I manage to run Gnome 2, 2 rdesktop sessions, gaim, linphone, firefox and a java applet (for managing pictures) all in 256mb without swap on a 'thin client'.
Using that right now for posting, and Firefox is consuming some 45mb.
Sure, it has a few leaks, I have read about those, and I bet people are not reporting those for no reason. Yet I have to see them on an install without extentions still.
this may be bc of a driver issue. in linux firefox, when I click left&right simultaneously on "Back", the previous page opens in a new tab. should be the same in mac and win?
This is either gdm or X using '3 button emulation'. No, it won't work on Windows unless your mouse driver there does it, no idea about OS X. At any rate, it has nothing to do with Firefox itself.
(2)... Sure. Windows XP Professional. You should be using it anyways, home sucks.
Sure, but see your own argument below..
(3)... yeah, if you are a linux zealot. Properly configured windows box is secure. I see no reason to switch just to serve up web pages as a hobby, and for the target audience (you were talking about people running WINDOWS XP HOME after all) that is a pretty big step.
Yes, it is a big step, and I am not suggesting people should make that step by definition, in most cases the platform one uses is pretty much irrelevant as long as it is good enough (and as I wrote in another post, NT and 2K already quakify for that often). The thing is that before you consider running your own publicly accessable webserver you should have a clue about what you are doing. That is for most a much bigger step then changing platforms.
When looking at a technical solution for running a personal webserver for ones own data (and web applications) it looks pretty much like something you'd want to solve with some appliance, preferably a nice low-power embedded system with some huge amount of disk storage, acting as webserver and for the local network as smb server. Incidentely, such systems exist and usually turn out to run some variation on Unix, usually Linux. Yeah, those definitely still require that you have a clue about what you are doing, and at times leave something to be desired with regards to their vendors and updates, so it doesn't solve the security side of it, nothing beats having a clue..
It does sound like a better idea then always leaving the home PC turned on however, and likely a bit cheaper as well. Also, it removes the need for installation and a secure default configuration for as far as the user is concerned, they can concentrate on their data and keeping that secure and available at the same time.
No there isn't a module for PHP, it is a standalone application. Installation is fairly straightforward. Follow *both* PHP's and Apache's instructions. You need to change httpd.conf to enable PHP (just like linux/unix/bsd)
Yeah, I got it to work (just didn't find it as easy as on the mentioned unix variations), but I was wondering if there was an Apache module by now (doing some stuff that doesn't work very well without the module)
XP Pro is so much better than home edition, it is worth the $50-$75 upgrade price. Many college campuses won't allow you to run it on their networks due to all of the security holes. Home is a piece of crap. Pro, SP2 is a good piece of software. I'd recommend it without reservation regardless of IIS.
Definitely, and I do the same for those who want or need Windows.
But it is still not what most home users are running. College campus networks are not very representative because first of all they are usually administrated by someone who has at least a bit of a clue and second the users there are a bit more likely to have some clue then the average person.
In the context of the average home user running his/her own webserver at home for his/her own data, I don't see how arguing that IIS comes with XP pro and 2k3 server and would work fine is going to be of much help. I would say that there is no option other then getting a clue about running a webserver securely and then picking whatever platform you are comfortable with and is affordable to you. On the way there, you will find yourself getting rid of most of the problems associated with Windows as well most likely (even when staying on that platform, which was one of the points of my original post, responding to the 'windows bashing' comment in its parent) since most of them are also a consequence of not having a clue.
The same applies to running Apache on any version of Windows. The same applies to running a webserver on any other platform.
I had php working in 20 minutes. (Extract the zip files, copy the DLL's to the c:\windows\system32, update apache configuration file) SSH was easy too. I didn't need perl, so I can't coment.
20 minutes is also how long it takes me to get FreeBSD + apache + ssl + php + perl + decent logging + webmail app + content management installed and configured, but ok. Is there a php module for apache on Windows now? because one of my main issue there is actually getting PHP apps to live with cgi based php.
Most home users have XP pro
Maybe most people around you do, but overhere you have a hard time as a consumer getting anything other then XP home, and you pay quite a bit for it, regardless of going to a shop or ordering online. XP home is what almost everyone has except for those who know about the difference.
, because most vendors ship with XP pro.
In the consumer market? not overhere.
Believe it or not. Home is such a piece of crap
There are better systems around, even from the same vendor.
, unless the users upgrade themselves they have XP pro.
Uh, shouldn't that read 'unless the users upgrade themselves they have XP home' ?
And if they upgrade themselves they are savvy enough to install apache.
Oh, definitely, but if you read back in this thread you may see I was replying to someone saying that IIS on 2003 server and XP (pro) was a decent solution for the idea of home users running their own webservers for their own data. I think it is not. Apache on XP? Oh, can work (eventho I have had my troubles with it, others are happy with it it seems) and could be a good option for such home users. Getting XP pro to begin with would also be an option and would give the choice of running IIS also.
Claiming that spending money on software is a good idea when there are at least as good alternatives that are free? Sounds silly to me.
For the rest, I agree with the fact that it is about knowing what you are doing, not about the platform you are using so much.
Very few vendors actually ship home edition... and very few of the people ACTUALLY SAVVY ENOUGH TO RUN A WEB SERVER would purchase home, given the option.
Well, where I live, and when looking online for what is being offered in other countries, I have a hard time finding any vendor that doesn't preload home edition by default for PCs for the consumer market. I did find some vendors not shipping pro with PCs for the consumer market however.
This picture is different when looking at the business market, but we were talking about home users running web servers for their own data, not about business users.
You are right of course that most people who actually know how to run a webserver securely will use something different from home edition, and what is more, for those people it shouldn't matter too much what the underlying platform is as long as it fits the requirements (and that Windows NT and 2000 already do well enough)
And there are workaround such as:http://www.iis-resources.com/modules/AMS/articl e.php?storyid=48 to get IIS working on Home.
Cool that it can run... but... where exactly would IIS come from in that case? I mean legally...
You see, there are a bunch of arguments to be made, but it is pointless if we aren't even talking about the same situation..
So, lets once more define the situation:
Typical HOME user wants to run web server for his personal data.
Choices this person has: 1. Run a free web server on his current platform (which in the large majority of cases will be XP home edition) 2. Upgrade to a version of his platform that comes with a webserver 3. Change to a different platform that comes with a webserver
Now, option 1 and 3 are free (money wise), option 2 is not.
The post I replied to was advocating option 2, and in its more expensive variation also (Windows 2003 server) tho it did mention the cheaper alternative (XP pro). Tel me, how is that a usefull advice to a home user wanting this?
Of course this all doesn't change that the one thing you need in all cases for doing this is knowledge. Choice of platform changes what and how much knowledge you need maybe, but not the fact that you will need it. People who do not have the knowledge and do not want to invest time and efford into getting it, should not want to run their own webserver either, that much I can agree with.
I've used IIS and Apache on Windows. While both have their perks, Apache is dead easy to install on windows. It has a graphical installer and installs as a service in less than 10 clicks. Way easier than installing Suse.
Untill you need something like PHP perl, ssl or such. Yes, all of them can work, but I did not exactly find it easy to get to work. Maybe things got a bit better since 1.3.25...
(Not to mention that XP Pro comes with IIS...)
Yes, and that is not exactly what the typical home user has, hence for the typical home/hobby user, this takes buying new software (even if it doesn't have to be Windows 2003 server).
At any rate, I am sure that many can quite deal with Apache on Windows, but I honestly doubt that was what I was pointing at in my original post.. maybe it was a lot more about how knowledge makes the difference, not the platform you use, and to point out that expensive solutions are not gonna appeal hobbyists if there are at least as good and much cheaper alternatives. Read all the Windows bashing in it you want..
Then why not say uneducated-user problem rather than the much more inflamitary "Windows related problem"? Obviously you have a bias against windows.
Because that same Windows (XP home edition) caters to those uneducated users. It should indeed be safe to use without much education. Matter of fact is that only educated users can use it safely. XP pro, most Linux distributions and the like do not cater at those uneducated users. The chance of someone actually running into substantial security issues with Linux as an uneducated user are small for now (since that user will have a problem getting it to run and connect to begin with)
Anti Windows bias? Well, I believe there are better alternatives, but I do not believe that all versions of Windows are useless from the start.
If you know how to securely run a machine, it doesn't really matter what OS you chose to use. I've run windows machines for may years and never had mine hacked. I also run a number of OpenBSD machines and can say the same for them.
If folks are running XP Home, then either they have specific applications they want to use that run only under XP or they prefer XP for some other reason, or they are uninformed enough about the options that they wouldn't be clued-in enough to run an alternate OS securely. In either case, telling them they would be 'better served' by another OS is pointless.
Which part of "and you do have the knowledge to securely run a webserver" was not clear in my statement?
No, you load only new comments. Old ones remain in place.
That is a possible implementation indeed, insert the new comment somewhere into the DOM.
While this works very well for adding new things (or replacing existing things), it becomes a real pain when the application (either server or client side) has to keep track of what is there.
Also, this concept was there with HTTP and DHTML, so while you are definitely right about this being a potentially smart way to do this, it has nothign to do with AJAX other then that AJAX does not conflict with it, and in fact suggests using such solutions.
If one comment of 2k was added, there was about 1k of content, 1k of HTML overhead which sits inside the JS so isn't downloaded, 1k of xmlhttprequest overhead. So about 2k downloaded. Other comments didn't change, remain untouched.
See above. You are right about the saving this can give, but it is not something that requires AJAX.
700k - 2k = 698k. Profit: bandwidth usage reduced by 99,7%. Considering the server-side throttling (on one hand) and lag for exchange of the AJAX dialog (on the other hand), you get waiting down from about 40s to 2s.
The issue is that AJAX basicly adds an alternative for GET/PUT requests, no more and no less. You can use that in all kinds of fancy ways, but very few of those ways are unique to AJAX, they just happen to work well with it.
AJAX also makes that your implementation gets a bit cleaner maybe because of not having to figure out a way to preserve a DOM or do requests in the background (both are not very difficult, but they are a bit hacky).
But it sent everything in one batch, using heavily paralell transmissions.
It is either one batch or heavily parallel transmissions...
Regardless, you load everything upfront indeed.
I didn't have to wait for the form to load separately. Before I click and I see the result, it takes at least some 2s, no matter how big is the page. But this is moot, the form being placed there dynamically is just a convenient trick. The idea is that after I add a comment, I don't wait to see it in context with the page reloading from scratch. It gets included at once, and I can go back to reading/writing more without waiting for the updated comments page to reload. 2s instead of 40s.
Yes, that is all nice DHTML, AJAX adds a clean way to do asynchronous requests to it, but there were already ways to do that anyway.
"nice" - needs good design. "responsive" is the keyword, and it IS the silver bullet here. You wait ONCE. Like with local apps, I start up my favourite GIMP and go read/. before it loads, but when it works, it works,
Ah.. I gues that is why so many operating systems delay loading of libraries untill they are actually used, hell, even do that with memory pages from executables..
I also guess this is why KDE for example loads itself and its whole bunch of applications all at once, you might just need them..
(oh, and Gimp 2 takes all of 11 seconds to load here anyway..)
same here, you need to let the AJAX app to load, go, read some other page in a different tab or have a cup of coffee, but then you go back to the AJAX-enabled page and everything gets very fast and responsive.
Absolutely usefull for quickly looking up information and such.. Oh, I should just keep the page open all day just in case I guess..
No, it doesn't compare to local applications at all. Most local applications here have initial load times in the order of 10-30 secs.
Your workflow isn't continuously interrupted by longish waits. If by "responsive" you mean "loads fast", that's a misunderstanding. Instead of 40 breaks of terribly annoying useless 10s each, you get one of 60s which you just wait through doing something productive (or not) and 39 of nice, friendly 2s.
Well, if that is the one web application you are going to need for the next 30 minutes or so you have a poi
The problem isn't the same. You don't need 2003 server, or even XP Pro to run a web server. You know they do make version of Apache and quite a few other web servers that will run just fine under XP home.
I have used Apache on a variety of Windows versions. It works, tho 'fine' isn't exactly what comes to mind. That said, it is a workable solution in many cases.
But just keep claiming the grandparent wanted folks to all buy 2003 server, because you can't possibly run a web server on XP home...
The parent claimed that IIS was fine for this. I pointed out that running IIS will take buying a new version of WIndows for many people. There are free alternatives.
If someone is clueless enough not to know that you can get a webserver running under XP Home, their chances of doing so securely under *nix are pretty much nill.
Definitely, and what is more, it works the other way around as well, because while the platform can help with security, understanding what you are doing is the first thing required for doing that thing in a secure way (regardless of what 'that thing' is). That was also the point of my original post (not having the typical Windows related problems does not refer to using another platform, but to knowing what you are doing)
This all said, if you are going to use an alternative webserver anyway, and you do have the knowledge to securely run a webserver, you may be better off using a nicely integrated and server oriented system for it, and there are indeed good alternatives to Windows with regards to that.
Ahh yes, because the *only* webservers available for Windows are the ones that come with Windows.
Claim was that IIS on Windows 2003 Server can work fine (I happen to agree with that) and that XP with IIS would do as well.
Alternative (free) webservers? Sure, those exist and are being used. It wasn't the argument being made however, not to mention that imho getting something like Apache to work on Windows is more efford then installing Suse with a webserver for example.
Of the probably 20 people I can think of off hand that are running Windows XP, one is running home. And, before you ask, none of the ones I'm referring to are pirated copies.
Good for them, but it isn't what the typical consumer has. We were talking about the average person running their own webserver for their own data, and those usually run home edition.
For now it is substantially cheaper to use an alternative to IIS when wanting a web server, esp. for the average consumer. Using a nicely integrated package (ie, Suse with apache, but there are quite a few alternatives) provides much if not all of the ease of use, for a better price (ie, free in many cases).
Oh and for that matter, most people do not have a MSDN subscription, and I am pretty sure Microsoft is not going to send free versions of their software to the large majority of their users either, so no, MSDN subscribtions don't work for getting stuff for free for this situation.
Regardless of what you use, you'll need some knowledge about what you are doing, platform nor choice of webserver matter for that (they only matter for what and how much you need to know exactly). Most people who have enough of a clue to run their own webserver at this moment also have enough of a clue to not have most of the issues that the typical Windows user has, regardless of if they are using Windows or not.
In other words, all I was pointing out is that knowledge is what makes the difference here, not so much the platform. Statements like the one about not having the typical windows issues should be read that way and not as 'windows bashing'.
Gee, it looks like he's saying you don't need 2003 Server. Learn to read idiot.
Hmm yes, calling people names is always a good idea when trying to make a point..
Lets ignore it..
GP indeed said:
For those that don't have access to a copy of Windows 2003 Server, Windows XP's IIS Web Server implementation is more than adequate to serve several low traffic sites (including those with dyanamic content)
Lets see how much that helps..
Last time I checked, Windows XP home edition is preloaded on virtually all computers sold to individuals. Windows XP home edition does not include IIS, it doesn't even include the personal web services from previous versions.
That means that in most cases people will have to pay for XP Professional beforehand or when they encounter needing a web server.
So... it may be somewhat cheaper then Win 2k3 server, but the problem is the same.
Hrm, wtf move to Tiscali? I am not aware of any location within the country where Tiscali has coverage and XS4ALL doesn't. Oh, and when you had to leave XS4ALL anyway, I'd have gone with Versatel before Tiscali (despite having family working at Tiscali and being able to get a reduced price for my subscription). Versatel has so far served me well (for about 3 years now). Have had 2 connection drops over the last 6 months, and those usually happen during the night. Getting the promissed download speeds (not on adsl2 here btw, only 'regular' adsl, but 12mbit downstream is what they promise and what I am getting most of the time)..
I have yet to get any complaints from them about data limits (while 100GB+/week is no exception for me at all)
Yeah, their helpdesk sucks (tho got a lot better over the last year) and they are not the cheapest,
At any rate, they make for an alltogether better choice imho.
Oh... this was about AJAX... sorry for the off-topic rant:)
A couple of hours ago when my internet connection was down (ok, not their fault, but it doesn't matter for me, I cannot use the g* apps, and that is what counts)
2. When was the last time Windows stopped working?
In my case, about a decade ago, I replaced it with something that was more of my liking, that I got a say in (ok, a small one, but still), and that turns out to be utterly reliable and stable for local applications.
The simple fact is that a single centrally administered server farm is vastly easier to administrate
Slightly easier then fixed function distributed environments. The trick is stopping users from changing the system, a central server may help in that but is nowhere a requirement.
A central service of some sort is a requirement for centralized administration of course.
At any rate, it quickly becomes a lot more difficulkt to administer when having to cater to the requirements of different users, and not having 'company policy' dictating what a user is supposed to do.
-- and will be vastly more reliable
It will only be as reliable as the conenction between it and the intended users, lots of things outside your control on the way that can go wrong.
If you perform 10 write operations a second (Firefox cache?) you will murder it really fast.
Definitely.
I'm currently building a bootable FreeBSD flash drive image for similar purposes. Having some experience with flash made for ensuring the Cache dir points to a memory file system.
Yeah, cache is gone after reboot, but that is not as big an issue as the speed at which you waste flash memory otherwise.
Of course one could also only cache to memory... but somehow I have bad experience with doing that (mostly firefox starting to eat memory like nothing)
the question is if you really are better at securing data than a company or not. It might be true for a small minority but the population at large might very well have a lot better security by using these online services.
You don't have to be for 2 reasons:
1. you are a less easy to find target 2. there is a lot less to get from hacking your system then hacking a system that contains all your data besides that of thousands of others.
No, that is not security through obscurity, it is looking at the risks and noticing they are a bit lower, hence you will have an easier time compensating for them with your security measures.
Yes. Amount of repeatable content, basic pain of CGI/PHP. Take a GOOD application of AJAX: DeviantArt comments. Each art piece posted to the site may be commented by the users. Sometimes there's 200-300 comments, discussion occurs etc. Indentation provides some threading, there are some basic forum-like features etc. You probably want to cut on page switching when you dig into the comments. You set it to display 100 per page. Including links, avatars, smileys and some more such crap plus bandwidth throttling from the server if you're not a subscriber, it starts getting really lengthy to load the comments page. But it's still better than loading 20 separate pages 10 comments each. Then you want to participate in the discussion...
Lets analyse this a little bit deeper..
Art piece gets posted, now lets assume this is a big picture and give it 2mb. comments get added, lets assume people really have something to say, and write 300 comments that average 2k bytes each. Now, the page also contains some other stuff like menus, logo etc, lets say this is another 50k for the html and 200k for pictures (logo etc).
So, the first time you look at this, regardless of it using AJAX or some PHP based solution or the like, you need to download some 2850k.
Next refresh this will be 650k in case of a traditional (CGI/PHP whatever solution), everything else will c ome from cache, and that is if the comments changed at all. It will be 600k in case of AJAX when the comments changed (the comments have to be loaded, the page layout etc not). In either case it will be a few bytes if the comments didn't change (and the server is smart enough to realize).
So, total gain for this example would be a bit less then 50k. Not really impressive, and not the huge kind of difference you seem to believe is possible.
Non-AJAX, non-javascript, pure CGI way: Click "Reply" in given thread. Wait for the "reply" form for given thread to load. Type your answer. Click "preview". Wait for preview to load. Click "send". Wait for the whole discussion page, 100 posts, plus your answer to load.
Yes, and the fact that AJAX hides this a little bit betetr in no way changes that the same underlying things are happening, taking approx as much time and bandwidth.
AJAX way: Click "Reply". Immediately a textarea appears, where your post would go, with "send", "preview" and "cancel" buttons. You type in your reply and press "preview". The border around the textarea blinks for a moment and then turns into your post's final look, in context of the 100 other posts, differing only by "preview" replaced by "edit" (which with no further delay gets you back to editing your post). You click "send" and the border blinks a moment more. Buttons vanish, your post is placed in the context amongst all the rest, where it was supposed to be. No single other post gets reloaded.
Ah yes... and luckily the JS code AND layout data for doing this didn't have to be sent to your computer beforehand, regardless of if you were going to reply..
If a website presents you with a form, it did have to send you that form first, REGARDLESS of AJAX. The form did not just magically appear in the memory of your computer.
AJAX has some very nice things, but it is not the silver bullet you seem to think it is when it comes to nice responsive web applications.
The way these services and others make place irrelevant is a good thing, people have tried many different solutions from PDAs and laptops to remote control software to achieve the same goal.
But this solution has also it's own problem, like all the earlier attempts, in this case the problem is a lot about security and secrecy.
To me the two biggest issues (besides security and privacy) seem to be:
1. need network access to get to my data (compare to a PDA which works perfectly fine without it, tho your data may not always be uptodate)
2. due to needing network access, the cost in battery use for accessing information is a lot higher.
Those two things make this a nice but not very workable idea for many of the situations I encounter, and yeah, I do have internet access from almost everywhere, can link my laptop to it from almost everywhere etc, regardless, there are often places where I need access to my data and where there is NO network coverage (read, NONE of the 6 GSM/GPRS networks that I could possibly use is reachable there).
Hence, this is for me an unworkable solution, it is simply a lot worse then using a PDA and syncing it wirelessly.
until you threw in a random anti-windows statement.
Lets see.. the grant parent said that those people don't suffer from the typical windows related problems,. This can of course be because of running Linux, it could also be because of having a clue about running a server on Windows.
Wether that is a statement about the users or the product is not clear, so I'd say you are reading more into the statement then was being said,
I'd like to ask you however how likely you think it is that many home users are going to buy Windows 2003 Server for having a tiny private website with their own information... Ever looked at the price for that? It is pretty reasonable to assume that most people will not use it for this.
Slashdot Mirror
There are browsers with automatic spelling correction (ie, Konqueror)
http://www.amigaforever.com/
I manage to run Gnome 2, 2 rdesktop sessions, gaim, linphone, firefox and a java applet (for managing pictures) all in 256mb without swap on a 'thin client'.
Using that right now for posting, and Firefox is consuming some 45mb.
Sure, it has a few leaks, I have read about those, and I bet people are not reporting those for no reason. Yet I have to see them on an install without extentions still.
that style of writing and that name.. Thijs?
this may be bc of a driver issue. in linux firefox, when I click left&right simultaneously on "Back", the previous page opens in a new tab. should be the same in mac and win?
This is either gdm or X using '3 button emulation'. No, it won't work on Windows unless your mouse driver there does it, no idea about OS X. At any rate, it has nothing to do with Firefox itself.
Not because of the 10 v 5 way conferencing (I don't care) but because
of the mentality it conveys.
They were out the day they got bought by ebay.
Good to see they are actually helping themselves die now.
(2) ... Sure. Windows XP Professional. You should be using it anyways, home sucks.
... yeah, if you are a linux zealot. Properly configured windows box is secure. I see no reason to switch just to serve up web pages as a hobby, and for the target audience (you were talking about people running WINDOWS XP HOME after all) that is a pretty big step.
Sure, but see your own argument below..
(3)
Yes, it is a big step, and I am not suggesting people should make that step by definition, in most cases the platform one uses is pretty much irrelevant as long as it is good enough (and as I wrote in another post, NT and 2K already quakify for that often). The thing is that before you consider running your own publicly accessable webserver you should have a clue about what you are doing. That is for most a much bigger step then changing platforms.
When looking at a technical solution for running a personal webserver for ones own data (and web applications) it looks pretty much like something you'd want to solve with some appliance, preferably a nice low-power embedded system with some huge amount of disk storage, acting as webserver and for the local network as smb server. Incidentely, such systems exist and usually turn out to run some variation on Unix, usually Linux. Yeah, those definitely still require that you have a clue about what you are doing, and at times leave something to be desired with regards to their vendors and updates, so it doesn't solve the security side of it, nothing beats having a clue..
It does sound like a better idea then always leaving the home PC turned on however, and likely a bit cheaper as well. Also, it removes the need for installation and a secure default configuration for as far as the user is concerned, they can concentrate on their data and keeping that secure and available at the same time.
No there isn't a module for PHP, it is a standalone application. Installation is fairly straightforward. Follow *both* PHP's and Apache's instructions. You need to change httpd.conf to enable PHP (just like linux/unix/bsd)
Yeah, I got it to work (just didn't find it as easy as on the mentioned unix variations), but I was wondering if there was an Apache module by now (doing some stuff that doesn't work very well without the module)
XP Pro is so much better than home edition, it is worth the $50-$75 upgrade price. Many college campuses won't allow you to run it on their networks due to all of the security holes. Home is a piece of crap. Pro, SP2 is a good piece of software. I'd recommend it without reservation regardless of IIS.
Definitely, and I do the same for those who want or need Windows.
But it is still not what most home users are running. College campus networks are not very representative because first of all they are usually administrated by someone who has at least a bit of a clue and second the users there are a bit more likely to have some clue then the average person.
In the context of the average home user running his/her own webserver at home for his/her own data, I don't see how arguing that IIS comes with XP pro and 2k3 server and would work fine is going to be of much help. I would say that there is no option other then getting a clue about running a webserver securely and then picking whatever platform you are comfortable with and is affordable to you. On the way there, you will find yourself getting rid of most of the problems associated with Windows as well most likely (even when staying on that platform, which was one of the points of my original post, responding to the 'windows bashing' comment in its parent) since most of them are also a consequence of not having a clue.
The same applies to running Apache on any version of Windows. The same applies to running a webserver on any other platform.
I had php working in 20 minutes. (Extract the zip files, copy the DLL's to the c:\windows\system32, update apache configuration file) SSH was easy too. I didn't need perl, so I can't coment.
20 minutes is also how long it takes me to get FreeBSD + apache + ssl + php + perl + decent logging + webmail app + content management installed and configured, but ok. Is there a php module for apache on Windows now? because one of my main issue there is actually getting PHP apps to live with cgi based php.
Most home users have XP pro
Maybe most people around you do, but overhere you have a hard time as a consumer getting anything other then XP home, and you pay quite a bit for it, regardless of going to a shop or ordering online. XP home is what almost everyone has except for those who know about the difference.
, because most vendors ship with XP pro.
In the consumer market? not overhere.
Believe it or not. Home is such a piece of crap
There are better systems around, even from the same vendor.
, unless the users upgrade themselves they have XP pro.
Uh, shouldn't that read 'unless the users upgrade themselves they have XP home' ?
And if they upgrade themselves they are savvy enough to install apache.
Oh, definitely, but if you read back in this thread you may see I was replying to someone saying that IIS on 2003 server and XP (pro) was a decent solution for the idea of home users running their own webservers for their own data. I think it is not. Apache on XP? Oh, can work (eventho I have had my troubles with it, others are happy with it it seems) and could be a good option for such home users. Getting XP pro to begin with would also be an option and would give the choice of running IIS also.
Claiming that spending money on software is a good idea when there are at least as good alternatives that are free? Sounds silly to me.
For the rest, I agree with the fact that it is about knowing what you are doing, not about the platform you are using so much.
Very few vendors actually ship home edition... and very few of the people ACTUALLY SAVVY ENOUGH TO RUN A WEB SERVER would purchase home, given the option.
l e.php?storyid=48 to get IIS working on Home.
Well, where I live, and when looking online for what is being offered in other countries, I have a hard time finding any vendor that doesn't preload home edition by default for PCs for the consumer market. I did find some vendors not shipping pro with PCs for the consumer market however.
This picture is different when looking at the business market, but we were talking about home users running web servers for their own data, not about business users.
You are right of course that most people who actually know how to run a webserver securely will use something different from home edition, and what is more, for those people it shouldn't matter too much what the underlying platform is as long as it fits the requirements (and that Windows NT and 2000 already do well enough)
And there are workaround such as:http://www.iis-resources.com/modules/AMS/artic
Cool that it can run... but... where exactly would IIS come from in that case? I mean legally...
You see, there are a bunch of arguments to be made, but it is pointless if we aren't even talking about the same situation..
So, lets once more define the situation:
Typical HOME user wants to run web server for his personal data.
Choices this person has:
1. Run a free web server on his current platform (which in the large majority of cases will be XP home edition)
2. Upgrade to a version of his platform that comes with a webserver
3. Change to a different platform that comes with a webserver
Now, option 1 and 3 are free (money wise), option 2 is not.
The post I replied to was advocating option 2, and in its more expensive variation also (Windows 2003 server) tho it did mention the cheaper alternative (XP pro). Tel me, how is that a usefull advice to a home user wanting this?
Of course this all doesn't change that the one thing you need in all cases for doing this is knowledge. Choice of platform changes what and how much knowledge you need maybe, but not the fact that you will need it. People who do not have the knowledge and do not want to invest time and efford into getting it, should not want to run their own webserver either, that much I can agree with.
I've used IIS and Apache on Windows. While both have their perks, Apache is dead easy to install on windows. It has a graphical installer and installs as a service in less than 10 clicks. Way easier than installing Suse.
Untill you need something like PHP perl, ssl or such. Yes, all of them can work, but I did not exactly find it easy to get to work. Maybe things got a bit better since 1.3.25...
(Not to mention that XP Pro comes with IIS...)
Yes, and that is not exactly what the typical home user has, hence for the typical home/hobby user, this takes buying new software (even if it doesn't have to be Windows 2003 server).
At any rate, I am sure that many can quite deal with Apache on Windows, but I honestly doubt that was what I was pointing at in my original post.. maybe it was a lot more about how knowledge makes the difference, not the platform you use, and to point out that expensive solutions are not gonna appeal hobbyists if there are at least as good and much cheaper alternatives. Read all the Windows bashing in it you want..
Then why not say uneducated-user problem rather than the much more inflamitary "Windows related problem"? Obviously you have a bias against windows.
Because that same Windows (XP home edition) caters to those uneducated users. It should indeed be safe to use without much education. Matter of fact is that only educated users can use it safely. XP pro, most Linux distributions and the like do not cater at those uneducated users. The chance of someone actually running into substantial security issues with Linux as an uneducated user are small for now (since that user will have a problem getting it to run and connect to begin with)
Anti Windows bias? Well, I believe there are better alternatives, but I do not believe that all versions of Windows are useless from the start.
If you know how to securely run a machine, it doesn't really matter what OS you chose to use. I've run windows machines for may years and never had mine hacked. I also run a number of OpenBSD machines and can say the same for them.
If folks are running XP Home, then either they have specific applications they want to use that run only under XP or they prefer XP for some other reason, or they are uninformed enough about the options that they wouldn't be clued-in enough to run an alternate OS securely. In either case, telling them they would be 'better served' by another OS is pointless.
Which part of "and you do have the knowledge to securely run a webserver" was not clear in my statement?
XP Pro ships with IIS. Unless they are running XP home
And guess what the large majority of home users are running..
No, you load only new comments. Old ones remain in place.
/. before it loads, but when it works, it works,
That is a possible implementation indeed, insert the new comment somewhere into the DOM.
While this works very well for adding new things (or replacing existing things), it becomes a real pain when the application (either server or client side) has to keep track of what is there.
Also, this concept was there with HTTP and DHTML, so while you are definitely right about this being a potentially smart way to do this, it has nothign to do with AJAX other then that AJAX does not conflict with it, and in fact suggests using such solutions.
If one comment of 2k was added, there was about 1k of content, 1k of HTML overhead which sits inside the JS so isn't downloaded, 1k of xmlhttprequest overhead. So about 2k downloaded. Other comments didn't change, remain untouched.
See above. You are right about the saving this can give, but it is not something that requires AJAX.
700k - 2k = 698k. Profit: bandwidth usage reduced by 99,7%. Considering the server-side throttling (on one hand) and lag for exchange of the AJAX dialog (on the other hand), you get waiting down from about 40s to 2s.
The issue is that AJAX basicly adds an alternative for GET/PUT requests, no more and no less.
You can use that in all kinds of fancy ways, but very few of those ways are unique to AJAX, they just happen to work well with it.
AJAX also makes that your implementation gets a bit cleaner maybe because of not having to figure out a way to preserve a DOM or do requests in the background (both are not very difficult, but they are a bit hacky).
But it sent everything in one batch, using heavily paralell transmissions.
It is either one batch or heavily parallel transmissions...
Regardless, you load everything upfront indeed.
I didn't have to wait for the form to load separately. Before I click and I see the result, it takes at least some 2s, no matter how big is the page. But this is moot, the form being placed there dynamically is just a convenient trick. The idea is that after I add a comment, I don't wait to see it in context with the page reloading from scratch. It gets included at once, and I can go back to reading/writing more without waiting for the updated comments page to reload. 2s instead of 40s.
Yes, that is all nice DHTML, AJAX adds a clean way to do asynchronous requests to it, but there were already ways to do that anyway.
"nice" - needs good design.
"responsive" is the keyword, and it IS the silver bullet here. You wait ONCE. Like with local apps, I start up my favourite GIMP and go read
Ah.. I gues that is why so many operating systems delay loading of libraries untill they are actually used, hell, even do that with memory pages from executables..
I also guess this is why KDE for example loads itself and its whole bunch of applications all at once, you might just need them..
(oh, and Gimp 2 takes all of 11 seconds to load here anyway..)
same here, you need to let the AJAX app to load, go, read some other page in a different tab or have a cup of coffee, but then you go back to the AJAX-enabled page and everything gets very fast and responsive.
Absolutely usefull for quickly looking up information and such.. Oh, I should just keep the page open all day just in case I guess..
No, it doesn't compare to local applications at all. Most local applications here have initial load times in the order of 10-30 secs.
Your workflow isn't continuously interrupted by longish waits. If by "responsive" you mean "loads fast", that's a misunderstanding. Instead of 40 breaks of terribly annoying useless 10s each, you get one of 60s which you just wait through doing something productive (or not) and 39 of nice, friendly 2s.
Well, if that is the one web application you are going to need for the next 30 minutes or so you have a poi
The problem isn't the same. You don't need 2003 server, or even XP Pro to run a web server. You know they do make version of Apache and quite a few other web servers that will run just fine under XP home.
I have used Apache on a variety of Windows versions. It works, tho 'fine' isn't exactly what comes to mind. That said, it is a workable solution in many cases.
But just keep claiming the grandparent wanted folks to all buy 2003 server, because you can't possibly run a web server on XP home...
The parent claimed that IIS was fine for this. I pointed out that running IIS will take buying a new version of WIndows for many people. There are free alternatives.
If someone is clueless enough not to know that you can get a webserver running under XP Home, their chances of doing so securely under *nix are pretty much nill.
Definitely, and what is more, it works the other way around as well, because while the platform can help with security, understanding what you are doing is the first thing required for doing that thing in a secure way (regardless of what 'that thing' is). That was also the point of my original post (not having the typical Windows related problems does not refer to using another platform, but to knowing what you are doing)
This all said, if you are going to use an alternative webserver anyway, and you do have the knowledge to securely run a webserver, you may be better off using a nicely integrated and server oriented system for it, and there are indeed good alternatives to Windows with regards to that.
Ahh yes, because the *only* webservers available for Windows are the ones that come with Windows.
Claim was that IIS on Windows 2003 Server can work fine (I happen to agree with that) and that XP with IIS would do as well.
Alternative (free) webservers? Sure, those exist and are being used. It wasn't the argument being made however, not to mention that imho getting something like Apache to work on Windows is more efford then installing Suse with a webserver for example.
Of the probably 20 people I can think of off hand that are running Windows XP, one is running home. And, before you ask, none of the ones I'm referring to are pirated copies.
Good for them, but it isn't what the typical consumer has. We were talking about the average person running their own webserver for their own data, and those usually run home edition.
For now it is substantially cheaper to use an alternative to IIS when wanting a web server, esp. for the average consumer. Using a nicely integrated package (ie, Suse with apache, but there are quite a few alternatives) provides much if not all of the ease of use, for a better price (ie, free in many cases).
Oh and for that matter, most people do not have a MSDN subscription, and I am pretty sure Microsoft is not going to send free versions of their software to the large majority of their users either, so no, MSDN subscribtions don't work for getting stuff for free for this situation.
Regardless of what you use, you'll need some knowledge about what you are doing, platform nor choice of webserver matter for that (they only matter for what and how much you need to know exactly). Most people who have enough of a clue to run their own webserver at this moment also have enough of a clue to not have most of the issues that the typical Windows user has, regardless of if they are using Windows or not.
In other words, all I was pointing out is that knowledge is what makes the difference here, not so much the platform. Statements like the one about not having the typical windows issues should be read that way and not as 'windows bashing'.
Gee, it looks like he's saying you don't need 2003 Server. Learn to read idiot.
Hmm yes, calling people names is always a good idea when trying to make a point..
Lets ignore it..
GP indeed said:
For those that don't have access to a copy of Windows 2003 Server, Windows XP's IIS Web Server implementation is more than adequate to serve several low traffic sites (including those with dyanamic content)
Lets see how much that helps..
Last time I checked, Windows XP home edition is preloaded on virtually all computers sold to individuals.
Windows XP home edition does not include IIS, it doesn't even include the personal web services from previous versions.
That means that in most cases people will have to pay for XP Professional beforehand or when they encounter needing a web server.
So... it may be somewhat cheaper then Win 2k3 server, but the problem is the same.
Your point was?
Theres a good thing about remote applications
if theres a security bug,
ALL the clients can be fixed in ONE update
There is a bad thing about centralized remote applications
if there is a security bug
ALL clients get compromised at the same time.
Hrm, wtf move to Tiscali? I am not aware of any location within the country where Tiscali has coverage and XS4ALL doesn't.
:)
Oh, and when you had to leave XS4ALL anyway, I'd have gone with Versatel before Tiscali (despite having family working at Tiscali and being able to get a reduced price for my subscription). Versatel has so far served me well (for about 3 years now). Have had 2 connection drops over the last 6 months, and those usually happen during the night. Getting the promissed download speeds (not on adsl2 here btw, only 'regular' adsl, but 12mbit downstream is what they promise and what I am getting most of the time)..
I have yet to get any complaints from them about data limits (while 100GB+/week is no exception for me at all)
Yeah, their helpdesk sucks (tho got a lot better over the last year) and they are not the cheapest,
At any rate, they make for an alltogether better choice imho.
Oh... this was about AJAX... sorry for the off-topic rant
1. When was the last time Google stopped working?
A couple of hours ago when my internet connection was down (ok, not their fault, but it doesn't matter for me, I cannot use the g* apps, and that is what counts)
2. When was the last time Windows stopped working?
In my case, about a decade ago, I replaced it with something that was more of my liking, that I got a say in (ok, a small one, but still), and that turns out to be utterly reliable and stable for local applications.
The simple fact is that a single centrally administered server farm is vastly easier to administrate
Slightly easier then fixed function distributed environments. The trick is stopping users from changing the system, a central server may help in that but is nowhere a requirement.
A central service of some sort is a requirement for centralized administration of course.
At any rate, it quickly becomes a lot more difficulkt to administer when having to cater to the requirements of different users, and not having 'company policy' dictating what a user is supposed to do.
-- and will be vastly more reliable
It will only be as reliable as the conenction between it and the intended users, lots of things outside your control on the way that can go wrong.
If you perform 10 write operations a second (Firefox cache?) you will murder it really fast.
Definitely.
I'm currently building a bootable FreeBSD flash drive image for similar purposes. Having some experience with flash made for ensuring the Cache dir points to a memory file system.
Yeah, cache is gone after reboot, but that is not as big an issue as the speed at which you waste flash memory otherwise.
Of course one could also only cache to memory... but somehow I have bad experience with doing that (mostly firefox starting to eat memory like nothing)
the question is if you really are better at securing data than a company or not. It might be true for a small minority but the population at large might very well have a lot better security by using these online services.
You don't have to be for 2 reasons:
1. you are a less easy to find target
2. there is a lot less to get from hacking your system then hacking a system that contains all your data besides that of thousands of others.
No, that is not security through obscurity, it is looking at the risks and noticing they are a bit lower, hence you will have an easier time compensating for them with your security measures.
Yes. Amount of repeatable content, basic pain of CGI/PHP. Take a GOOD application of AJAX: DeviantArt comments. Each art piece posted to the site may be commented by the users. Sometimes there's 200-300 comments, discussion occurs etc. Indentation provides some threading, there are some basic forum-like features etc. You probably want to cut on page switching when you dig into the comments. You set it to display 100 per page. Including links, avatars, smileys and some more such crap plus bandwidth throttling from the server if you're not a subscriber, it starts getting really lengthy to load the comments page. But it's still better than loading 20 separate pages 10 comments each. Then you want to participate in the discussion...
Lets analyse this a little bit deeper..
Art piece gets posted, now lets assume this is a big picture and give it 2mb.
comments get added, lets assume people really have something to say, and write 300 comments that average 2k bytes each.
Now, the page also contains some other stuff like menus, logo etc, lets say this is another 50k for the html and 200k for pictures (logo etc).
So, the first time you look at this, regardless of it using AJAX or some PHP based solution or the like, you need to download some 2850k.
Next refresh this will be 650k in case of a traditional (CGI/PHP whatever solution), everything else will c ome from cache, and that is if the comments changed at all. It will be 600k in case of AJAX when the comments changed (the comments have to be loaded, the page layout etc not). In either case it will be a few bytes if the comments didn't change (and the server is smart enough to realize).
So, total gain for this example would be a bit less then 50k. Not really impressive, and not the huge kind of difference you seem to believe is possible.
Non-AJAX, non-javascript, pure CGI way: Click "Reply" in given thread. Wait for the "reply" form for given thread to load. Type your answer. Click "preview". Wait for preview to load. Click "send". Wait for the whole discussion page, 100 posts, plus your answer to load.
Yes, and the fact that AJAX hides this a little bit betetr in no way changes that the same underlying things are happening, taking approx as much time and bandwidth.
AJAX way: Click "Reply". Immediately a textarea appears, where your post would go, with "send", "preview" and "cancel" buttons. You type in your reply and press "preview". The border around the textarea blinks for a moment and then turns into your post's final look, in context of the 100 other posts, differing only by "preview" replaced by "edit" (which with no further delay gets you back to editing your post). You click "send" and the border blinks a moment more. Buttons vanish, your post is placed in the context amongst all the rest, where it was supposed to be. No single other post gets reloaded.
Ah yes... and luckily the JS code AND layout data for doing this didn't have to be sent to your computer beforehand, regardless of if you were going to reply..
If a website presents you with a form, it did have to send you that form first, REGARDLESS of AJAX. The form did not just magically appear in the memory of your computer.
AJAX has some very nice things, but it is not the silver bullet you seem to think it is when it comes to nice responsive web applications.
The way these services and others make place irrelevant is a good thing, people have tried many different solutions from PDAs and laptops to remote control software to achieve the same goal.
But this solution has also it's own problem, like all the earlier attempts, in this case the problem is a lot about security and secrecy.
To me the two biggest issues (besides security and privacy) seem to be:
1. need network access to get to my data (compare to a PDA which works perfectly fine without it, tho your data may not always be uptodate)
2. due to needing network access, the cost in battery use for accessing information is a lot higher.
Those two things make this a nice but not very workable idea for many of the situations I encounter, and yeah, I do have internet access from almost everywhere, can link my laptop to it from almost everywhere etc, regardless, there are often places where I need access to my data and where there is NO network coverage (read, NONE of the 6 GSM/GPRS networks that I could possibly use is reachable there).
Hence, this is for me an unworkable solution, it is simply a lot worse then using a PDA and syncing it wirelessly.
until you threw in a random anti-windows statement.
Lets see.. the grant parent said that those people don't suffer from the typical windows related problems,. This can of course be because of running Linux, it could also be because of having a clue about running a server on Windows.
Wether that is a statement about the users or the product is not clear, so I'd say you are reading more into the statement then was being said,
I'd like to ask you however how likely you think it is that many home users are going to buy Windows 2003 Server for having a tiny private website with their own information... Ever looked at the price for that? It is pretty reasonable to assume that most people will not use it for this.