As someone who's been running it for several months at home and in a work situation as a test the answer is yes it's better. Lycoris has not once not found common hardware thrown at it (unlike Mandrake) it requires very little configuration (great for a home or corporate user) and it's stable (not one crash on equipment mandrake used to lock up on)
They are slicker and they don't have top fold into anything - they might actually make it works and why should they have to give into a bigger distro, what are Mandrake and Red Hat supposed to suddenly be like MS and buy up any competition ?
There are many reasons Lycoris should be slicker, if they have done a better job then they have - and do not forget that they have done the work to make a DESKTOP only os, the others are server class with a desktop possible installs - not a dedicated desktop.
The lycoris update process is Painless and simple - it asks for the root password if it needs to install anything new and otherwise it's just some progress bars and informatipon on the updates - simple and efffective
Im all for one single simple linux i can use in a corporate environment out of the box - the other 400 are great but every user has different needs
Monolinux is carrying a review of lycoris in 2 parts written by a corporate IT manager and looking at lycoris from a possible business desktop use, its a good read and less hype filled and believable than MSNBC's - i reccomend it.
It's BSD/Apache as a quick check of a million other posts on this and other sites would have found out and even the site in question would have told you. Microsoft runs BSD and UNIX very heavily internally and has done since the network was first set up
Now why they would choose apache over IIS is up to you to guess ?
I apologised for my error and i didnt bash the product - i have bought every one of valves releases and until i contacted them i had no idea what the issue was, the documentation on the site wasn' good enough.
If you do some investigating on this subject you will find another post by me in which i support and proclaim valve for the quality of the product.
I apologised and used my logged in name for it thus risking losing karma. I have never karma whored and worked damn hard to build it up BUT the right thing to do is apolgise if you make an error.
As for the conspiracy theory stuff, read some of my other posts - im not a linux zealot, i often post supporting MS.
I apologise - in a conversation with tech support on the forum i have discovered that their keygen had an issue and didnt work properly thats why it asked me for the CC number.
It does that without the secret code as its a full working version of the client they will be using.
I have now downloaded the software and played half life, i have a post in the same story about it an i can say that it appears to work as advertised.
And anybody dumb enough to write these guys a letter or an email can look forward to being hassled for the rest of their lives by scientology mail, phone calls and personal visits, thats assuming they dont just sue them for their trouble.
These guys play for keeps - read the xenu.net site, you dont provoke them for fun as they WILL destroy your reputation and your life, they think nothing of spreading false stories about people being criminals and or even child molesters.
They are a dangerous group of people and you should carefully investigate them before taking them on this is not an example of MS suing someone or a hacker being charged - this is a group who broke into the IRS and copied files, who have been accused of murder, false imprisonment and brainwashing, have been banned as illegal in a number of countries.
SO- a warning to the/. users who see them selves as white knights and crusaders. Unless you are prepared to be attacked, lose your ISP, maybe your job and carerr DO NOT mess with these people lightly.
They have some very educated and technically skilled people so be carefull and make sure ANYTHING you do or say against them is done anonymously.
And i can speak from experience,i lost an ISP account for posting certain comments to newsgroups about them and a really nice cease and desist letter. I have moved 5 times and i still get mail from them, i dont know how they do it but they have to have sources inside australia post to get it (im an aussie) and that means they can track you - im sure they do in the US.
I dont recommend the experience and everything i do know is thru anonymous sources.
After messing around on the software trying to get it working and posing some questions about it i finally got it up and running.
I run a P111 900 with 512mb ram and GeForce 2 MX 64mb over a cable modem linl. Install of the game took about 1 minute and then i was in and it runs as smooth at 1024x768 as it ever did off my pc (but i wish they could get rid of that fscking opening movie - ive seen it enough)
The interesting thin is file size. I run a firewall on my xp box (only zone alarm but it works) and it shows i donwloaded 80.1 mb. The size of the Cache directory is 565 mb. Thats some very interesting compression.
As it stands it works and i would pay a MINIMAL fee for the service is the speed would be the same. Bearing in mind im in australia and im guessing the server is not local to me its not bad and the game runs solid with about the same level change slowdown as it does off cd.
Its free but it asks for credit card details and there is no indication on the site or information about why they want it.
Plus they ask for special offer code which you dont have of course.
Why do they need my credit card? why wont they tell me why they need it ? I dont give my card number out to anyone for any verification process, its bullshit and a company the size of valve should not need it.
I wanted to try this out but i wont be doing so as i wont give them my credit card - this is a BETA test. At this point it reminds me of the famous Lindows pay $99 to beta test our software but you cant tell anyone about it or show it to anyone.
Actually they eventually lost and had many of their senior members including hubbards wife sent to jail, you see the way they were winning was using spies to break into and copy the IRS's documents and give them to them, they also did the same thing against the justice department and other departments.
The fact is that google are one of the few if only companies willing to stand up to the COS, they have deep pockets and lots of lawyers and they throw lawsuits around like confetti.
I encourage everyone to read the Clambake Site and the linked documents, and i would reccomend the books linked from it - Particularly the following
A piece of blus sky - subject of a massive lawsuit - the inside story of the church written by a former scienologist himself. L Ron Hubbard - Messiah or madman - learn the truth about the nutcase named ron
Theres many more and i encourage you to read them.
This is a church that robs its clients, asttempted to take over the british mental health system, pretty much took over the town of Clearwater, performs feudal punishments for transgressions,may have been involved in a number of murders, were caught systematically spying on the US govt including breaking into the IRS and copying court documents and much more. (read about the Sea Org, their very own navy)
they dont play games and they harrass people who go against them in ways you cannot even imagine and they have billions of dollars in money and assetts.
Read about them and learn the truth but be very carefull, these guys are very serious customers.
The spam figures amaze me, i work as an IT manager and post on many newsgroups, i have hotmail address and i spend about 12 hours a day on line yet my spam haul is about 4-5 emails a day across 6 accounts ! Yes i post to usenet and i post to support forums and i use my hotmail.
The thing is i ONLY ever give out my hotmail address when subscribing for something, I never use my personal address at all unless i know and trust the person or org. Hotmail get a lot of abuse on this site i know, and i suspect most of you havent used it in a long time - its now a very good mail system and the spam blocks work very well, you see it once you block it and you dont see it again (the only ones that dont work for this are the degree mill people who run dictionary attacks against hotmail addys from throwaway accounts; but as its one a week im not too bothered.
I dont join any open discussion newsgroups with my real addresses, i use my hotmail or more often my bigfoot auto forwarder (had it for over 6 years) and get the mail forwarded to me, i can then manage it a bit better.
So i dont understand the 30-40 emails a day, that to me is simply someone who doesnt understand how to protect themselves and uses their email everywhere.
I dont subscribe to any porn sites (have you ever heard of newsgroups btw ? they are free you know) and i would never do so using my personal email - thats just stupid, as is posting to usenet with it.
Your mail client can no doubt filter spam (i use the dreaded and horrible outlook (never had a virus from it but maybe its just my systems) and it has very effective spam filters in XP) or set up some rules to handle it - mine just gets deleted immediately (dumped to tghe deleted items)
If you're getting 40 spams a day you've been careless with your email addy and youre reaping the price.
Its something i expect an AOL newbie to do not a software developer.
True its not the worlds fastest however the poster was talking about companies selling preinstalled linux distros and thus it fits the bill, the power and value was never one of the original issues but i would point out that for a home user the lycoris machine is very good.
BTW the gateway machines do not include Shipping and come ONLY with windows XP (No linux available)thus defeating the point of the original post which was a company selling bundled linux with full support, sure you could install it yourself but the point of the whole exercise is to offer a pre loaded machine with OS support by the company, something you dont get in that case.
I could build a better machine for less or the same price myself and install linux as can anyone but in this case the company who made the distro are selling the machines pre configured and supported and that after all was the point of the original post.
A side note - Gateway have shut down in Most or Europe and Asia with massive staff cuts and write downs which might not make it the most intelligent buy as the chances of their continued financial viability past 2002 are very slim.
i saw that myself but as it comes with WIne perhaps theres a reason, maybe some IBM software or something?
or perhaps as they are refurbished they already have the windows 98 license with them as it was sold originally and as such theyve done it dual boot, im not sure but i suspect this might be the case
as a lycoris user i run it on both dual boot and single OS machines and the Dual Boots a good way to go for maximum flevibility, i can run photoshop when needed and still work in linux
lycoris offer desktop LX preinstalled on machines for $449.95 and laptops for $799.99.
The pcs are HP and laptops IBM and they come with full tech support and OS support and warranty from manuf. the PC's are new and the laptops refurbished. The prices include shipping.
PC
Hewlett Packard PC Intel Celeron 700 Mhz Processor 128MB RAM 10GB Hard Drive 8MB Integrated AGP Video 48x CD-ROM Drive 56k Modem or 10/100 Ethernet Card (NIC) Keyboard Mouse Speakers Desktop/LX Amethyst 1 Year Warranty from HP Monitor Sold Separately
Laptop IBM ThinkPad 600E 366Mhz Pentium II Processor AGP Graphics 3.5 inch Disk Drive 10 GB Hard Drive DVD ROM Drive 128/256 Std/Max RAM Dual boot Desktop/LX Amethyst & Windows® 98 13.3 inch TFT Active Matrix Screen 56k voice/fax modem 5 lbs. w/ battery Refurbished with 3 Months Limited Warranty from IBM
And im sure there are more out there.
PS on the Dell side i buy nothing but dell and i have never ever seen the linux links except on server products, the fact is that MS may have stopped them from doing or they may have not but from what i have seen Dell didnt exactly try hard in the first place and i suspect it was only ever an option to make them seem like they cared about choice. Dell have always been microsofts number one fan.
Oh and this may be offtopic but on lindows im sorry but i personally believe its vapour ware and will believe it when i see it - a company charging $99 for Beta testers to get it is not a good sign and i have yet to come across anyone who has ever used it. Until i see it i wont believe it -for now its a pretty web site and 2 screenshots that could easily be forged. Micheal Robinson marketed MP3's before and now hes marketing linux and so far all i have seen is a lawsuit he knew would be the result of the naming and one i personally believe he went looking for.
But more power to companies who ship linux preinstalled, i run lycoris and for a desktop OS its very very good.
Im surprised anyone still has it. Here in australia we pay for bandwidth used and we monitor our usage carefully, we dont dictate we simply provide guidelines (which are international for our company) and people ar expected not to go outside them. We do scan our proxy logs for certain keywords and trust me get caught looking at porn its instant dismissal - no questions.
None of my staff can bypass it as the scan results go directly to Human resources and i support it - they have no reason to be doing anything like that.
Now this might seem a bit extreme but thertes good reasons why i agree.
1. We encourage our staff to use the Net responsibly and for legitimate research and work purposes, we dont mind reading a newspaper, looking at the sports results or catching up with a hobby during their breaks.
2. We expect them to have the good sense to know what isnt appopriate and they sign a legal agreement noting they understand the conditions and the consequences of their actions BEFORE they get their login and passwords to the system.
3. its work - not home
The people on/. who whine about liberties and freedom are missing the point - its work, we pay you for a job and we pay for the resources you use and the computer you use them on - if you dont like it then find another job, internet is NOT a right.
PS we dont allow newsgroups, ICQ, IRC or Instant Messengers and we block FTP for all expect IT users - our support calls for people who have downloaded software have gone thru the floor and as its also a breach to do that people dont try it anyway.
Why did we do this?
our internet bills went thru the roof thats why and we looked at the traffic - guess what ? Porn sites, movie sites, tucows, game sites etc.
2 staff sacked for breaches and now its a whole different workplace.
I have zero tolerance for whiners, in a previous management role i was the one who had to deal with kiddie porn found on a computer by one of my support guys when he was fixing it (Aust gove so i had to call the police etc) and it was the most disgusting thing i have ever seen. Look at porn on my network get your balls lopped - what you do at home is your business and i like naked chicks as much as the next guy but i dont see it as appropriate in any circumstance for work.
PS and for those of you who think iam a nazi we also filter mail and block.mov,.mpeg,.mp3,.wav,.vbs,.js and a lot of others - we spend a lot of time securing and managing our systems and theres no work reason for any of the above products (we would block jpegs as well but they are sometimes (our work study indicates only about 30% of the time) work related.
Internet access is not a right at work, its a company provided privelege
i disagree completely - Lycoris from a user persp.
on
Lycoris Desktop/LX Review
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
I run lycoris on no fewer than 5 machines inside and outrside of a windows domain. I disagree with the 'not ready' statement and it shows that the person who commented on the article hasnt used the distro.
In all 5 cases (all different machines) it found all hardware and installed seamlessly, the video card on my personal notebook (Dell LS400) was found perfectly, something Mandrake 8 and 8.1 couldnt manage.
the Distro has built in and fully workin Div-xm,DVD, Mp3 and the Koffice suite, Samba configured to acccess windows shares by default and wine.
My home network is a windows XP pro one with a shared internet connection (dont laugh it works 100% perfectly and requires 2 seconds setup) Lycoris found it without config and worked straight away fpr all web funtions, it connects by default with my shares and it does so on windows 200 active directory as well.
In short its a desktop OS for the average user, it doesnt come with advanced features, compilers and dev tools installed but you can download and install them, its a full working simple to use and install linux distro for everyone. I gave it to my mother of all people and she loves it - it does everything she needs, loads fast, looks like fun and she can run her windows stuff.
I have given this OS to about 20 people from technical linux zealots to newbies and all of them have enjoyed using it and the newbies love it - in short its an OS i as an IT manager can roll out on a desktop, it's built on top of redhat and users RPMS which makes it great if you already have redhat servers and use the OS in your environment.
Yes it needs work but what is doesnt need is apache or any other server components, it doesnt need compilers and 10 shells instaled as a default, its a desktop linux and it works and for the first time a user doesnt need to resort to makefiles and consoles to try and get anything working in the OS (Div-x Under redhat anyone ?)
It works for what it is and its worth $29 or you can download for free.
The era we are discussing was PRE mandrake and the competiton was windows 3.1
It was stable, easy to install and worked (as does XP)
The Mandrake comment is true though - i have a computer and a notebook here that mandrake wont detect things on (Video Card in One (neomagic 128) and sound (Crystal in the other) yet Debian and Lycoris and Red hat all work perfectly.
Adn the less said about cyrix processors the better (stil the only processor i have ever seen that needed a software patch)
We all forget that Windows 3.1 was a stable and well developed OS at the time - attempting to make out that modern OSes have any relation to OS2 V1 is a laugh as standard machine build was 386 with 8mb ram and a 512k video card(1mb if you had money to burn)
And we are'nt discussing Warp VS Windows 95 BUT if you do a bit of reading you will find that on NON ibm hardware 95 with all of its problems still outperformed OS2 in most cases and was more stable (Note the bit about embedded OS2 in ATMS is true but its very very customised and stripped down and doesnt have all of the problem casuing bits (the Graphics subsystem, memory management (what a joke) and the other tripe that made OS2 such a dog. The kernel in this mode is apparently very stable but were only talking i believe IBM ATM machines and some older NCR's so it could hardly be called an industry standard.
In closing the/. attitude that windows is the root of all evil got old a long rime ago and with XP its now incorrect as well.
(i know you may be joking but im sick of it - lets move on with Linux and forget about windows and MS - its not as bad as most people on here make out and it alienates people)
I was selling this stuff on launch and the better than anything else tag is hilarious.
OS2 1 was a disaster
What about the steepest resource requirements around ? (you didnt have 24mb of ram forget it - in those days the standard systems i sold with 3.1 had 8mb) What about random crashes for no reason? buggy software ? unpredictable performance? Installations that wouldnt work for no apparent reason? Issues with Vesa equipment ? Cryix processor issues ? IBM's legendary lack of support? price of the OS - well above windows 3.1? ($50-90 more from memory) Applications that didnt work properly ?
and thats just off the top of my head
I mean come on OS2 Warp was getting there sort of but V1 was a big steaming heap. OS2 never got to the point where it could compete on stability with win3.1 and IBM's half hearted on again off again support and marketing for it didnt help.
Im intrigued as to how your going to read data from a digital format with a microscope and a camera - you can take a photo of it at any resolution and it stil wont do a damn thing - this is digital storage not analogue and no image processing program in the world could put together bits from a picture of a CD surface.
I didnt defend MS but yes its NOT spyware (IMHO) if its written in the EULA. Ignoarnce is no defence and if you can't be bothered to read the license the thats an issue for you.
Whether you agree of not once you hit i agree and install the product it isnt an invasion of your privacy as you have agreed to it.
Lycoris is very good if you want a fully working Desktop linux - its a simple lizard install and comes with lizard as the installer. Finds everything in 5 machines so far including 3 dell laptops. Div-x runs immediately and has real video and all extras installed. Comes with Koffice and Mozilla and all works fully.
It doesnt have some of the libraries and would need a bit of modifing for some things to work but as a simple and easy to use OS for a beginner to use linux or for someone who just wants a simple solution to a fully working OS with nothing extra.
I ran it primarily because i wanted an OS for div-x and multimedia on my notebook and i couldnt be bothered messing around for hours to setup all the software and drivers. It works.
Samba automatically found my Winxp Shared Internet connection and talks natively to my Windows Shares with built in samba, also talks to a Windows NT4 and Windows 2000 Active Driectory domain.
Sorry but i miss your point. Microsoft have some security issues (although a quick read or CERT will show you that so do many open source products - they dont get publicity on it) but i dont understand the point your trying to make ?
When have Microsoft ever actually included spyware in products ? (and dont talk to me about Media Player - its been in the user agreement for a long time)
This issue has nothing to do with well written or badly written code IMHO - it has to do with companies willingness to take money from anyone who comes along, NEW.NET is spyware just like Gator or Bonzi Buddy.
Holding up open source with its lack of focus, consistency and in some cases stability as a standard is not relevant to this discussion - try getting a lot of common open source software to run with minimal knowledge on a linux system - try getting an out of the box Mandrake to play DIV-X movies as a new linux user. You can't unless you know to downgrade glibc and fix the other numerous dependency issues.
The fact is Microsoft have questionable business practicies and a rapacious attitude to business ethics but the thing is the average user just doesnt care - the stuff works. They dont give a crap if its bloated or needs activation because they can walk into a store, buy a cd, install it and it just works.
The open source model makes so much sense but its no panacea to the ills of the world. The fact that spyware isnt found in open source has nothing to do with the philosophy of the product but more to do with the fact that most of the software is developed privately or not for profit. Its no gurantee of quality or well written code.
As open source grows more mature (if it survives) this problem will grow as well, just like viruses will.
Stop putting everything back on MS and accept that the world is full on unscrupulous people out to make a quick buck, they exist in all areas.
PS if you want to look at it this way im not slamming open source or trolling for microsoft in any way. Im writing this on my Lycoris box (redmond linux) and i use and like linux despite so issues with it at times, i just cant stand the attitiude that everything bad is MS and everything good is open source.
Slashdot Mirror
As someone who's been running it for several months at home and in a work situation as a test the answer is yes it's better. Lycoris has not once not found common hardware thrown at it (unlike Mandrake) it requires very little configuration (great for a home or corporate user) and it's stable (not one crash on equipment mandrake used to lock up on)
They are slicker and they don't have top fold into anything - they might actually make it works and why should they have to give into a bigger distro, what are Mandrake and Red Hat supposed to suddenly be like MS and buy up any competition ?
There are many reasons Lycoris should be slicker, if they have done a better job then they have - and do not forget that they have done the work to make a DESKTOP only os, the others are server class with a desktop possible installs - not a dedicated desktop.
Guess what
The lycoris update process is Painless and simple - it asks for the root password if it needs to install anything new and otherwise it's just some progress bars and informatipon on the updates - simple and efffective
Im all for one single simple linux i can use in a corporate environment out of the box - the other 400 are great but every user has different needs
Monolinux is carrying a review of lycoris in 2 parts written by a corporate IT manager and looking at lycoris from a possible business desktop use, its a good read and less hype filled and believable than MSNBC's - i reccomend it.
PS it was posted yesterday as well - before MSNBC
http://www.monolinux.com/modules/news/
Who ever said it was IIS ?
It's BSD/Apache as a quick check of a million other posts on this and other sites would have found out and even the site in question would have told you. Microsoft runs BSD and UNIX very heavily internally and has done since the network was first set up
Now why they would choose apache over IIS is up to you to guess ?
yep operation clambake
the site this whole thread is about
www.xenu.net
I apologised for my error and i didnt bash the product - i have bought every one of valves releases and until i contacted them i had no idea what the issue was, the documentation on the site wasn' good enough.
If you do some investigating on this subject you will find another post by me in which i support and proclaim valve for the quality of the product.
I apologised and used my logged in name for it thus risking losing karma. I have never karma whored and worked damn hard to build it up BUT the right thing to do is apolgise if you make an error.
As for the conspiracy theory stuff, read some of my other posts - im not a linux zealot, i often post supporting MS.
But i love the last line about bitching
Pot meet kettle
A further Update.
I apologise - in a conversation with tech support on the forum i have discovered that their keygen had an issue and didnt work properly thats why it asked me for the CC number.
It does that without the secret code as its a full working version of the client they will be using.
I have now downloaded the software and played half life, i have a post in the same story about it an i can say that it appears to work as advertised.
I was wrong.
I apologise.
And anybody dumb enough to write these guys a letter or an email can look forward to being hassled for the rest of their lives by scientology mail, phone calls and personal visits, thats assuming they dont just sue them for their trouble.
/. users who see them selves as white knights and crusaders. Unless you are prepared to be attacked, lose your ISP, maybe your job and carerr DO NOT mess with these people lightly.
These guys play for keeps - read the xenu.net site, you dont provoke them for fun as they WILL destroy your reputation and your life, they think nothing of spreading false stories about people being criminals and or even child molesters.
They are a dangerous group of people and you should carefully investigate them before taking them on this is not an example of MS suing someone or a hacker being charged - this is a group who broke into the IRS and copied files, who have been accused of murder, false imprisonment and brainwashing, have been banned as illegal in a number of countries.
SO- a warning to the
They have some very educated and technically skilled people so be carefull and make sure ANYTHING you do or say against them is done anonymously.
And i can speak from experience,i lost an ISP account for posting certain comments to newsgroups about them and a really nice cease and desist letter. I have moved 5 times and i still get mail from them, i dont know how they do it but they have to have sources inside australia post to get it (im an aussie) and that means they can track you - im sure they do in the US.
I dont recommend the experience and everything i do know is thru anonymous sources.
You have been warned -dont mess with them.
I dont know.
After messing around on the software trying to get it working and posing some questions about it i finally got it up and running.
I run a P111 900 with 512mb ram and GeForce 2 MX 64mb over a cable modem linl. Install of the game took about 1 minute and then i was in and it runs as smooth at 1024x768 as it ever did off my pc (but i wish they could get rid of that fscking opening movie - ive seen it enough)
The interesting thin is file size. I run a firewall on my xp box (only zone alarm but it works) and it shows i donwloaded 80.1 mb. The size of the Cache directory is 565 mb. Thats some very interesting compression.
As it stands it works and i would pay a MINIMAL fee for the service is the speed would be the same. Bearing in mind im in australia and im guessing the server is not local to me its not bad and the game runs solid with about the same level change slowdown as it does off cd.
Apologies i missed the bit about key generator in the setup BUT i still want to know WHY the credit card
Its free but it asks for credit card details and there is no indication on the site or information about why they want it.
Plus they ask for special offer code which you dont have of course.
Why do they need my credit card? why wont they tell me why they need it ? I dont give my card number out to anyone for any verification process, its bullshit and a company the size of valve should not need it.
I wanted to try this out but i wont be doing so as i wont give them my credit card - this is a BETA test. At this point it reminds me of the famous Lindows pay $99 to beta test our software but you cant tell anyone about it or show it to anyone.
Something smells fishy here.
Actually they eventually lost and had many of their senior members including hubbards wife sent to jail, you see the way they were winning was using spies to break into and copy the IRS's documents and give them to them, they also did the same thing against the justice department and other departments.
Some religion hey?
The fact is that google are one of the few if only companies willing to stand up to the COS, they have deep pockets and lots of lawyers and they throw lawsuits around like confetti.
I encourage everyone to read the Clambake Site and the linked documents, and i would reccomend the books linked from it - Particularly the following
A piece of blus sky - subject of a massive lawsuit - the inside story of the church written by a former scienologist himself.
L Ron Hubbard - Messiah or madman - learn the truth about the nutcase named ron
Theres many more and i encourage you to read them.
This is a church that robs its clients, asttempted to take over the british mental health system, pretty much took over the town of Clearwater, performs feudal punishments for transgressions,may have been involved in a number of murders, were caught systematically spying on the US govt including breaking into the IRS and copying court documents and much more. (read about the Sea Org, their very own navy)
they dont play games and they harrass people who go against them in ways you cannot even imagine and they have billions of dollars in money and assetts.
Read about them and learn the truth but be very carefull, these guys are very serious customers.
The spam figures amaze me, i work as an IT manager and post on many newsgroups, i have hotmail address and i spend about 12 hours a day on line yet my spam haul is about 4-5 emails a day across 6 accounts ! Yes i post to usenet and i post to support forums and i use my hotmail .
The thing is i ONLY ever give out my hotmail address when subscribing for something, I never use my personal address at all unless i know and trust the person or org. Hotmail get a lot of abuse on this site i know, and i suspect most of you havent used it in a long time - its now a very good mail system and the spam blocks work very well, you see it once you block it and you dont see it again (the only ones that dont work for this are the degree mill people who run dictionary attacks against hotmail addys from throwaway accounts; but as its one a week im not too bothered.
I dont join any open discussion newsgroups with my real addresses, i use my hotmail or more often my bigfoot auto forwarder (had it for over 6 years) and get the mail forwarded to me, i can then manage it a bit better.
So i dont understand the 30-40 emails a day, that to me is simply someone who doesnt understand how to protect themselves and uses their email everywhere.
I dont subscribe to any porn sites (have you ever heard of newsgroups btw ? they are free you know) and i would never do so using my personal email - thats just stupid, as is posting to usenet with it.
Your mail client can no doubt filter spam (i use the dreaded and horrible outlook (never had a virus from it but maybe its just my systems) and it has very effective spam filters in XP) or set up some rules to handle it - mine just gets deleted immediately (dumped to tghe deleted items)
If you're getting 40 spams a day you've been careless with your email addy and youre reaping the price.
Its something i expect an AOL newbie to do not a software developer.
True its not the worlds fastest however the poster was talking about companies selling preinstalled linux distros and thus it fits the bill, the power and value was never one of the original issues but i would point out that for a home user the lycoris machine is very good.
BTW the gateway machines do not include Shipping and come ONLY with windows XP (No linux available)thus defeating the point of the original post which was a company selling bundled linux with full support, sure you could install it yourself but the point of the whole exercise is to offer a pre loaded machine with OS support by the company, something you dont get in that case.
I could build a better machine for less or the same price myself and install linux as can anyone but in this case the company who made the distro are selling the machines pre configured and supported and that after all was the point of the original post.
A side note - Gateway have shut down in Most or Europe and Asia with massive staff cuts and write downs which might not make it the most intelligent buy as the chances of their continued financial viability past 2002 are very slim.
i saw that myself but as it comes with WIne perhaps theres a reason, maybe some IBM software or something?
or perhaps as they are refurbished they already have the windows 98 license with them as it was sold originally and as such theyve done it dual boot, im not sure but i suspect this might be the case
as a lycoris user i run it on both dual boot and single OS machines and the Dual Boots a good way to go for maximum flevibility, i can run photoshop when needed and still work in linux
www.lycoris.com
lycoris offer desktop LX preinstalled on machines for $449.95 and laptops for $799.99.
The pcs are HP and laptops IBM and they come with full tech support and OS support and warranty from manuf. the PC's are new and the laptops refurbished. The prices include shipping.
PC
Hewlett Packard PC
Intel Celeron 700 Mhz Processor
128MB RAM
10GB Hard Drive
8MB Integrated AGP Video
48x CD-ROM Drive
56k Modem or
10/100 Ethernet Card (NIC)
Keyboard
Mouse
Speakers
Desktop/LX Amethyst
1 Year Warranty from HP
Monitor Sold Separately
Laptop
IBM ThinkPad 600E
366Mhz Pentium II Processor
AGP Graphics
3.5 inch Disk Drive
10 GB Hard Drive
DVD ROM Drive
128/256 Std/Max RAM
Dual boot Desktop/LX Amethyst & Windows® 98
13.3 inch TFT Active Matrix Screen
56k voice/fax modem
5 lbs. w/ battery
Refurbished with 3 Months Limited Warranty from IBM
And im sure there are more out there.
PS on the Dell side i buy nothing but dell and i have never ever seen the linux links except on server products, the fact is that MS may have stopped them from doing or they may have not but from what i have seen Dell didnt exactly try hard in the first place and i suspect it was only ever an option to make them seem like they cared about choice. Dell have always been microsofts number one fan.
Oh and this may be offtopic but on lindows im sorry but i personally believe its vapour ware and will believe it when i see it - a company charging $99 for Beta testers to get it is not a good sign and i have yet to come across anyone who has ever used it. Until i see it i wont believe it -for now its a pretty web site and 2 screenshots that could easily be forged. Micheal Robinson marketed MP3's before and now hes marketing linux and so far all i have seen is a lawsuit he knew would be the result of the naming and one i personally believe he went looking for.
But more power to companies who ship linux preinstalled, i run lycoris and for a desktop OS its very very good.
Im surprised anyone still has it. Here in australia we pay for bandwidth used and we monitor our usage carefully, we dont dictate we simply provide guidelines (which are international for our company) and people ar expected not to go outside them. We do scan our proxy logs for certain keywords and trust me get caught looking at porn its instant dismissal - no questions.
/. who whine about liberties and freedom are missing the point - its work, we pay you for a job and we pay for the resources you use and the computer you use them on - if you dont like it then find another job, internet is NOT a right.
.mov, .mpeg, .mp3, .wav, .vbs, .js and a lot of others - we spend a lot of time securing and managing our systems and theres no work reason for any of the above products (we would block jpegs as well but they are sometimes (our work study indicates only about 30% of the time) work related.
None of my staff can bypass it as the scan results go directly to Human resources and i support it - they have no reason to be doing anything like that.
Now this might seem a bit extreme but thertes good reasons why i agree.
1. We encourage our staff to use the Net responsibly and for legitimate research and work purposes, we dont mind reading a newspaper, looking at the sports results or catching up with a hobby during their breaks.
2. We expect them to have the good sense to know what isnt appopriate and they sign a legal agreement noting they understand the conditions and the consequences of their actions BEFORE they get their login and passwords to the system.
3. its work - not home
The people on
PS we dont allow newsgroups, ICQ, IRC or Instant Messengers and we block FTP for all expect IT users - our support calls for people who have downloaded software have gone thru the floor and as its also a breach to do that people dont try it anyway.
Why did we do this?
our internet bills went thru the roof thats why and we looked at the traffic - guess what ? Porn sites, movie sites, tucows, game sites etc.
2 staff sacked for breaches and now its a whole different workplace.
I have zero tolerance for whiners, in a previous management role i was the one who had to deal with kiddie porn found on a computer by one of my support guys when he was fixing it (Aust gove so i had to call the police etc) and it was the most disgusting thing i have ever seen. Look at porn on my network get your balls lopped - what you do at home is your business and i like naked chicks as much as the next guy but i dont see it as appropriate in any circumstance for work.
PS and for those of you who think iam a nazi we also filter mail and block
Internet access is not a right at work, its a company provided privelege
I run lycoris on no fewer than 5 machines inside and outrside of a windows domain. I disagree with the 'not ready' statement and it shows that the person who commented on the article hasnt used the distro.
In all 5 cases (all different machines) it found all hardware and installed seamlessly, the video card on my personal notebook (Dell LS400) was found perfectly, something Mandrake 8 and 8.1 couldnt manage.
the Distro has built in and fully workin Div-xm,DVD, Mp3 and the Koffice suite, Samba configured to acccess windows shares by default and wine.
My home network is a windows XP pro one with a shared internet connection (dont laugh it works 100% perfectly and requires 2 seconds setup) Lycoris found it without config and worked straight away fpr all web funtions, it connects by default with my shares and it does so on windows 200 active directory as well.
In short its a desktop OS for the average user, it doesnt come with advanced features, compilers and dev tools installed but you can download and install them, its a full working simple to use and install linux distro for everyone. I gave it to my mother of all people and she loves it - it does everything she needs, loads fast, looks like fun and she can run her windows stuff.
I have given this OS to about 20 people from technical linux zealots to newbies and all of them have enjoyed using it and the newbies love it - in short its an OS i as an IT manager can roll out on a desktop, it's built on top of redhat and users RPMS which makes it great if you already have redhat servers and use the OS in your environment.
Yes it needs work but what is doesnt need is apache or any other server components, it doesnt need compilers and 10 shells instaled as a default, its a desktop linux and it works and for the first time a user doesnt need to resort to makefiles and consoles to try and get anything working in the OS (Div-x Under redhat anyone ?)
It works for what it is and its worth $29 or you can download for free.
The era we are discussing was PRE mandrake and the competiton was windows 3.1
/. attitude that windows is the root of all evil got old a long rime ago and with XP its now incorrect as well.
It was stable, easy to install and worked (as does XP)
The Mandrake comment is true though - i have a computer and a notebook here that mandrake wont detect things on (Video Card in One (neomagic 128) and sound (Crystal in the other) yet Debian and Lycoris and Red hat all work perfectly.
Adn the less said about cyrix processors the better (stil the only processor i have ever seen that needed a software patch)
We all forget that Windows 3.1 was a stable and well developed OS at the time - attempting to make out that modern OSes have any relation to OS2 V1 is a laugh as standard machine build was 386 with 8mb ram and a 512k video card(1mb if you had money to burn)
And we are'nt discussing Warp VS Windows 95 BUT if you do a bit of reading you will find that on NON ibm hardware 95 with all of its problems still outperformed OS2 in most cases and was more stable (Note the bit about embedded OS2 in ATMS is true but its very very customised and stripped down and doesnt have all of the problem casuing bits (the Graphics subsystem, memory management (what a joke) and the other tripe that made OS2 such a dog. The kernel in this mode is apparently very stable but were only talking i believe IBM ATM machines and some older NCR's so it could hardly be called an industry standard.
In closing the
(i know you may be joking but im sick of it - lets move on with Linux and forget about windows and MS - its not as bad as most people on here make out and it alienates people)
I was selling this stuff on launch and the better than anything else tag is hilarious.
OS2 1 was a disaster
What about the steepest resource requirements around ? (you didnt have 24mb of ram forget it - in those days the standard systems i sold with 3.1 had 8mb)
What about random crashes for no reason?
buggy software ?
unpredictable performance?
Installations that wouldnt work for no apparent reason?
Issues with Vesa equipment ?
Cryix processor issues ?
IBM's legendary lack of support?
price of the OS - well above windows 3.1? ($50-90 more from memory)
Applications that didnt work properly ?
and thats just off the top of my head
I mean come on OS2 Warp was getting there sort of but V1 was a big steaming heap. OS2 never got to the point where it could compete on stability with win3.1 and IBM's half hearted on again off again support and marketing for it didnt help.
Im intrigued as to how your going to read data from a digital format with a microscope and a camera - you can take a photo of it at any resolution and it stil wont do a damn thing - this is digital storage not analogue and no image processing program in the world could put together bits from a picture of a CD surface.
Once the CD is shredded the data is gone. Finis.
I didnt defend MS but yes its NOT spyware (IMHO) if its written in the EULA. Ignoarnce is no defence and if you can't be bothered to read the license the thats an issue for you.
Whether you agree of not once you hit i agree and install the product it isnt an invasion of your privacy as you have agreed to it.
Lycoris is very good if you want a fully working Desktop linux - its a simple lizard install and comes with lizard as the installer. Finds everything in 5 machines so far including 3 dell laptops. Div-x runs immediately and has real video and all extras installed. Comes with Koffice and Mozilla and all works fully.
It doesnt have some of the libraries and would need a bit of modifing for some things to work but as a simple and easy to use OS for a beginner to use linux or for someone who just wants a simple solution to a fully working OS with nothing extra.
I ran it primarily because i wanted an OS for div-x and multimedia on my notebook and i couldnt be bothered messing around for hours to setup all the software and drivers. It works.
Samba automatically found my Winxp Shared Internet connection and talks natively to my Windows Shares with built in samba, also talks to a Windows NT4 and Windows 2000 Active Driectory domain.
worht the download, give it a go.
Sorry but i miss your point. Microsoft have some security issues (although a quick read or CERT will show you that so do many open source products - they dont get publicity on it) but i dont understand the point your trying to make ?
When have Microsoft ever actually included spyware in products ? (and dont talk to me about Media Player - its been in the user agreement for a long time)
This issue has nothing to do with well written or badly written code IMHO - it has to do with companies willingness to take money from anyone who comes along, NEW.NET is spyware just like Gator or Bonzi Buddy.
Holding up open source with its lack of focus, consistency and in some cases stability as a standard is not relevant to this discussion - try getting a lot of common open source software to run with minimal knowledge on a linux system - try getting an out of the box Mandrake to play DIV-X movies as a new linux user. You can't unless you know to downgrade glibc and fix the other numerous dependency issues.
The fact is Microsoft have questionable business practicies and a rapacious attitude to business ethics but the thing is the average user just doesnt care - the stuff works. They dont give a crap if its bloated or needs activation because they can walk into a store, buy a cd, install it and it just works.
The open source model makes so much sense but its no panacea to the ills of the world. The fact that spyware isnt found in open source has nothing to do with the philosophy of the product but more to do with the fact that most of the software is developed privately or not for profit. Its no gurantee of quality or well written code.
As open source grows more mature (if it survives) this problem will grow as well, just like viruses will.
Stop putting everything back on MS and accept that the world is full on unscrupulous people out to make a quick buck, they exist in all areas.
PS if you want to look at it this way im not slamming open source or trolling for microsoft in any way. Im writing this on my Lycoris box (redmond linux) and i use and like linux despite so issues with it at times, i just cant stand the attitiude that everything bad is MS and everything good is open source.