philosophy vs. the proprietary philosophy like most Slashdot readers do for insta
Yeah, good point. The way I figure it, if you like Windows, as I generally do, then having Linux push Microsoft to be better is a good thing. And if you love Linux, then having a goal set by Windows is a good thing (whether your goal is to match them or beat them).
I'm very sick of the argument "Linux comes with an assload of software and all Windows has is a browser, notepad and solitaire".
I know this isn't an original point, but it's a good one... What would happen to your poor Linux distros is Microsoft was allowed to ship whatever they wanted (assuming they properly licensed what they didn't own themselves)? You'd all be screaming that we need to drag their asses into court that same day!
Give me a break... Do you think Linux would have ANY chance WHATSOEVER if Microsoft was allowed to ship Office, Visual Studio, Flight Simulator and, hmm, let's say Norton SystemWorks? Short answer, in case your blind zealotry keeps you from seeing straight: NONE, ZERO, ZIP, NADA, NO CHANCE.
Even if it didn't come bundled with PC's, which I don't think you could legally stop since an OEM could always just go buy Windows off the shelf and install it to their hearts' content, even if people had to install it themselves, Windows would still be king of the hill for a variety of other reasons (like a nice, clean, consistent user interface, like simplicity of software installation and removal, like the biggest software library out there as far the collection after you scrape away the crap software goes, and more).
Linux is great as a server platform. Actually, I take that back. It's not great, it's good. Seeing as how our IBM consultants are having trouble getting their own products to run on RedHat, and I've seen my share of Linux boxes crash for no apparent reason (and hardware issues were eliminated) and I've seen a number of Linux boxes not boot up again after a sudden power failure and WITH a journaled file system.
Linux on the desktop? No. Not now. Maybe never, maybe some day, but not now. I will offer one bit of advice that the community at large should take to heart if you ever really do want to challenge the leaders (not just Microsoft, I mean the application leaders as well)... Stop writing article after article about why Windows sucks and why Linux is better and start writing articles about what's wrong with Linux and how you can fix it, or just how you can improve it. Stop comparing Linux to Windows so damned much and judge it on it's own merits. Face the good (there's plenty of it) and the bad (just as plentiful) and stop the whining about how Microsoft competes in illegal or at best nasty ways and beat them at the game you all want to claim they can't play, that is, delivering the best solutions. Make the best software out there, and not just the best software as compared to Windows as judged by 15-year old whiz-kids, but the best products as judged by any neutral observer.
Do these things and you have a chance. Continue the crap your doing now, and forget it, you will be forever relegated to the nerd's OS and the back-office server platform that the geeks in the organizations want to run but the boys in the boardroom who write the checks will want to stay away from.
That's fair, and you've hit upon the one real sore spot that his pissed me off with myIE, the bookmark thing that is (I have no experience dealing with the developers). If they fixed that one issue alone, I'd be happy as hell.
I've played with Firefox a bit lately, and I'm personally not all that impressed. Mind you I'm saying that when comparing it to myIE, not plain IE, which it is certainly superior to in most ways. The one thing I find Firefox to really be better at is developer tools. I'm really impressed with the DOM Inspector and just the Javascript console is very nice. Otherwise, I'm personally quite happy with myIE.
I'm not looking to convince anyone, but I do think it's fair to point out that if you do happen to generally like IE, as I do, there are ways to make it better, myIE being one of them, and I think that yields a better comparison to Firefox and Mozilla and the life than does IE itself.
I agree with you, to an extent... IE is actually quite standards-compliant, just not up-to-date. I'm not saying that's a whole lot better, but a standards-compliant site that isn't using the latest specs works quite well.
As a rather accompished web developer myself (my achievements to date make that statement not a boast but a statement of fact), I can also tell you that most users don't give a damn about standards compliance, and especially if you play in a domain where cross-browser is less of a concern (or no concern at all, which frankly is the environment I develop in most of the time), it's even less of an issue.
In addition, there is, at least in the business world, a general trend away from web development that would require the latest specs. People are actually dumbing-down their interfaces across the board from what I've seen. This to me is sad and a definite step in the wrong direction, but it further implies that standards-compliance is less of an issue because the less complex (and frankly functional) the interface, the easier it is to make it cross-browser, whether standards are involved or not.
I'm not saying any of this is good mind you... I've made a name for myself in my job because my web applications look, feel and work very much like fat-clients (at the price of being IE-only, which is acceptable as far as my organization is concerned), but if a mandate ever comes down that says my apps have to be cross-browser and/or standards-compliance (not automatically the same thing!), then my life will be much more difficult because if they still want my apps to be as accessible and frankly as cool as they have been so far, dealing with IE is going to be a pain rather than the near pleasure it is now (believe me, IE allows you to do some incredibly cool things on the client that you either can't do with other browsers, or more likely is just harder and will obviously increase development time to make work on both).
Then using myIE. Now you have a feature set that blows away Firefox, and everything else, while still having IE under the covers (if you want that... I happen to like IE, and myIE makes it tremendously powerful, and even a little bit more secure).
While you are PROBABLY right, it's very common for someone to think along the lines of "gee, I can take more money right now than I will ever be able to spend from this person that wants to buy my company, or I can wait and MAYBE make ten times that in the future... Think I'll take the definite thing!".
Maybe the Google guys are the exception, but they'd be one of the few.
It's a good thought for the things we can predict, but it's the things we know nothing about that I'd prefer to be as ready as possible for. The only way to do that is to have a disaster recovery site for the human race (like the geek analogy?!?)
If the ONLY concern was the Sun going out then yes, I'd be the first in line to agree with you and say to hell with manned space flight, let my children's children's children deal with it, I'll do something about hunger and the environment and all the more immediate threats we face.
But what about impact from celestial objects? This is a very real danger, and as I said in the original post, one we are statistically due for. Sure, it may not happen for a million more years, but it also may hap......sorry, that was just some gas:) You see the point thought I hope? It really IS an immediate threat, and unlike hunger and AIDS and even nuclear weapons, all of which SOME of us will survive, a sufficiently large comet impact could wipe out every living thing on this planet. THAT'S the threat we have to take just as seriously as any of those you named, not the Sun going out, and manned spaceflight is the only cure for it the we know of (hopefully someone discovers a Stargate buried somewhere, then this discussion is moot:) ).
When asked why/if we should be out in space, he said the following... just change it to answer the question we face now: should we (meaning people) go into space at all... the answer is the same...
"We have to stay here and there's a simple reason why. Ask ten different scientists about the environment, population control, genetics and you'll get ten different answers, but there's one thing every scientist on the planet agrees on. Whether it happens in a hundred years or a thousand years or a million years, eventually our Sun will grow cold and go out. When that happens, it won't just take us. It'll take Marilyn Monroe and Lao-Tzu, Einstein, Morobuto, Buddy Holly, Aristophanes.. and all of this.. all of this was for nothing unless we go to the stars."
Our SURVIVAL is at stake. Forget the Sun going out, what about an comet impact? That's not an unprecedented event in Earth history, and we're due, statistically speaking. We HAVE to go, and it has to be sooner rather than later because that comet might hit us sooner rather than later.
Sorry Van Allen, your dead wrong on this one, and so is the human race if too many agree with you.
Slashdot Mirror
I have to be honest and say I'm not a huge fan of Linux in general. I recognize it's useful in some situations to be sure, but overall I'm not a big fan. Even further, I actually like Windows (Win2K and XP only, nothing before them!), independant of my feelings about Linux. I've had scant few problems since Win2K came around, yet I've actually had an unsettlingly high number of problems with Linux in various cases.
The only reason I say those things is so I can say what I'm about to say... This article struck me as a couple of Microsoft shills too. I wouldn't be at all surprised if we find out in a couple of days that these two companies were paid by MS to switch, probably had a large force of MS-supplied consultants to help, and that it wasn't as smooth as they claimed and their reasons for switching weren't the fault of Linux at all but of their own lack of expertise.
I cry foul very often when I think MS isn't being treated in a fair way (meaning when they get ragged on when I don't think they actually deserve it in a given instance). And I'll get on the faults I see in Linux just as fast, but it's got to be fair both ways, and this article strikes me as not being legit.
It would be funny if I didn't think half of Slashdot would, at least privately, entertain the idea in a serious way.
Your right, and it should count for something, but I see too many people that think that one accomplishment automatically entitles them to all the power and sway in an organization. THAT'S what I object to,
I don't have a Ph.D myself, don't even have a college degree actually (for purely financial reasons, although I'm very slowly working to complete it now in my 30's)... Maybe I would feel differently if my parents had been able to afford to send me to school and I had gotten an advanced degree... I like to think not though.
You may not be right for Google, but you sound right for the business world.
You'd be surprised home many of the recently hired at my office are of the Ph.D variety. You'd also be surprised that the vast majority of the projects they are in charge of are failing miserably because they can't simply get things done. Oh, they can draw some kick-ass UML diagrams, and they can use all the latest buzzwords with the utmost proficiency...
Then there are a couple of us that have been around for 10 years or more with the company. We are the ones that frankly get it done in crunch time. We are the ones that have never been part of a failed project because we busted our asses when it came to it (but just generally worked smart throughout the process so it rarely came to that anyway).
Sure, I'm bragging a bit here, but it happens to be true. Theory has to meet experience and proven ability, it can't exist in a vacumn. It's nice to hire MENSA members who can rotate geometric shapes in five dimensions in their head and choose the correct figure, but give me the guy who can read through online docs efficiently and can pound out the code when it counts and I don't care if he has a Ph.D or flunked out of high school.
Look, we can all sit around all day and come up with conspiracy theories about how MS is trying to kill this competitor or that competitor... And some of the time those theories are even going to prove correct because, well, MS *is* exceptionally savy to the point of being bullies and even worse many times... But this article is nothing but FUD from someone on the OSS side of the fence. He might be right in the long-run, but for now it's just a glorified conspiracy theory.
The FUD flows both ways folks, let's not forget that. You think MS is the only one using dirty tricks? The OSS side has a massive contingent of zealots to go along with the truly gifted, intelligent, talented and insightful members of the community, and they many times have a much louder voice than the good ones. MS has plenty of legitimate flaws, but so too does the OSS community. The sooner we all come to that realization, the sooner we might be able to change the world.
This article isn't a good example of fulfilling that goal, indeed it's a good example of what we should be trying to avoid!
The problem is that it came from Dan Wertheimer himself... To quote him from yesterday:
"It's the most interesting signal from SETI@home. We're not jumping up and down, but we are continuing to observe it."
Thank you! :) I went and looked him up afterwards (two seconds before would have removed my uncertainty... I plead laziness after being at work all day).
You can draw that conclusion if you wish, but in truth what I am saying is that the comments I listed form a chain that seems potentially illogical.
Either the signal was interesting to warrant further investigation, or it wasn't in the first place, or it was but then they discovered it wasn't.
If it does warrant further investigation, why stop investigating it now? What changed their minds in only a few hours? They certainly didn't expand on why it was hype and blown out of proportion. What are we left with? One day they say it's interesting and will be observed, the next day it's all hype and not being observed.
One of those statements is true while the other is false, OR something changed their minds and they haven't told us.
COULD there be a conspiracy here? Sure, there COULD be. My belief? They probably messed up the P.R. and nothing more.
So, you think my ellipses means "there really IS a consipracy!", but I'm flat-out telling you they actually mean "there almost certainly is not". Either statement fits after the "but", the second one is how I feel though.
This is kind of what I think it is, but a good scientist wouldn't try to cover up their mistake, they would simply explain the mistake and try and learn from it.
So they are either (a) covering something real up, or (b) covering up their mistake and thereby making themselves look worse or (c) just really badly botched the PR side of things, which doesn't bode well for anything that might happen legitimately in the future.
Not sure which *I'D* like to chose in their shoes...
Just to clarify my comments, I certainly don't think they did this on pupose if it was just a mistake. I think they got excited about something, then a few hours later realized it wasn't nearly as exciting as they thought at first.
If that's the case, I'd really like an expanded explanation. If they figured out it's a telescope malfunction, let us know. If they discovered it corresponds with a Pulsar or something, let us know. If they think someone hacked the software, let us know. They way they left it strikes me as a little bizarre is all.
I try to keep the tinfoil hat in the closet as much as possible, but one can't resist...
Yesterday, we get this quote from Dan Wertheimer:
"It's the most interesting signal from SETI@home. We're not jumping up and down, but we are continuing to observe it."
but today we get:
"It's all hype and noise. We have nothing that is unusual. It's all out of proportion."
and we also get Paul Horowitz:
"It's not much of anything at all. We're not investigating it further."
So yesterday the chief scientist for the project says it's the most interesting signal (which in and of itself just means it was a little different than the rest) and that they will continue to investigate it. But now today it's just a bunch of media hype and they aren't investigating it any further (I'm not sure who Horowitz actually is, but it seems a safe assumption, based on his comment, that he's associated with the project".
Yes, it COULD just be a case of "Oh wow!... Oh no, wait, nothing". Or it could be an outright coverup. I suspect it's something in between, but chains of comments like these really do lead a person down a particular path.
Hmm, interesting. Certainly not out of the question that I'm not remembering correctly... I was almost certain before, now I'm just kinda certain :)
Uh, in fact it does... When you install XP (and I think when you first turn it on if it was an OEM install) you are asked to create a new user, which I believe does NOT default to admin equivalent.
Ok, granted, maybe there could be some verbiage explaining why this is a good idea rather than just allowing the Abort button, which makes you use the admin account. But Windows XP does in fact work as you are stating it should.
I've already experienced this "logging" (much to my surprise)... Downloaded an EXE the other day (yes, from a known good source) and clicked it to run... The thing popped up a dialog asking if I wanted to run the file because it's source is not known and might not be trusted, or some verbiage to that effect.
Wah? I thought?
So I clicked a couple more EXE's that were already on my system. Nope, no warning. Copied one over from another machine on my local network. Nope, no warning. Downloaded another EXE. Yep, warning.
I think it could get a tad bit annoying to someone like me that knows what I'm doing, but (a) I think I saw an option to turn it off on the dialog, and (b) it's I think a great idea for someone like my mom, or even the so-called "power users" who just THINK they know what they are doing.
I don't know if that's the logging that's referred to, I haven't done the requisite research to find out. But I suspect it is, and if it is, it strikes me as a good, non-sinister thing.
I guess you'd be right on that. You didn't turn out to be a rant troll as I expected and actually came back with a thoughtful responds so I'm willing to say I stand corrected on that statement.
:)
Now I can say the same of you
One advantage of the journalized file system is that they greatly reduce the need for fsck but there are cases where both Linux (such as ext3) and third party JFSs (such as Veritas JFS and the AIX JFS) get screwed up enough that even running fsck doesn't solve the problem. This shows that there's no replacement for a reliable backup system.
I know I've had the same problem with ext3 and ReiserFS, I think those are the only two I've tried. Certainly I've seen NTFS have problems (I have a folder on my start menu now that cannot be deleted no matter what I do, every disk check program I've tried says there is no problem, can't even right-click the thing), but I've never seen NTFS corrupt so bad that the system wouldn't boot, yet I've seen it at least three times with Linux. Like I said, there could have been something I could have done, but at least in my experience it's not as fault-tolerant as far as file systems go (maybe there is a FS that wouldn't have done this, I don't know... certainly there's plenty of choices, one nice thing about Linux).
When Windows 2003 Server came out (I'm a Windows sys admin BTW), one of the changes MS bragged about was that you can pretty much do almost anything you want (admin wise) via the command prompt. In fact, there are many tools that you can only use via command prompt. So even with Windows, you can't really escape from arcane commands.
I certainly don't think command lines are bad, I wasn't trying to imply that. But I've come to appreciate GUI tools after MANY years of fighting against it. I was really against the whole GUI concept early on, having grown up with command line-based computers. If I'm being fair I have to admit that lack of familiarity is the biggest reason I think of Linux as having arcane commands. All it comes down to is that my preference these days is a GUI-based system, and anything that isn't that feels like a step backwards to me, having come from that background. Just personal preference certainly.
Do you have details has exactly what software's (since hardware is ruled out) causing the problem? Are they dealing with customized software here?
I don't have those details, I'm not intimately involved with the process. I just get periodic status reports on the situation. I know that we're talking about RedHat Enterprise, if not the latest than no more than one version back. It's also WebSphere, the latest version as I recall, IBM's Portal Server and whatever supporting components go into that (i.e., JDK, things like that). None of it is customized at this point (it would be down the road, the Portal components anyway). There was also an issue with Oracle crashing the OS completely, but that's obviously not IBM's fault. I know that one was cured by a kernel patch from RedHat, but again, precise details of the problem I do not know.
Considering that Office and Visual Studio costs more than Windows itself, why whould MS bundle it with Windows? And why would anyone install Norton Systemworks? In fact, I'd praise MS if they included all those (minus the Systemworks) software with Windows without increasing the price. And what's stoping MS from shipping with OpenOffice, Sun Java VM (not the bastardised MS Jave VM), Mozilla, and other free applications?
What's stopping them? All the people that would bitch and moan that they are anticompetitive because they are bundling, and the DOJ, so on and so on. Come on, you HAVE to know they couldn't get away with it, regardless of what they did with the price. You wouldn't praise them, MOST ESPECIALLY if it didn't raise the price, because what incentive would there be to go with any alternative then? Absolutely none. You may argue that last part of it, that would be a fair argument, but seriously, would you really praise them? Bluntly, I don't believe you if you say you would.
Is it your companie's policy to hire consultants that can't even get their own products to run? And as for the sudden power failure, I question the competency of sys admins that have setup those Linux servers/workstations without UPSes to protect against sudden power failures, not to mention that a surge usally following such power outages. And an IT expert like youself should know better than to know the true purpose of journaling file systems.
Perhaps I wasn't clear... we're talking about *IBM* having trouble, not the "consultant of the week". Surely you would agree that IBM of all companies should know what they're doing when it comes to Linux? And certainly when dealing with their own products? Is it too much to expect they should have little difficulty getting their product to run on RedHat (not like we picked an unusual distro!)? No, it's obviously not, and it shouldn't take the two months it's going on now. Whether we should or should not have gotten rid of them a long time ago is a moot point (I'm not the one making that decision by the way)... it shouldn't have gone this far, and each problem they've overcome has been tracked to OS problems by the way (every single one thus far has needed a kernel patch... I'm not intimately familiar with the details frankly, but I get daily reports, and that solution has been used a number of times already).
As for the power loss, that's my bad, I should have been more clear... I wasn't referring to servers, not real ones anyway. I'm talking about the test server on my desk. It doesn't have a UPS, nor does my workstation.
But I'll tell you what... I've had power failures a number of times on my XP workstation, and it's started back up without a hitch. Quick scandisk at boot and all is right with the world. The Linux box? At least twice it would no longer boot. It does it's little file system check and locks up there, no progress, no boot, no nothing. Maybe there's a way to fix it, but shouldn't it be able to handle such a thing by itself, especially if an "inferior" OS like XP can pull it off without a problem? I certainly shouldn't have to go spend any time in newsgroups or man pages or doc project sites or whatever to figure out what arcane commands I need to run from a boot disk that the OS should have managed to do itself.
Certainly though, educate me... I thought a journalized file system should be able to reconstruct itself in such a situation. I thought crash recovery was a big reason for such filesystems in the first place. Maybe I don't understand the concept, I'd be more than happy to hear your explain it to me and why my expectations of it are incorrect.
And who should be this "neutral observer"? You? SCO? MS? IBM? Slashdotters?
A fair point actually. What I was getting at was the concensus of the majority of computer users as the neutral observers. I dare say most users don't care about the FOSS philosophy vs. the proprietary philosophy like most Slashdot readers do for insta
Yeah, good point. The way I figure it, if you like Windows, as I generally do, then having Linux push Microsoft to be better is a good thing. And if you love Linux, then having a goal set by Windows is a good thing (whether your goal is to match them or beat them).
I'm very sick of the argument "Linux comes with an assload of software and all Windows has is a browser, notepad and solitaire".
I know this isn't an original point, but it's a good one... What would happen to your poor Linux distros is Microsoft was allowed to ship whatever they wanted (assuming they properly licensed what they didn't own themselves)? You'd all be screaming that we need to drag their asses into court that same day!
Give me a break... Do you think Linux would have ANY chance WHATSOEVER if Microsoft was allowed to ship Office, Visual Studio, Flight Simulator and, hmm, let's say Norton SystemWorks? Short answer, in case your blind zealotry keeps you from seeing straight: NONE, ZERO, ZIP, NADA, NO CHANCE.
Even if it didn't come bundled with PC's, which I don't think you could legally stop since an OEM could always just go buy Windows off the shelf and install it to their hearts' content, even if people had to install it themselves, Windows would still be king of the hill for a variety of other reasons (like a nice, clean, consistent user interface, like simplicity of software installation and removal, like the biggest software library out there as far the collection after you scrape away the crap software goes, and more).
Linux is great as a server platform. Actually, I take that back. It's not great, it's good. Seeing as how our IBM consultants are having trouble getting their own products to run on RedHat, and I've seen my share of Linux boxes crash for no apparent reason (and hardware issues were eliminated) and I've seen a number of Linux boxes not boot up again after a sudden power failure and WITH a journaled file system.
Linux on the desktop? No. Not now. Maybe never, maybe some day, but not now. I will offer one bit of advice that the community at large should take to heart if you ever really do want to challenge the leaders (not just Microsoft, I mean the application leaders as well)... Stop writing article after article about why Windows sucks and why Linux is better and start writing articles about what's wrong with Linux and how you can fix it, or just how you can improve it. Stop comparing Linux to Windows so damned much and judge it on it's own merits. Face the good (there's plenty of it) and the bad (just as plentiful) and stop the whining about how Microsoft competes in illegal or at best nasty ways and beat them at the game you all want to claim they can't play, that is, delivering the best solutions. Make the best software out there, and not just the best software as compared to Windows as judged by 15-year old whiz-kids, but the best products as judged by any neutral observer.
Do these things and you have a chance. Continue the crap your doing now, and forget it, you will be forever relegated to the nerd's OS and the back-office server platform that the geeks in the organizations want to run but the boys in the boardroom who write the checks will want to stay away from.
Harsh? Yes. Reality? Abso-fraggin'-lutely!
That's fair, and you've hit upon the one real sore spot that his pissed me off with myIE, the bookmark thing that is (I have no experience dealing with the developers). If they fixed that one issue alone, I'd be happy as hell.
I've played with Firefox a bit lately, and I'm personally not all that impressed. Mind you I'm saying that when comparing it to myIE, not plain IE, which it is certainly superior to in most ways. The one thing I find Firefox to really be better at is developer tools. I'm really impressed with the DOM Inspector and just the Javascript console is very nice. Otherwise, I'm personally quite happy with myIE.
I'm not looking to convince anyone, but I do think it's fair to point out that if you do happen to generally like IE, as I do, there are ways to make it better, myIE being one of them, and I think that yields a better comparison to Firefox and Mozilla and the life than does IE itself.
I agree with you, to an extent... IE is actually quite standards-compliant, just not up-to-date. I'm not saying that's a whole lot better, but a standards-compliant site that isn't using the latest specs works quite well.
As a rather accompished web developer myself (my achievements to date make that statement not a boast but a statement of fact), I can also tell you that most users don't give a damn about standards compliance, and especially if you play in a domain where cross-browser is less of a concern (or no concern at all, which frankly is the environment I develop in most of the time), it's even less of an issue.
In addition, there is, at least in the business world, a general trend away from web development that would require the latest specs. People are actually dumbing-down their interfaces across the board from what I've seen. This to me is sad and a definite step in the wrong direction, but it further implies that standards-compliance is less of an issue because the less complex (and frankly functional) the interface, the easier it is to make it cross-browser, whether standards are involved or not.
I'm not saying any of this is good mind you... I've made a name for myself in my job because my web applications look, feel and work very much like fat-clients (at the price of being IE-only, which is acceptable as far as my organization is concerned), but if a mandate ever comes down that says my apps have to be cross-browser and/or standards-compliance (not automatically the same thing!), then my life will be much more difficult because if they still want my apps to be as accessible and frankly as cool as they have been so far, dealing with IE is going to be a pain rather than the near pleasure it is now (believe me, IE allows you to do some incredibly cool things on the client that you either can't do with other browsers, or more likely is just harder and will obviously increase development time to make work on both).
Then using myIE. Now you have a feature set that blows away Firefox, and everything else, while still having IE under the covers (if you want that... I happen to like IE, and myIE makes it tremendously powerful, and even a little bit more secure).
Don't be too sure...
While you are PROBABLY right, it's very common for someone to think along the lines of "gee, I can take more money right now than I will ever be able to spend from this person that wants to buy my company, or I can wait and MAYBE make ten times that in the future... Think I'll take the definite thing!".
Maybe the Google guys are the exception, but they'd be one of the few.
It's a good thought for the things we can predict, but it's the things we know nothing about that I'd prefer to be as ready as possible for. The only way to do that is to have a disaster recovery site for the human race (like the geek analogy?!?)
If the ONLY concern was the Sun going out then yes, I'd be the first in line to agree with you and say to hell with manned space flight, let my children's children's children deal with it, I'll do something about hunger and the environment and all the more immediate threats we face.
...sorry, that was just some gas :) You see the point thought I hope? It really IS an immediate threat, and unlike hunger and AIDS and even nuclear weapons, all of which SOME of us will survive, a sufficiently large comet impact could wipe out every living thing on this planet. THAT'S the threat we have to take just as seriously as any of those you named, not the Sun going out, and manned spaceflight is the only cure for it the we know of (hopefully someone discovers a Stargate buried somewhere, then this discussion is moot :) ).
But what about impact from celestial objects? This is a very real danger, and as I said in the original post, one we are statistically due for. Sure, it may not happen for a million more years, but it also may hap...
When asked why/if we should be out in space, he said the following... just change it to answer the question we face now: should we (meaning people) go into space at all... the answer is the same...
.. and all of this .. all of this was for nothing unless we go to the stars."
"We have to stay here and there's a simple reason why. Ask ten different scientists about the environment, population control, genetics and you'll get ten different answers, but there's one thing every scientist on the planet agrees on. Whether it happens in a hundred years or a thousand years or a million years, eventually our Sun will grow cold and go out. When that happens, it won't just take us. It'll take Marilyn Monroe and Lao-Tzu, Einstein, Morobuto, Buddy Holly, Aristophanes
Our SURVIVAL is at stake. Forget the Sun going out, what about an comet impact? That's not an unprecedented event in Earth history, and we're due, statistically speaking. We HAVE to go, and it has to be sooner rather than later because that comet might hit us sooner rather than later.
Sorry Van Allen, your dead wrong on this one, and so is the human race if too many agree with you.