"... nor would it disallow anyone from modifying the original BSD code to mimic the closed-source project's new functionality "
How do you make that leap? As I mention above, neither BSD or public domain prevents the commercial vendor (or an individual for that matter) from copyrighting their deltas. Were you to do something similar, it is an open question whether they would have a court case against you. Worse, of course, if they got a software patent.
"It's simple and boring, and doesn't really make good cocktail party conversation. Maybe that's why it gets overlooked..."
Uh, yeah, I am SO sure that is why IBM, HP, Oracle, etc, etc choose to participate in GPL projects, even though BSD has been around so much longer. Couldn't have anything to do with the guarantee of a level playing field. I think you nailed it. It must be the cocktail party conversation value......
As has been pointed out numerous times, public domain is no "protection". BSD is no "protection". Either allows someone else to claim ownership of code changes based on your work. Maybe you are a week away from similar - even better extensions, but if they beat you to copyright, you are hosed.
And since when did "emacs getting "ripped off" by other people" have anything to do with him getting started in open source? Seems the published account that has been around all these years somehow missed that....
Of course, if you would look at the history, revisions and the very fact that _you_ choose the version that _you_ feel best fits the philosophy, it is hard to argue about trust.
It just isn't _necessary_ to take advantage of the result.
Redhat and Ubuntu will update your system to the latest version (think Vista in MS land) for the same price of the SP3 update to a legacy OS."
OK, that wasn't mine.
"How about "direct from the vendor, in a supported and trusted form"."
Given that definition, then I believe you are correct about RedHat. Note, that is not true of Novel/SLES/SLED.
The whole thing seems a bit silly. If you like the way RedHat software is laid out, or have an application which tells you you need it (lets not go down the road at how absurd that is) but don't want to pay for RHN access, there are multiple alternatives based on the same source code. Yeah open source.
The bottom line is that if someone is stuck in the MS mentality and doesn't take a moment to understand what open source means - in terms of the options for support that just doesn't exist under any closed source business model, then you will miss out.
And I have been involved in too many face to face instances of folks just flat saying 'that can't be true' because they are just unaware of what open source means.
Now that said, the comment you were referring to, I thought was actually a leering reference to the fact that you could buy an 'update' to Vista that gets you to XP. Remember, it is also true in the open source world, that if you want a nice shiny install medium you don't have to build, or often printed manuals - you can pay something around the Vista upgrade price for a boxed set.
I still recommend OpenSuSE boxes to folks for that nice documentation. 8-)
"Tight control over computer resources by IT staff is certainly best practices for a secure network."
Having worked in at least one place that had policies set by network admins that defined my assigned tasks in support of muliti-million dollar inhouse software projects as 'subject to dismissal', I sorta feel tight control should only be given to folks with a clue. It was also funny that turning on X protocol on the network was subject to dismissal but the company just invested about $30 million in machinery whose admin tools were X based.
So, the concept that someone in an IT department might be doing something really stupid for the circumstances really has nothing to do with whether it is their responsibility - it has to do with whether it is stupid or not.
"Depending on the support contract, RedHat costs you anything from US$500 to US$thousands per year for updates."
Nope. Sorry. Simply not true. Updates are available regardless. Get over it. The whole model is not comparable to MS. Though millions of dollars change hands because lots of folks, including IT folks, just don't get it. Geez, I wonder if it is worth looking up the thread from maybe 4 years ago with IBMers who thought their support contract was a user license and they had to have it in place before they could use SLES.
But we in the community appreciate you dumping the money out there, even if it is on totally bogus assumptions.
"Ya, NO linux based company would EVER do something like that. "
Not only they wouldn't - they couldn't. They cannot revoke your user license (MS can) and you have the source code - so whether you get updates from redhat, Joe's code and update emporium, or you inhouse IT staff, they can't try to force you to change to their newer product by restricting the availability of updates. They don't own the code.
If you think Linux comes from a vendor, you just don't get it.
This pretty much cuts to the chase. For all the hype about the PowerPC based machines - I will repeat my dismay that you can't do a comparison of them against other machines at spec.org. If they were really all that hot, my guess would be that you would see those results splashed all over their website as well as spec. And of course, the first real comparison that I can recall seeing was pointed out here on Friday - and viola - the hardware didn't exactly blow away the competion and the OS was downright panned for server use.
There was a time when a Mac was a good PC and a superb investment for a business. That pretty much ended with the release of OS/2 v2. For those who don't remember - even ex Apple folks were writing reviews about it 'being the desktop we should have delivered'. And it was fully pre-emptive multi-tasking.
Apple was a good investment because it was significantly better price/performance than what the inventor of their interface (Xerox) came out with.
Ever since the OS/2 days, Apple just hasn't offered the price/performance. They have survived based on 1) a bit of cult following and 2) Some historically high quality apps that still run best on that platform (and have been slow to porting to modern OSes).
High time to let Mr. Jobs just sit back and count his money - why waste the effort trying to convince us of _relevance_ at this point?
"Debian unstable is pretty effin' stable. The distro had nothing to do with his problems,"
Fair enough. 'unstable' is relative, I guess. Compared to 'gold' XP, a lot of 'alpha' code can look good. It wasn't clear that your googling was to get around problems with the 'unstable' distribution or, as you now seem to imply, simply with learning how to use apache and MySQL.
Nor do you make it clear, even here, whether the Debian on the servers is the 'unstable' so you had the knowledge that at this point, that 'unstable' version is really about ready to go 'stable'. It just seems odd you would bother to say Debian 'unstable' at one point and just Debian later.
Oh please. I have done support at IBM on site. Have you? I have trained secretaries terrifed to touch a computer. For that matter, I have trained astonauts (though not about computers). Try using a little logic with factual imputs rather than vacuous logic. Having supported end users and developers for 20+ years I can tell you that making Linux work in an organization is no big deal, if the folks want to make it work. If they don't, they will find all sorts of bogus excuses for making it hard. And I have personally had far too many instances of having rabid MS folks being force to try something like OS/2 back in the pre Linux days come back to me, apologize and thank me... and far too many instances of various folks from rabid MS to the merely curious come back with all their examples of what they can do with Linux, or that their wife won't let them boot the machine back into Windows, etc. to believe Linux hasn't been 'ready' for the desktop or lots of typical hone uses for years now. Now, there are lots of exmaples of folks who just make up any excuse to not want to use it. Kind of like what you are offering here...
"... the problem is that security fixes are included in "support" with the Linux distros - which you pay annually for.... At least with Microsoft, I can get the security fixes without paying for an enterprise support agreement."
I am afraid this is just as wrong as claiming there are licensing costs. There are NO COSTS with updates either. Of course, you can CHOOSE to pay for certain methodologies, like a particular RedHat tool, but hey, you can just CHOOSE to write them a large check for nothing too. Or, you can use one of the free tools. Or choose a distribution where the default tool is free. Like everything but RedHat. Choose individual patches if you want to, set up completely automated patching if that is what you want. For any distribution. Or choose to pay someone else to do it all for you. Choice. Not lock in.
And with MS, it is just a factor of what you have paid for, because unless you are violating law, you have paid for a license - and today, you get security updates with that purchase. Sort of. Now, the latest MS information I have to get third hand these days since I refuse to run it, but the descriptions of the latest requirements of the access you have to give MS to your computer in return for being able to run their updates on the XP distributions sure sounds like you are paying them as you go with data from your computer, and having to allow them to do what they wish.
Now, finally, to raise the awfull spector of 'compiling source' - well, I only do that when I want to for fun or learning. Nothing about managing a standard distro desktop for a business requires any compilation. Just because you are wrong about all these things is no reason to make up stuff.
You seriously need a reality check here. With every statement you make about what you have to pay for being wrong, how can you even begin to compare real TCO?
Bah indeed. For all the reasons one might reasonably not want to mess with Linux, from just not liking the looks of it to having to have some particular hardware that isn't supported well, completely ficticious arguments about how much it costs are just bogus. And posting comments like that to a community that knows better....
You might want to go and get a CD of all the Linux Journal issues and plod thru all the success stories.
It can be done correctly and it can be done wrong. Done correctly, it simply saves large companies millions of dollars.
I watched a 12K seat organization that was rather disjoint, with virtually no firewalls in place and something like 20 different ISP points spread across that many locations around the country running AIX but still essentially never compromised move to a 'unified' Windows platform with $100K Cisco security solutions and controlled net access taken down more than once. Yeah, that really saved some money. The fact is, if an organization can't do Linux correctly, do you really think they can do Windows correctly?(OK, that is almost an oxymoron)
In particular, I dealt with this organization on and off for more years than I wish to recall, but there was one instance of 'Windows works, no matter how many times it breaks' that speaks volumes. The email adminstrator was so rabid Windows it would be funny if it weren't so sad. For one product, the solution was to use an OS/2 server (to replace about 6 DOS 'servers'). Of course, it wasn't MS anymore, so it was nothing but problems. I built and configured the server and delivered it to this customer. Three seperate times I was called in because the OS/2 server was 'broken'. Each of those times, a power crash in the server room ended up with 1) the routers not having the stupid manual static routes being restored or 2) a Novel server had it's software so scrambled that it had to be reloaded. Never a problem with the OS/2 server. We finally said I wasn't going over there to trouble shoot for them any more unless they added some money to the contract for me supporting them onsite. To this day, this person will wail about all the problems with the OS/2 server.
Swing the clock forward, and the new 'enterprise' mail solution runs on either Windows or UNIX, but this person insists on Windows servers. Claims no problems with them. In a test lab, we find wierd stuff happening - and this person has the solution! Oh yeah, these files get regularly corrupeted and all you have to do is delete them so the server can recreate and populate them when it comes up again. You see, since it is running on Windows, that is not a problem, it is a feature.
It gets worse. This software is famous for buggy releases, and at least there was an attempt to chose more 'stable' versions - but the choice was made only for the Windows platform. Even though numerically, most of the users had UNIX servers across the organization, releases with, for example, memory leaks in UNIX were distributed (for conformity, everyone had to have the same version number throughout the organization). So, the UNIX administrators had to set up cron jobs to bound the mail app (not the server) at midnight.
But of course, the Windows servers were touted as having 'no problems', and the orgainzation eventually settled on a 'cost savings' of uniformly moving to Windows servers. At quite a few $ of buying Windows servers to replace the UNIX servers.
Oh yeah, folks are just so happy with Windows because 'it works' that companies should waste millions of dollars on it. I'm so convinced.
When we were getting a group to try and 'standardise' on a Linux distribution there were the two typical RedHat and SuSE camps. The heavy hitter in the Web development and support group was a RedHat guy for years. Had all the things he needed to build and add to RedHat professional down pat. Once I finally got him to try SuSE professional, he was bowled over at having most of the stuff he added or reconfigured on RedHat already set up an working. Even found some new things he hadn't known of before and began to swear by.
I guess one of the real problems with having hundreds of distros to choose from is finding the one that works best for you. Some problem, eh?
But please, choosing an 'unstable' distribution and complaining about things not working? I mean, that is not tech talk, that is plain english.
"there are still a lot of legal questions surrounding Linux"
There are no legal questions surrounding Linux. There is a great deal of FUD however, and I have certainly seen bogus 'legal concerns' used to try and block internal work at IBM I have been involved with.
The facts are that Microsoft has been convicted of code theft and patent infringement and no Linux distributor or customer has. Period.
"Linux distros now cost MORE than Windows to license"
There are NO license costs for any Linux distro. Zero. None. They don't exist. The only sosts are support costs. Ask the folks at Earnie Ball what they pay for support. Funny, a small non-tech company that makes guitar strings can out tech-support IBM?
This is another classic in-house funny money game. One of the best examples I saw of this was a GIS group that was crying to have Suns for their work, but the in-house cost listed for Suns were higher than any premium one-off contact I had ever seen, so Windows 'looked' cheaper. What those poor folks had to go thru to try and get their work done. I personally went thru hell and high water trying to tell some folks who finally got permission to buy a Linux server NOT to get the RedHat Enterprise product for the two machines because of the absurd price. Even after buying it, the support stunk and it just didn't work. We wound up putting SuSE professional on them, and found this was what most of the Linux underground at the organization was doing anyway. $75 for those who wanted the printed manuals, and no cost to put on any number of machines you want from the media in the box BECAUSE THERE ARE NO LICENSE COSTS. It's GPL folks, and can be redistributed as you wish. Now, finally, you can download the DVD from the net for it as well, in addition to the long standing FTP server install.
Now, Microsoft does cost, per seat, and I have seen their 'enterprise support' at a 12K seat level and it is laughable. It makes the early 90's AIX support look charitable.
When we were teamed with IBM in the early nineties, the IBM lead on my task finally set up a system. He had enough clout that he would get the latest desktop box when one would come out. He told the internal support guys to 'leave it at the door' and call me to set it up. Dual boot AIX 1.3 and OS/2. Couple of hundred floppies worth. 8-( Of course, it got a bit easier when I discovered an internal AIX install server. 8-)
Generally speaking, the internal support groups I have dealt with at 3 major corporations and a couple of Federal agencies could, as the saying goes, foul up a nocturnal emission.
Come to think of it, that is how I got involved in IT in the first place, as folks who actually wanted their machines to work found out they did so after I went and worked on them. But I digress.
The upshot is that for any management directive to do anything on the desktop, it will take 10 times longer than it should until that same management understands that hiring the cheapest bodies for support isn't always the cheapest solution.
Remember - this is just speaking in generalities, and I know there are some good end user support folks. But staying in the generalities, the cream does tend to rise to the top, and they end up doing server support. 8-)
Speaking of which, I don't recall any real issues with the internal directive to dump Windows servers in favor Linux servers. ??
Back to ancient history. When the division I was dealing with (I don't think it was IBM wide) dictated they were going with RS6K servers and OS/2 on the PC, my lead was almost in tears laughing at the squal that went up among his fellow employees. There was a bit of a stunned response when he piped up from the back of the room 'what is the big deal, I've had that for over a year now'. Lots of folks trouping thru his office for demos. Even got to the point the support group was talking about having me trouble shoot their network installation of OS/2. Pity about that time the project went in the dumpster.
Nor did it help when he set up a seperate contract for me when the entire 50 or so employees at my company and hundreds of IBMers were layed off/ moved when the project went down. Seemed all of a sudden I was a security risk to have on site even though there were corporate NDAs in place for years and I had on site access on that other project for years.
Yeah, dealing with internal bureaucratic momentum can be a real nightmare.
It has been a long time since I have done this personally, but just get wine set up - I know on SuSE 8 and above it was pretty much taken care of by the base installation. Then you might look at
Ooops. Sorry, I actually even went back to re-read the post without noticing the name.
This 'clarification' definately has a more reasonable tone. I too, agree that "in NO case should something be withheld from the public simply because it reveals someone's misconduct."
Indeed, is that not the purpose of a court case, in general? And the discovery process in particular? To discover misconduct?
Now, to compare to your OP:
"You have a right to privacy if you are at home in your living room, not if you make a conscious decision to go into a public arena such as a courtroom."
First, how could you even begin to apply this ot the to the party dragged into court? Maybe you could make some claims about the party _bringing_ the suit. Something along the lines of a 'he who is without sin' sort of argument. However, even that is a bit weak. There are appropriate rules of discovery that limit the process only to relevant areas. Are either plaintif or defendant's living rooms now open to the public just because they are in court? Particularly for a civil - not criminal - case?
It would seem you don't really want to over do this, but I hope you see how your OP prompted my reply.
Perhaps more important is the background behind this action. Now this is covered quite well on Groklaw, but a small digest from memory:
1) SCOG reads aloud from a priviledged document in open court. IBM objects. Judge agrees. SCOG continues. Judge stops them again. Judge seals transcript of session.
2) MO writes a story citing information that seems to be only known by litigants and judge. Story also claims statements made in open court that don't jive with either of two courtroom observers share with the world thru Groklaw. MO is called to task for this on Groklaw.
3) MO writes a story that claims SCOG is about to charge IBM with fraud in relation to this sealed information SCOG was trying to get out - improperly, according to the judge. No sign of any filing or anything relating to fraud as yet.
4) MO writes a story implying IBM has been overly zealous in sealing documents and that she is filing the request for unsealing.
PJ did a nice little quick analysis of how many documents were requested sealed by the litigants. Almost even, with SCOG having one more than IBM. Hmmm. Then the claim that it seems more than one of the IBM seals was at the request of SCOG.
Now, I would be the first to say, all other things equal, that it doesn't hurt to double check that only those documents are sealed that are done so with a good reason. If for no other reason, as one who wishes OSS to continue to flourish, I am interested that this case is handled properly.
On the other hand, to base the request on what would seem to be a bogus, biased reason diminishes the request.
There are tons of filings and depositions that are not sealed (ie, it is not as if the whole case is trying to be hidden). There are obvious reasons why there has to be some sealing done.
Frankly, this just smacks of another delaying move on the part of an SCOG advocate. IMHO IANAL, etc.
Slashdot Mirror
About 2 and a half Slashdots.
Are we speaking quantity or quality here?
"... nor would it disallow anyone from modifying the original BSD code to mimic the closed-source project's new functionality "
How do you make that leap? As I mention above, neither BSD or public domain prevents the commercial vendor (or an individual for that matter) from copyrighting their deltas. Were you to do something similar, it is an open question whether they would have a court case against you. Worse, of course, if they got a software patent.
"It's simple and boring, and doesn't really make good cocktail party conversation. Maybe that's why it gets overlooked..."
Uh, yeah, I am SO sure that is why IBM, HP, Oracle, etc, etc choose to participate in GPL projects, even though BSD has been around so much longer. Couldn't have anything to do with the guarantee of a level playing field. I think you nailed it. It must be the cocktail party conversation value ......
Damn, I see bold, itallic, where is irony?
"The best protection is public domain."
As has been pointed out numerous times, public domain is no "protection". BSD is no "protection". Either allows someone else to claim ownership of code changes based on your work. Maybe you are a week away from similar - even better extensions, but if they beat you to copyright, you are hosed.
And since when did "emacs getting "ripped off" by other people" have anything to do with him getting started in open source? Seems the published account that has been around all these years somehow missed that ....
"... but who trust Stallman?"
Who cares. Read what it says.
Of course, if you would look at the history, revisions and the very fact that _you_ choose the version that _you_ feel best fits the philosophy, it is hard to argue about trust.
It just isn't _necessary_ to take advantage of the result.
"The GPL isn't open source compatible with most other open source licenses, either."
In that sense, no open source license is compatible with any other - since each is trying to do something _slightly_ different.
If they all said the same thing, they wouldn't be different licenses would they?
Yet, there is quite a range of "differences". Some licenses are quite similar and some wildly different.
Your statement is without useful meaning.
"This is the comment I was replying to:
Redhat and Ubuntu will update your system to the latest version (think Vista in MS land) for the same price of the SP3 update to a legacy OS."
OK, that wasn't mine.
"How about "direct from the vendor, in a supported and trusted form"."
Given that definition, then I believe you are correct about RedHat. Note, that is not true of Novel/SLES/SLED.
The whole thing seems a bit silly. If you like the way RedHat software is laid out, or have an application which tells you you need it (lets not go down the road at how absurd that is) but don't want to pay for RHN access, there are multiple alternatives based on the same source code. Yeah open source.
The bottom line is that if someone is stuck in the MS mentality and doesn't take a moment to understand what open source means - in terms of the options for support that just doesn't exist under any closed source business model, then you will miss out.
And I have been involved in too many face to face instances of folks just flat saying 'that can't be true' because they are just unaware of what open source means.
Now that said, the comment you were referring to, I thought was actually a leering reference to the fact that you could buy an 'update' to Vista that gets you to XP. Remember, it is also true in the open source world, that if you want a nice shiny install medium you don't have to build, or often printed manuals - you can pay something around the Vista upgrade price for a boxed set.
I still recommend OpenSuSE boxes to folks for that nice documentation. 8-)
"No, they're not. At least not in any comparable form."
I guess you have to define 'comparable form' since the entire OS and updates are available as white box ....
The updates are available. You can pay for quicker access and to use certain tools, but it is open source software, after all.
"Tight control over computer resources by IT staff is certainly best practices for a secure network."
Having worked in at least one place that had policies set by network admins that defined my assigned tasks in support of muliti-million dollar inhouse software projects as 'subject to dismissal', I sorta feel tight control should only be given to folks with a clue. It was also funny that turning on X protocol on the network was subject to dismissal but the company just invested about $30 million in machinery whose admin tools were X based.
So, the concept that someone in an IT department might be doing something really stupid for the circumstances really has nothing to do with whether it is their responsibility - it has to do with whether it is stupid or not.
"Depending on the support contract, RedHat costs you anything from US$500 to US$thousands per year for updates."
Nope. Sorry. Simply not true. Updates are available regardless. Get over it. The whole model is not comparable to MS. Though millions of dollars change hands because lots of folks, including IT folks, just don't get it. Geez, I wonder if it is worth looking up the thread from maybe 4 years ago with IBMers who thought their support contract was a user license and they had to have it in place before they could use SLES.
But we in the community appreciate you dumping the money out there, even if it is on totally bogus assumptions.
"Ya, NO linux based company would EVER do something like that. "
Not only they wouldn't - they couldn't. They cannot revoke your user license (MS can) and you have the source code - so whether you get updates from redhat, Joe's code and update emporium, or you inhouse IT staff, they can't try to force you to change to their newer product by restricting the availability of updates. They don't own the code.
If you think Linux comes from a vendor, you just don't get it.
Old data. Given the ports and forks since it was vetted, seems time is ripe for another round of court time!
8-)/2
"not one of the major companies using it"
Got any examples of BSD licensed projects where these 'major corporations' contribute?
"Why pay 3,000 for a machine that is a LIE?!?!"
This pretty much cuts to the chase. For all the hype about the PowerPC based machines - I will repeat my dismay that you can't do a comparison of them against other machines at spec.org. If they were really all that hot, my guess would be that you would see those results splashed all over their website as well as spec. And of course, the first real comparison that I can recall seeing was pointed out here on Friday - and viola - the hardware didn't exactly blow away the competion and the OS was downright panned for server use.
There was a time when a Mac was a good PC and a superb investment for a business. That pretty much ended with the release of OS/2 v2. For those who don't remember - even ex Apple folks were writing reviews about it 'being the desktop we should have delivered'. And it was fully pre-emptive multi-tasking.
Apple was a good investment because it was significantly better price/performance than what the inventor of their interface (Xerox) came out with.
Ever since the OS/2 days, Apple just hasn't offered the price/performance. They have survived based on 1) a bit of cult following and 2) Some historically high quality apps that still run best on that platform (and have been slow to porting to modern OSes).
High time to let Mr. Jobs just sit back and count his money - why waste the effort trying to convince us of _relevance_ at this point?
Well, my copy is at home - but from the title of the article I googled on "ncs brainlab" and came up with:
Brainlab including references to NCSHow about just interviewing folks in the corporations from whome MS has been convicted of stealing IP from?
No need to 'think about it' much, just ask those who know!
"might it be cheaper"
No. If you are staying legal, you pay a per user fee for the rdesktop sessions. Wine is free.
I may be the preferred solution in many cases, but not because it is 'cheaper'. At least in initial costs.
"Debian unstable is pretty effin' stable. The distro had nothing to do with his problems,"
Fair enough. 'unstable' is relative, I guess. Compared to 'gold' XP, a lot of 'alpha' code can look good. It wasn't clear that your googling was to get around problems with the 'unstable' distribution or, as you now seem to imply, simply with learning how to use apache and MySQL.
Nor do you make it clear, even here, whether the Debian on the servers is the 'unstable' so you had the knowledge that at this point, that 'unstable' version is really about ready to go 'stable'. It just seems odd you would bother to say Debian 'unstable' at one point and just Debian later.
Cheers.
"Use some logic here."
... and far too many instances of various folks from rabid MS to the merely curious come back with all their examples of what they can do with Linux, or that their wife won't let them boot the machine back into Windows, etc. to believe Linux hasn't been 'ready' for the desktop or lots of typical hone uses for years now. Now, there are lots of exmaples of folks who just make up any excuse to not want to use it. Kind of like what you are offering here ...
... At least with Microsoft, I can get the security fixes without paying for an enterprise support agreement."
....
Oh please. I have done support at IBM on site. Have you? I have trained secretaries terrifed to touch a computer. For that matter, I have trained astonauts (though not about computers). Try using a little logic with factual imputs rather than vacuous logic. Having supported end users and developers for 20+ years I can tell you that making Linux work in an organization is no big deal, if the folks want to make it work. If they don't, they will find all sorts of bogus excuses for making it hard. And I have personally had far too many instances of having rabid MS folks being force to try something like OS/2 back in the pre Linux days come back to me, apologize and thank me
"... the problem is that security fixes are included in "support" with the Linux distros - which you pay annually for.
I am afraid this is just as wrong as claiming there are licensing costs. There are NO COSTS with updates either. Of course, you can CHOOSE to pay for certain methodologies, like a particular RedHat tool, but hey, you can just CHOOSE to write them a large check for nothing too. Or, you can use one of the free tools. Or choose a distribution where the default tool is free. Like everything but RedHat. Choose individual patches if you want to, set up completely automated patching if that is what you want. For any distribution. Or choose to pay someone else to do it all for you. Choice. Not lock in.
And with MS, it is just a factor of what you have paid for, because unless you are violating law, you have paid for a license - and today, you get security updates with that purchase. Sort of. Now, the latest MS information I have to get third hand these days since I refuse to run it, but the descriptions of the latest requirements of the access you have to give MS to your computer in return for being able to run their updates on the XP distributions sure sounds like you are paying them as you go with data from your computer, and having to allow them to do what they wish.
Now, finally, to raise the awfull spector of 'compiling source' - well, I only do that when I want to for fun or learning. Nothing about managing a standard distro desktop for a business requires any compilation. Just because you are wrong about all these things is no reason to make up stuff.
You seriously need a reality check here. With every statement you make about what you have to pay for being wrong, how can you even begin to compare real TCO?
Bah indeed. For all the reasons one might reasonably not want to mess with Linux, from just not liking the looks of it to having to have some particular hardware that isn't supported well, completely ficticious arguments about how much it costs are just bogus. And posting comments like that to a community that knows better
"THOUSANDS of employees"
100K +, last I saw.
You might want to go and get a CD of all the Linux Journal issues and plod thru all the success stories.
It can be done correctly and it can be done wrong. Done correctly, it simply saves large companies millions of dollars.
I watched a 12K seat organization that was rather disjoint, with virtually no firewalls in place and something like 20 different ISP points spread across that many locations around the country running AIX but still essentially never compromised move to a 'unified' Windows platform with $100K Cisco security solutions and controlled net access taken down more than once. Yeah, that really saved some money. The fact is, if an organization can't do Linux correctly, do you really think they can do Windows correctly?(OK, that is almost an oxymoron)
In particular, I dealt with this organization on and off for more years than I wish to recall, but there was one instance of 'Windows works, no matter how many times it breaks' that speaks volumes. The email adminstrator was so rabid Windows it would be funny if it weren't so sad. For one product, the solution was to use an OS/2 server (to replace about 6 DOS 'servers'). Of course, it wasn't MS anymore, so it was nothing but problems. I built and configured the server and delivered it to this customer. Three seperate times I was called in because the OS/2 server was 'broken'. Each of those times, a power crash in the server room ended up with 1) the routers not having the stupid manual static routes being restored or 2) a Novel server had it's software so scrambled that it had to be reloaded. Never a problem with the OS/2 server. We finally said I wasn't going over there to trouble shoot for them any more unless they added some money to the contract for me supporting them onsite. To this day, this person will wail about all the problems with the OS/2 server.
Swing the clock forward, and the new 'enterprise' mail solution runs on either Windows or UNIX, but this person insists on Windows servers. Claims no problems with them. In a test lab, we find wierd stuff happening - and this person has the solution! Oh yeah, these files get regularly corrupeted and all you have to do is delete them so the server can recreate and populate them when it comes up again. You see, since it is running on Windows, that is not a problem, it is a feature.
It gets worse. This software is famous for buggy releases, and at least there was an attempt to chose more 'stable' versions - but the choice was made only for the Windows platform. Even though numerically, most of the users had UNIX servers across the organization, releases with, for example, memory leaks in UNIX were distributed (for conformity, everyone had to have the same version number throughout the organization). So, the UNIX administrators had to set up cron jobs to bound the mail app (not the server) at midnight.
But of course, the Windows servers were touted as having 'no problems', and the orgainzation eventually settled on a 'cost savings' of uniformly moving to Windows servers. At quite a few $ of buying Windows servers to replace the UNIX servers.
Oh yeah, folks are just so happy with Windows because 'it works' that companies should waste millions of dollars on it. I'm so convinced.
When we were getting a group to try and 'standardise' on a Linux distribution there were the two typical RedHat and SuSE camps. The heavy hitter in the Web development and support group was a RedHat guy for years. Had all the things he needed to build and add to RedHat professional down pat. Once I finally got him to try SuSE professional, he was bowled over at having most of the stuff he added or reconfigured on RedHat already set up an working. Even found some new things he hadn't known of before and began to swear by.
I guess one of the real problems with having hundreds of distros to choose from is finding the one that works best for you. Some problem, eh?
But please, choosing an 'unstable' distribution and complaining about things not working? I mean, that is not tech talk, that is plain english.
"there are still a lot of legal questions surrounding Linux"
There are no legal questions surrounding Linux. There is a great deal of FUD however, and I have certainly seen bogus 'legal concerns' used to try and block internal work at IBM I have been involved with.
The facts are that Microsoft has been convicted of code theft and patent infringement and no Linux distributor or customer has. Period.
"Linux distros now cost MORE than Windows to license"
There are NO license costs for any Linux distro. Zero. None. They don't exist. The only sosts are support costs. Ask the folks at Earnie Ball what they pay for support. Funny, a small non-tech company that makes guitar strings can out tech-support IBM?
This is another classic in-house funny money game. One of the best examples I saw of this was a GIS group that was crying to have Suns for their work, but the in-house cost listed for Suns were higher than any premium one-off contact I had ever seen, so Windows 'looked' cheaper. What those poor folks had to go thru to try and get their work done. I personally went thru hell and high water trying to tell some folks who finally got permission to buy a Linux server NOT to get the RedHat Enterprise product for the two machines because of the absurd price. Even after buying it, the support stunk and it just didn't work. We wound up putting SuSE professional on them, and found this was what most of the Linux underground at the organization was doing anyway. $75 for those who wanted the printed manuals, and no cost to put on any number of machines you want from the media in the box BECAUSE THERE ARE NO LICENSE COSTS. It's GPL folks, and can be redistributed as you wish. Now, finally, you can download the DVD from the net for it as well, in addition to the long standing FTP server install.
Now, Microsoft does cost, per seat, and I have seen their 'enterprise support' at a 12K seat level and it is laughable. It makes the early 90's AIX support look charitable.
Bah, this makes me want to spit.
He he. Old, if not fond memories.
When we were teamed with IBM in the early nineties, the IBM lead on my task finally set up a system. He had enough clout that he would get the latest desktop box when one would come out. He told the internal support guys to 'leave it at the door' and call me to set it up. Dual boot AIX 1.3 and OS/2. Couple of hundred floppies worth. 8-( Of course, it got a bit easier when I discovered an internal AIX install server. 8-)
Generally speaking, the internal support groups I have dealt with at 3 major corporations and a couple of Federal agencies could, as the saying goes, foul up a nocturnal emission.
Come to think of it, that is how I got involved in IT in the first place, as folks who actually wanted their machines to work found out they did so after I went and worked on them. But I digress.
The upshot is that for any management directive to do anything on the desktop, it will take 10 times longer than it should until that same management understands that hiring the cheapest bodies for support isn't always the cheapest solution.
Remember - this is just speaking in generalities, and I know there are some good end user support folks. But staying in the generalities, the cream does tend to rise to the top, and they end up doing server support. 8-)
Speaking of which, I don't recall any real issues with the internal directive to dump Windows servers in favor Linux servers. ??
Back to ancient history. When the division I was dealing with (I don't think it was IBM wide) dictated they were going with RS6K servers and OS/2 on the PC, my lead was almost in tears laughing at the squal that went up among his fellow employees. There was a bit of a stunned response when he piped up from the back of the room 'what is the big deal, I've had that for over a year now'. Lots of folks trouping thru his office for demos. Even got to the point the support group was talking about having me trouble shoot their network installation of OS/2. Pity about that time the project went in the dumpster.
Nor did it help when he set up a seperate contract for me when the entire 50 or so employees at my company and hundreds of IBMers were layed off/ moved when the project went down. Seemed all of a sudden I was a security risk to have on site even though there were corporate NDAs in place for years and I had on site access on that other project for years.
Yeah, dealing with internal bureaucratic momentum can be a real nightmare.
It has been a long time since I have done this personally, but just get wine set up - I know on SuSE 8 and above it was pretty much taken care of by the base installation. Then you might look at
l ?o id=2:25424
http://www.developer.ibm.com/tech/faq/individua
for some specific tweaks.
Ooops. Sorry, I actually even went back to re-read the post without noticing the name.
This 'clarification' definately has a more reasonable tone. I too, agree that "in NO case should something be withheld from the public simply because it reveals someone's misconduct."
Indeed, is that not the purpose of a court case, in general? And the discovery process in particular? To discover misconduct?
Now, to compare to your OP:
"You have a right to privacy if you are at home in your living room, not if you make a conscious decision to go into a public arena such as a courtroom."
First, how could you even begin to apply this ot the to the party dragged into court? Maybe you could make some claims about the party _bringing_ the suit. Something along the lines of a 'he who is without sin' sort of argument. However, even that is a bit weak. There are appropriate rules of discovery that limit the process only to relevant areas. Are either plaintif or defendant's living rooms now open to the public just because they are in court? Particularly for a civil - not criminal - case?
It would seem you don't really want to over do this, but I hope you see how your OP prompted my reply.
Perhaps more important is the background behind this action. Now this is covered quite well on Groklaw, but a small digest from memory:
1) SCOG reads aloud from a priviledged document in open court. IBM objects. Judge agrees. SCOG continues. Judge stops them again. Judge seals transcript of session.
2) MO writes a story citing information that seems to be only known by litigants and judge. Story also claims statements made in open court that don't jive with either of two courtroom observers share with the world thru Groklaw. MO is called to task for this on Groklaw.
3) MO writes a story that claims SCOG is about to charge IBM with fraud in relation to this sealed information SCOG was trying to get out - improperly, according to the judge. No sign of any filing or anything relating to fraud as yet.
4) MO writes a story implying IBM has been overly zealous in sealing documents and that she is filing the request for unsealing.
PJ did a nice little quick analysis of how many documents were requested sealed by the litigants. Almost even, with SCOG having one more than IBM. Hmmm. Then the claim that it seems more than one of the IBM seals was at the request of SCOG.
Now, I would be the first to say, all other things equal, that it doesn't hurt to double check that only those documents are sealed that are done so with a good reason. If for no other reason, as one who wishes OSS to continue to flourish, I am interested that this case is handled properly.
On the other hand, to base the request on what would seem to be a bogus, biased reason diminishes the request.
There are tons of filings and depositions that are not sealed (ie, it is not as if the whole case is trying to be hidden). There are obvious reasons why there has to be some sealing done.
Frankly, this just smacks of another delaying move on the part of an SCOG advocate. IMHO IANAL, etc.
Cheers.
No argument thete. In fact the judge has already OKed the process in the case whereby the parties stipulate what should be sealed.
Please note the post I was responding to - where 'no privacy' was being advocated.
Cheers.