We should all volunteer to help our local school districts realize how much money is wasted on MS licensing. And then volunteer (maybe as a group of people) to help switch them from Microsoft products to Opensource products. We can make each school realize that getting rid of proprietary licensing will save them enough to purchase X number of new PC's, or new books, or hell hire a couple more teachers to get the student/teacher ratio down.
Who do you think Corporate Manager's are going to send to work for the Gov't? They are going to get rid of the most incompetent buffoons they have in their organization - whether they are techies, managers or project managers. Corporate Managers would love to be rid of some of these people that cause daily headaches!
Same may also be true if there is any truth to the feeling I get when reading other posts - that the Gov't IT workforce is possibly a bunch of slackers anyhow.
Private industry and Gov't are just going to trade their least successful people!
This would be a great opportunity for companies like Sun, Red Hat, IBM, etc. to purchase two of these Unisys ES7000 servers, and donate them to an independent reviewing company. Have the reviewers load a *NIX data center solution on one and a Microsoft's Windows 2000 data center solution on the other. Then compare performance, maintainabilty, price, scalability, etc. This would put the ol' kebosh on Microsoft's typical FUD campaign.
Sun's remedies include a "Permanent injunction requiring Microsoft to:
Disclose and license proprietary interfaces, protocols and formats.
Unbundle tied products like Internet Explorer, IIS and.NET framework."
It is amazing that the disclosure of proprietary interfaces, protocols, etc (Open Source) can be the single solution to Microsoft's violation of 7 (summary different anti-trust laws.
She implied that HP needs Compaq in order to save its printing and imaging business, according to the Jan. 14 article.
This is understandable. Xerox just dumped it's SOHO (small office/home office) printing unit last year. The reason: you can't make money on the printers, just the supplies.
If the market is saturated now for inkjets, then they are losing money if they are still manufacturing the printers. HP's have a really high quality, unless you are playing basketball with it. So people don't replace printers unless they want higher resolution (digital cameras). Now that resolutions are picture quality, the only optimization is speed. Who cares if the new model prints at 8PPM instead of 6PPM, it's not like you sit there staring at the printer while it works. You surf the web, play solitaire, or do your bills.
Lets see...
Washington Post article says 7 million copies have been sold since launch.
If it takes an IT person 10 minutes to download/fix (optimistic) then: 7,000,000 X 10 = 70,000,000
70,000,000 min / 60 min/hour = 1,166,666 hours
1,166,666 hours X $15/hour = $17,499,999
Is there anything that can be done to prevent MS from continuing their bashing of competition?
This should only go so far, MS has the marketing and PR capability to spread a lot of FUD. They are doing this because there isn't any specific company or persons that they are bashing. IANAL, but isn't this something similar to defamation of character?
Because of MS's wealth and market dominance, much of the general public will just believe what they say. I fear that MS will continue its practices until the Open Source/Linux community can put together a PR/marketing organization that will squash any/all FUD coming out of Redmond. It doesn't need to be a for-profit thing, just an Open Source organization that will promote Open Source products/markets/etc. and organize rebuttals to MS when they put out the FUD spread.
I agree. I currently work on HR systems for a large technology company and getting people their pay/benefits isn't something you want to mess around with. We run Sun/Solaris and Oracle here because you need to have 24/7 support should something happen to either hardware or software. This just doesn't exist in the marketplace for Linux at the same level as it does for Sun/Oracle.
If I were running a small business it may be an option, but when you have 95,000 employees, you need to have something that you can depend on.
I think a common misconception with the general public is that everything in computers/IT is 1 market. Once you are in the IT business, there are so many different areas that they really should be thought of as distinct markets. People don't generally think that General Electric is a monopoly, but they have a vast array of products that are all really based on power generation/electricity. But their products are thought of as being in different markets.
Maybe a good way to monitor MS is to group each distinct market (OS, Office suite, games, hardware, etc.) into wholly owned subsidiaries that would then be forced to compete against others in their market.
This would also take some of the financial punch out of some of MS's crappy products that can float around for a couple of years because they can accept losses until they dominate that market.
This may help change people's mindset that IT is one market, when in fact it is several.
I completely agree. I have tried Everquest and was extremely bored. I have a hard time convincing myself that it is ok to drop $50 on a game because I worry that I am going to solve it over the weekend or become bored to the point that my drool short-circuits the keyboard. Then throw in the fact that you have to pay to play, I would get more enjoyment of going to the local arcade with a roll of quarters.
Maybe one of the MMORPG's would be worth it if you could earn points or something towards tangible items. Then it may be worth it to pay and play, kinda like skeeball!
MicroSoft should be suitably punished for incorporating IE into the Windows OS. A suitable punishment for that could be to force them to release source code for IE (present and future versions), and any future (for 3-5 years?) API's that will leverage their monopoly of web browser market share. This should include their.Net stuff and server code like IIS.
This would level the playing field for a while, and wouldn't prevent them from innovating.
They also should be forced to release (for free) the API's that tie into the OS, so other companies can release software that will leverage the OS the same way MicroSoft does.
If it is MicroSoft's job to "manage software updates and security patches while making sure the multitude of software packages don't conflict with each other" then aren't they partly liable for all of the Code Red, Nimda and whatever the next gaping security hole is in their software?
Also, if they claim this is their job, then maybe they are also partly liable for millions of lost revenue from companies (Amazon?) that have had problems with MicroSoft products conflicting with eachother.
All the OEM's have to do is just include the install files for the JRE. Then when the consumer/end user receives the PC they ordered, just have some initial setup program run that will install the JRE after user clicks on the current license.
At least this will save a lot of downloading time on the end users part.
Ummm, you are obviously NOT well versed on Java. It is used for a lot more than just Applets. In fact a lot of web programming is changing to Java Servlets/JSP. And Enterprise Java Beans are excellent should the need arise for component based development involving multiple systems while enforcing security, transactions, database connections, etc.
You also can write solid client/server systems in Java, and network programming with sockets or RMI, or using it on the command line to process text files into a database, or interfaces on cell phones/printers/copiers/Palm devices or.... get the point?
Java has strict typing, and is an excellent learning language because you can learn the introductory fundamentals of programming very easily. Not to mention the fact that it can introduce many different aspects of programming to a student (GUI/event programming, network programming, OOP, database interaction, etc.) without having to learn another language/environment or some 3rd party libraries.
If you are teaching an OOP class then your goal is to teach OOP. Java is a perfect choice because it has strict typing, memory management and is system independent. This is perfect for an introductory class in OOP.
The professor's should stress in any CS class that the students should choose the best tool for the task at hand. I have seen many instances where someone had programmed something in a language because that was the language they knew/adored/cherished/whatever. They should have looked for a tool to suit the task, not attempting to adapt a tool to the task.
You can hang a picture on the wall by using the end of a screwdriver to pound the nail in, but you should probably use a hammer instead.
Java may not be the best tool for low level programming, but for learning OOP it is a good choice. Actually it is a good choice for any complex OOP tasks because it takes care of a lot for you.
It looks like Sony is heading towards creating an appliance that you can just plug in and start playing games, watching DVD's, surfing the web, instant messaging, etc.
This makes a lot more sense to the average consumer that just wants to get on the web, have a game console for their kids and not have to worry about device drivers, software upgrades, "is my system compatible with yours" and all of the other B.S. that is associated with having a PC.
The only caveat being that they have to ensure that they're going to have a fast, stable system that is easily maintained (maybe using a broadband connection to do automatic upgrades).
And the best part is, you don't have to spend money on a monitor!
Slashdot Mirror
I have - I just install Win98 for gaming and NT4 for business stuff. If I had a copy of Win2000 I would probably prefer that.
What are the differences betweeen WinXP (home) and Win98? Don't even tell me it's more stable - its still Windows
We should all volunteer to help our local school districts realize how much money is wasted on MS licensing. And then volunteer (maybe as a group of people) to help switch them from Microsoft products to Opensource products. We can make each school realize that getting rid of proprietary licensing will save them enough to purchase X number of new PC's, or new books, or hell hire a couple more teachers to get the student/teacher ratio down.
Same may also be true if there is any truth to the feeling I get when reading other posts - that the Gov't IT workforce is possibly a bunch of slackers anyhow.
Private industry and Gov't are just going to trade their least successful people!
This would be a great opportunity for companies like Sun, Red Hat, IBM, etc. to purchase two of these Unisys ES7000 servers, and donate them to an independent reviewing company. Have the reviewers load a *NIX data center solution on one and a Microsoft's Windows 2000 data center solution on the other. Then compare performance, maintainabilty, price, scalability, etc. This would put the ol' kebosh on Microsoft's typical FUD campaign.
It is amazing that the disclosure of proprietary interfaces, protocols, etc (Open Source) can be the single solution to Microsoft's violation of 7 (summary different anti-trust laws.
Knuth
This is understandable. Xerox just dumped it's SOHO (small office/home office) printing unit last year. The reason: you can't make money on the printers, just the supplies.
If the market is saturated now for inkjets, then they are losing money if they are still manufacturing the printers. HP's have a really high quality, unless you are playing basketball with it. So people don't replace printers unless they want higher resolution (digital cameras). Now that resolutions are picture quality, the only optimization is speed. Who cares if the new model prints at 8PPM instead of 6PPM, it's not like you sit there staring at the printer while it works. You surf the web, play solitaire, or do your bills.
If it takes an IT person 10 minutes to download/fix (optimistic) then:
7,000,000 X 10 = 70,000,000
70,000,000 min / 60 min/hour = 1,166,666 hours
1,166,666 hours X $15/hour = $17,499,999
Ok, I'll be nice and round down to $15 million.
Someone send Mr. Bill Gates an invoice!
This should only go so far, MS has the marketing and PR capability to spread a lot of FUD. They are doing this because there isn't any specific company or persons that they are bashing. IANAL, but isn't this something similar to defamation of character?
Because of MS's wealth and market dominance, much of the general public will just believe what they say. I fear that MS will continue its practices until the Open Source/Linux community can put together a PR/marketing organization that will squash any/all FUD coming out of Redmond. It doesn't need to be a for-profit thing, just an Open Source organization that will promote Open Source products/markets/etc. and organize rebuttals to MS when they put out the FUD spread.
If I were running a small business it may be an option, but when you have 95,000 employees, you need to have something that you can depend on.
Bottom line: You get what you pay for!
Maybe a good way to monitor MS is to group each distinct market (OS, Office suite, games, hardware, etc.) into wholly owned subsidiaries that would then be forced to compete against others in their market. This would also take some of the financial punch out of some of MS's crappy products that can float around for a couple of years because they can accept losses until they dominate that market.
This may help change people's mindset that IT is one market, when in fact it is several.
Maybe one of the MMORPG's would be worth it if you could earn points or something towards tangible items. Then it may be worth it to pay and play, kinda like skeeball!
This would level the playing field for a while, and wouldn't prevent them from innovating.
They also should be forced to release (for free) the API's that tie into the OS, so other companies can release software that will leverage the OS the same way MicroSoft does.
Also, if they claim this is their job, then maybe they are also partly liable for millions of lost revenue from companies (Amazon?) that have had problems with MicroSoft products conflicting with eachother.
At least this will save a lot of downloading time on the end users part.
Ummm, you are obviously NOT well versed on Java. It is used for a lot more than just Applets. In fact a lot of web programming is changing to Java Servlets/JSP. And Enterprise Java Beans are excellent should the need arise for component based development involving multiple systems while enforcing security, transactions, database connections, etc.
.... get the point?
You also can write solid client/server systems in Java, and network programming with sockets or RMI, or using it on the command line to process text files into a database, or interfaces on cell phones/printers/copiers/Palm devices or
Java has strict typing, and is an excellent learning language because you can learn the introductory fundamentals of programming very easily. Not to mention the fact that it can introduce many different aspects of programming to a student (GUI/event programming, network programming, OOP, database interaction, etc.) without having to learn another language/environment or some 3rd party libraries.
If you are teaching an OOP class then your goal is to teach OOP. Java is a perfect choice because it has strict typing, memory management and is system independent. This is perfect for an introductory class in OOP.
The professor's should stress in any CS class that the students should choose the best tool for the task at hand. I have seen many instances where someone had programmed something in a language because that was the language they knew/adored/cherished/whatever. They should have looked for a tool to suit the task, not attempting to adapt a tool to the task.
You can hang a picture on the wall by using the end of a screwdriver to pound the nail in, but you should probably use a hammer instead.
Java may not be the best tool for low level programming, but for learning OOP it is a good choice. Actually it is a good choice for any complex OOP tasks because it takes care of a lot for you.
This makes a lot more sense to the average consumer that just wants to get on the web, have a game console for their kids and not have to worry about device drivers, software upgrades, "is my system compatible with yours" and all of the other B.S. that is associated with having a PC.
The only caveat being that they have to ensure that they're going to have a fast, stable system that is easily maintained (maybe using a broadband connection to do automatic upgrades). And the best part is, you don't have to spend money on a monitor!