If you were wondering just how big the shell's libraries are (IE included) on xpsp1, ask Process Explorer:
shell32.dll: shell common (contains many bitmaps, icons and avis too)- 7.85mb
mshtml.dll: html renderer - 2.66mb
shdocvw.dll: Shell Doc Object and Control Library - 1.27mb
ole32.dll: OLE/COM library - 1.12mb
browseui.dll: shell/browser UI -.97mb
mlang.dll: multi-language support 563k
comctl32.dll: common controls lib - 544k
oleaut32.dll: another OLE/COM library - 556k
shdoclc.dll: shell doc library - 536k
urlmon.dll: a URL lookup helper - 473k
shlwapi.dll: lightweight shell helper - 386k
cscui.dll: client-side caching (offline files)- 300k
cscdll.dll: offline files - 87k
That's a total of 17315k.
FireFox 9.2 OTOH is mostly a single 6.4mb file (firefox.exe) with 3.4mb of jars for chrome.
Yesterday I was working on my mom's boyfriend's computer, which I installed a fresh copy of XP on a couple days prior. Already, there were bluescreens during shutdown/reboot (due to IRQ conflicts with our precious plug-n-play system)
An IRQ conflict won't cause a bluescreen unless some crappy third-party driver doesn't handle that situation correctly and panics.
I'm not sure, but I think Adaptec CD-Creator is actually Roxio Easy CD-Creator. In any case, since other apps can print correctly, it's obvious that the printing problem is CD-Creator's, not Windows's.
right-clicking on My Computer to go to properties would yield a cryptic registry-based error before opening properties.
Care to repeat the error message verbatim? What makes you think it's a problem in the registry? Saying that it's registry based is just as useful as saying that some file in/ect is misconfigured on Linux.
I was using that to download drivers, and search for other things (such as "workarounds" for the ever annoying XP Activation), and IE would hang at just about every other website I would go to, rendering everything else I was doing on the computer useless until it freed it's resources.
I agree that activation is a pain.
What resources do you speak of? CPU? Windows has process and thread priorities. If they are inappropriate, change them. Besides, two processes competeing at the same priority will only take 50% each; hardly useless. Disk? I can't imagine what IE would be doing with the disk for long periods of time. Ask Filemon.
Memory? How much memory does IE have committed? What's the total commit charge? How much physical memory free? Does IE itself using the memory or is it some leaky plugin? If you could at least narrow it down to what type of resource? I can't imagine how IE could be rendering the entire computer unusable.
I installed FireFox, and that helped a lot with the browsing issues.
If FireFox made things better, great. Personally, I use Mozilla; and it has its own issues, like not handling messages correctly so it gets paged out agressively and paging in at 10% the speed of other apps, requiring large quantities of memory (100mb with 3 windows right now) all in the working set.
and I have had absolutely 0 problems. It JUST WORKS.
Good for you. I have had tons of problems. X Windows won't start; it says that there is no mouse, but it restarts like 10 times, as if the mouse problem will magically resolve by restarting a few times in rapid succesion. XF86Config has the same ps/2 mouse config setup as my FC1 install; it works in RedHat but not Debian 3. Also I can't start X without a mouse; how stupid is that? I can still do everything in Windows with no mouse. The sound driver won't load; I'm not sure where to start with this. It is for a VIA AC'97 interface and it tells me something about an unresolved symbol. I had to jump thru hoops to enable DMA on my hard drive. I can't compile the kernel anymore; it says "cpp: output pipe has been closed" compiling/kernel/module.c. I would reinstall the sources but debconf won't let me add new sources anymore and the ftp site I was going to before is closed now. When I try to add a new source from the list there it says it can't find the host but I can ping the host from another console. It won't let me force the host to be added to the list. The DHCP client is bogus: it continually allocates new IP addresses without releasing the old ones until my DHCP server runs out, preventing other computers from getting one. I know it's Debian by the MAC address and the fact that it's the only instlled OS on that computer.
I don't see why anybody in their right mind would still f
Ummm, actually you CAN use ReadFile and WriteFile on a socket. Read the docs. In fact, ReadFile and WriteFile can be used on anything that acts like a pipe or file. Perhaps the libarary you are using is doing something wrong?
The reason X works badly has nothing to do with the one extra context switch per action. In fact if X is just drawing and avoiding the problem calls, it has far fewer context switches than Windows, since the drawing calls are all stuffed in a buffer and sent as one block (it's possible Windows is doing this in modern versions, too, I don't know).
Back in the days of NT 3.51, the GUI (video drivers too) ran completely in user space in winsrv.dll hosted by csrss. The interface libraries (gdi32 and user32) used to pack multiple drawing commands into large packets. Communication didn't even use a pipe: it used a local procedure call port that basically allows a thread to enter another process's context. Anyways, the overhead of out-of-process commuication was really gross (according to MS). So they moved it all into kernel mode (win32k.sys) in NT4 to not only to reduce context switching overhead but also to simplify threading, memory transfers and deadlock detection.
Yeah, I forgot to include the BSDs. I'm just saying that its an advantage of free/open software opposed to proprietary/closed software; not Windows vs UNIX.
With Automatic Updates it takes about 3 clicks to confirm installation. It's even possible to schedule installation automatically during the night. I can't imagine what they are spending hours doing each day as maintenance.
Alt+enter on my XP cd tells me that it contains 489MB of data. The i386 directory (where the OS files are) is 460MB. XP can be completely installed from the contents in the i386 directory; I do it from the network all the time. (still only 460MB) Compare that to 365MB for 2000 Pro, 157MB for NT4.0 WKS and 32MB for NT3.51. CD media is physically incapable of storing 4GB of actual data. Is it possible that some sectors are named redundantly in the file table? Possibly as the result of some kind of multi-in-1 CD?
2k3 has everything that XP has, plus server services. It's like Win2k: 2k Server has everything that Pro has, plus higher licenced limits (CPUs, memory, connections) and some extra server-end software. The 32MB is the total memory used by all processes. Note that it is not using the standard shell, and it is not running any apps.
The first part of Windows setup in text mode uses the same kernel and drivers as it does while running a GUI. The problem is that the GUI is heavily integrated with the win32 subsystem: almost all software for Windows requires win32. (the alternative is to use the native apis, like setup does) OH and you can edit the registry from a CLI: see reg.exe.
I think some of us (me too) are saying that easy to get software that isn't on the CD should be included. You could always burn your own custom CD with a custom install script: see OEM and unattended installations.
All versions of the NT MP kernel can support up to 32 CPUs. It's the licencing on the top that prevents you from using more. 2000 Server supports 4 cpus and costs $999. I'm not saying that it's cheap. The stupid client access licences really kill you.
In my experience (and I work for an ISP, so it's not merely a home network), a UNIX needs to be set up once, and have updates or a new kernel compiled every now and then (ie, few months). Windows need constant attention. Most of our *NIX admins sit round reading/. all day, while the NT ones are working constantly. =)
So your NT admins are incompitent. They can't prepare and maintain their systems properly. My NT machines require minimal maintenance.
I call bullshit. It may be over 3 CDs, but that's irrelevant - the footprint on the drive is 800Mb, a default XP is 1.4Gb. And if you're installing 800Mb, that's far from "minimal" (my home router has a full-but-stripped-down OS in 150Mb).
ps. try a straight copy/paste of an XP cd one day, it's like 4Gb.
My FC1 install with everything from Red Hat is 5.7GB. No, I'm not using all the packages, but it is a type of standard install: the button is right there. Yes, it sucks that Microsoft makes it hard to remove components from Windows. It's still possible:)
4GB on a CD??? Wow! How do they get the density that high? I thought that only 1 layer 1 side DVDs had that amount of capacity. Seriously, just about everything is installed from the CD normally and it's much less than 4GB. 150MB for a router? Surely you can get it down to 20-30MB:)
Again, horse hockey. System hog != memory hog for a start, but to make my point XP uses 256Mb of my RAM just after a boot, Linux on the same machine uses 70. And that's with GUI, yes =)
Looking at my 2k3 server (even heavier than XP) it only has 97MB committed, and it is even hosting an Active Directory domain/w DNS and DHCP. A nearby, idle 2k machine has 32MB committed. Perhaps your XP computer has some unnecessary services running? My FC1 desktop has 89 committed.
Linux: cli and GUI, Windows: GUI only
Windows comes with a CLI, and you have several options available as additions to what's supplied out of the box.
I would argue that many things are impossible/very difficult to do solely in the GUI under Linux (without using a command prompt in the GUI). That said, I agree that Windows has weaker command line tools out of the box. If you wanted UNIXy tools in Windows, cygwin is right around the corner. Set bash to be your shell. No DOS = no shell?? This has nothing to do with the shell: is sh less of a shell since it runs under xterm? BTW: ME still has DOS; it's just better hidden. Also you can run at least xf86 and the window managers it supports under Windows.
*Yawn*
I dunno about you, but the last time I looked it was a simple compile to put in all of this "missing functionality". The Enterprise kernels, IMHO, are simply for convienience. Example: how much for a windows server that can handle 4 CPUs and 4Gb of RAM?
Now, how much for a *NIX that can handle the same? And yes, I'm talking time and initial cost here...
You may argue "but then you need to compile things!! That's bad!!", but if you're installing an enterprise-level server you should be compiling everything you fricken' can on it anyway, especially the kernel. Which is another advantage of *NIX that we missed - software compiled for the specific hardware on which it runs.
All releases of Windows NT include the MP kernel. The same binary is used for server and workstation. The difference is in the licencing. I'm not saying that MS doesn't gouge server licence prices. Besides, even standard server is licenced for at least 4GB and 4 CPUs. About recompilation: is this really an advange of UNIX in general, or just the GNU/Linux philosophy? Will IBM really give me the source code to AIX so I can recompile the kernel?
One account per person certainly is more secure. I just meant that it was possible if you want to trade security for simplicity. The author was a bit vague as to what he wanted.
But if you're stuck with XP, I'd suggest a VERY minimal install of XP, with your program loaded in the registry full screen, and Windows.Form.KeyPreview on, Windows.Form.KeyDown testing for and disabling all standard keys (like alt-tab and ctrl-alt-del).
Windows.Form.KeyPreview? From.NET? First,.NET is a bit heavyweight for that; a keyboard journal hook in win32 is much better. Second, it's excessive: what's so bad about alt-tab? Third, it will be ineffective: ctrl-alt-delete is a security attention sequence; Windows goes to extra lengths to make sure it cannot ever be disabled, short of installing a new keyboard driver.
First, create a user group for the locked-down users. Give it the least privledges possible. You can have everyone log on with the same user; use autologon for simplicity. Use the account property that prevents the user from changing the password. Then replace the shell for that group with the app you want to run. That property is User->Admin. Templates->Custom User Interface. In ctrl-alt-delete settings remove task manager if you want. Turn off autoplay. For a really locked down mode, use Software Restriction Policies. Create a whitelist of runnable apps by hash; if the program isn't on the list for users affected by the group policy, they cannot start the program. You can still admin the systems by logging on as a real user; just use ctrl-alt-delete to log off. Use this for shutdown/restart too. You may need to set SRP from an XP machine or install the server 2003 admin kit (free) because SRP didn't exist yet in the win2k era; it's only supported locally on XP and later. The win2k AD server can still enforce the policy but the standard interface doesn't list the option.
Now, I know it might seem contradictory to some, but is there a way to make those computers completely locked down?
It's not contradictory. SRP does a great job of locking a Windows system down completely.
I remember when HP used to represent quaility too. HP oscilliscopes, spectrum analyzers, calculators were sought after. There is old HP equipment still in use around here from 20+ years ago that still works great; pieces of equipment that have never had parts break. Of recent products: I have an HP48GX calc that is working beautifully. I have a cheapo deskjet printer that works OK; the ink prices are murder and a third party cartridge seems to have plugged some the heads causing streaks. It's still much better than the Epson color stylus 2 I had before. I also have a ZT1000 notebook computer, about 2 years old. I've had a few issues, but overall it is very stable. I agree that their quaility has gone down a great deal recently (with Carly+merger mostly).
About companies that don't care about long-term reputation, only short-term profits: I worry that it is going that way too. Still, the implicit purpose of most corps is to make money for the investors.
And yes, Microsoft is partially to blame because they made an architectural and business choice only to be in control of a small set of essential drivers. Linus on the other hand wants drivers in his tree.
Microsoft actually develops quite a few drivers; out of the 58 devices listed in the device manager on my computer, 42 use only MS drivers. Of those 16 other devices, 7 have generic driver alternatives from MS. Out of the total driver binaries installed (about 120) I'd say that 85% are from MS. MS also endorses some drivers by including them on the Windows install disk, and MS has a driver signing program (WHQL). Although the signing program is sometimes cheated
it still provides MS with some control. The OP was very ambiguous as to who provided the drivers for his winmodem. It's important because third party, unsupported drivers have nothing to do with Windows's stability.
Linus' central control results in him (or his lieutenants) having the ability to throw code back at the driver developer and laugh at them cruely until they fix it.
I'm sure that Microsoft would love to have the source code to all the drivers submitted to WHQL, that really isn't realistic. Manufactures don't want their products reverse-engineered and their ideas stolen, which open source drivers only escalate. It's more about the difference between closed and open source than anything.
It's a pain in the ass to use third party drivers. Having them in the kernel makes my life easier, and it increases the quality of the code because the kernel maintainer community have high standards.
Linux's inability to load binary drivers (or even re-compiled drivers, often) from versions past is a shortcoming of its architecture, not a feature. It makes using third-party drivers alsmost impossible; the kernel version and build must match perfectly. This makes thrid-party closed drivers a very poor option. So, either the manufacturer has to open up or forget about supporting Linux; either it becomes part of the kernel distro or it is unsupported. It's nice that the kernel maintenance community has high standards. I would say that Microsoft's kernel mode group has high standards, too.
Furthermore the architectural choice of using the GPL for Linux means that if there are bugs in drivers anyone with an appropriate clue can fix them. In the Windows world this is not possible.
This isn't so much of a architectural choice as it is one of policy and buisness strategy. I wish MS was more open too. It would be nice to be able to fix other vendor's crappy drivers. I like the idea that the only limitation is your own skill and knowledge; if you know what you are doing, go ahead and fix it. Realistically, the number of people that can actually do that doesn't extend much past the established community.
It's not about blaming Microsoft or Windows, or Linux for that matter. Well, not just that. It's about what system is more stable.
Sure it's about who to blame. Half the point is to have the question of why it is stable/unstable. The answer lies with who is responsible for the components in question. You can't say that something is unstable when the direct cause is an outside component not part of the original system, enabled by the operator's negligence. (as the OP did)
Yes, drivers are a necessary part of the OS. The stability of drivers created by Microsoft is a valid point of comparison. It is not valid to blame a third-party driver's instability on Microsoft or Windows. The question is: who created the driver in question?
A cross-platform driver environment. That would be nice:)
Ummm, no. All pointers in 64 bit programs are 64 bit. The current amount of that address space devoted to user-process memory is 512TB. See this; it's about win64 on Itanium, but I'm sure AMD64 is the same.
Perhaps you are thinking of PAE on 32-bit systems? Windows is fully capable of providing real 64-bit addressing. It even causes driver problems; you can't use 32 bit drivers in 64 bit Windows. Current versions of OSX, OTOH, can't. They use memory windowing similar to PAE.
Mochasoft has cross-platform terminal emulators for TN5250, TN3270, TN3812 (a printer), LPD and SSH. They aren't free, but not too expensive either (for the TN5250 $25 USD single or $250 company) and worth it.
I get lost with how hard things are to find and accomplish with a Windows desktop.
Sometimes I feel the same way about a Linux desktop; I know it's because of inexpierence.
A good interface, quick command line access and a useful command line. SFTP/FTP/HTTP/everything/etc directly accessible under my filesystem browsing (KDE/Konqueror)... lots.
I find the Windows command line to be useful; if you want Unix tools, use cygwin.
Yes, it's more stable. From what I understand of XP, the BSOD doesn't happen anymore because the machine just reboots rather than show a screen dump to most people who will never know what it is.
Yes, the default mode is to restart automatically. That behavior can be modified; and it still puts an entry in the event log. My main computer running XP hasn't crashed for 6 months since I upgraded the video drivers; the two crashes before that were their fault.
And sound support is not so hard as you make it out to be. It just works, just like in Windows. As for the total 2 hours of configuration, that's BS. I can't remember ever rebuilding a Windows box in under a day. My Debian install, should I need to reinstall it, can be reconfigured in less time than that will all programs and preferences and configuration carried over.
Sound support has improved greatly in Linux; I agree that is that easy. I bet I could reinstall Windows in a couple of hours too, configuration and all. I'm not sure, because I've never done it before.
Yes, and the fact that Outlook insecurities can affect the OS is proof that the OS itself is also insecure.
If you are saying that OE can somehow bypass the opearating system's security, then no. All system calls go through ntdll, after which security is checked, and every object has a seperate ACL. If you are running OE as admin, well that's your fault.
Again, I choose Linux because it works better for me. I can't do my job from a Windows machine anymore. It just isn't capable.
Fine, whatever works for you. As for 'not capable', could you be more specific?
I use it on my servers, my desktop, my laptop, and my TV. That's a whole lot of environments, a wide variety of hardware, and lots of different programs, moreso than I think is even available for Windows. Linux isn't the solution to everything and karma whores here are often pointing that out while those that say it is are usually modded down for lacking insight. That doesn't mean it should be pigeon-holed to only specific circumstances though.
I use Windows on my desktop, laptop and servers. I always build my own computers, so I make some interesting hardware combos too. I have always been able to resolve them under Windows. Linux too; althogh it takes me longer because I don't know it as well. As for old hardware, Microsoft has taken to removing older drivers from newer installs; for no good reason. All I have to do then is install the drivers from the earlier disc. I would never hope to install an old binary driver under Linux. I also wouldn't know how to make it work even with the source.
Sounds like when you want to work from your machine, you use Linux. But for the home machine, it doesn't matter. Lots of people here use their computers for work and therefore rely on their functionality. Linux is a much more viable choice then.
I use Windows for work. Again, because I know it better. I don't need to be fooling around with the OS at the same time I'm trying to work.
For the same reason you're using open source software on Windows, I use it for everything. It's just better, and all for the same reasons. There's just more flexibility and there are more useful features with opensource alternatives. Choosing Mozilla over IE is not any different from choosing Linux over Windows. Pick what suits you.
Microsoft's average
of 25 days between disclosure and release of a fix was the lowest of all the platform
maintainers we evaluated.
25 days? This seems pretty gross, and it's supposed to be the lowest? They put Red Hat and Debian at 57, the best scores for Linux distros. Is this because Microsoft sits on vulns longer to get more time, or does MS really release patches quicker?
Later on, it says that Windows has the highest quantity of critical vulns. This is because almost every network service runs in the SYSTEM account with tons of priveledges; either that or the kernel. WS2003 moves a few to lesser accounts, but it is too little too late. IIS can't run as anything but SYSTEM, with some of itself in kernel mode. Even the SMB file sharing service runs in a kernel mode driver (srv.sys). Microsoft needs to clean this up, badly.
Before NT4, in user mode hosted in csrss.exe; after that in kernel mode. I wouldn't consider a video driver an application; the original point was that an application could crash the system.
Windows NT has the same protections that other operating systems have: memory protection, a single syscall interface, access control, process seperation, etc. Surely there is a program that can crash my XP computer without priveledges, that you could link to? Are you sure that crappy kernel mode drivers aren't causing the crashes you are having? I have never had an application crash bring down any of my NT based systems.
Ummm, if you copy the i386 directory from NT to the destination drive, you can install it from there. You can do the copy from DOS and Interlink over the paralell port if you want. NT4 would work ok with 20mb of memory.
It's hard to complain if you are already happy, though.
No, it's not possible. Yes, you can intentionally crash the OS given enough priveledges, but you can't crash it without them. This has always been true of Windows NT and its derivatives.
No, it's not valid in XP. WinME is from the old 9x code base; XP is from the NT code base, two completely different architectures. The.ini files are not used for anything in NT based operating systems; everything is stored in the registry. Stopping unnecessary services is a good way to save memory in XP.
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If you were wondering just how big the shell's libraries are (IE included) on xpsp1, ask Process Explorer: .97mb
shell32.dll: shell common (contains many bitmaps, icons and avis too)- 7.85mb
mshtml.dll: html renderer - 2.66mb
shdocvw.dll: Shell Doc Object and Control Library - 1.27mb
ole32.dll: OLE/COM library - 1.12mb
browseui.dll: shell/browser UI -
mlang.dll: multi-language support 563k
comctl32.dll: common controls lib - 544k
oleaut32.dll: another OLE/COM library - 556k
shdoclc.dll: shell doc library - 536k
urlmon.dll: a URL lookup helper - 473k
shlwapi.dll: lightweight shell helper - 386k
cscui.dll: client-side caching (offline files)- 300k
cscdll.dll: offline files - 87k
That's a total of 17315k.
FireFox 9.2 OTOH is mostly a single 6.4mb file (firefox.exe) with 3.4mb of jars for chrome.
An IRQ conflict won't cause a bluescreen unless some crappy third-party driver doesn't handle that situation correctly and panics.
I'm not sure, but I think Adaptec CD-Creator is actually Roxio Easy CD-Creator. In any case, since other apps can print correctly, it's obvious that the printing problem is CD-Creator's, not Windows's.
Care to repeat the error message verbatim? What makes you think it's a problem in the registry? Saying that it's registry based is just as useful as saying that some file in /ect is misconfigured on Linux.
I agree that activation is a pain.
What resources do you speak of?
CPU? Windows has process and thread priorities. If they are inappropriate, change them. Besides, two processes competeing at the same priority will only take 50% each; hardly useless.
Disk? I can't imagine what IE would be doing with the disk for long periods of time. Ask Filemon.
Memory? How much memory does IE have committed? What's the total commit charge? How much physical memory free? Does IE itself using the memory or is it some leaky plugin?
If you could at least narrow it down to what type of resource? I can't imagine how IE could be rendering the entire computer unusable.
If FireFox made things better, great. Personally, I use Mozilla; and it has its own issues, like not handling messages correctly so it gets paged out agressively and paging in at 10% the speed of other apps, requiring large quantities of memory (100mb with 3 windows right now) all in the working set.
Good for you. I have had tons of problems. X Windows won't start; it says that there is no mouse, but it restarts like 10 times, as if the mouse problem will magically resolve by restarting a few times in rapid succesion. XF86Config has the same ps/2 mouse config setup as my FC1 install; it works in RedHat but not Debian 3. Also I can't start X without a mouse; how stupid is that? I can still do everything in Windows with no mouse. The sound driver won't load; I'm not sure where to start with this. It is for a VIA AC'97 interface and it tells me something about an unresolved symbol. /kernel/module.c. I would reinstall the sources but debconf won't let me add new sources anymore and the ftp site I was going to before is closed now. When I try to add a new source from the list there it says it can't find the host but I can ping the host from another console. It won't let me force the host to be added to the list.
I had to jump thru hoops to enable DMA on my hard drive. I can't compile the kernel anymore; it says "cpp: output pipe has been closed" compiling
The DHCP client is bogus: it continually allocates new IP addresses without releasing the old ones until my DHCP server runs out, preventing other computers from getting one. I know it's Debian by the MAC address and the fact that it's the only instlled OS on that computer.
Ummm, actually you CAN use ReadFile and WriteFile on a socket. Read the docs. In fact, ReadFile and WriteFile can be used on anything that acts like a pipe or file. Perhaps the libarary you are using is doing something wrong?
Anyways, the overhead of out-of-process commuication was really gross (according to MS). So they moved it all into kernel mode (win32k.sys) in NT4 to not only to reduce context switching overhead but also to simplify threading, memory transfers and deadlock detection.
I'm not disagreeing; just some history of WinNT.
Yeah, I forgot to include the BSDs. I'm just saying that its an advantage of free/open software opposed to proprietary/closed software; not Windows vs UNIX.
With Automatic Updates it takes about 3 clicks to confirm installation. It's even possible to schedule installation automatically during the night. I can't imagine what they are spending hours doing each day as maintenance.
Alt+enter on my XP cd tells me that it contains 489MB of data. The i386 directory (where the OS files are) is 460MB. XP can be completely installed from the contents in the i386 directory; I do it from the network all the time. (still only 460MB) Compare that to 365MB for 2000 Pro, 157MB for NT4.0 WKS and 32MB for NT3.51.
CD media is physically incapable of storing 4GB of actual data. Is it possible that some sectors are named redundantly in the file table? Possibly as the result of some kind of multi-in-1 CD?
2k3 has everything that XP has, plus server services. It's like Win2k: 2k Server has everything that Pro has, plus higher licenced limits (CPUs, memory, connections) and some extra server-end software.
The 32MB is the total memory used by all processes. Note that it is not using the standard shell, and it is not running any apps.
The first part of Windows setup in text mode uses the same kernel and drivers as it does while running a GUI. The problem is that the GUI is heavily integrated with the win32 subsystem: almost all software for Windows requires win32. (the alternative is to use the native apis, like setup does)
OH and you can edit the registry from a CLI: see reg.exe.
I think some of us (me too) are saying that easy to get software that isn't on the CD should be included. You could always burn your own custom CD with a custom install script: see OEM and unattended installations.
All versions of the NT MP kernel can support up to 32 CPUs. It's the licencing on the top that prevents you from using more. 2000 Server supports 4 cpus and costs $999. I'm not saying that it's cheap. The stupid client access licences really kill you.
Yes, it sucks that Microsoft makes it hard to remove components from Windows. It's still possible
4GB on a CD??? Wow! How do they get the density that high? I thought that only 1 layer 1 side DVDs had that amount of capacity. Seriously, just about everything is installed from the CD normally and it's much less than 4GB.
150MB for a router? Surely you can get it down to 20-30MB
My FC1 desktop has 89 committed.I would argue that many things are impossible/very difficult to do solely in the GUI under Linux (without using a command prompt in the GUI). That said, I agree that Windows has weaker command line tools out of the box. If you wanted UNIXy tools in Windows, cygwin is right around the corner. Set bash to be your shell.
No DOS = no shell?? This has nothing to do with the shell: is sh less of a shell since it runs under xterm? BTW: ME still has DOS; it's just better hidden.
Also you can run at least xf86 and the window managers it supports under Windows.All releases of Windows NT include the MP kernel. The same binary is used for server and workstation. The difference is in the licencing. I'm not saying that MS doesn't gouge server licence prices. Besides, even standard server is licenced for at least 4GB and 4 CPUs.
About recompilation: is this really an advange of UNIX in general, or just the GNU/Linux philosophy? Will IBM really give me the source code to AIX so I can recompile the kernel?
A better alternative is to use group policy to remove everything from that screen. Then it's just a pretty picture with a cancel button.
One account per person certainly is more secure. I just meant that it was possible if you want to trade security for simplicity. The author was a bit vague as to what he wanted.
Think Software Restriction Policies.
Overall, those are good ideas.
Then replace the shell for that group with the app you want to run. That property is User->Admin. Templates->Custom User Interface.
In ctrl-alt-delete settings remove task manager if you want.
Turn off autoplay.
For a really locked down mode, use Software Restriction Policies. Create a whitelist of runnable apps by hash; if the program isn't on the list for users affected by the group policy, they cannot start the program. You can still admin the systems by logging on as a real user; just use ctrl-alt-delete to log off. Use this for shutdown/restart too.
You may need to set SRP from an XP machine or install the server 2003 admin kit (free) because SRP didn't exist yet in the win2k era; it's only supported locally on XP and later. The win2k AD server can still enforce the policy but the standard interface doesn't list the option.It's not contradictory. SRP does a great job of locking a Windows system down completely.
I remember when HP used to represent quaility too. HP oscilliscopes, spectrum analyzers, calculators were sought after. There is old HP equipment still in use around here from 20+ years ago that still works great; pieces of equipment that have never had parts break.
Of recent products: I have an HP48GX calc that is working beautifully. I have a cheapo deskjet printer that works OK; the ink prices are murder and a third party cartridge seems to have plugged some the heads causing streaks. It's still much better than the Epson color stylus 2 I had before. I also have a ZT1000 notebook computer, about 2 years old. I've had a few issues, but overall it is very stable.
I agree that their quaility has gone down a great deal recently (with Carly+merger mostly).
About companies that don't care about long-term reputation, only short-term profits: I worry that it is going that way too. Still, the implicit purpose of most corps is to make money for the investors.
MS also endorses some drivers by including them on the Windows install disk, and MS has a driver signing program (WHQL). Although the signing program is sometimes cheated it still provides MS with some control.
The OP was very ambiguous as to who provided the drivers for his winmodem. It's important because third party, unsupported drivers have nothing to do with Windows's stability.I'm sure that Microsoft would love to have the source code to all the drivers submitted to WHQL, that really isn't realistic. Manufactures don't want their products reverse-engineered and their ideas stolen, which open source drivers only escalate. It's more about the difference between closed and open source than anything.Linux's inability to load binary drivers (or even re-compiled drivers, often) from versions past is a shortcoming of its architecture, not a feature. It makes using third-party drivers alsmost impossible; the kernel version and build must match perfectly. This makes thrid-party closed drivers a very poor option. So, either the manufacturer has to open up or forget about supporting Linux; either it becomes part of the kernel distro or it is unsupported.
It's nice that the kernel maintenance community has high standards. I would say that Microsoft's kernel mode group has high standards, too.This isn't so much of a architectural choice as it is one of policy and buisness strategy. I wish MS was more open too. It would be nice to be able to fix other vendor's crappy drivers. I like the idea that the only limitation is your own skill and knowledge; if you know what you are doing, go ahead and fix it. Realistically, the number of people that can actually do that doesn't extend much past the established community.Sure it's about who to blame. Half the point is to have the question of why it is stable/unstable. The answer lies with who is responsible for the components in question.
You can't say that something is unstable when the direct cause is an outside component not part of the original system, enabled by the operator's negligence. (as the OP did)
Yes, drivers are a necessary part of the OS. The stability of drivers created by Microsoft is a valid point of comparison. It is not valid to blame a third-party driver's instability on Microsoft or Windows. The question is: who created the driver in question?
:)
A cross-platform driver environment. That would be nice
Surely you mean in the front: the engine is in the back!
Or is the new model different?
Ummm, no. All pointers in 64 bit programs are 64 bit. The current amount of that address space devoted to user-process memory is 512TB. See this; it's about win64 on Itanium, but I'm sure AMD64 is the same.
Perhaps you are thinking of PAE on 32-bit systems?
Windows is fully capable of providing real 64-bit addressing. It even causes driver problems; you can't use 32 bit drivers in 64 bit Windows.
Current versions of OSX, OTOH, can't. They use memory windowing similar to PAE.
Mochasoft has cross-platform terminal emulators for TN5250, TN3270, TN3812 (a printer), LPD and SSH. They aren't free, but not too expensive either (for the TN5250 $25 USD single or $250 company) and worth it.
Sometimes I feel the same way about a Linux desktop; I know it's because of inexpierence.
I find the Windows command line to be useful; if you want Unix tools, use cygwin.
Yes, the default mode is to restart automatically. That behavior can be modified; and it still puts an entry in the event log. My main computer running XP hasn't crashed for 6 months since I upgraded the video drivers; the two crashes before that were their fault.
Sound support has improved greatly in Linux; I agree that is that easy.
I bet I could reinstall Windows in a couple of hours too, configuration and all. I'm not sure, because I've never done it before.
If you are saying that OE can somehow bypass the opearating system's security, then no. All system calls go through ntdll, after which security is checked, and every object has a seperate ACL. If you are running OE as admin, well that's your fault.
Fine, whatever works for you. As for 'not capable', could you be more specific?
I use Windows on my desktop, laptop and servers. I always build my own computers, so I make some interesting hardware combos too. I have always been able to resolve them under Windows. Linux too; althogh it takes me longer because I don't know it as well.
As for old hardware, Microsoft has taken to removing older drivers from newer installs; for no good reason. All I have to do then is install the drivers from the earlier disc. I would never hope to install an old binary driver under Linux. I also wouldn't know how to make it work even with the source.
I use Windows for work. Again, because I know it better. I don't need to be fooling around with the OS at the same time I'm trying to work.
Sometimes open sou
Is this because Microsoft sits on vulns longer to get more time, or does MS really release patches quicker?
Later on, it says that Windows has the highest quantity of critical vulns. This is because almost every network service runs in the SYSTEM account with tons of priveledges; either that or the kernel. WS2003 moves a few to lesser accounts, but it is too little too late. IIS can't run as anything but SYSTEM, with some of itself in kernel mode. Even the SMB file sharing service runs in a kernel mode driver (srv.sys). Microsoft needs to clean this up, badly.
Before NT4, in user mode hosted in csrss.exe; after that in kernel mode. I wouldn't consider a video driver an application; the original point was that an application could crash the system.
Windows NT has the same protections that other operating systems have: memory protection, a single syscall interface, access control, process seperation, etc.
Surely there is a program that can crash my XP computer without priveledges, that you could link to?
Are you sure that crappy kernel mode drivers aren't causing the crashes you are having?
I have never had an application crash bring down any of my NT based systems.
The i386 directory for NT4 Workstation is only 84mb.
Ummm, if you copy the i386 directory from NT to the destination drive, you can install it from there. You can do the copy from DOS and Interlink over the paralell port if you want. NT4 would work ok with 20mb of memory.
It's hard to complain if you are already happy, though.
No, it's not possible. Yes, you can intentionally crash the OS given enough priveledges, but you can't crash it without them. This has always been true of Windows NT and its derivatives.
No, it's not valid in XP. WinME is from the old 9x code base; XP is from the NT code base, two completely different architectures. The .ini files are not used for anything in NT based operating systems; everything is stored in the registry. Stopping unnecessary services is a good way to save memory in XP.
It would commit less memory if your turned off unnecessary services; without them, its more like 50mb. I've run XP with 128mb without problems.