blaah... I'l stick to good old 2.0.36
on
Linux 2.2 Released
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· Score: 1
Did you upgrade all the programs you're supposed to? Did you read the x11amp FAQ on that subject? Did you read about kmod? Or did you just spout off without thinking? "Nothing works" - what a sad joke you are. In the words of the ancient wise men: RTFM
Linux pussywillow.cs.unr.edu 2.2.0 #1 Mon Jan 25 20:58:58 PST 1999 i686 unknown
And there was much rejoycing in the world...
on
Linux 2.2 Released
·
· Score: 1
Glibc has substantially better built-in threading support, among other things. Most importantly of all, it's portable.
(really - couldn't they at least have produced a version of X that takes advantage of the neat graphics hardware? I know it would mean not releasing Linux support the day after the machine comes out, but support without keyboards isn't really support).
They, who? The kernel people probably aren't too interested in writing X servers. Releasing support the day after the machine comes out is just fine - people who find the lack of keyboard support galling can wait until later. But if releasing support for keyboards delays kernel support, that only hurts people who don't care about keyboards. And since keyboard support is so important to you, I'll look for your name in the CREDITS file.
NT device drivers are an order of magnitude harder to write than linux equivalents
True enough, although I'd say two orders.
linux PPP is an order of magnitude harder to get working than NT PPP
It's too bad you tried to use this as an example. Because it's a terrible one - Linux PPP is cake. However, that said, very few people here are flaming "all mac users" or saying "Linux is perfect in every way." And then you come on with another bad example: GNOME and KDE. The reason both of them exist is that nobody has figured out that people who use windows are going to think anything else is hard at first. The UI options offered under Linux/UN*X already whip everything else out there. But anyway... The people who are saying such things are wrong and simply shouldn't be here - so don't read their posts. As for whether it's better for software to be easy or hard to use...I'll take easy any day, but only to the extent that no flexibility is lost.
In any case, the point here is not about "macs suck" or "mac users suck" - it's about whether people with no knowledge of computers, no concept of netiquette, and no independent thinking abilities (even as re: not computers) can benefit themselves or others by "getting on the information superhighway." And that is a resounding NO.
The same thing we do when our Sun Ultra Entriprise servers crash (not that this ever happens): boot from cdrom, tape, arbitrary scsi device, network,... The concept that machines can only be booted from a disk or a floppy is confining and intelpc-centric. There's a great big world of booting options out there, and macs actually support some of them. Go do your homework before you mock a machine that lacks a slow, outdated, roundly despised piece of hardware.
Sorry, but you're wrong. Microsoft products aren't easy to use. The reason most people think so is that every computer they've ever used has had that software on it. People who have been using U*ix for 2/5/10+ years, as many of these people have used MSDOS, then windows3, then windows4 have, feel it's far easier to use than anything else. Ditto for mac users, etc. It's all what they're used to.
As for windows4 -> windows5 (NT/2000/whatever) being a big leap, that is true in some cases, but not for the reason you think. Large corporations with hundreds or thousands of systems to "upgrade" have a difficult time with any large-scale change in software. But as for the user side of things, the differences are fairly small between windows 3.0 and any "OS" microsoft is likely to sell in the next five years.
The similarities: 1. Low reliability. Microsoft-based systems need frequent reboots, reinstalls, and other manual maintenance. 2. High per-seat cost. Microsoft hasn't sold system software for less than $70-300 per seat, and they won't start now. Even commercial Unices are usually cheaper than this. 3. High support cost. Microsoft products are difficult even for seasoned IT professionals to understand. Hence costly tech support contracts are a must even for small (as low as 1 seat) installations. 4. Awful UI. Although DOS presented a difficult-to-use UI, it was at least fast. Since then, ms UIs have gotten slower, more confusing, and less consistent. 5. Minimal security. Although NT[45] is better than windows4, the security level is nothing like what even a basic U*ix offers, and "trusted" versions of high-end OS's like Solaris and HPUX offer more than NT ever will.
So, for home buyers/users, and for users in any environment, the changes will be small, as they always have been. Simply adding a few features, some new drivers, another layer of residue to UI, and a large supply of new bugs doesn't constitute a major leap.
Finally, as for willing leapers: anyone willing to leap simply because they are told to is going to leap in the direction his most conservative advisors instruct him to. These people are lost and should not be allowed to own or use computers at all. The right target for Linux upgrades is the set of people who feel compelled to leap because the products they use don't meet their needs. These people can be tempted by Linux over both NT (Linux is just all-around better) and commercial U*ix (Linux is cheaper, and sometime better in ways that might (not) matter to the buyer). And let's not forget that many of these people either need something other than Linux, or don't need computers at all.
To all the people complaining about the team writing a piece of free software because THEY WANT TO WRITE IT, your efforts would be better spent on a OSS project than trawling./ looking for things to complain about.
I'm not complaining about it - they have every right to code whatever they want. But the project is a waste of time at best, and counterproductive at worst.
I don't. With the greatest respect to the Wine team, their project is a waste of time. If people want windoze apps, they can buy and use windoze, and buy and use those apps. If they don't want windoze, they can a) generate demand for similar apps on their favorite OS, b) write their own apps to do what they want, or c) pay somebody to do (b). If libwine is used, as Corel has discussed, to port apps to Un*x, then we get lots of crufty, ugly, windoze-lookalike apps. They may not crash the whole OS, but they'll still crash a lot, be hard to use, ugly, and in general everything many of us stopped using windoze for. If wine is used as an emulator, more copies of windoze apps are bought, nothing gets ported, and Microsoft comes out the winner - their OS remains the primary development platform.
Use wine if you like, but be aware it may cost you in the long run. The massive wine effort would be better spent re-implementing the #1..n most-requested apps in {Motif|GTK|QT|Xaw|even ascii}. I bet they'd run 2-4x as fast, without licensing issues, etc. Because when all's said and done, reimplementing the windoze api is just plain dumb. The api itself is despicable and sickening, and even a really good implementation (Free, even) is going to suck, as are any apps it runs. There are leaner, meaner, cleaner, Freer, and just plain better apis just waiting for in-demand apps to be written in them. Why use such a bad one? Because it's popular? Now re-read the last 3 sentences with "OS" in mind instead of "api." Gotcha.
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Did you upgrade all the programs you're supposed to? Did you read the x11amp FAQ on that subject? Did you read about kmod? Or did you just spout off without thinking? "Nothing works" - what a sad joke you are. In the words of the ancient wise men: RTFM
Linux pussywillow.cs.unr.edu 2.2.0 #1 Mon Jan 25 20:58:58 PST 1999 i686 unknown
Glibc has substantially better built-in threading support, among other things. Most importantly of all, it's portable.
(really - couldn't they at least have produced a version of X that takes advantage of the neat graphics hardware? I know it would mean not releasing Linux support the day after the machine comes out, but support without keyboards isn't really support).
They, who? The kernel people probably aren't too interested in writing X servers. Releasing support the day after the machine comes out is just fine - people who find the lack of keyboard support galling can wait until later. But if releasing support for keyboards delays kernel support, that only hurts people who don't care about keyboards. And since keyboard support is so important to you, I'll look for your name in the CREDITS file.
NT device drivers are an order of magnitude harder to write than linux equivalents
True enough, although I'd say two orders.
linux PPP is an order of magnitude harder to get working than NT PPP
It's too bad you tried to use this as an example. Because it's a terrible one - Linux PPP is cake. However, that said, very few people here are flaming "all mac users" or saying "Linux is perfect in every way." And then you come on with another bad example: GNOME and KDE. The reason both of them exist is that nobody has figured out that people who use windows are going to think anything else is hard at first. The UI options offered under Linux/UN*X already whip everything else out there. But anyway... The people who are saying such things are wrong and simply shouldn't be here - so don't read their posts. As for whether it's better for software to be easy or hard to use...I'll take easy any day, but only to the extent that no flexibility is lost.
In any case, the point here is not about "macs suck" or "mac users suck" - it's about whether people with no knowledge of computers, no concept of netiquette, and no independent thinking abilities (even as re: not computers) can benefit themselves or others by "getting on the information superhighway." And that is a resounding NO.
The same thing we do when our Sun Ultra Entriprise servers crash (not that this ever happens): boot from cdrom, tape, arbitrary scsi device, network, ... The concept that machines can only be booted from a disk or a floppy is confining and intelpc-centric. There's a great big world of booting options out there, and macs actually support some of them. Go do your homework before you mock a machine that lacks a slow, outdated, roundly despised piece of hardware.
Sorry, but you're wrong. Microsoft products aren't easy to use. The reason most people think so is that every computer they've ever used has had that software on it. People who have been using U*ix for 2/5/10+ years, as many of these people have used MSDOS, then windows3, then windows4 have, feel it's far easier to use than anything else. Ditto for mac users, etc. It's all what they're used to.
As for windows4 -> windows5 (NT/2000/whatever) being a big leap, that is true in some cases, but not for the reason you think. Large corporations with hundreds or thousands of systems to "upgrade" have a difficult time with any large-scale change in software. But as for the user side of things, the differences are fairly small between windows 3.0 and any "OS" microsoft is likely to sell in the next five years.
The similarities:
1. Low reliability. Microsoft-based systems need frequent reboots, reinstalls, and other manual maintenance.
2. High per-seat cost. Microsoft hasn't sold system software for less than $70-300 per seat, and they won't start now. Even commercial Unices are usually cheaper than this.
3. High support cost. Microsoft products are difficult even for seasoned IT professionals to understand. Hence costly tech support contracts are a must even for small (as low as 1 seat) installations.
4. Awful UI. Although DOS presented a difficult-to-use UI, it was at least fast. Since then, ms UIs have gotten slower, more confusing, and less consistent.
5. Minimal security. Although NT[45] is better than windows4, the security level is nothing like what even a basic U*ix offers, and "trusted" versions of high-end OS's like Solaris and HPUX offer more than NT ever will.
So, for home buyers/users, and for users in any environment, the changes will be small, as they always have been. Simply adding a few features, some new drivers, another layer of residue to UI, and a large supply of new bugs doesn't constitute a major leap.
Finally, as for willing leapers: anyone willing to leap simply because they are told to is going to leap in the direction his most conservative advisors instruct him to. These people are lost and should not be allowed to own or use computers at all. The right target for Linux upgrades is the set of people who feel compelled to leap because the products they use don't meet their needs. These people can be tempted by Linux over both NT (Linux is just all-around better) and commercial U*ix (Linux is cheaper, and sometime better in ways that might (not) matter to the buyer). And let's not forget that many of these people either need something other than Linux, or don't need computers at all.
This just shows they just plain don't get it. People don't want "new stuff." They want something that will fucking work . What a concept.
But Windows isn't a MacOS emulator.
Sure it is. Windows runs MacOS binaries every bit as well as its native binaries.
To all the people complaining about the team writing a piece of free software because THEY ./ looking for things to complain about.
WANT TO WRITE IT, your efforts would be better spent on a OSS project than trawling
I'm not complaining about it - they have every right to code whatever they want. But the project is a waste of time at best, and counterproductive at worst.
I hope WINE gets good, really good. ...
I don't. With the greatest respect to the Wine team, their project is a waste of time. If people want windoze apps, they can buy and use windoze, and buy and use those apps. If they don't want windoze, they can a) generate demand for similar apps on their favorite OS, b) write their own apps to do what they want, or c) pay somebody to do (b). If libwine is used, as Corel has discussed, to port apps to Un*x, then we get lots of crufty, ugly, windoze-lookalike apps. They may not crash the whole OS, but they'll still crash a lot, be hard to use, ugly, and in general everything many of us stopped using windoze for. If wine is used as an emulator, more copies of windoze apps are bought, nothing gets ported, and Microsoft comes out the winner - their OS remains the primary development platform.
Use wine if you like, but be aware it may cost you in the long run. The massive wine effort would be better spent re-implementing the #1..n most-requested apps in {Motif|GTK|QT|Xaw|even ascii}. I bet they'd run 2-4x as fast, without licensing issues, etc. Because when all's said and done, reimplementing the windoze api is just plain dumb. The api itself is despicable and sickening, and even a really good implementation (Free, even) is going to suck, as are any apps it runs. There are leaner, meaner, cleaner, Freer, and just plain better apis just waiting for in-demand apps to be written in them. Why use such a bad one? Because it's popular? Now re-read the last 3 sentences with "OS" in mind instead of "api." Gotcha.
Microsoft will stop making an "OS" when...
They can no longer make money selling it, or make money by using it to force people to use their apps. IOW, never.