1) FreeBSD is under the hood with most common base system utilities pre-configured from Apple at time of shipment. You can install Fink or Darwinports to get an apt-get repository of OSX-binary distributions of many open source packages as well.
No, the XNU kernel is under the hood (the implementation damaged many of Mach's philosophies), and there is a BSD compatibility subsystem - which is used by POSIX tools on the system. MacOSX comes with command-line tools from FreeBSD.
2) What's the performance under Java like? On dual proccy machines (my Opteron, Core2Duo), Java screams. Can I expect the same performance under OSX?
MacOSX's Java isn't bad at performance, the problem is the fact that it's horribly broken in some cases. They've tried to replace things like awt, swt and so on with their own Aqua magic versions. But in order for most Java applications in my experience to actually get it right (No flickering, bugs). They need to use the EXTENDED JAVA FUNCTIONS (the thing Microsoft was sued for), to get it to work. This of course makes your Java binaries incompatible with other JREs.
4) How much Free software is available? Can GNU/Open/Free programs be compiled easily and natively? I'd think because it's more consistent than the hundreds of Linux distros, this would be true...
It really depends on what you're compiling. Some stuff will work perfectly, other stuff will be horribly broken. Stay away from anything that uses signals, it's handled very badly in my experience.
5) How solid is the workmanship. Hey, I get mocked at work because of my Dell, but it was cheap and it's fast. That's usually all I need. My Thinkpad is better built, but the $600 price difference was not worth it. What makes the Mac worth the extra $1K?
I'm a tech, I hate dealing with Macs mostly, because they emit annoying noises I can hear. It doesn't say much about the 'workmanship' in my opinion.
6) How fast is it? Remember, I used to own lots of Macs. I know that the PowerPC Macs were not so fast in everyday usage as the equivalent Intel/AMD chips. If you quote some meaningless statistic and some Apple press release I will laugh at you because I used them on a daily basis for years. But Macs now have a new OS, new chips... On real world apps (Java, video, disk), how do they stack up?
Pretty decent when you run benchmarks under Linux and windows under the hardware against similar hardware.
I love the implicit "You did backup your profile directory, didn't you?"
Firefox makes backups of bookmarks, usually it's called 'bookmarks.bak'.
Why does Firefox do this? Because under windows, if for some reason you suffered a powercut, Firefox was killed violently (could of happened if the firefox installer tried to close firefox). It never had the time to write the actual bookmarks to disk.
This is the problem with file locking under Windows, as I understand it. Other operating systems where Firefox exists don't have this problem.
Yeah, but Opera is already several versions ahead.:)
Yeah, and Opera doesn't have something that can synchronise your bookmarks, cookies, history, saved passwords and so on auto-magically between different computers and different operating systems -- with proper conflict resolution.
The main reason why *I* cannot use any other browser.:P
All my teachers, techtv when it was techtv, and most of my techie friends all have stated that ME was a quick release of what they had done so far on XP or 2000 or whatever and they released it because OS9 had just come out.
The wiki entry on Windows ME doesn't speak of it either. I am also having trouble finding news articles on Google discussing this.
everyone remember when Windows ME was rushed out because their main competetor, Apple, just released a new OS and they didn't want to lose the market share
Nope. I don't remember Apple computers even being sold here when Windows ME came out.
I've seen stupid things to complain about, fight against. But.. "WoW ruins lives!11!" "WoW doesn't ruin lives!" articles.. come on. Too much of anything obviously has repercussions.
Note: I will talk about Ubuntu Linux, because I don't want to go on about where to go for each distro like Debian, Mandriva, Fedora, SuSE, etc. etc. etc.
Microsoft is now creating open standards, open formats, even open source applications
I liked how the open standards took dramatic twists when for example Mono started. Suddenly it looked like there were 'dramatic' changes in some areas just to make it difficult -- at least to me.
not one hundred percent of the time, but hey, they're doing it! They're starting to look more and more like us.
Not really. The open formats were providing less features, less extendible than Microsoft's secret proprietary formats, and I'm supposed to believe this work is just as good? Think of Microsoft's XML document format and the DOT XML standard. The non-microsoft one was built to be extendible, had plenty of features and did not have less features than Microsoft word doc.
Where's our readily accessible documentation localised in dozens of languages?
Provided you install the localisations:/usr/share/doc
It's also not useless like Microsoft's helpfiles.
Where's our toll-free licensing hotline?
Licensing? What? Is this about 'activating' linux or some non-sense?
Where's our reliable and knowledgeable tech support team?
Well, for ubuntu for example, you can use the ubuntuforums, the ubuntu IRC channel, also providing specific channels for different languages like #ubuntu-countrycode, for example, Polish is #ubuntu-pl. Google groups, Online wiki documentations and so on. FREE, NO COST AT ALL.
Now, Microsoft reliable support team? I've had to wait on the phone for hours to get a response from paid support, only to be told "I don't know" and that I should probably try doing a long distance non-free call.
Our software assurance subscription that actually sends a disc in the mail when there's an update?
You can subscribe to announcement mailing lists, and then request a FREE DISC, NO COST AT ALL CD from here.
Honestly, people. Why is Microsoft getting so much better, while *we're* really starting to SUCK?
Eh?
You know what really bugs me? That last one. I used to pay $4.95 a month for a quarterly package of three major Linux distributions. I liked that.
I'm able to get copies of major linux distributions with magazine subscriptions for something around that price here. By the way, where can I get that for Windows for that price?
Slashdot Mirror
"Slashdot is like playboy, people don't read it for the articles."
There, fixed.
(I got this off a signature I read a few days ago)
My request.
Please stop making products that keep emitting sounds at pitches I can hear. It really makes my day worse having to deal with Macs that do this.
Why does Firefox do this? Because under windows, if for some reason you suffered a powercut, Firefox was killed violently (could of happened if the firefox installer tried to close firefox). It never had the time to write the actual bookmarks to disk.
This is the problem with file locking under Windows, as I understand it. Other operating systems where Firefox exists don't have this problem.
I look at the demonstration and see nothing happening.
The main reason why *I* cannot use any other browser.
There, fixed it for you.
Gnome, KDE, Bash, XFCE etc.
Nothing wrong with choice in my opinion.... It's ugly in my opinion..NET is not a activex/com replacement, nor have Microsoft removed any components in favour of something in
What they have done is rewritten some components using
This article gets a '!life' tag from me.
I've seen stupid things to complain about, fight against. But.. "WoW ruins lives!11!" "WoW doesn't ruin lives!" articles.. come on. Too much of anything obviously has repercussions.
I fear the upcoming dupe.
c64 emulators!? What they trying todo? Make Flash like some sort of, even more closed Java!?
I liked how the open standards took dramatic twists when for example Mono started. Suddenly it looked like there were 'dramatic' changes in some areas just to make it difficult -- at least to me.Not really. The open formats were providing less features, less extendible than Microsoft's secret proprietary formats, and I'm supposed to believe this work is just as good? Think of Microsoft's XML document format and the DOT XML standard. The non-microsoft one was built to be extendible, had plenty of features and did not have less features than Microsoft word doc.
Provided you install the localisations:
It's also not useless like Microsoft's helpfiles.Licensing? What? Is this about 'activating' linux or some non-sense?Well, for ubuntu for example, you can use the ubuntuforums, the ubuntu IRC channel, also providing specific channels for different languages like #ubuntu-countrycode, for example, Polish is #ubuntu-pl. Google groups, Online wiki documentations and so on. FREE, NO COST AT ALL.
Commercial support is also available [1] [2]
Now, Microsoft reliable support team? I've had to wait on the phone for hours to get a response from paid support, only to be told "I don't know" and that I should probably try doing a long distance non-free call.
You can subscribe to announcement mailing lists, and then request a FREE DISC, NO COST AT ALL CD from here.
Eh?
I'm able to get copies of major linux distributions with magazine subscriptions for something around that price here. By the way, where can I get that for Windows for that price?Because you aren't in the know.
"It's a turp!"