But to a large degree the attitude on behalf of Linux users is a *big* part of the reason I'm leaving.
Hehe. Yeah, ok....must not have much experience with the attitude of BSD users, huh? Go check out the mailing lists or IRC channels some time; if you thought Linux users were dicks, you're about to hit the big leagues.
Hehe. This guy is obviously a great coder. Too bad he's such a total dickhead.
This article really highlights Theo's personality problems, and may shed some light on why NetBSD summarily kicked him out on the street. Here's the first email he got from the core developers after he complained that they shut down his CVS access:
Over the past year and a half, we have received a considerable number of complaints about the fact that you seem to harass and abuse both users and developers of NetBSD. At various times, some of us have suggested (with varying levels of severity) that you cease this behaviour, but this has been ineffective. Indeed, you have given us scant reason to believe that your behaviour is ever going to change for the better.
Your abusive actions have seriously impaired the success of the NetBSD project in several ways. Your actions have driven away developers or potential developers, and have alienated many users. They have also squandered much of the good will that various people have directed at the project.
Finally, it is clear that for the project to be a success, we must promote a positive environment for both users and developers. If we continue to allow you, an official representative of the NetBSD project, to behave in this manner, we create the perception that we approve of your behaviour. That perception is damaging to the project and cannot be allowed to persist.
Because of these things, we believe that it would be in the best interest of the NetBSD project if you were to resign all official association with the project. We request that you resign from the NetBSD core team, resign as the maintainer of the NetBSD SPARC port, and post a message to the "netbsd-users", "current-users", and "port-sparc" mailing lists announcing your resignation. If you choose not to post such an announcement within one day (by 9:00AM, 12/21/94), we will be forced to inform the public about your removal from the organization ourselves.
We regret having to do this, because you have done a significant amount of very good work for the project. In spite of that, we can no longer condone your behaviour. We wish for this parting to be as painless as possible; we have disabled your accounts on the NetBSD development machines and have removed you from the "core" and "port-masters" mailing lists, but have left your subscriptions to other NetBSD mailing lists untouched. We have no objection to your further participation in NetBSD, as long as you participate in a mature manner and make clear the fact that you no longer officially represent the NetBSD Project.
Of course, now no one can kick him out of OpenBSD, so I guess he's found the one role that'll work for him. Luckily, it's irrelevant during the 364 days this year when some idiot at Forbes didn't decide to upchuck a completely assinine, one-sided bullshit flame from a proven asshole, and then call it a news story.
I'd bet on it. At the announcement, they said they would ensure that OSX only ran on Apple hardware, but that they would not do anything to stop people from running Windows on Apple hardware. I think the quote even said "I'm sure a few people will do that" but I don't have it handy.
Now, they didn't mention Linux/BSD/etc., but I'd guess that if they expect a stock copy of XP to run, somebody will have Linux going on it the first night.
Is this the beginning of a strategy for Microsoft? Can't beat them, just buy them or the lead developer?
This seems to be the overriding (conspiracy) theory. I only see one problem....drobbins hasn't been running Gentoo for quite a while now. He's not really been active, and MS picking him up isn't having an effect at all on the running of Gentoo. So, I have to say I don't see what value they would place on that. It seems like if that was their goal, there would be lots of other people in much more vital roles that they would try to pick up.
My theory is, maybe they saw how extremely successful this guy was at building a massive online development community, and thought he'd be an excellent choice for someone to teach them how to reach OSS-type developers.
Well, there was some talk a year or two ago about perhaps requiring that we keep our shoes on in the office.....but most of us thought that was pretty draconian. Definitely no issues with hair/piercing/etc.
It was generally agreed upon that I shouldn't wear the "I read your email" shirt to work, but that's the only restriction I know about.
If there's any marketing / advertising person at imdb who has to analyse the hits for various movies, I'd love to see them trying to puzzle out the/. anomalies.
Well, both these responses ignore the difference between your situations and the reasonably recent ones: the file format changed in both your cases. But the last format change was the Word 95->97 one....all the later versions of word use that same Word97 format, with just some extensions for the new features. document movement between the versions has thus become much more stable.
This cat is no doubt a talented-as-hell programmer, and has done lots of real cool things.
But on the other hand, I think the most telling part of this story is the comparison to the third link where he's resigning from netscape and the mozilla project. He really comes off sounding like an asshole, and it doesn't help that he's so unbelievably wrong in retrospect.
He complains that no community ever formed around mozilla. He whines that the code they produced was too hard to modify and that people couldn't easily add new features. He complains of a lack of a mail program. Mozilla.org handled both of these issues quite well, now didn't they? He also takes issue with Netscape for continuing devlopment of 4.5 on the old codebase while mozilla.org was starting up, while he simultaneously complains that they didn't ship end-user software. But, see, they did....Netscape 4.5. It just wasn't the end-user software he wanted shipped.
And the practical truth of that is that it was simply harder to do than he wanted it to be. Mozilla was just too huge, too hard to complete, for his timeframe to be realistic. It would be a few more years until the project could release the real-deal, which really was 1.0. And a couple more to get Firefox and Thunderbird to their 1.0 releases, which was when they really came into their own as the best-of-breed tools he always wanted them to be.
But this did all happen eventually. And he just gave up and threw in the towel, because this shit was too hard and was taking longer than he wanted it to take.
Sounds a lot like the current situation, no?
Of course, I think the feeling's mutual:
Dear Slashdot: please don't post about this. Screw you guys.
Single threaded processes should never have issues running on an SMP system, though there will be a small loss of speed due to the overhead of SMP
I question whether this is really true anymore. I don't know the story in Windows so I'll just ignore it. But in Linux, my understanding was that late-model kernels put in all the SMP spinlocks and interupt mojo into the single-proc kernel anyway...the vaunted "preemptive kernel patch" that made so much noise in the mid-2.5 series. In such a case, doesn't that mean that the loss in throughput from "SMP overhead" would also be evident in single-proc machines, and thus not amount to a loss in performance in a dual situation?
I don't know. But it seems worth checking out.
Also, note I said "throughput" which is the more precise version of "speed" that I took to be your meaning. And this raises another important point. First, as most of us know, SMP systems kick total ass for responsiveness...although the difference is much less noticable now, due to that same preemptive kernel patch (PKP from now on) and some others. So it's only the throughput that might be adversely affected. And this I would expect would be just as affected by the PKP as by having SMP. This is notable because I believe I read a Linux Journal article from the mid-2.5 period that involved testing both latency and throughput with and without the PKP. The author expected to see much-improved latency and slightly degraded throughput. But in actuality he found that both latency and throughput were improved. His explanation was that the spinlocks were actually helping throughput by allowing the kernel to quit processing when it wasn't necessary anymore, where without the PKP it would have had to continue through the execution for much longer.
It's been a while now since I read through that, but it suggests to me that under a lot of load types throughput may actually be better than 2:1 for a dual:single comparison, if the comparison is a single-proc machine without PKP and a dual-proc machine with SMP. And the same logic would suggest that a single-proc PKP-enabled machine would deliver exactly half the throughput of an SMP machine.
Obviously, this ignores all other system components and bandwidth issues.
Just because you can't install packages through the package manager without a root password (or sudo elevation) doesn't prevent the user from running other programs (that don't require the package manager, and don't need to be compiled if you don't allow user access to gcc) from his home directory.
Ok.....then what the fuck is your point in the first place? You can install software in your home directory in Linux. If that's what you were talking about, then you weren't just advocating bad system policy, you were just plain fucking wrong. That's not what the package manager is for, and it doesn't keep you from doing it. The package manager is for system-wide software installation. Which explains why I assumed that's what you are talking about. Because you were bitching about not being able to use the package manager as a normal user. A normal user shouldn't have access to the package manager because they shouldn't be allowed to install software system-wide, and that's what the package manager is for. If you want to install software in your home directory, fine, go ahead.
So it turns out you never had anything to bitch about in the first place, and were just making shit up. And as for the 15-yr old Linux asshole bit, let's examine 3 things:
1)You're the one posting AC
2)My user number should give you an idea of how many years I've been here, which should preclude such a young age
3)Given that I'm the one here that seems to have some basic idea of what you can and can't do in Linux (and yes, even maybe why that is) you're coming off as the asshole.
Well, if I argued against letting everyone install things system wide, it was only because I did not even entertain the stupidity involved in complaining about not being able to install things in your home directory. BECAUSE YOU CAN. So, even worse than the point I thought he was trying to make, he was making a fictional point.
So whatever. Maybe I misunderstood it. But it was only because I was giving him too much credit.
So what's this, you've found the one guy on the Internet that says apt-get fucked up on him, and you also claim the same thing happened to you once? Ok, whatever. I've had Macs just stop booting, an OSX install fail on allegedly supported hardware and had a list of Windows breakage that needs to come in ASCII format on DVD. You are still full of shit, and "the slightest mistake" does not bring things "tumbling down." Apt-get is more than capable, and robust as hell...those of us who actually use it instead of whining about how Linux isn't MacOS and how "that debian install one time screwed up" know this full well. I have used apt-get successfully with zero problems on several machines. For years.
Why yes, yes I am. But I can't have an application installed to my home directory because I need to install a package. And I can't install the package, because I don't have access to the package database.
Uh, sorry man. That's just not right. You can still install things in your home directory. There is no requirement of using the package manager, it's just the easy way to install software system-wide. Please sit down.
Both of the aboves gives you a pretty good summary of why Debians way of handling packages isn't really any good in the long run.
No, both of those are asinine examples of stupid assumptions and bad behavior, and don't show any "problems" at all.
First of you can't install a application as a user, now how stupid is that? If *I* want to install a bleeding edge version of Gimp, I neither want to bother the admin with it nor do I want to force it an all the others users, yet Debian requires me todo exactly that.
You jackass. It's called some semblance of security. Allowing any user to install things is a Bad Thing, and even a properly locked-down Windows box won't allow this these days. You want to have some control over what can and can't be installed; if you want somebody to be able to install things, you grant them permission, either by letting them su or by giving sudo access. The latter you can do 1)requiring root's password, 2)requiring the user's password, or 3)requiring no password at all. Your choice. Quit your bitching.
Secondly Debian packages work great, but only for stuff that is in Debian, which might be a lot, but is *far* from everything and its also often *way* outdated
Debian is not a mainstream desktop OS. Go get Ubuntu, which has the same packaging system and basic system design, but much newer packages and a better desktop setup. And quit your bitching.
And this bullshit about "Could not find package xyz"? So, you're complaining because to install something, you need to know what it's called? I mean, seriously......you don't think it's reasonable to ask the user to know the name of a program? Well, ok, fine....apt-cache, and all the apt-get frontends, allow you to search both names and descriptions. So quit your bitching.
The one thing that stands out at me is that Symphony uses Yet Another(TM) packaging system that is supposed to fix all the woes of the previous packaging system. Haven't we learned yet? In a complex system, packages are just as bad (actually worse) for users than DLL Hell.
This is Just Plain Wrong (tm)
This is a debian based (apt-get) packaging system. It was one of the first, and it "fixed" all the problems you complain about in your post. (More accurately, it didn't have to fix them, as from its very inception it was designed to handle these issues.) No dependency/.dll/.so/library hell. apt-get handles this quite nicely, thank you, without you having to know anything about the deps or libs in question...you tell it what you want, it gives you what you need. No problem.
The fact that there are a few frontends to apt-get is not a problem, particularly in this case, where these guys are really trying to engineer a new desktop experience....they want this to look/feel different. But I'll bet you the same functionality is there; the problems you mention will not happen.
Look guys, I hate to break it to the sensationalist-journalism crowd, but this just is not an earth-shattering development. Apple is changing processors. This does not equate to a massive assault on, well, anything. They are still going to sell expensive, well designed, proprietary boxes with a welded-in OS. It's not going to run on commodity hardware. It'll still "just work" and Mac people will still love it for all the same reasons, and us Linux heads will keep doing what we're doing.
The fact that those machines will have x86 procs from here on in actually makes me much less interested; I always wanted a ppc linux box (I've plenty of x86 ones) and I probably would have even dual-booted it. But now....what's the point?
It sounds like something they'd wanna do, but given their antitrust history, they'd be damn stupid to...
What history? You mean the history where they manipulated/faked evidence, thumbed their nose at the judicial system, totally ignored the first antitrust case on their way to the second, finally were sentenced to be broken into two companies, and then were completely and totally let off the hook with a slap on the wrist when the current administration came in and started their love-fest?
Microsoft hasn't had anything to worry about from U.S. antitrust authorities since day one of the Bush administration. And Europe's sanctions have been weak too. They can do whatever the hell they want, and will.
Slashdot Mirror
No I *love* BSD users. But then again I am and always have been an elitist asshole.
Oh, well, my apologies; I stand corrected. You'll fit right in ;-)
But to a large degree the attitude on behalf of Linux users is a *big* part of the reason I'm leaving.
Hehe. Yeah, ok....must not have much experience with the attitude of BSD users, huh? Go check out the mailing lists or IRC channels some time; if you thought Linux users were dicks, you're about to hit the big leagues.
Hehe. This guy is obviously a great coder. Too bad he's such a total dickhead.
This article really highlights Theo's personality problems, and may shed some light on why NetBSD summarily kicked him out on the street. Here's the first email he got from the core developers after he complained that they shut down his CVS access:
Over the past year and a half, we have received a considerable number of complaints about the fact that you seem to harass and abuse both users and developers of NetBSD. At various times, some of us have suggested (with varying levels of severity) that you cease this behaviour, but this has been ineffective. Indeed, you have given us scant reason to believe that your behaviour is ever going to change for the better.
Your abusive actions have seriously impaired the success of the NetBSD project in several ways. Your actions have driven away developers or potential developers, and have alienated many users. They have also squandered much of the good will that various people have directed at the project.
Finally, it is clear that for the project to be a success, we must promote a positive environment for both users and developers. If we continue to allow you, an official representative of the NetBSD project, to behave in this manner, we create the perception that we approve of your behaviour. That perception is damaging to the project and cannot be allowed to persist.
Because of these things, we believe that it would be in the best interest of the NetBSD project if you were to resign all official association with the project. We request that you resign from the NetBSD core team, resign as the maintainer of the NetBSD SPARC port, and post a message to the "netbsd-users", "current-users", and "port-sparc" mailing lists announcing your resignation. If you choose not to post such an announcement within one day (by 9:00AM, 12/21/94), we will be forced to inform the public about your removal from the organization ourselves.
We regret having to do this, because you have done a significant amount of very good work for the project. In spite of that, we can no longer condone your behaviour. We wish for this parting to be as painless as possible; we have disabled your accounts on the NetBSD development machines and have removed you from the "core" and "port-masters" mailing lists, but have left your subscriptions to other NetBSD mailing lists untouched. We have no objection to your further participation in NetBSD, as long as you participate in a mature manner and make clear the fact that you no longer officially represent the NetBSD Project.
Of course, now no one can kick him out of OpenBSD, so I guess he's found the one role that'll work for him. Luckily, it's irrelevant during the 364 days this year when some idiot at Forbes didn't decide to upchuck a completely assinine, one-sided bullshit flame from a proven asshole, and then call it a news story.
Login before posting redudant.
--Mark Twain
will it run Linux?
I'd bet on it. At the announcement, they said they would ensure that OSX only ran on Apple hardware, but that they would not do anything to stop people from running Windows on Apple hardware. I think the quote even said "I'm sure a few people will do that" but I don't have it handy.
Now, they didn't mention Linux/BSD/etc., but I'd guess that if they expect a stock copy of XP to run, somebody will have Linux going on it the first night.
Is this the beginning of a strategy for Microsoft? Can't beat them, just buy them or the lead developer?
This seems to be the overriding (conspiracy) theory. I only see one problem....drobbins hasn't been running Gentoo for quite a while now. He's not really been active, and MS picking him up isn't having an effect at all on the running of Gentoo. So, I have to say I don't see what value they would place on that. It seems like if that was their goal, there would be lots of other people in much more vital roles that they would try to pick up.
My theory is, maybe they saw how extremely successful this guy was at building a massive online development community, and thought he'd be an excellent choice for someone to teach them how to reach OSS-type developers.
Fool! Netcraft has confirmed, apples are dying.
Well, there was some talk a year or two ago about perhaps requiring that we keep our shoes on in the office.....but most of us thought that was pretty draconian. Definitely no issues with hair/piercing/etc.
It was generally agreed upon that I shouldn't wear the "I read your email" shirt to work, but that's the only restriction I know about.
who the hell says chiefing? are you from some european country?
What!? You don't say "chiefing"? Seriously? "Man, we were chiefing this blunt the other day, and..."
I'm smack in the middle of the country, but I've heard that usage all over the place.
If there's any marketing / advertising person at imdb who has to analyse the hits for various movies, I'd love to see them trying to puzzle out the /. anomalies.
Don't they have access to http-referrer?
I think it has the ability but it's optional. Of course, OpenOffice has that system-tray quicklaunch deal as well.
Well, both these responses ignore the difference between your situations and the reasonably recent ones: the file format changed in both your cases. But the last format change was the Word 95->97 one....all the later versions of word use that same Word97 format, with just some extensions for the new features. document movement between the versions has thus become much more stable.
Yeah, who indeed.
This cat is no doubt a talented-as-hell programmer, and has done lots of real cool things.
But on the other hand, I think the most telling part of this story is the comparison to the third link where he's resigning from netscape and the mozilla project. He really comes off sounding like an asshole, and it doesn't help that he's so unbelievably wrong in retrospect.
He complains that no community ever formed around mozilla. He whines that the code they produced was too hard to modify and that people couldn't easily add new features. He complains of a lack of a mail program. Mozilla.org handled both of these issues quite well, now didn't they? He also takes issue with Netscape for continuing devlopment of 4.5 on the old codebase while mozilla.org was starting up, while he simultaneously complains that they didn't ship end-user software. But, see, they did....Netscape 4.5. It just wasn't the end-user software he wanted shipped.
And the practical truth of that is that it was simply harder to do than he wanted it to be. Mozilla was just too huge, too hard to complete, for his timeframe to be realistic. It would be a few more years until the project could release the real-deal, which really was 1.0. And a couple more to get Firefox and Thunderbird to their 1.0 releases, which was when they really came into their own as the best-of-breed tools he always wanted them to be.
But this did all happen eventually. And he just gave up and threw in the towel, because this shit was too hard and was taking longer than he wanted it to take.
Sounds a lot like the current situation, no?
Of course, I think the feeling's mutual:
Dear Slashdot: please don't post about this. Screw you guys.
Oh well...
Single threaded processes should never have issues running on an SMP system, though there will be a small loss of speed due to the overhead of SMP
I question whether this is really true anymore. I don't know the story in Windows so I'll just ignore it. But in Linux, my understanding was that late-model kernels put in all the SMP spinlocks and interupt mojo into the single-proc kernel anyway...the vaunted "preemptive kernel patch" that made so much noise in the mid-2.5 series. In such a case, doesn't that mean that the loss in throughput from "SMP overhead" would also be evident in single-proc machines, and thus not amount to a loss in performance in a dual situation?
I don't know. But it seems worth checking out.
Also, note I said "throughput" which is the more precise version of "speed" that I took to be your meaning. And this raises another important point. First, as most of us know, SMP systems kick total ass for responsiveness...although the difference is much less noticable now, due to that same preemptive kernel patch (PKP from now on) and some others. So it's only the throughput that might be adversely affected. And this I would expect would be just as affected by the PKP as by having SMP. This is notable because I believe I read a Linux Journal article from the mid-2.5 period that involved testing both latency and throughput with and without the PKP. The author expected to see much-improved latency and slightly degraded throughput. But in actuality he found that both latency and throughput were improved. His explanation was that the spinlocks were actually helping throughput by allowing the kernel to quit processing when it wasn't necessary anymore, where without the PKP it would have had to continue through the execution for much longer.
It's been a while now since I read through that, but it suggests to me that under a lot of load types throughput may actually be better than 2:1 for a dual:single comparison, if the comparison is a single-proc machine without PKP and a dual-proc machine with SMP. And the same logic would suggest that a single-proc PKP-enabled machine would deliver exactly half the throughput of an SMP machine.
Obviously, this ignores all other system components and bandwidth issues.
No, no, just post them to Google Groups! That way you can always get back to them no matter where you are!
Now we get to the heart of the issue. What you're saying is directly analogous to "Apache isn't a very good web browser."
That's not what apt-get is supposed to do. Let it go.
Just because you can't install packages through the package manager without a root password (or sudo elevation) doesn't prevent the user from running other programs (that don't require the package manager, and don't need to be compiled if you don't allow user access to gcc) from his home directory.
Ok.....then what the fuck is your point in the first place? You can install software in your home directory in Linux. If that's what you were talking about, then you weren't just advocating bad system policy, you were just plain fucking wrong. That's not what the package manager is for, and it doesn't keep you from doing it. The package manager is for system-wide software installation. Which explains why I assumed that's what you are talking about. Because you were bitching about not being able to use the package manager as a normal user. A normal user shouldn't have access to the package manager because they shouldn't be allowed to install software system-wide, and that's what the package manager is for. If you want to install software in your home directory, fine, go ahead.
So it turns out you never had anything to bitch about in the first place, and were just making shit up. And as for the 15-yr old Linux asshole bit, let's examine 3 things:
1)You're the one posting AC2)My user number should give you an idea of how many years I've been here, which should preclude such a young age
3)Given that I'm the one here that seems to have some basic idea of what you can and can't do in Linux (and yes, even maybe why that is) you're coming off as the asshole.
So please, shut the fuck up.
Well, if I argued against letting everyone install things system wide, it was only because I did not even entertain the stupidity involved in complaining about not being able to install things in your home directory. BECAUSE YOU CAN. So, even worse than the point I thought he was trying to make, he was making a fictional point.
So whatever. Maybe I misunderstood it. But it was only because I was giving him too much credit.
So what's this, you've found the one guy on the Internet that says apt-get fucked up on him, and you also claim the same thing happened to you once? Ok, whatever. I've had Macs just stop booting, an OSX install fail on allegedly supported hardware and had a list of Windows breakage that needs to come in ASCII format on DVD. You are still full of shit, and "the slightest mistake" does not bring things "tumbling down." Apt-get is more than capable, and robust as hell...those of us who actually use it instead of whining about how Linux isn't MacOS and how "that debian install one time screwed up" know this full well. I have used apt-get successfully with zero problems on several machines. For years.
Why yes, yes I am. But I can't have an application installed to my home directory because I need to install a package. And I can't install the package, because I don't have access to the package database.
Uh, sorry man. That's just not right. You can still install things in your home directory. There is no requirement of using the package manager, it's just the easy way to install software system-wide. Please sit down.
Both of the aboves gives you a pretty good summary of why Debians way of handling packages isn't really any good in the long run.
No, both of those are asinine examples of stupid assumptions and bad behavior, and don't show any "problems" at all.
First of you can't install a application as a user, now how stupid is that? If *I* want to install a bleeding edge version of Gimp, I neither want to bother the admin with it nor do I want to force it an all the others users, yet Debian requires me todo exactly that.
You jackass. It's called some semblance of security. Allowing any user to install things is a Bad Thing, and even a properly locked-down Windows box won't allow this these days. You want to have some control over what can and can't be installed; if you want somebody to be able to install things, you grant them permission, either by letting them su or by giving sudo access. The latter you can do 1)requiring root's password, 2)requiring the user's password, or 3)requiring no password at all. Your choice. Quit your bitching.
Secondly Debian packages work great, but only for stuff that is in Debian, which might be a lot, but is *far* from everything and its also often *way* outdated
Debian is not a mainstream desktop OS. Go get Ubuntu, which has the same packaging system and basic system design, but much newer packages and a better desktop setup. And quit your bitching.
And this bullshit about "Could not find package xyz"? So, you're complaining because to install something, you need to know what it's called? I mean, seriously......you don't think it's reasonable to ask the user to know the name of a program? Well, ok, fine....apt-cache, and all the apt-get frontends, allow you to search both names and descriptions. So quit your bitching.
To call Debian's release cycle glacial is an insult to glaciers everywhere.
Hey, when's the last time you saw a glacier upgrade its kernel from 2.2 to 2.4 n four years?
The one thing that stands out at me is that Symphony uses Yet Another(TM) packaging system that is supposed to fix all the woes of the previous packaging system. Haven't we learned yet? In a complex system, packages are just as bad (actually worse) for users than DLL Hell.
This is Just Plain Wrong (tm)
This is a debian based (apt-get) packaging system. It was one of the first, and it "fixed" all the problems you complain about in your post. (More accurately, it didn't have to fix them, as from its very inception it was designed to handle these issues.) No dependency/.dll/.so/library hell. apt-get handles this quite nicely, thank you, without you having to know anything about the deps or libs in question...you tell it what you want, it gives you what you need. No problem.
The fact that there are a few frontends to apt-get is not a problem, particularly in this case, where these guys are really trying to engineer a new desktop experience....they want this to look/feel different. But I'll bet you the same functionality is there; the problems you mention will not happen.
So please, can the FUD.
The fact that those machines will have x86 procs from here on in actually makes me much less interested; I always wanted a ppc linux box (I've plenty of x86 ones) and I probably would have even dual-booted it. But now....what's the point?
It sounds like something they'd wanna do, but given their antitrust history, they'd be damn stupid to...
What history? You mean the history where they manipulated/faked evidence, thumbed their nose at the judicial system, totally ignored the first antitrust case on their way to the second, finally were sentenced to be broken into two companies, and then were completely and totally let off the hook with a slap on the wrist when the current administration came in and started their love-fest?
Microsoft hasn't had anything to worry about from U.S. antitrust authorities since day one of the Bush administration. And Europe's sanctions have been weak too. They can do whatever the hell they want, and will.