The sad thing is, you probably consider yourself a free speech advocate, too:)
Just because TummyX likes Microsoft doesn't mean he's spreading FUD. I've never seen him claim anything that either I didn't already know or that couldn't be backed up by searching MSDN.
Do you _really_ think Microsoft _cares_ about/.? You're fooling yourself if you think/. matters to them. I doubt they even care that much about Linux, to be honest with you; Linux is a convenient buzzword to pull out at the trial when they're bleating on about how much competition there is in the market, that's all.
Not completely true... it is possible to change this. You have to adjust the MIME type definition for.DOC so that IE doesn't load it inline (when installed IE sets this property to true for all Office documents).
Right, but Word's not really _designed_ for that, is it? It's a word processor, not a layout engine. If you want that, then you go Quark or Adobe (or LaTeX, or, God forbid, Microsoft Publisher).
I don't think it's fair to lambast Word for something it wasn't really designed to do. Having said that, Word 97/2000 do offer precise positioning of frames (you have to turn off snap-to-grid), text flow, and graphic anti-aliasing (for bitmap formats, not vectors [dunno why]).
Did I miss something? Did Microsoft cancel the W2K launch at the last moment? Did the spooks cover it up? No, everybody else is reporting the news except/.
If the W2K launch isn't "News for Nerds", then I'm afraid I don't know what is. A Linux kernel update is "News for Nerds", but the most anticipated OS release in the past two years isn't?
Today is a new low for/. Congratulations. Long live media bias!
(And don't flame me with "but this is a Linux news site" - the site specifically says "News for Nerds", not "News for Linux Nerds".)
Ok, so it says it's got an "embedded Internet Web Browser, E-Mail"...
I wonder what they're using for this.
Can't be Netscape. The last thing you want is for your tech support people to be getting calls from customsers 'cause their PDA keeps on crashing (or, at least, appears to).
Mozilla? Shows a lot of promise, but you wouldn't load Alpha software onto a commercial product.
Opera?
Hmm...
And another thing is - how does the GPL come into play here? Now, I genuinely am rusty on this, so this may be a silly question. But if they're using Linux, do they have to distribute the source? (Or at least provide it somehow?) Or does that only come into play if you're actually releasing a distribution?
Finally - the specs mention USB. Anybody care to comment on this? I was under the impression USB was not one of Linux's strong points... is this the case, or has progress been made (to the point where a digital camera can just be plugged in and it will work, which is what this thing is going to require if they expect to sell any...)
... instead of teaching the corporations about the benefits of open development, I think that open source leaders are in for a lesson themselves. They won't have beaten the corporations by having joined them. Rather, it will be the other way around.
I didn't realise that the goal of Linux was to "beat" anybody. I thought the goal of Linux, in its role as part of the Free Software Foundation's vision, was to provide a free (libre) UNIX-like operating environment that people who valued their freedom had an alternative to closed-sourced environments.
Or am I missing something?
Cheers, Alastair
PS - and what's up with/.'s Extrans post mode? It's outputting HTML tags as plain text instead of interpreting them (at least in my browser)... I had to post this as "HTML Formatted".
There are bugs in NT, serious security ones that MS has known about that they can't or won't fix because they would require major rewrites, they also don't mention these.
If they haven't been mentioned, then how do you know about them?:)
That is my major issue with MS, that they release shoddy products and don't seem to care or want to always fix them.
I think there's a difference between some bugs and a "shoddy" (which to me says "poorly designed; rushed") product. And I think you'll find Microsoft is pretty proactive about fixing Windows NT and W2K. The bug-to-patch turnaround time for NT is about 16 days; that's less than Sun's average bug-to-patch turnaround time, and only just above Redhat's (~11-12 days).
11 days doesn't seem too bad, given that there must be a fair amount of discovery and regression testing involved. Obviously the faster the better - 1 or 2 days would be nice.
Virtually all software is in perpetual beta, because virtually all software development methodologies are incapable of producing anything better in realistic timeframes.
Along with: obsurd memory requirements to support a small number of users, random crashes, application security problems (peoplesoft and certain virus scanners), administration nightmares and daily reboots.
And the sad thing is that dealing with that is preferable to administering a network of Windows 98 boxes:)
I'd rather deal with the problems you mention above (you _are_ exaggerating a bit, though! aren't you?) on one box than on an entire network of 'em.
One of the main difficulties with windows apps over a network is that they have no concept of mutiple users and file permissions. For instance, the Normal.dot template in word must be writable by all users, usually resulting in some wonderful macro viruses.
Good point. I think Office 2000 (and new versions of apps from other vendors, I'm sure) are much better at working in a multi-user environment. Remember that older apps didn't realise they could ever be run multi-user, so resource (e.g. file) contention wasn't really seen as a problem...
I'm going to correct myself, before somebody else does...
Once you get past the cost of Windows 2000 Server itself, you've got a free (beer) thin-client Win32 solution.
I've just remembered that this isn't correct. With Microsoft Terminal Services, you have to pay a per-client license; it's a Windows NT Workstation license, because "you're getting Windows NT functionality". So 400 Linux desktops means 400 NT wks licenses.
Now all of a sudden the GraphOn licensing looks _really_ attractive:)
The question is, do Citrix clients work with Microsoft Terminal Services?
I'm pretty sure it's a moot point, though, because I'm still pretty certain that MTS only supports Win32 and Win16 clients.
Yes, this is interesting. Windows 2000 Server has built-in terminal services, and Citrix does indeed offer a free Linux client. Once you get past the cost of Windows 2000 Server itself, you've got a free (beer) thin-client Win32 solution. Contrast with GraphOn, where you need to buy the Bridges software itself, in addition to any Windows server costs.
The question is, do Citrix clients work with Microsoft Terminal Services? I'm pretty sure I read somewhere some time ago that MTS is a wounded version of Citrix that only supports Win32 and Win16 clients. If that's no longer the case (or if it never was the case) then this is significant. If this is still the case, then (all other things being equal) the GraphOn solution becomes more attractive, because its licensing is better (Citrix metaframe is a per-client license on the server, IIRC).
The fact is that Corel has historically (and rather tragically) always tried to offer its own solutions rather than use anything even remotely associated with Microsoft. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it may have influenced their decision to go with GraphOn rather than Citrix, assuming the products are functionally identical. But until somebody can confirm that the Citrix Linux client works with Microsoft's MTS, I'm not sure that's true.
This product is not like VNC. It can remote display a single application running on a remote NT server on the local *nix desktop. But the remote app itself is never displayed on the remote server. This product isn't a "screen scraper" like VNC or PCAnywhere.
Even under single-user NT, it is a multi-user product, because screen and/or input device contention is not an issue.
1) Inconsistency. Is the file system bassed in a "my computer", or in a: c: etc drives? depends what you ask. Why does "my computer" look ike a normal directory but you can't add things to it? How come you can see the treeview in one way of accessing the filesystem, but not another? Is the file system capable of long names, or only 8.3 ones? Too many different ways of doing the same thing, each with differing side effects and capabilities.
The file system is based in drives. The drives are based in My Computer. What's so strange about that? Would you like a file system on your monitor? No, didn't think so... but the monitor has to logically be grouped somewhere, and My Computer is the place for that.
You can always see either Tree or List Views, no matter where abouts you are. Right click on any object: Open gives you a List View, Explore gives you a Tree View. Quite consistent.
The file system is capable of long filenames. I don't see where confusion over 8.3 comes from, unless you're referring to Microsoft's continued (and, I agree, somewhat braindead) usage of 8.3 filenames in the SYSTEM directory (no long names on DLLs, etc.).
You can add stuff to My Computer. Plug in a scanner, a camera, a zip disk, etc., and it appears in My Computer.
I agree that there are many ways of achieving the same thing. I think any Perl programmer will tell you that this is A Good Thing, because the system is able to adapt to your work methods, rather than you having to adapt your work methods to the system.
2) Spurious crap. Internet explorer as a window viewer. Half the dir window taken up by a pane full of non-useful info. The MSDOS underpinnings. A start bar, desktop icons, a MSOffice toolbar, all to launch apps in different ways.
IE as a window viewer is a personal choice, I guess. I used to hate it too, but IE 5 has finally won me over. It takes quite a bit of grunt to render it all, though. Conceptually I like the idea of a single browser for local files and remote content. I think ultimately it's a personal choice though. I think there should be a way to disable the integration for those who don't like it.
It's quite easy to remove and/or customise (via HTML) all that extra stuff rendered in the file views.
MS-DOS compatibility is part of Windows' legacy, in the same way that sh (or any other shell) is part of GTK and KDE's legacy. It's generally hidden from the GUI, though - you have to specifically invoke a command shell to see it.
The MS Office toolbar (which is not installed by default in 97 or 2000, I believe) is not part of the base Windows GUI - it's app specific, so beyond the scope of this discussion. Windows is document centric, so of course there are multiple ways to launch documents and their parent applications. And of course you don't have to use all the methods available. You can ignore the methods you don't like.
3) Un-protected access to stuff you absolutely do not wish to touch (unless you are very fond of the color blue). Complicated and hard ways of altering things you frequently want to alter.
Um, I think this is a security gripe. It's nothing to do with the GUI. Try deleting system stuff on a decently admin'd Windows NT box.
Which things do you frequently want to alter, and in what way is it hard to do so? In Linux, you drop down to a command line for repetitive stuff; same in Windows with Windows Scripting Host (VB-based commandline).
4) The fact that it's designed to fulfil the interests of M$ over your own, where they conflict.
I agree that using IE as a file browser is self-serving for MS. Is that what you're referring to? Or do you have something else in mind...?
5) minor design faux-pas like putting the quit command in the file menu, or putting scroll bar arrowheads at each end
The thing I dislike most is the fact that app close buttons are right next to app min and max buttons. I think that's a fairly major design flaw. I know the close button is slightly offset from the others, but it's still too damn close...:)
All current GUIs have little bits and bobs like this which some people like and others don't. I think Windows' major failing is that it's too hard to customise some of this stuff; e.g. I should be able to move the app close button around and put it where I want, but I can't do this.
6) no security worth spit
Irrelevant to a discussion of the GUI. Again, see Windows NT.
SQL Server 7 is a complete rewrite and no longer includes Sybase code. Sybase could open-source their old stuff and it wouldn't have any effect on MS.
Re:The word you are looking for is distribution.
on
RMS The Coder
·
· Score: 1
No, NT _is_ the kernel. Win32 is one of the pluggable subsystems that rides above the kernel. NT + subsystems + IE (Win32 subsystem required) = OS according to MS, I guess:)
Hopefully by the time this actually becomes a problem (any bets on when AI is going to actually happen? It's been more delayed than W2K), we will have ditched the patent scheme and consigned it to the rubbish bin...
Slashdot Mirror
Thanks a bunch for calling New Zealand and New Zealanders stupid. We really appreciate it. Great way to advance your argument.
The sad thing is, you probably consider yourself a free speech advocate, too :)
/.? You're fooling yourself if you think /. matters to them. I doubt they even care that much about Linux, to be honest with you; Linux is a convenient buzzword to pull out at the trial when they're bleating on about how much competition there is in the market, that's all.
Just because TummyX likes Microsoft doesn't mean he's spreading FUD. I've never seen him claim anything that either I didn't already know or that couldn't be backed up by searching MSDN.
Do you _really_ think Microsoft _cares_ about
Not completely true... it is possible to change this. You have to adjust the MIME type definition for .DOC so that IE doesn't load it inline (when installed IE sets this property to true for all Office documents).
See My Computer -> View | Folder Options.
Right, but Word's not really _designed_ for that, is it? It's a word processor, not a layout engine. If you want that, then you go Quark or Adobe (or LaTeX, or, God forbid, Microsoft Publisher).
I don't think it's fair to lambast Word for something it wasn't really designed to do. Having said that, Word 97/2000 do offer precise positioning of frames (you have to turn off snap-to-grid), text flow, and graphic anti-aliasing (for bitmap formats, not vectors [dunno why]).
Did I miss something? Did Microsoft cancel the W2K launch at the last moment? Did the spooks cover it up? No, everybody else is reporting the news except /.
/. Congratulations. Long live media bias!
/.
If the W2K launch isn't "News for Nerds", then I'm afraid I don't know what is. A Linux kernel update is "News for Nerds", but the most anticipated OS release in the past two years isn't?
Today is a new low for
(And don't flame me with "but this is a Linux news site" - the site specifically says "News for Nerds", not "News for Linux Nerds".)
Open soure. Closed minds. We are
Someone for whom English was a second language. Check the TLD: .kr
Ok, so it says it's got an "embedded Internet Web Browser, E-Mail"...
I wonder what they're using for this.
Can't be Netscape. The last thing you want is for your tech support people to be getting calls from customsers 'cause their PDA keeps on crashing (or, at least, appears to).
Mozilla? Shows a lot of promise, but you wouldn't load Alpha software onto a commercial product.
Opera?
Hmm...
And another thing is - how does the GPL come into play here? Now, I genuinely am rusty on this, so this may be a silly question. But if they're using Linux, do they have to distribute the source? (Or at least provide it somehow?) Or does that only come into play if you're actually releasing a distribution?
Finally - the specs mention USB. Anybody care to comment on this? I was under the impression USB was not one of Linux's strong points... is this the case, or has progress been made (to the point where a digital camera can just be plugged in and it will work, which is what this thing is going to require if they expect to sell any...)
Cheers,
Alastair
If a rising tide lifts all boats, does a lowering tide (e.g. the shady dealings surrounding LinuxOne) lower all boats?
That is, does one dodgy operation affect the credibility of all?
Cheers
Alastair
I didn't realise that the goal of Linux was to "beat" anybody. I thought the goal of Linux, in its role as part of the Free Software Foundation's vision, was to provide a free (libre) UNIX-like operating environment that people who valued their freedom had an alternative to closed-sourced environments.
Or am I missing something?
Cheers,
Alastair
PS - and what's up with /.'s Extrans post mode? It's outputting HTML tags as plain text instead of interpreting them (at least in my browser)... I had to post this as "HTML Formatted".
There are bugs in NT, serious security ones that MS has known about that they can't or won't fix because they would require major rewrites, they also don't mention these.
:)
If they haven't been mentioned, then how do you know about them?
That is my major issue with MS, that they release shoddy products and don't seem to care or want to always fix them.
I think there's a difference between some bugs and a "shoddy" (which to me says "poorly designed; rushed") product. And I think you'll find Microsoft is pretty proactive about fixing Windows NT and W2K. The bug-to-patch turnaround time for NT is about 16 days; that's less than Sun's average bug-to-patch turnaround time, and only just above Redhat's (~11-12 days).
11 days doesn't seem too bad, given that there must be a fair amount of discovery and regression testing involved. Obviously the faster the better - 1 or 2 days would be nice.
;)
It's better than Sun's average, anyway
Virtually all software is in perpetual beta, because virtually all software development methodologies are incapable of producing anything better in realistic timeframes.
It seemed that IE4 had repartitioned the users hard disk
/. for 18 months now.
Oh, please. This is the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard, and I've been reading anti-Microsoft flamage on
You may not like IE, and that's fine, 'cause it's a free world; but for goodness sake, stick to the facts.
The Amiga version of Virus works under UAE.
Along with: obsurd memory requirements to support a small number of users, random crashes, application security problems (peoplesoft and certain virus scanners), administration nightmares and daily reboots.
:)
And the sad thing is that dealing with that is preferable to administering a network of Windows 98 boxes
I'd rather deal with the problems you mention above (you _are_ exaggerating a bit, though! aren't you?) on one box than on an entire network of 'em.
No. VNC is a screen scraper. GraphOn (like Citrix Metaframe) is a multi-user remote application server.
One of the main difficulties with windows apps over a network is that they have no concept of mutiple users and file permissions. For instance, the Normal.dot template in word must be writable by all users, usually resulting in some wonderful macro viruses.
Good point. I think Office 2000 (and new versions of apps from other vendors, I'm sure) are much better at working in a multi-user environment. Remember that older apps didn't realise they could ever be run multi-user, so resource (e.g. file) contention wasn't really seen as a problem...
I'm going to correct myself, before somebody else does...
:)
Once you get past the cost of Windows 2000 Server itself, you've got a free (beer) thin-client Win32 solution.
I've just remembered that this isn't correct. With Microsoft Terminal Services, you have to pay a per-client license; it's a Windows NT Workstation license, because "you're getting Windows NT functionality". So 400 Linux desktops means 400 NT wks licenses.
Now all of a sudden the GraphOn licensing looks _really_ attractive
The question is, do Citrix clients work with Microsoft Terminal Services?
I'm pretty sure it's a moot point, though, because I'm still pretty certain that MTS only supports Win32 and Win16 clients.
Go read that patent. It's _extremely_ specific, and doesn't affect (for example) screen scraper software like VNC or PCAnywhere.
/., I think.
One of the most reasonable patents ever mentioned on
Yes, this is interesting. Windows 2000 Server has built-in terminal services, and Citrix does indeed offer a free Linux client. Once you get past the cost of Windows 2000 Server itself, you've got a free (beer) thin-client Win32 solution. Contrast with GraphOn, where you need to buy the Bridges software itself, in addition to any Windows server costs.
The question is, do Citrix clients work with Microsoft Terminal Services? I'm pretty sure I read somewhere some time ago that MTS is a wounded version of Citrix that only supports Win32 and Win16 clients. If that's no longer the case (or if it never was the case) then this is significant. If this is still the case, then (all other things being equal) the GraphOn solution becomes more attractive, because its licensing is better (Citrix metaframe is a per-client license on the server, IIRC).
FWIW, the URL for the Linux client download is http://download.citrix. com/cgi-bin/license.cgi?client=linux. Maybe someone with an existing MTS setup can see if this works?
The fact is that Corel has historically (and rather tragically) always tried to offer its own solutions rather than use anything even remotely associated with Microsoft. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it may have influenced their decision to go with GraphOn rather than Citrix, assuming the products are functionally identical. But until somebody can confirm that the Citrix Linux client works with Microsoft's MTS, I'm not sure that's true.
This product is not like VNC. It can remote display a single application running on a remote NT server on the local *nix desktop. But the remote app itself is never displayed on the remote server. This product isn't a "screen scraper" like VNC or PCAnywhere.
Even under single-user NT, it is a multi-user product, because screen and/or input device contention is not an issue.
Ok, I'll take the challenge... :)
:)
1) Inconsistency. Is the file system bassed in a "my computer", or in a: c: etc drives? depends what you ask. Why does "my computer" look ike a normal directory but you can't add things to it? How come you can see the treeview in one way of accessing the filesystem, but not another? Is the file system capable of long names, or only 8.3 ones? Too many different ways of doing the same thing, each with differing side effects and capabilities.
The file system is based in drives. The drives are based in My Computer. What's so strange about that? Would you like a file system on your monitor? No, didn't think so... but the monitor has to logically be grouped somewhere, and My Computer is the place for that.
You can always see either Tree or List Views, no matter where abouts you are. Right click on any object: Open gives you a List View, Explore gives you a Tree View. Quite consistent.
The file system is capable of long filenames. I don't see where confusion over 8.3 comes from, unless you're referring to Microsoft's continued (and, I agree, somewhat braindead) usage of 8.3 filenames in the SYSTEM directory (no long names on DLLs, etc.).
You can add stuff to My Computer. Plug in a scanner, a camera, a zip disk, etc., and it appears in My Computer.
I agree that there are many ways of achieving the same thing. I think any Perl programmer will tell you that this is A Good Thing, because the system is able to adapt to your work methods, rather than you having to adapt your work methods to the system.
2) Spurious crap. Internet explorer as a window viewer. Half the dir window taken up by a pane full of non-useful info. The MSDOS underpinnings. A start bar, desktop icons, a MSOffice toolbar, all to launch apps in different ways.
IE as a window viewer is a personal choice, I guess. I used to hate it too, but IE 5 has finally won me over. It takes quite a bit of grunt to render it all, though. Conceptually I like the idea of a single browser for local files and remote content. I think ultimately it's a personal choice though. I think there should be a way to disable the integration for those who don't like it.
It's quite easy to remove and/or customise (via HTML) all that extra stuff rendered in the file views.
MS-DOS compatibility is part of Windows' legacy, in the same way that sh (or any other shell) is part of GTK and KDE's legacy. It's generally hidden from the GUI, though - you have to specifically invoke a command shell to see it.
The MS Office toolbar (which is not installed by default in 97 or 2000, I believe) is not part of the base Windows GUI - it's app specific, so beyond the scope of this discussion. Windows is document centric, so of course there are multiple ways to launch documents and their parent applications. And of course you don't have to use all the methods available. You can ignore the methods you don't like.
3) Un-protected access to stuff you absolutely do not wish to touch (unless you are very fond of the color blue). Complicated and hard ways of altering things you frequently want to alter.
Um, I think this is a security gripe. It's nothing to do with the GUI. Try deleting system stuff on a decently admin'd Windows NT box.
Which things do you frequently want to alter, and in what way is it hard to do so? In Linux, you drop down to a command line for repetitive stuff; same in Windows with Windows Scripting Host (VB-based commandline).
4) The fact that it's designed to fulfil the interests of M$ over your own, where they conflict.
I agree that using IE as a file browser is self-serving for MS. Is that what you're referring to? Or do you have something else in mind...?
5) minor design faux-pas like putting the quit command in the file menu, or putting scroll bar arrowheads at each end
The thing I dislike most is the fact that app close buttons are right next to app min and max buttons. I think that's a fairly major design flaw. I know the close button is slightly offset from the others, but it's still too damn close...
All current GUIs have little bits and bobs like this which some people like and others don't. I think Windows' major failing is that it's too hard to customise some of this stuff; e.g. I should be able to move the app close button around and put it where I want, but I can't do this.
6) no security worth spit
Irrelevant to a discussion of the GUI. Again, see Windows NT.
SQL Server 7 is a complete rewrite and no longer includes Sybase code. Sybase could open-source their old stuff and it wouldn't have any effect on MS.
No, NT _is_ the kernel. Win32 is one of the pluggable subsystems that rides above the kernel. NT + subsystems + IE (Win32 subsystem required) = OS according to MS, I guess :)
Hopefully by the time this actually becomes a problem (any bets on when AI is going to actually happen? It's been more delayed than W2K), we will have ditched the patent scheme and consigned it to the rubbish bin...