Specifically some Dell and Compaq servers that there is a specific order drivers must be installed. If you don't, there will be nothing glaringly wrong, but the machine will lock up periodically
Well, ya, but the devil is in the details, as they say. I cant see that there wouldnt be cases where things like this happen in Linux, either. In my experience, problems with Dell servers have been caused mainly by their choice in using the BroadCom gigabit ethernet chip, which seems to have a lot of issues. Things like this are technically hardware, though- you cant blame MS for BroadCom making a flakey NIC, or any of the other various non-OS related problems.
Just like the problem with the anti-virus you mentioned, that is a problem with the AV program, it has nothing to do with the OS. I have to purchase a new version of my anti-virus program so I can put it on XP and 2003; Im not really complaining, though, because these things happen. Software and hardware dont last forever, and MS cant be responsible for non-MS products (although Ive personally seen them make many accommodations).
The reason microsoft products are bad for the economy, is they are a tax. They are essentially a tax on all computers in most cases.
Come on, you seem like a smart guy. Think that thru- you dont consider paying for a mechanic to fix your car a tax, do you? The world works by everyone paying for goods and services. If MS is giving away their stuff for free, than they cant improve their product.
One thing which is a real peeve of mine is when people here say "Windows cant do such-and-such", when it actually can, and most times its either been in Windows for a long time, or is a free download! The fact is that Windows can do a LOT of things which you would otherwise have to pay tons of money to get from third parties, or else cobble together a franken-server with software from tons of different products. When you are running an IT shop, its a HUGE benefit not to have to call ten different companies when you have a problem (or check a ton of different support boards, in the case of OS solutions). Most people want to make themselves feel better by beating up on things they know nothing about, or dont understand well. If you learn in-depth about Windows, there is a very lot to know and keep track of. Just as much as any other technical subject; just because it has a GUI doesnt mean you just click two buttons and things happen. There is a whole world of things to know, and you really need to understand what is going on and the implications of clicking what seems like a simple change.
Anyway, I drifted a bit off topic, but nobody rides for free. It will be proven with this Munich thing, but when you impliment a free solution, your support costs are going to rise- just watch and see. Imagine what would happen if some company wanted to do this, and didnt have IBM and SUSE holding their hand! Heads would roll... as I said earlier, thats why they talked a government into doing something stupid and expensive like this; the city isnt going to go out of business. If it were a company, they would really be up shit creek. But around here you get modded as flamebait or troll if you say harsh realities like that (like I did).
Word processing software should be a commodity. It's just not hard, there are probably a dozen packages that would satisfy 95% of the uses of Word. If Microsoft exported to anything that was well documented, and editable, business's around the world would save billions of dollars every year. You're paying a monopoly rent, that's all there is to it.
Ah, there are tons of things you can say that about. If I didnt have to pay taxes or social security I could save thousands a year. If my car didnt use gas, I could save hundreds of dollars.
Does your company look at cutting out fax machines, phone lines, paper, etc? All that is a business expense too. There is no free ride. If something is of use, you are going to have
Firstly it isn't deuchmark (or even deutschmark) - Munich is in the Eurozone these days.
Secondly, IBM are acting as lead contractors on this migration so a certain percentage of those 35 MegaEuros will be ending up in Armonk, NY at some point along the line.
Thirdly the grandparent was criticising MSoft's monopoly lock-in as bad for the small-e economy (ie on general economic grounds in that it is effectively a rent upon all economic activity) rather than the big-E economy (ie the US balance of payments). In any case why should a bunch of regional civil servants in Germany be bothered about the US economy when it comes to deciding their IT strategy?
I already addressed all those issues in earlier posts, and feel no need to repeat myself ad nauseum. Just because you learned something last week doesnt make it new, or news.
MS "tax"
This term you guys cooked up is the dumbest fucking arguement Ive ever heard. You are using something which fulfills a need. If I have to get my car fixed, I dont consider the mechanic to be an 'auto tax'. I also dont think that paying a tip after I eat at a restaurant or drink at a bar is some huge conspiracy 'service tax'. Likewise, paying for an operating system isnt some "Microsoft tax".
If you dont like it, go fucking use something else! MS isnt forcing people to use their OS. Just because third parties only program for MS proves the superiority of their platform; nobody wants to support multiple OS versions of the same product if they dont have to. If this situation ever changes, the market forces that be will determine that, too. But being a whiney bitch about it doesnt make you right.
Because they think that the MSoft monopoly is a Bad Thing economically (see above) and view their proprietary formats as a bulwark of that monopoly?
Sigh. I dont know what I waste time talking to retards. If you own a store, lets say Jewel, are you going pay your workers to give people coupons to other grocery stores? No, of course not- there is no incentive. You are spending your money, and having your people work on things, which are only going to benefit people who want to acquire goods and services at companies which arent YOU.
But people like you were driving the whole dot-com bust, thinking you could make money giving stuff away for free. Here's a tip- you lost! Companies cant spend "free". You cant pay employees with "free", or buy ads with "free", or pay rent with "free".
You are just jealous because Bill Gates is the wealthiest man in the world, and *you* arent. Get over it.
In the real world, if you want something, you have to pay for it. "Free" usually means you are doing most of the work yourself, and often at greater cost in time and money than if you had paid for it.
In that vein, MS is wisely choosing to spend its money on improving its products for people who are still going to use it. What kind of moron spends money driving away their customers?
Oh, and get a clue. How in the world can you say that Microsoft Collaboration Data Objects [microsoft.com] is non-standard? It is made by MS to WORK WITH MS EXCHANGE. Did you also forget the part of my post where I said that Microsofts OWN people checked the code? The code is as simple as can be. I guess you also missed the part of how it has been workign in MS Exhcange 2000 for some time now? Statements like that show you to be just a blind MS Weeine. Talk about zealotry.
you are obviously a fucking moron. YOU said you were doing custom COM objects to get your shitty calendar crap to work. Thus making you a fucking liar, and a bullshitter. Grow up and take responsibility for your actions; although you arent even doing this stuff, you are probably some slug intern in the accounting department who tries to be all cool and talk computers with the real tech guys. Here's a tip- YOU ARE BORING. Go away. We dont want to talk to you, and hobbyists arent interesting. You arent impressing anybody.
How in the world is this NOT a forced upgrade? MS does this ALL THE TIME. If you were a manager and turned down a forced upgrade from MS now, and 1-2 years later had to pay up to twice as much for the same software, do you think you would still have your job?
Have you ever purchased a used car? You will hear the same thing from them, too. Remember, these are sales people, and their goal is to make a sale. Perhaps your managers need to know how to deal with vendors, rather than being a sales mark.
You have no proof that MS is going to charge you 500 times as much for the licenses in a year if you dont upgrade. A year from now they will want to sell you the stuff just as much as they do today. Heck, maybe even more so. So again, grow up and be a man. Nobody is forcing anybody to do anything.
Do you have experience doing ANY large Linux rollout?
No, I dont waste my time working with things I dont care about. I focus on being an expert on Windows, not a hobbyist playing with two or more operating systems.
Nope. So shut yer' trap M'kay? There are plenty of people around the world doing/have done desktp Linux roll outs. I am right outside of Orlando. Not too far from me is Largo FL. I guess you don't recall that conversion to Linux on the Desktop? That is running sweet as pie
So name one, moron. Thats what I asked, because you were trying to be clever and name companies which converted all their SERVERS to desktops. Sorry, it takes more intelligence than you possess to bullshit me. You are just angry you got caught.
Um, thats because you should be exporting from the 5.5 info store to pst's, then importing them to the new format.
Now, you can be a fool and trust other people telling you it will work ok, or you can do it the long, boring, but reliable way.
Me, I work in IT, which means the Information is more important than anything. Being a professional, I do the most reliable thing each time. Other people should take the same mindset.
Also, I like the asshole moderators around here. A person cant even have an intelligent discussion without getting modded down as a troll or whatever. Fucking idiots
my apologies if you didnt actually see it. He refers to it in his standup act, and on one of his specials (I think it was from HBO).
He had a really good line about Superman standing there with a big shit-eating grin on his face, saying "you cant hurt me, Im Superman!", but then ducking because the gun gets thrown at him.
We have a custom COM object that talks to the Exchange server to get calendar/email for users to display on our corporate portal.
So your original statement was misleading. Its locking up because you are doing non-standard things, not because you are doing a plain vanilla Exchange 2003 server.
Well, MS comes in and says if you upgrade now, you will save money, if you wait 2 years, it will be almost twice as much. That is pretty much forcing the upgrade.
Come on, now you are making stuff up. And, even were that the case, they still arent forcing you to do anything. Thats like saying Jewel is forcing me to buy oranges because they are on sale this week.
blah blah blah... I guess none of these companies have _anyone_ that knows what they are doing. Maybe they should all hire you since you are the only It person in the world that knows how to run things?
You are talking about servers, not desktops. There is a difference between running a Linux server farm and a 1000 desktop linux network. So point out some companies which have converted all their users to Linux, and come back and talk. M'kay?
Umm, you can interview users at just about _any_ company NOW and here tons of complaints about MS software, so what is your point?
I hear very few complaints about Windows. Office, however, I have very many complaints on. They are getting better, though, but I still think Word Perfect really dropped the ball; they had a well designed program, but technically it was way to buggy (I was at a company which did an early mass-migration to Office97, same story. Users loved it, tech support hated it. Tech support buys the software and sets policy: guess who won?).
Because we all know just how "honest" the MS PR machine is right?
A lot more honest that the Slashdot zealotry, thats for sure.
It known to hang, and/or crash. In my experience, it gives you very little to backtrack to figure out what is causing the problems. (It might be that I don't have the right tools).
There are lots of things you can look at, like the event viewer, dump logs, etc. I still have yet to see Win2k just crash or blue screen. Ive seen lockups, but thats not the same, and the OS is usually still running in the background (meaning you can troubleshoot or fix via the network if you have to).
Can you download a GUI to do family tree stuff, probably not. Can you download a tool deal with the newest goofy scanner that some no name brand has put out, probably not. Can you download some of the goofy little programs that people develop only for Win32? Normally no, you can't.
See, I dont view that as a valid complaint. If a person isnt logged on as an administrator (which they better not be in a networked environment), they cant install programs (because they only have limited access to the registry). Ya, they can get single executable programs from the internet, but you can also lock down the machine in tons of ways. Heck, you can even make it so that only IE and/or Office will run if you want.
Sure, Linux may be good in a small environment. But its not suited very well for a huge user base. Shit, its not even MADE for that. This issue really seems like Munich putting the square peg in the round hole, with IBM and SUSE handing them a hammer.
it's fundamentally bad for the economy (it's limiting competition, and an artificial constraint on increasing effeciency, all of which are bad for the economy).
I dont see how having people buy from a US company or get something free can be seen as bad in terms of economic competition. In that respect, people should be all for MS, because Munich using SUSE isnt bringing a single deuchmark into the US.
Second, I dont see that its artificially contraining effeciency, especially since the alternative isnt really going to make people work any faster. If somebody wants to fuck off, they are going to do it whether they have internet access or not, or if they have a Windows machine or a Linux one (or even no computer).
If people exchanged documents in a more open format, it'd be a heck of a lot easier to migrate to a non-windows environment.
And your point is? I dont see why people complain about MS using non-open formats. Why should they? The only benefit is for people who dont want to use MSOffice. There seems to be little economic incentive to help those people.
I almost soiled my pants reading that. There is noting "perfected" coming from MS. I work at a fortune 500 with 140,000+ employess. MS came in and told all the PHB's that they just HAD to upgrade our Exchange server to Exchange 2003 running on MS Windows 2003. What a nightmare. The server is constantly going down, and our corporate email is not dependable. These problems cannot be blamed on our IT staff since several of MS's people have been here a few WEEKS trying to get it running smoothly.
I question that last part. A key point in any project is being able to roll back; sounds like somebody fucked up. Also, any IT shop which thinks its going to be all cool because they are an early adopter deserves to be completely fired. Sounds like they just didnt care: dont blame MS for your company's bad project management skills. They didnt force anybody to upgrade.
Also, its really easy to upgrade, as long as you arent flying by the seat of your pants and thinking you are going to migrate thousands of users over a weekend. What most of you yahoos dont understand is that the majority of the work should be done BEFORE you start doing even a single step in the migration: testing, planning, research. Ya, its tedious and boring, but thats the job; if you dont like it, become a pro wrestler.
Now do you really think IBM will let that happen? Of course not. With Novell in the picture for SuSE, they will be there too to make sure that it gets finished. There is no such thing as a large scale migration of anything without problems. Migrating with MS's own products to newer versions can be a nightmare. We have had tons of issues doing large upgrades in addition to the one I pointed out above.
Again, I can personally attest that this isnt true. Ive migrated many places either to NT, or from NT to Active Directory. If you know what you are doing, its pretty painless. Sounds like the guys at your company dont know what they are doing, and are too stupid to contract with people who do.
Yeah, you sound like you have done a lot of large scale migrations. There are only so many senarios you can plan for in advance. After that you just need a little luck and good developers/admins working for you.
I sure have. And from what I read, they didnt have enough time/money/intelligence to do a planned conversion. So what did they do? A non-planned conversion. Really fucking smart, and they didnt test jack shit. Like I said, Germans just like to play; very few professionals, by US standards. Most are just glorified hobbyists. Thats why anywhere with real IT pros wont convert to Linux; for a government I guess its ok, because A. nobody is going to get fired, and B. they arent going to go out of business. Government work is a whole other realm of incompetance; I have so many stories to tell.
In about 1 year, all the positive press will come out and MS will be scrambling to play it down and MS weeines will be making excuses.
LOL, yeah, right. They are going to bulldoze their way into a 'successful' migration, and forcefeed Linux to all their employees. I'll bet if you interview anybody who actaully does any work there in one year, they will have tons of complaints.
But you wont see those interviews, you will only see IBM saying "Mission Accomplished!". Makes me think of GWB standing in a flightsuit on the deck of an aircraft carrier. We got it done! Truth be damned!
What pisses me off is that these kind of studies are hardly ever conducted when you do a Windows to Windows migration, although the issues, impacts and risks are just as high
The difference is that Microsoft has already spent the money to test and perfect the migration path. Munich is spending that money all by their lonesome.
Were I a taxpayer there, I would be raising hell over the stupid waste of time and money.
From article: In late December the Munich city council demanded a full breakdown of the projected financial costs of the project, including the costs involved in retraining city employees accustomed to working with Windows 98, 95 and 3.1. The council has also requested a detailed migration schedule.
The cost analysis and schedule is to be presented to the council by May at the latest, according to council reports. The city will then decide how to proceed with the planned migration from Windows.
Seems it would have been MUCH smarter to get a cost analysis done BEFORE they started DOING the project!! Oh well, I used to work for a German company. Their IT guys always were going off half cocked, thinking up ways to justify playing with technology. We always had an uphill battle to get them to leave stuff alone, or to not wildly inflate projects with goofy shit. Seems Munic had the same problems, except since they are all German, there is nobody to be a voice of reason.
I predict a failed migration, millions of euros in lost money and productivity, and a scandal involving lots of high paid consultants 'talking' somebody influential into pushing this as a good idea.
But instead of paying $23.7 million for the Microsoft solution, Munich's city council opted to spend roughly $35.7 million to switch to open source, saying that the higher price would be offset by lower costs and more flexibility in licensing fees and software choices over the long run.
Good ol' Germany. Always thinking short term, and never looking at the big picture.
But according to Computerwoche and other reports, the city lacks the funds to invest in the planned testing and development of an open-source solution. IBM and Germany-based Linux distributor SuSE are expected to help offset the costs of the migration by supplying technical support and conducting some of the studies that the Munich city council has requested.
Because these two companys have just as much at stake with seeing this migration actaully happen as the ill-advised city council.
Its a shame the council didnt think of network security, and even more a shame that their technical advisors wanted to play rather than thinking of what was best. No matter what OS you are going to use, gutting your network is never a good idea. Even worse is that they went and did it without adequate planning.
Reports in Computerwoche also stated that local vendors who currently code applications for the city were experiencing problems in developing applications for the open-source operating system, since they are more familiar with Windows than Linux.
Yep, another one of those hidden costs nobody is ever willing to tell you about. Another funny thing is that those Germans werent even good at writing Windows applications. Their apps were buggy, poorly designed, and usually couldnt even be run over a network. We started doing WinNT on the desktop, and most of their apps couldnt even run on NT. Heck, many of them were still programming like the apps was for Win3.11!
Munich may opt to install an emulation program on city workers' computers that will allow Windows applications to run on Linux.
So, now they need to run their Windows software thru a flakey emulator. Smoothe move! This is also going to jack up their support costs, offsetting any savings in software licensing. But on the bright side, IBM can learn from their expensive mistakes, so at least a US company will benefit.
Yes, Ive been supporting Windows since Win95. If you cant get Windows to run stable, the problem lies between the chair and the keyboard.
I've seen it happen, Ive done it myself: Windows CAN run without crashing!!! If you work in IT, than you should probably quit and go sell shoes; you arent cut out for this job.
Yeah, and people not working in capitol hill don't get paid to fuck with laws, nor would most of them even want to. Only lawmakers care about that shit, and at least 99% of citizens are not lawmakers.
But the difference is that Jane in Marketting cant change anti-fraud laws on her PC, rendering the US Legal system incapable of booting.
Nice try at an analogy troll, but you need to pick a better example.
Who gives a fuck. People working in an office (or even an overwhelming majority of home users) dont get paid to fuck with the source code, nor would most of them even want to. Only programmers care about that shit, and at least 99% of computer users are not programmers.
2) It's Windows. Forget "stable".
If Win2k or XP are unstable, your computer is a piece of shit. Your poor choices in hardware arent Microsoft's responsibility; stop buying Packard Bell.
3) It's Windows. Forget "drivers" without a dozen driver install disks...
A. d00d, turn off the 8-track; drivers come on CD's these days B. Again, get out of the 60s. On Win2k/XP you rarely need drivers which arent provided (especially XP).
5) It's Windows... most apps won't run without registry editing and all kinds of other crap.
I dont have to edit the registry, or anything else, to get my applications to run. And if you do, than whoever put together your install package is a retard (I should know, Ive put several install packages together). But actually, isnt getting applications to run on Linux a bit of a chore, depending on your distro?
All in all, a pretty weak troll attempt. I give it 2 out of a possible 10. You are going to have to try way harder than that around here.
I believe it was either PBS or the History Channel, but they had a huge show on DeBeers. After seeing all the crap that cartel has done, and how they operate, I'll be damned if I ever waste money on a diamond. Its funny, because the guy who founded the cartel was a geologist who pretty knew for a fact that diamonds were so common as to be valueless!
I am glad your workplaces have bought you laptops, I am sure you must be proud.
Nothing really to be proud of, its not like I cured cancer or anything.
However laptops are expensive computers because of the portability
They sure are. Thats why I wont buy one.
Just because it's expensive doesn't mean it's a waste of money.
I realize that. But until such a time comes, which I cant envision presently, I dont see any reason to purchase one.
I waste enough money keeping my desktop up to speed, and there are always other expenses like tech books, trying to get adequate furniture, fixing my vehicle, etc.
Thus, by applying that logic, we can say that money tends not to get stolen: after all, the amount of money possessed far outweighs the amount of money stolen.
IMO...
...Im not saying Ive never had one: in fact, Ive had at least ten of them. ...I only have a laptop if the place I work for buys one for me. ...thats a pretty big, and non-justifyable expense.
I never said laptops are useless. I only said that I have never found them useful enough to actaully spend my own money on.
Especially, given the situation where employers will purchase them for me.
IMO- In My Opinion
My statement was never expresses as anything other than my opinion.
As opposed to what? Only attaining it if (and it's a big IF) they attain it themselves?
Um, ya, that was kind of the point.
Let me draw you a chart. If Mono can acheive 100% compatibility with the code THEY are responsible for, but there are compatibility issues with Wine, than, overall, there is no 100%. Since they have no control or influence over the Wine project, they will have, at that point, reached an impasse; since Wine can improve, not improve, fold, or accept external improvements to their sources and summarily wipe their asses with them, there is nothing further Mono can do to improve their own project.
If, however, they impliment their own windows emulation, they can make use of changes in the Wine project (giving them credit, of course), start from scratch, or whatever. But, they then have a situation in which they can acheive their goals, and have the control they require to further their main project.
As people higher in this thread have stated, there are issues with Wine. Were this not the case, such a statement would be senseless. But all duplication of effort is not necessarily a bad thing.
If you ever learn how to manage a project, this whole subject is basic.
As I said, HAVING a laptop isnt stupid. But BUYING one, for me, is. As always, YMMV, but I have never had to purchase one, they have always been purchased for me.
IMO, buying a laptop is the height of stupidity. Im not saying Ive never had one: in fact, Ive had at least ten of them.
But, to quote one of my former bosses, I do not pay for disposable technology. I only have a laptop if the place I work for buys one for me. If I need appliction or document portability, I own a 256mb USB key. Much lighter, and cheaper, than a laptop.
I guess stuff like this laptop is nice if you have more money than you know what to do with, but for a regular working guy (even in tech), thats a pretty big, and non-justifyable expense.
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Well, ya, but the devil is in the details, as they say. I cant see that there wouldnt be cases where things like this happen in Linux, either. In my experience, problems with Dell servers have been caused mainly by their choice in using the BroadCom gigabit ethernet chip, which seems to have a lot of issues. Things like this are technically hardware, though- you cant blame MS for BroadCom making a flakey NIC, or any of the other various non-OS related problems.
Just like the problem with the anti-virus you mentioned, that is a problem with the AV program, it has nothing to do with the OS. I have to purchase a new version of my anti-virus program so I can put it on XP and 2003; Im not really complaining, though, because these things happen. Software and hardware dont last forever, and MS cant be responsible for non-MS products (although Ive personally seen them make many accommodations).
The reason microsoft products are bad for the economy, is they are a tax. They are essentially a tax on all computers in most cases.
Come on, you seem like a smart guy. Think that thru- you dont consider paying for a mechanic to fix your car a tax, do you? The world works by everyone paying for goods and services. If MS is giving away their stuff for free, than they cant improve their product.
One thing which is a real peeve of mine is when people here say "Windows cant do such-and-such", when it actually can, and most times its either been in Windows for a long time, or is a free download! The fact is that Windows can do a LOT of things which you would otherwise have to pay tons of money to get from third parties, or else cobble together a franken-server with software from tons of different products. When you are running an IT shop, its a HUGE benefit not to have to call ten different companies when you have a problem (or check a ton of different support boards, in the case of OS solutions). Most people want to make themselves feel better by beating up on things they know nothing about, or dont understand well. If you learn in-depth about Windows, there is a very lot to know and keep track of. Just as much as any other technical subject; just because it has a GUI doesnt mean you just click two buttons and things happen. There is a whole world of things to know, and you really need to understand what is going on and the implications of clicking what seems like a simple change.
Anyway, I drifted a bit off topic, but nobody rides for free. It will be proven with this Munich thing, but when you impliment a free solution, your support costs are going to rise- just watch and see. Imagine what would happen if some company wanted to do this, and didnt have IBM and SUSE holding their hand! Heads would roll... as I said earlier, thats why they talked a government into doing something stupid and expensive like this; the city isnt going to go out of business. If it were a company, they would really be up shit creek. But around here you get modded as flamebait or troll if you say harsh realities like that (like I did).
Word processing software should be a commodity. It's just not hard, there are probably a dozen packages that would satisfy 95% of the uses of Word. If Microsoft exported to anything that was well documented, and editable, business's around the world would save billions of dollars every year. You're paying a monopoly rent, that's all there is to it.
Ah, there are tons of things you can say that about. If I didnt have to pay taxes or social security I could save thousands a year. If my car didnt use gas, I could save hundreds of dollars.
Does your company look at cutting out fax machines, phone lines, paper, etc? All that is a business expense too. There is no free ride. If something is of use, you are going to have
Oh wow, another linux holy war. how exciting. wake me when its over.
Secondly, IBM are acting as lead contractors on this migration so a certain percentage of those 35 MegaEuros will be ending up in Armonk, NY at some point along the line.
Thirdly the grandparent was criticising MSoft's monopoly lock-in as bad for the small-e economy (ie on general economic grounds in that it is effectively a rent upon all economic activity) rather than the big-E economy (ie the US balance of payments). In any case why should a bunch of regional civil servants in Germany be bothered about the US economy when it comes to deciding their IT strategy?
I already addressed all those issues in earlier posts, and feel no need to repeat myself ad nauseum. Just because you learned something last week doesnt make it new, or news.
MS "tax"
This term you guys cooked up is the dumbest fucking arguement Ive ever heard. You are using something which fulfills a need. If I have to get my car fixed, I dont consider the mechanic to be an 'auto tax'. I also dont think that paying a tip after I eat at a restaurant or drink at a bar is some huge conspiracy 'service tax'. Likewise, paying for an operating system isnt some "Microsoft tax".
If you dont like it, go fucking use something else! MS isnt forcing people to use their OS. Just because third parties only program for MS proves the superiority of their platform; nobody wants to support multiple OS versions of the same product if they dont have to. If this situation ever changes, the market forces that be will determine that, too. But being a whiney bitch about it doesnt make you right.
Because they think that the MSoft monopoly is a Bad Thing economically (see above) and view their proprietary formats as a bulwark of that monopoly?
Sigh. I dont know what I waste time talking to retards. If you own a store, lets say Jewel, are you going pay your workers to give people coupons to other grocery stores? No, of course not- there is no incentive. You are spending your money, and having your people work on things, which are only going to benefit people who want to acquire goods and services at companies which arent YOU.
But people like you were driving the whole dot-com bust, thinking you could make money giving stuff away for free. Here's a tip- you lost! Companies cant spend "free". You cant pay employees with "free", or buy ads with "free", or pay rent with "free".
You are just jealous because Bill Gates is the wealthiest man in the world, and *you* arent. Get over it.
In the real world, if you want something, you have to pay for it. "Free" usually means you are doing most of the work yourself, and often at greater cost in time and money than if you had paid for it.
In that vein, MS is wisely choosing to spend its money on improving its products for people who are still going to use it. What kind of moron spends money driving away their customers?
you are obviously a fucking moron. YOU said you were doing custom COM objects to get your shitty calendar crap to work. Thus making you a fucking liar, and a bullshitter. Grow up and take responsibility for your actions; although you arent even doing this stuff, you are probably some slug intern in the accounting department who tries to be all cool and talk computers with the real tech guys. Here's a tip- YOU ARE BORING. Go away. We dont want to talk to you, and hobbyists arent interesting. You arent impressing anybody.
How in the world is this NOT a forced upgrade? MS does this ALL THE TIME. If you were a manager and turned down a forced upgrade from MS now, and 1-2 years later had to pay up to twice as much for the same software, do you think you would still have your job?
Have you ever purchased a used car? You will hear the same thing from them, too. Remember, these are sales people, and their goal is to make a sale. Perhaps your managers need to know how to deal with vendors, rather than being a sales mark.
You have no proof that MS is going to charge you 500 times as much for the licenses in a year if you dont upgrade. A year from now they will want to sell you the stuff just as much as they do today. Heck, maybe even more so. So again, grow up and be a man. Nobody is forcing anybody to do anything.
Do you have experience doing ANY large Linux rollout?
No, I dont waste my time working with things I dont care about. I focus on being an expert on Windows, not a hobbyist playing with two or more operating systems.
Nope. So shut yer' trap M'kay? There are plenty of people around the world doing/have done desktp Linux roll outs. I am right outside of Orlando. Not too far from me is Largo FL. I guess you don't recall that conversion to Linux on the Desktop? That is running sweet as pie
So name one, moron. Thats what I asked, because you were trying to be clever and name companies which converted all their SERVERS to desktops. Sorry, it takes more intelligence than you possess to bullshit me. You are just angry you got caught.
Now, you can be a fool and trust other people telling you it will work ok, or you can do it the long, boring, but reliable way.
Me, I work in IT, which means the Information is more important than anything. Being a professional, I do the most reliable thing each time. Other people should take the same mindset.
Also, I like the asshole moderators around here. A person cant even have an intelligent discussion without getting modded down as a troll or whatever. Fucking idiots
He had a really good line about Superman standing there with a big shit-eating grin on his face, saying "you cant hurt me, Im Superman!", but then ducking because the gun gets thrown at him.
So your original statement was misleading. Its locking up because you are doing non-standard things, not because you are doing a plain vanilla Exchange 2003 server.
Well, MS comes in and says if you upgrade now, you will save money, if you wait 2 years, it will be almost twice as much. That is pretty much forcing the upgrade.
Come on, now you are making stuff up. And, even were that the case, they still arent forcing you to do anything. Thats like saying Jewel is forcing me to buy oranges because they are on sale this week.
blah blah blah... I guess none of these companies have _anyone_ that knows what they are doing. Maybe they should all hire you since you are the only It person in the world that knows how to run things?
You are talking about servers, not desktops. There is a difference between running a Linux server farm and a 1000 desktop linux network. So point out some companies which have converted all their users to Linux, and come back and talk. M'kay?
Umm, you can interview users at just about _any_ company NOW and here tons of complaints about MS software, so what is your point?
I hear very few complaints about Windows. Office, however, I have very many complaints on. They are getting better, though, but I still think Word Perfect really dropped the ball; they had a well designed program, but technically it was way to buggy (I was at a company which did an early mass-migration to Office97, same story. Users loved it, tech support hated it. Tech support buys the software and sets policy: guess who won?).
Because we all know just how "honest" the MS PR machine is right?
A lot more honest that the Slashdot zealotry, thats for sure.
There are lots of things you can look at, like the event viewer, dump logs, etc. I still have yet to see Win2k just crash or blue screen. Ive seen lockups, but thats not the same, and the OS is usually still running in the background (meaning you can troubleshoot or fix via the network if you have to).
Can you download a GUI to do family tree stuff, probably not. Can you download a tool deal with the newest goofy scanner that some no name brand has put out, probably not. Can you download some of the goofy little programs that people develop only for Win32? Normally no, you can't.
See, I dont view that as a valid complaint. If a person isnt logged on as an administrator (which they better not be in a networked environment), they cant install programs (because they only have limited access to the registry). Ya, they can get single executable programs from the internet, but you can also lock down the machine in tons of ways. Heck, you can even make it so that only IE and/or Office will run if you want.
Sure, Linux may be good in a small environment. But its not suited very well for a huge user base. Shit, its not even MADE for that. This issue really seems like Munich putting the square peg in the round hole, with IBM and SUSE handing them a hammer.
it's fundamentally bad for the economy (it's limiting competition, and an artificial constraint on increasing effeciency, all of which are bad for the economy).
I dont see how having people buy from a US company or get something free can be seen as bad in terms of economic competition. In that respect, people should be all for MS, because Munich using SUSE isnt bringing a single deuchmark into the US.
Second, I dont see that its artificially contraining effeciency, especially since the alternative isnt really going to make people work any faster. If somebody wants to fuck off, they are going to do it whether they have internet access or not, or if they have a Windows machine or a Linux one (or even no computer).
If people exchanged documents in a more open format, it'd be a heck of a lot easier to migrate to a non-windows environment.
And your point is? I dont see why people complain about MS using non-open formats. Why should they? The only benefit is for people who dont want to use MSOffice. There seems to be little economic incentive to help those people.
Thank you, Robert Wuhl.
I question that last part. A key point in any project is being able to roll back; sounds like somebody fucked up. Also, any IT shop which thinks its going to be all cool because they are an early adopter deserves to be completely fired. Sounds like they just didnt care: dont blame MS for your company's bad project management skills. They didnt force anybody to upgrade.
Also, its really easy to upgrade, as long as you arent flying by the seat of your pants and thinking you are going to migrate thousands of users over a weekend. What most of you yahoos dont understand is that the majority of the work should be done BEFORE you start doing even a single step in the migration: testing, planning, research. Ya, its tedious and boring, but thats the job; if you dont like it, become a pro wrestler.
Now do you really think IBM will let that happen? Of course not. With Novell in the picture for SuSE, they will be there too to make sure that it gets finished. There is no such thing as a large scale migration of anything without problems. Migrating with MS's own products to newer versions can be a nightmare. We have had tons of issues doing large upgrades in addition to the one I pointed out above.
Again, I can personally attest that this isnt true. Ive migrated many places either to NT, or from NT to Active Directory. If you know what you are doing, its pretty painless. Sounds like the guys at your company dont know what they are doing, and are too stupid to contract with people who do.
Yeah, you sound like you have done a lot of large scale migrations. There are only so many senarios you can plan for in advance. After that you just need a little luck and good developers/admins working for you.
I sure have. And from what I read, they didnt have enough time/money/intelligence to do a planned conversion. So what did they do? A non-planned conversion. Really fucking smart, and they didnt test jack shit. Like I said, Germans just like to play; very few professionals, by US standards. Most are just glorified hobbyists. Thats why anywhere with real IT pros wont convert to Linux; for a government I guess its ok, because A. nobody is going to get fired, and B. they arent going to go out of business. Government work is a whole other realm of incompetance; I have so many stories to tell.
In about 1 year, all the positive press will come out and MS will be scrambling to play it down and MS weeines will be making excuses.
LOL, yeah, right. They are going to bulldoze their way into a 'successful' migration, and forcefeed Linux to all their employees. I'll bet if you interview anybody who actaully does any work there in one year, they will have tons of complaints.
But you wont see those interviews, you will only see IBM saying "Mission Accomplished!". Makes me think of GWB standing in a flightsuit on the deck of an aircraft carrier. We got it done! Truth be damned!
The difference is that Microsoft has already spent the money to test and perfect the migration path. Munich is spending that money all by their lonesome.
Were I a taxpayer there, I would be raising hell over the stupid waste of time and money.
From article: In late December the Munich city council demanded a full breakdown of the projected financial costs of the project, including the costs involved in retraining city employees accustomed to working with Windows 98, 95 and 3.1. The council has also requested a detailed migration schedule.
The cost analysis and schedule is to be presented to the council by May at the latest, according to council reports. The city will then decide how to proceed with the planned migration from Windows.
Seems it would have been MUCH smarter to get a cost analysis done BEFORE they started DOING the project!! Oh well, I used to work for a German company. Their IT guys always were going off half cocked, thinking up ways to justify playing with technology. We always had an uphill battle to get them to leave stuff alone, or to not wildly inflate projects with goofy shit. Seems Munic had the same problems, except since they are all German, there is nobody to be a voice of reason.
I predict a failed migration, millions of euros in lost money and productivity, and a scandal involving lots of high paid consultants 'talking' somebody influential into pushing this as a good idea.
But instead of paying $23.7 million for the Microsoft solution, Munich's city council opted to spend roughly $35.7 million to switch to open source, saying that the higher price would be offset by lower costs and more flexibility in licensing fees and software choices over the long run.
Good ol' Germany. Always thinking short term, and never looking at the big picture.
But according to Computerwoche and other reports, the city lacks the funds to invest in the planned testing and development of an open-source solution. IBM and Germany-based Linux distributor SuSE are expected to help offset the costs of the migration by supplying technical support and conducting some of the studies that the Munich city council has requested.
Because these two companys have just as much at stake with seeing this migration actaully happen as the ill-advised city council.
Its a shame the council didnt think of network security, and even more a shame that their technical advisors wanted to play rather than thinking of what was best. No matter what OS you are going to use, gutting your network is never a good idea. Even worse is that they went and did it without adequate planning.
Reports in Computerwoche also stated that local vendors who currently code applications for the city were experiencing problems in developing applications for the open-source operating system, since they are more familiar with Windows than Linux.
Yep, another one of those hidden costs nobody is ever willing to tell you about. Another funny thing is that those Germans werent even good at writing Windows applications. Their apps were buggy, poorly designed, and usually couldnt even be run over a network. We started doing WinNT on the desktop, and most of their apps couldnt even run on NT. Heck, many of them were still programming like the apps was for Win3.11!
Munich may opt to install an emulation program on city workers' computers that will allow Windows applications to run on Linux.
So, now they need to run their Windows software thru a flakey emulator. Smoothe move! This is also going to jack up their support costs, offsetting any savings in software licensing. But on the bright side, IBM can learn from their expensive mistakes, so at least a US company will benefit.
Er, I should know this... oh yes. 8675 309, that's it. No, wait, that's not it. Damn you, Tommy Tutone!
Only one thing to do.. 111 1111... Lois? Damn! 111 1112... Lois? Damn! 111 1113...
I've seen it happen, Ive done it myself: Windows CAN run without crashing!!! If you work in IT, than you should probably quit and go sell shoes; you arent cut out for this job.
But the difference is that Jane in Marketting cant change anti-fraud laws on her PC, rendering the US Legal system incapable of booting.
Nice try at an analogy troll, but you need to pick a better example.
1) It's Windows. Forget "open".
Who gives a fuck. People working in an office (or even an overwhelming majority of home users) dont get paid to fuck with the source code, nor would most of them even want to. Only programmers care about that shit, and at least 99% of computer users are not programmers.
2) It's Windows. Forget "stable".
If Win2k or XP are unstable, your computer is a piece of shit. Your poor choices in hardware arent Microsoft's responsibility; stop buying Packard Bell.
3) It's Windows. Forget "drivers" without a dozen driver install disks...
A. d00d, turn off the 8-track; drivers come on CD's these days
B. Again, get out of the 60s. On Win2k/XP you rarely need drivers which arent provided (especially XP).
4) It's Windows. Forget "Source code".
A. I beg to differ
B. See statements regarding #1.
5) It's Windows... most apps won't run without registry editing and all kinds of other crap.
I dont have to edit the registry, or anything else, to get my applications to run. And if you do, than whoever put together your install package is a retard (I should know, Ive put several install packages together). But actually, isnt getting applications to run on Linux a bit of a chore, depending on your distro?
All in all, a pretty weak troll attempt. I give it 2 out of a possible 10. You are going to have to try way harder than that around here.
I believe it was either PBS or the History Channel, but they had a huge show on DeBeers. After seeing all the crap that cartel has done, and how they operate, I'll be damned if I ever waste money on a diamond. Its funny, because the guy who founded the cartel was a geologist who pretty knew for a fact that diamonds were so common as to be valueless!
Scientists to DeBeers: FUCK YOU!!!
Nothing really to be proud of, its not like I cured cancer or anything.
However laptops are expensive computers because of the portability
They sure are. Thats why I wont buy one.
Just because it's expensive doesn't mean it's a waste of money.
I realize that. But until such a time comes, which I cant envision presently, I dont see any reason to purchase one.
I waste enough money keeping my desktop up to speed, and there are always other expenses like tech books, trying to get adequate furniture, fixing my vehicle, etc.
Thus, by applying that logic, we can say that money tends not to get stolen: after all, the amount of money possessed far outweighs the amount of money stolen.
Especially, given the situation where employers will purchase them for me.
IMO- In My Opinion
My statement was never expresses as anything other than my opinion.
Even now, Frodo and Sam are fighting their way through Mordor to throw your "One True Opinion" into the fiery maw of Mount Doom.
Um, ya, that was kind of the point.
Let me draw you a chart. If Mono can acheive 100% compatibility with the code THEY are responsible for, but there are compatibility issues with Wine, than, overall, there is no 100%. Since they have no control or influence over the Wine project, they will have, at that point, reached an impasse; since Wine can improve, not improve, fold, or accept external improvements to their sources and summarily wipe their asses with them, there is nothing further Mono can do to improve their own project.
If, however, they impliment their own windows emulation, they can make use of changes in the Wine project (giving them credit, of course), start from scratch, or whatever. But, they then have a situation in which they can acheive their goals, and have the control they require to further their main project.
As people higher in this thread have stated, there are issues with Wine. Were this not the case, such a statement would be senseless. But all duplication of effort is not necessarily a bad thing.
If you ever learn how to manage a project, this whole subject is basic.
As I said, HAVING a laptop isnt stupid. But BUYING one, for me, is. As always, YMMV, but I have never had to purchase one, they have always been purchased for me.
But, to quote one of my former bosses, I do not pay for disposable technology. I only have a laptop if the place I work for buys one for me. If I need appliction or document portability, I own a 256mb USB key. Much lighter, and cheaper, than a laptop.
I guess stuff like this laptop is nice if you have more money than you know what to do with, but for a regular working guy (even in tech), thats a pretty big, and non-justifyable expense.
Having said that, its still pretty fucking cool.
Im just going to hold out for those Cold Fusion generators. They should probably be coming out any day now, right?