.NET is freely downloadable from the Microsoft site and the msdn.microsoft.com website is far, far more than an online manual giving frameworks, best practice methods, online manuals - the lot. If you need an "offline" manual then I've yet to see anything better than MSDN.
As for thr third party SDK's... well, to be honest when I work on projects we all have to use the same thing. If I want to use Visual Age, which has a good Java SDK and you insist on Eclipse that's fine but even still I still counter that only VA comes within a mile of Visual Studio. Seriously. Being able to create Winforms, Web forms simply and debugging code, javascripts, connecting to databases easily, editing and updating tables from one SDK... that's just for starters.
I am a Brit and have been in Manchester when we've been bombed by the IRA, who incidentally received a lot of funding in the US. I can absolutely assure you it's scary when you know poeple from school who get scarred for life from flying glass.
Of course it is wrong and immoral to blow up innocent people and I cannot understand their mentality. However, they do NOT see it as wrong!
We went for years where we used to increase the agression in pursuing them IRA and Loyalist terrorists. We were more brutal, we policed harder, we vowed never to give in. They tried to blow up our Government, we stepped up the patrols and made life harder. We killed people who protested sometimes and sometimes killed people at checkpoints. Still the attacks continued.
The only thing which has helped the situation is by talking, engaging and starting to dismantle the reasons which fire their anger and aggression. If you think that bombing and hunting people solves the problem I can tell you from our experiences that you bettre get used to facing years and years of terrorist actions.
From what I read, I thought that his idea about using technology to create these mobs in Africa was quite far-fetched, but I did think that if you extend his ideas, you can see them existing in everyday life here in 'the West'.
If you think about how use the internet, you can create a 'flash mob' particularly if a website offers a particularly good deal. For example, if I find cheap flights to Europe on a site like Ryanair I will email my friends to book the flights and come with me. This may not be a 'real' flash mob as he cites about the groups meeting in cities. It may not be a flash mob as we know it, but they do exists and I'd say on a larger level.
I think you're right on this. I bet there are lots of Linux machines that are just built and left running and becuase the security issues are simply not as great when compared to a Windows server, maybe people just forget to keep them up to date.
Sorry, you DO NOT know that SCO is doing anything illegal at all. That is for the courts to decide.
As for the Enron scandal, that is TOTALLY different to this. Enron was about conning, lying and cheating people out of money whereas this guy is simply not wanting to hire people purely based on where they have worked - and SCO have not done anything illegal.
What chance does the average coder who works to feed his family and keep a roof over his head have of influencing company executives (who can sakc him) who smell a big pay packet? Get real. Absolutely none at all. Sure, he can leave but if everyone who worked at companies who have undesirable motives, or were pursuing easy money then there'd be no one working!
chrisd if I were you, I'd get this taken off because you're company just looks petty and rather spiteful. Who would WANT to work for a company where the person who is interviewing you is mainly concerned with nothing to do with your job? You don't do yourself, or your company any favours whatsoever. What's next - judge someone on where they worked 5 years ago? God help your current employees with MS experience or if Red Hat etc ever do anything amiss!
I have seen many large site that use J2EE and can dig out some examples for you. I agree that there are a lot of big sites that don't use.NET or J2EE but there are a lot more large 'smaller' ones that do use J2EE and, to a lesser degree,.NET mainly becuase the tech is still maturing. When I get a little time I can point you to them, but I am tad busy in work at the moment;)
With regards to the site, it was just an example that because the technology is built from the ground up to scale you won't have any problems from a basic site to a full scale, highly interactive, database driven site!:) PHP won't and once you get to a certain level, the technology doesn't scale in that extra developers who come in have to understand your PHP methodology whereas in a more OO style it is a lot easier to understand in my opinion. A C#/Java programmer will understand the UML diagrams and theory behind the designs whereas in PHP it is not so easy to define the design as clearly.
Of course, a major benefit of using J2EE/.Net is that a class of business logic can be easily reused on the desktop to the website really easily. Try that in PHP and it becomes a problem.
You make a lot of good, interesting and valid points though.
I wouldn't disagree with you about bullshit, I've seen many instances where someone says you have to have a farm or whatever and I have managed to not have to use one. However, that it because I spend time planning the coding strategy, planning the resources, optimising the code and I find this alone will save significant amounts of money in both the hardware needed and coding time.
I disagree though that scability is bullshit - it isn't and once you work on a project and you get to the part where you need to scale up, you going to stuggle with PHP and that's a fact. It's great to a certain level, but once you hit that level where you need to scale you'll be sorry that you didn't choose a platform - Java or.NET - that can't handle the extra work. You may have a bad story about ONE pitch, but you will find many more people who simply find that a combination of OOP, design patterns, scalability etc just makes it very difficult to ignore when up against something like PHP.
You talk of 'throwing money' at the problem, you're right of course, but I will gurantee that either.NET or J2EE will be cheaper in the longer term.
Why? Here's a few reasons:
1. J2EE and.NET are designed to handle projects from 20 page sites up to 20,000,000 pages sites by simply adding new servers etc.
2. By adhering to a OO philoshophy it allows systems designers to take a 'higher level' view of the project, and employ tested patterns. PHP means you get bogged down in the implementation detail quite early on.
3. When you start building bigger teams of developers and bringing in new staff, the OO philosophy is understood and it's easier to explain and understand the models.
If you're talking dirty and quick, maybe for smaller projects that's fine but as soon as you start developing larger projects and start needing server farms, PHP just doesn't cut it, and when your boss asks for more features and you need to scale you're in trouble.
Quick and dirty may be fine for you, but for anything other than that, PHP is just not a patch on J2EE or.Net.
I'd add Visual Age for Java to that list. In my experience it is quite impressive but I do agree with the parent poster that using Visual Studio to build apps just makes it far easier to build, do RAD and you're also more likely to find people in the marketplace who will be able to come in and understand the original work.
I used to develop on J2EE and now develop for C# and ASP.NET and think both are very impressive patforms. Apart from one only running on Windows, there's little to choose between them and the only reason I prefer.Net is simply becuase I prefer the development tools for it but I certainly cannot say a bad word about Java. I am amazed you think it's slow and cumbersome, but that is more likely that you do not like or understand OOP.
However, what both J2EE and.NET are able to do far, far outstrips what you can do with PHP. We can argue the details, but with J2EE/.NET you are able to scale from small websites with limited functionality right up to sites running on many app servers, database servers, you name it - they are both Enterprise level systems.
What you can also do with both J2EE and.NET is cross train far more easily between making web and desktop based apps - again something you cannot do in PHP. For example, load up Visual Studio.NET and I guarantee that ANY ASP.NET programmer will be able to make desktop apps very quick, and the same for Java.
I will be very surprised if.NET doesn't end up on most desktops, to say it's a dead end is frankly plain stupid. I guess you've never done a stroke or work on the framework otherwise you'd be able to understand why those who have used it think it is probably the best thing MS have done for a long while.
I don't dislike PHP at all, it has it's uses, but put simply, it's not in the same league as.NET or J2EE. I really suggest you have a look at both products, get hold of Visual Age for Java or Visual Studio, get a book on OOP and don't look back!:)
If you are looking for a handheld console that has a free SDK, can be used with any development environment on Linux, Mac or Windows then have a look at the GamePark 32 which is available in Korea and soon into Europe.
I recommend looking at the GP32 site though as it has better descriptions, reviews, news and gives you a great overview of what is possible.
It is the first 'Open' console that's been produced and already has quite a 'bedroom' community that has sprung up around it.
Not only it is open, it just happens to be the most powerful handheld console out there and there's ports of Doom, Heretic on it already as well as Atari ST, Gameboy, SMS, PC Engine and Megadrive emulators. It has a built in MP3 player and you can also plays DivX movies if you pay a small fee (3.50/$6) for the player. All the commerical games for it are very cheap too - most in the 7/$12 bracket.
In short it is superb and runs on standard Smart Media Cards so once you've bought the console you aren't tied to buying proprietry hardware like the Gameboy.
So, you have no excuses now - buy one, start developing and make money!:)
As someone who earns his living off writing for the.Net framework (Linux at home though;) I think this is really quite an impressive piece of kit which could have a lot of ramifications for how software is written for phones, web pages and on the desktop.
With the latest release of Visual Studio, they have really blurred the difference between how you put together a Windows Form, a ASP.NET form and a Mobile form. Just to have the ability to write a few classes and get good, working output on a Windows Form, ASP.NET form and a mobile form you start to realise just how impressive it is, and also how relatively easy it will be to, for example, take an existing Windows Form app and get it working on a WAP Page, ASP.Net page, Smartphone or anything else. This alone is a huge step forward and is going to make new development a whole lot easier as well as being able to leverage existing software onto the phones.
Sadly, most on here will totally dismiss it with the predictable BSOD 'gags' (again and again... dzz) but this is something which is very impressive. I know you can do similiar things in Java but with MS you will be talking about business applications being run on phones, not the games and utilities that are mainly found on the Java phones. I will add that I do like Java, but I am speaking from what I have seen here.
So, I say to you: take the time just to read about.Net and the SDK, what it can do. We all know that MS gets a lot of things wrong, but every so often they get something right - as all companies do.
What happens if there IS code in Linux that SCO own? So far, everything I've read on Slashdot says there isn't and I have not read any posts that ask the 'what if...'
If it can be shown that there is an infringment in the code, in any court, then it will make for an interesting case.
In any event, is there anything other than the IBM financial power that could stop this type of case again? Playing Devil's Advocate, what would happen if (say) Microsoft backed SCO against IBM?
A lot of questions here, but I don't know any of the answers...
IBM do have far greater resources than SCO and can afford to drag this through the courts.
However, it needs to be established if SCO have a case (I don't think they do) and if so, the offending code needs either replacing or paying for - resolving in some way.
If this ends up with IBM winning through greater financial resource, I don't think the matter will have been answered... afterall, when will the next company make similar charges? What happens if a larger beast than SCO makes the charge?
Burying heads in sand isn't the way to resolve this.
But do Red Hat know something that possibly the greater community do not?
If there has been no infringement then logically there would be no need for this fund as, again logically, it could be demonstrated in every court that Linux doesn't contain any SCO material.
I guess that this is not just for the SCO charges, but maybe for other similar charges from other companies who may, sometime in the future, level the same accusations.
Maybe I am well off track here, but surely it would be of better use to the community for SuSE, IBM etc to also put into the pot.... I guess the interest gained alone from such a pot would be huge if it is to protect people from charges similar to SCO which I will guess will end up costing millions.
I really hope this can be finally be put to rest sometime soon, as this kind of 'war chest building' does not inspire confidence. I have said before that whilst these charges, counter charges and now this warchest it is going to make those who are looking at migrating someway towards Linux a little concerned.
This case is threatening to be one in which only the lawyers come out of it with anything.
For all the predictably negative comments made by the Linux community, no one it seems, is preparing to challenge SCO and get this resolved. I will guarantee there are an endless stream of SCO jibes on this page now but not a single one of those jibes is something proactive or reactive to this seemingly large problem.
As far as I am aware, this has been ongoing for several months now and is including some very big companies that PHB's have heard of. Now, if a PHB knows that SCO is taking IBM to court and threatening Novell it would seem to suggest that using Linux in any form is likely to have implications at some time in the future, and therefore hold back Linux in the workplace.
Whilst this cloud is hanging over Linux, managers are going to be wary about rolling out Linux solutions and therefore other solutions such as MS ones are going to look increasingly safe choices, particularly with the new legal benefits.
A lot of people will, and indeed should, compare Linux with Windows. In order to improve Linux it should be compared to it's peers.
Windows is the most common OS out there and a lot of people coming to Linux from Windows (myself included) find that things which are real easy on Windows are surprisingly difficult on Linux. MS will have spent millions on developing the GUI and therefore do some things really well, others not so well.
Example of annoyances, for me, where trying to open certain Word documents on OO, not being able to use a Linux machine on a Windows network and enjoy the power(!) of Exchange etc. These are personal to me, and unfortunately a lot of people in a corporate environment WOULD compare Linux and Windows and find that Linux just has too many annoyances.
For a start, light at night makes it difficult to sleep at night. Try having a streetlight outside your bedroom window and you will quickly (as I found out!) find your sleep patterns are disturbed as you wake up easier and therefore find it difficult to sleep.
Consider that for many of us in major cities, we cannot view the natural beauty of space. Our views are blocked by artifical lights that stop us from seeing the sights our ancestors looked upon and first asked the great philosophical questions.
You imply that light is a good thing. It isn't. Well, not always. Of course we need light, but it needs to be used appropriately.
Artificial light isn't a replacement for natural light. Aside from the voluminous amounts of electricity a lot of it wastes it does cause problems for people.
Daylight is a good thing for animals, plants and humans on the planet. For people who live in northern Europe and the US/Canda there are higher incidencies of suicide, alcoholism and drug abuse than there are in places which recieve more natural light, and this has been attributed to a lack of natural light. Artifical light just isn't the same. You could have 12 hours of artifical light in a polar region and it wouldn't make any difference.
On a small, and possibly more irrelevant scale to you, consider the number of insects that congregate around lamp posts thinking the worlds most beautiful fly/wasp/bee/moth/whatever is in front of them. In time, it will affect their and predators natural actions!
It is very easy to mock and joke about this, but it is a very, very important issue for a lot of people, plants and animals!:)
The point is, that separating WMP from XP is not that easy. It is an integral part of the OS now, and quite frankly it does a very good job for me.
The PC is not just a geeky toy anymore - it is slowly moving into front rooms, being used as media stations and other functions and as a consequence, a media player that seemlessly integrates with the OS is just as important as being able to browse text files etc.
As for paying for everything you use. Fine. I am not sure that being able to pick and choose an endless variety number of packages is what most users want. They just want to go to My Music or whatever and preview, organise and rate etc.
If the EU stop Microsoft trading in Europe, they'll be huge problems. Like I said, I live and work in England and I have never been to an office where there's anything less than 95% MS stuff. Put simply, big business cannot afford to allow a decision like this affect them, and neither can national governments.
Like I've said previously, we all know MS is abusing their monopoly but the EU have picked up on a case which is not as clear cut as it could be. As a consequence, not much will happen.
Slashdot Mirror
I take it you know little of .NET then?
.NET is freely downloadable from the Microsoft site and the msdn.microsoft.com website is far, far more than an online manual giving frameworks, best practice methods, online manuals - the lot. If you need an "offline" manual then I've yet to see anything better than MSDN.
As for thr third party SDK's... well, to be honest when I work on projects we all have to use the same thing. If I want to use Visual Age, which has a good Java SDK and you insist on Eclipse that's fine but even still I still counter that only VA comes within a mile of Visual Studio. Seriously. Being able to create Winforms, Web forms simply and debugging code, javascripts, connecting to databases easily, editing and updating tables from one SDK... that's just for starters.
I am a Brit and have been in Manchester when we've been bombed by the IRA, who incidentally received a lot of funding in the US. I can absolutely assure you it's scary when you know poeple from school who get scarred for life from flying glass. Of course it is wrong and immoral to blow up innocent people and I cannot understand their mentality. However, they do NOT see it as wrong! We went for years where we used to increase the agression in pursuing them IRA and Loyalist terrorists. We were more brutal, we policed harder, we vowed never to give in. They tried to blow up our Government, we stepped up the patrols and made life harder. We killed people who protested sometimes and sometimes killed people at checkpoints. Still the attacks continued. The only thing which has helped the situation is by talking, engaging and starting to dismantle the reasons which fire their anger and aggression. If you think that bombing and hunting people solves the problem I can tell you from our experiences that you bettre get used to facing years and years of terrorist actions.
The 'War on Terror' cannot be won by capturing anyone! You can only 'win' by solving the problems that only serve to create more and more terrorists.
From what I read, I thought that his idea about using technology to create these mobs in Africa was quite far-fetched, but I did think that if you extend his ideas, you can see them existing in everyday life here in 'the West'.
If you think about how use the internet, you can create a 'flash mob' particularly if a website offers a particularly good deal. For example, if I find cheap flights to Europe on a site like Ryanair I will email my friends to book the flights and come with me. This may not be a 'real' flash mob as he cites about the groups meeting in cities. It may not be a flash mob as we know it, but they do exists and I'd say on a larger level.
I think you're right on this. I bet there are lots of Linux machines that are just built and left running and becuase the security issues are simply not as great when compared to a Windows server, maybe people just forget to keep them up to date.
Sorry, you DO NOT know that SCO is doing anything illegal at all. That is for the courts to decide.
:)
As for the Enron scandal, that is TOTALLY different to this. Enron was about conning, lying and cheating people out of money whereas this guy is simply not wanting to hire people purely based on where they have worked - and SCO have not done anything illegal.
Seriously, you're taking this WAY to hard!
I have to agree here.
What chance does the average coder who works to feed his family and keep a roof over his head have of influencing company executives (who can sakc him) who smell a big pay packet? Get real. Absolutely none at all. Sure, he can leave but if everyone who worked at companies who have undesirable motives, or were pursuing easy money then there'd be no one working!
chrisd if I were you, I'd get this taken off because you're company just looks petty and rather spiteful. Who would WANT to work for a company where the person who is interviewing you is mainly concerned with nothing to do with your job? You don't do yourself, or your company any favours whatsoever. What's next - judge someone on where they worked 5 years ago? God help your current employees with MS experience or if Red Hat etc ever do anything amiss!
You will get the applicants you deserve.
I have seen many large site that use J2EE and can dig out some examples for you. I agree that there are a lot of big sites that don't use .NET or J2EE but there are a lot more large 'smaller' ones that do use J2EE and, to a lesser degree, .NET mainly becuase the tech is still maturing. When I get a little time I can point you to them, but I am tad busy in work at the moment ;)
:) PHP won't and once you get to a certain level, the technology doesn't scale in that extra developers who come in have to understand your PHP methodology whereas in a more OO style it is a lot easier to understand in my opinion. A C#/Java programmer will understand the UML diagrams and theory behind the designs whereas in PHP it is not so easy to define the design as clearly.
With regards to the site, it was just an example that because the technology is built from the ground up to scale you won't have any problems from a basic site to a full scale, highly interactive, database driven site!
Of course, a major benefit of using J2EE/.Net is that a class of business logic can be easily reused on the desktop to the website really easily. Try that in PHP and it becomes a problem.
You make a lot of good, interesting and valid points though.
I wouldn't disagree with you about bullshit, I've seen many instances where someone says you have to have a farm or whatever and I have managed to not have to use one. However, that it because I spend time planning the coding strategy, planning the resources, optimising the code and I find this alone will save significant amounts of money in both the hardware needed and coding time.
.NET - that can't handle the extra work. You may have a bad story about ONE pitch, but you will find many more people who simply find that a combination of OOP, design patterns, scalability etc just makes it very difficult to ignore when up against something like PHP.
.NET or J2EE will be cheaper in the longer term.
.NET are designed to handle projects from 20 page sites up to 20,000,000 pages sites by simply adding new servers etc.
I disagree though that scability is bullshit - it isn't and once you work on a project and you get to the part where you need to scale up, you going to stuggle with PHP and that's a fact. It's great to a certain level, but once you hit that level where you need to scale you'll be sorry that you didn't choose a platform - Java or
You talk of 'throwing money' at the problem, you're right of course, but I will gurantee that either
Why? Here's a few reasons:
1. J2EE and
2. By adhering to a OO philoshophy it allows systems designers to take a 'higher level' view of the project, and employ tested patterns. PHP means you get bogged down in the implementation detail quite early on.
3. When you start building bigger teams of developers and bringing in new staff, the OO philosophy is understood and it's easier to explain and understand the models.
There are more reasons of course.
If you're talking dirty and quick, maybe for smaller projects that's fine but as soon as you start developing larger projects and start needing server farms, PHP just doesn't cut it, and when your boss asks for more features and you need to scale you're in trouble.
.Net.
Quick and dirty may be fine for you, but for anything other than that, PHP is just not a patch on J2EE or
I'd add Visual Age for Java to that list. In my experience it is quite impressive but I do agree with the parent poster that using Visual Studio to build apps just makes it far easier to build, do RAD and you're also more likely to find people in the marketplace who will be able to come in and understand the original work.
I used to develop on J2EE and now develop for C# and ASP.NET and think both are very impressive patforms. Apart from one only running on Windows, there's little to choose between them and the only reason I prefer .Net is simply becuase I prefer the development tools for it but I certainly cannot say a bad word about Java. I am amazed you think it's slow and cumbersome, but that is more likely that you do not like or understand OOP.
.NET are able to do far, far outstrips what you can do with PHP. We can argue the details, but with J2EE/.NET you are able to scale from small websites with limited functionality right up to sites running on many app servers, database servers, you name it - they are both Enterprise level systems.
.NET is cross train far more easily between making web and desktop based apps - again something you cannot do in PHP. For example, load up Visual Studio.NET and I guarantee that ANY ASP.NET programmer will be able to make desktop apps very quick, and the same for Java.
.NET doesn't end up on most desktops, to say it's a dead end is frankly plain stupid. I guess you've never done a stroke or work on the framework otherwise you'd be able to understand why those who have used it think it is probably the best thing MS have done for a long while.
.NET or J2EE. I really suggest you have a look at both products, get hold of Visual Age for Java or Visual Studio, get a book on OOP and don't look back! :)
However, what both J2EE and
What you can also do with both J2EE and
I will be very surprised if
I don't dislike PHP at all, it has it's uses, but put simply, it's not in the same league as
If you are looking for a handheld console that has a free SDK, can be used with any development environment on Linux, Mac or Windows then have a look at the GamePark 32 which is available in Korea and soon into Europe.
:)
I recommend looking at the GP32 site though as it has better descriptions, reviews, news and gives you a great overview of what is possible. It is the first 'Open' console that's been produced and already has quite a 'bedroom' community that has sprung up around it.
Not only it is open, it just happens to be the most powerful handheld console out there and there's ports of Doom, Heretic on it already as well as Atari ST, Gameboy, SMS, PC Engine and Megadrive emulators. It has a built in MP3 player and you can also plays DivX movies if you pay a small fee (3.50/$6) for the player. All the commerical games for it are very cheap too - most in the 7/$12 bracket.
In short it is superb and runs on standard Smart Media Cards so once you've bought the console you aren't tied to buying proprietry hardware like the Gameboy.
So, you have no excuses now - buy one, start developing and make money!
For them to become the biggest company in the world, I guess they might have at least got a single, solitary product right at least once?
Marketing alone doesn't put 40bn in the bank.
As someone who earns his living off writing for the .Net framework (Linux at home though ;) I think this is really quite an impressive piece of kit which could have a lot of ramifications for how software is written for phones, web pages and on the desktop.
.Net and the SDK, what it can do. We all know that MS gets a lot of things wrong, but every so often they get something right - as all companies do.
With the latest release of Visual Studio, they have really blurred the difference between how you put together a Windows Form, a ASP.NET form and a Mobile form. Just to have the ability to write a few classes and get good, working output on a Windows Form, ASP.NET form and a mobile form you start to realise just how impressive it is, and also how relatively easy it will be to, for example, take an existing Windows Form app and get it working on a WAP Page, ASP.Net page, Smartphone or anything else. This alone is a huge step forward and is going to make new development a whole lot easier as well as being able to leverage existing software onto the phones.
Sadly, most on here will totally dismiss it with the predictable BSOD 'gags' (again and again... dzz) but this is something which is very impressive. I know you can do similiar things in Java but with MS you will be talking about business applications being run on phones, not the games and utilities that are mainly found on the Java phones. I will add that I do like Java, but I am speaking from what I have seen here.
So, I say to you: take the time just to read about
Also, can you buy the kind of publicity this type of offer will generate?
What happens if there IS code in Linux that SCO own? So far, everything I've read on Slashdot says there isn't and I have not read any posts that ask the 'what if...'
If it can be shown that there is an infringment in the code, in any court, then it will make for an interesting case.
In any event, is there anything other than the IBM financial power that could stop this type of case again? Playing Devil's Advocate, what would happen if (say) Microsoft backed SCO against IBM?
A lot of questions here, but I don't know any of the answers...
IBM do have far greater resources than SCO and can afford to drag this through the courts.
However, it needs to be established if SCO have a case (I don't think they do) and if so, the offending code needs either replacing or paying for - resolving in some way.
If this ends up with IBM winning through greater financial resource, I don't think the matter will have been answered... afterall, when will the next company make similar charges? What happens if a larger beast than SCO makes the charge?
Burying heads in sand isn't the way to resolve this.
But do Red Hat know something that possibly the greater community do not?
If there has been no infringement then logically there would be no need for this fund as, again logically, it could be demonstrated in every court that Linux doesn't contain any SCO material.
I guess that this is not just for the SCO charges, but maybe for other similar charges from other companies who may, sometime in the future, level the same accusations.
Maybe I am well off track here, but surely it would be of better use to the community for SuSE, IBM etc to also put into the pot.... I guess the interest gained alone from such a pot would be huge if it is to protect people from charges similar to SCO which I will guess will end up costing millions.
I really hope this can be finally be put to rest sometime soon, as this kind of 'war chest building' does not inspire confidence. I have said before that whilst these charges, counter charges and now this warchest it is going to make those who are looking at migrating someway towards Linux a little concerned.
This case is threatening to be one in which only the lawyers come out of it with anything.
For all the predictably negative comments made by the Linux community, no one it seems, is preparing to challenge SCO and get this resolved. I will guarantee there are an endless stream of SCO jibes on this page now but not a single one of those jibes is something proactive or reactive to this seemingly large problem.
As far as I am aware, this has been ongoing for several months now and is including some very big companies that PHB's have heard of. Now, if a PHB knows that SCO is taking IBM to court and threatening Novell it would seem to suggest that using Linux in any form is likely to have implications at some time in the future, and therefore hold back Linux in the workplace.
Whilst this cloud is hanging over Linux, managers are going to be wary about rolling out Linux solutions and therefore other solutions such as MS ones are going to look increasingly safe choices, particularly with the new legal benefits.
There may be problems installing hardware on Windows, but frankly there are a lot fewer than installing hardware on Linux.
A lot of people will, and indeed should, compare Linux with Windows. In order to improve Linux it should be compared to it's peers.
Windows is the most common OS out there and a lot of people coming to Linux from Windows (myself included) find that things which are real easy on Windows are surprisingly difficult on Linux. MS will have spent millions on developing the GUI and therefore do some things really well, others not so well.
Example of annoyances, for me, where trying to open certain Word documents on OO, not being able to use a Linux machine on a Windows network and enjoy the power(!) of Exchange etc. These are personal to me, and unfortunately a lot of people in a corporate environment WOULD compare Linux and Windows and find that Linux just has too many annoyances.
It is not quite as simplistic as you make out.
:)
For a start, light at night makes it difficult to sleep at night. Try having a streetlight outside your bedroom window and you will quickly (as I found out!) find your sleep patterns are disturbed as you wake up easier and therefore find it difficult to sleep.
Consider that for many of us in major cities, we cannot view the natural beauty of space. Our views are blocked by artifical lights that stop us from seeing the sights our ancestors looked upon and first asked the great philosophical questions.
You imply that light is a good thing. It isn't. Well, not always. Of course we need light, but it needs to be used appropriately.
Artificial light isn't a replacement for natural light. Aside from the voluminous amounts of electricity a lot of it wastes it does cause problems for people.
Daylight is a good thing for animals, plants and humans on the planet. For people who live in northern Europe and the US/Canda there are higher incidencies of suicide, alcoholism and drug abuse than there are in places which recieve more natural light, and this has been attributed to a lack of natural light. Artifical light just isn't the same. You could have 12 hours of artifical light in a polar region and it wouldn't make any difference.
On a small, and possibly more irrelevant scale to you, consider the number of insects that congregate around lamp posts thinking the worlds most beautiful fly/wasp/bee/moth/whatever is in front of them. In time, it will affect their and predators natural actions!
It is very easy to mock and joke about this, but it is a very, very important issue for a lot of people, plants and animals!
The point is, that separating WMP from XP is not that easy. It is an integral part of the OS now, and quite frankly it does a very good job for me.
The PC is not just a geeky toy anymore - it is slowly moving into front rooms, being used as media stations and other functions and as a consequence, a media player that seemlessly integrates with the OS is just as important as being able to browse text files etc.
As for paying for everything you use. Fine. I am not sure that being able to pick and choose an endless variety number of packages is what most users want. They just want to go to My Music or whatever and preview, organise and rate etc.
If the EU stop Microsoft trading in Europe, they'll be huge problems. Like I said, I live and work in England and I have never been to an office where there's anything less than 95% MS stuff. Put simply, big business cannot afford to allow a decision like this affect them, and neither can national governments.
Like I've said previously, we all know MS is abusing their monopoly but the EU have picked up on a case which is not as clear cut as it could be. As a consequence, not much will happen.
Oh well, it happens to the best of us at times! :)