"The law doesn't apply to me! Now hold on while I figure out my net aggregate income level minus personal expenses for March 2008 so I can enter it on my Form 3442."
The differences between Windows 7 and Windows Vista are greater than the difference between OS X 10.4 and 10.6. Seriously, if all you do is listen to Slashdot chatter, you should directly compare across XP, Vista and Windows 7 with OS X 10.2-10.6, and you'd find that Microsoft (while it doesn't have as regular a release schedule) is very comparable.
The main draw of Windows is compatibility with all the apps out there. Netbooks aren't going to be running those apps, so why bother with Windows?
You're making bad assumptions. I wrote a document this morning on the train in Word 2007 running in Windows 7 on my MSI Wind netbook. The fact that I was using real Word with real Word features was super-helpful in getting my work done.
I don't know why you think people won't run existing apps on netbooks. That's exactly the appeal, to me: same apps, small form-factor.
You mean kind of like AppleScript in Mac OS 7? It wasn't a CLI scripting feature though-- classic Mac had no CLI, it was a GUI scripting feature, universal across all applications. Being GUI, it actually made it easier to use. You could record macros, for example, to make a script, or you could simply type one in and run it.
It was a great powerful system, but not enough people made use of it to make it worth the effort to maintain, so it's basically shrunk to nothing (if it even still exists) in OS X.
Seriously? My Windows experience was "plug in USB capture card, open Windows Media Center." That was the entirety of it.
My old Linux box, I spent ages trying to get my Hauppauge WinTV 150 to work with the "ivtv" driver (which at the time was the only driver that *claimed* to work with it.) It never worked; the best I ever got was a tiny postage-stamp sized video window with no audio.
After consulting with numerous Linux experts, the best they could come up with is that maybe Hauppauge changed the chipset in the card from the one in the card "ivtv" was designed to run with. Whatever; the point is, it didn't work. (The same card worked perfectly in Windows with IIRC EyeTV, natch.)
I had the same thought. Does he also pick and choose which Windows security fixes to install?
Windows makes it blatantly obvious which updates are: * Required (security fixes) * Recommended (driver updates) * Optional (things like Vista's Ultimate Extras)
He was just presented with a huge-ass list of confusing stuff with no clue which was important and which wasn't. Maybe he should have updated, but the designer of that dialog should have done a better job making it, if his goal was to get people to update. (Evidently it doesn't work as-is.)
GUIs have such a thing as "labels" and "text fields." You do realize this... right? Somehow, Google manages to use a GUI *and* have a way of typing in text! AMAZING!
Vista is organized that way. (Mostly; it uses the term "Music" instead of "Media." Then again, Joe Six-pack is more likely to understand "Music" than "Media," since media has dozens of definitions.)
Assuming you're using the following definition of "prompts": Computer Science. A symbol that appears on a monitor to indicate that the computer is ready to receive input...
The only thing "prompts" give you is knowledge that you're allowed to input a command. With a GUI, if you can't input a command "that little icon" is grayed-out, and so that isn't an issue. I have no idea why you would say this is some great advancement of the CLI unless you've actually never used a GUI.
Of course you don't. You don't "need" it in Windows, either. But having it is a lot more convenient for people like the submitter than not having it, and if Linux wants to get more copies in the enterprise, they should figure out some standardized way of emulating it.
Applying windows technology in this case is like calling a spreadsheet a database.
From a practical perspective, a spreadsheet is a database. Just not a relational one.
Well 17 comments in one thread desperately trying to excuse the Vista UAC whitelist exploit here two days ago show your not above a bit of unapologetic hand waving yourself (when it suits).
You obviously didn't read my UAC comments.
I don't necessarily think UAC is the best solution to Microsoft's security problems, but when I consider the problem I can't think of anything better. Those 17 posts were all in a thread to get suggestions about what Microsoft should have done instead of UAC, and most of them are pointing out to people ways in which their plans were flawed or simply unrealistic.
So yes, I'm excusing it, because I think UAC was the best solution to a difficult problem. It's not like I'm randomly just supporting everything Microsoft does because I love them and hug them and keep a poster of Ballmer over my bedstand, it's because, in this case, they made the right decision.
I suppose the real problem is that this is too subtle for you, actually having independent thought on Slashdot. Here, let me try it the Slashdot way: "HUR LINUX RULES M$ SUX GOAT CHEESE!"
Not to mention you must have missed the 10 comments in this thread currently at +5 explaining exactly how to stop people running unwanted programs in Linux.
Currently now. Not at the time I posted that. At the time I posted it, the thread was nothing but dodging the question.
The fact that it's a dumb idea has *nothing* to do with answering the question. He works for a large corporation, of COURSE it's a dumb idea... 80% of the stuff their IT does is probably a dumb idea (at least in the Slashdot view.)
When someone focuses on that instead of answering the question, they're giving me strong vibes that they're avoiding the question because they don't have an answer, it can't be done. If it could easily be done, why would they go on about how you "shouldn't" need to do it? If it's something that can be easily done in Linux, why were there 60 posts on this forum about avoiding the issue and zero that provide the answer? (At the time I posted that.)
Well, for one thing, you can restrict applications from saving specific settings. For (an arbitrary) example, say that you want to make sure that everybody who uses IMs keeps smilies turned off. You can find the registry key that controls this setting in every IM client people run at your business and lock down its value so it can't be changed by users.
Now, in Linux, using those tools, you might be able to lock down the entire file that stores the preferences, but you can't lock a single feature without locking all the others. The only alternative would be to hire a programmer to alter a specific IM program to your needs, then deploy it, but that is orders of magnitude more work and you restrict the IM clients your users can use.
Disclaimer: I've never used puppet. I'm basing this partially on the knowledge that there's no Registry-like system in Linux that would make this example possible.
Have you ever actually sat down and (tried to) *use* Lotus Notes? It's like pulling fingernails, except you somehow end up with even more blood on the floor. Unspeakably crappy software.
Oooh, this is by far my favorite, that's why I saved it for last. If you're to the point where you're seriously considering disabling solitaire, this reveals a number of things about the organization:
1) The I.T. staff and/or managers are unapologetic control freaks and perhaps even proud of it. 2) You don't trust your employees to actually be productive on their own. 3) Your hiring standards are probably pretty low. 4) You have unrealistic expectations of employee efficiency. 5) Morale must really be in the toilet already. 6) It's solitaire for fuck's sake, possibly the most boring game ever devised. If your employees are playing it instead of whatever they should be doing, that means they have no motivation to work, which means management should be the ones to get their lunchtime games taken away, not the employees.
And yet, all this is just a distraction from the fact that this type of task is MUCH EASIER to do in a Windows environment than a Linux environment... I thought Linux was the "more powerful" OS?
(Actually, the "doing this is a bad idea" is a pretty common response from Linux fans when confronted by something their OS doesn't do well, or at all. It's really quite annoying, because it distracts from the real issue: Linux isn't as powerful as Windows, despite the open source philosophy.)
It has nothing to do with "working correctly", it has to do with enforcing policies.
Frankly, I love articles like this, because maybe some Linux programmers will get it into their skull *why* so many businesses are using Windows... if you replicate Windows features, you'll get into businesses running Windows. And then we're all better off.
1. A TV with HDMI and Scart input, and a computer with VGA and DVI output.
Spend $5 (or whatever currency you use in a place that has "Scart" inputs) on a DVI->HDMI adapter. One probably came with your computer/video card, if you dig in the box.
2. I don't feel like trailing cables across my entire house, and how would the remote control work?
Well, the idea is that you buy a *second* computer to run your TV. Computers are cheap, most likely half the price you spent on your sound system. Most HP models come with the remote control, it works with RF. If you spend more on a remote, you'll get better features (like control of the mouse pointer), but the one that HP packs in works fine with something like Media Center.
(Note: I'm not really recommending buying a HP computer; they load a lot of crap on them. Just saying that remotes are basically pack-in items at this point.)
3. Reliable OSes have a tendency not to work with your hardware and software.
I have no idea what you're talking about. I run Media Center on Windows Vista on my TV, and it's never crashed. (Although, my USB HDTV antenna thing has crapped out a couple times-- I think it overheats.) With the reputation Vista has on this site, you'd think it would crash if you looked at it funny, yet it's perfectly reliable.
Maybe you just have a shitty computer?
4. An average one.
And it craps out often enough for this to be a concern? Seriously? You do not have an average Internet connection if you're even slightly concerned about this. At this moment, my (cheap) DSL has had a solid 2 years of non-interrupted service. Even with the record snows and nasty weather we had in Washington State this winter, it didn't go out for a single hour.
5. I don't have one in the living room.
Yeah, I typoed. I meant to say the one you'd already mentioned in the back room.
1. There's no connector in common between my computer and the TV. 2. My computer is upstairs in a back room, the TV is in the living room. 3. I don't want my TV viewing to be interrupted by error messages, screensavers, energy-saving features turning the video card off, programs crashing etc. 4. I don't want to miss out on watching a live show because the Internet connection is down. 5. What if someone wants to use the computer whilst someone else watches TV? 6. Problems with remote controls etc.
1. What kind of crappy-ass TV/Computer do you have? 2. And...? 3. Then turn off the screensaver and use a reliable OS. 4. What kind of crappy-ass Internet connection do you have? 5. They use the one in your living room that you already mentioned. 6. Like...?
Face it, you're just making excuses at this point.
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I don't know if that was intentionally or unintentionally hilarious, but kudos man.
"The law doesn't apply to me! Now hold on while I figure out my net aggregate income level minus personal expenses for March 2008 so I can enter it on my Form 3442."
After playing BF2142 last night and getting killed like 46 times by some asshole with a knife and stealth pack-- I'm all for this legislation!
The differences between Windows 7 and Windows Vista are greater than the difference between OS X 10.4 and 10.6. Seriously, if all you do is listen to Slashdot chatter, you should directly compare across XP, Vista and Windows 7 with OS X 10.2-10.6, and you'd find that Microsoft (while it doesn't have as regular a release schedule) is very comparable.
The main draw of Windows is compatibility with all the apps out there. Netbooks aren't going to be running those apps, so why bother with Windows?
You're making bad assumptions. I wrote a document this morning on the train in Word 2007 running in Windows 7 on my MSI Wind netbook. The fact that I was using real Word with real Word features was super-helpful in getting my work done.
I don't know why you think people won't run existing apps on netbooks. That's exactly the appeal, to me: same apps, small form-factor.
You mean kind of like AppleScript in Mac OS 7? It wasn't a CLI scripting feature though-- classic Mac had no CLI, it was a GUI scripting feature, universal across all applications. Being GUI, it actually made it easier to use. You could record macros, for example, to make a script, or you could simply type one in and run it.
It was a great powerful system, but not enough people made use of it to make it worth the effort to maintain, so it's basically shrunk to nothing (if it even still exists) in OS X.
Been there, done that.
Seriously? My Windows experience was "plug in USB capture card, open Windows Media Center." That was the entirety of it.
My old Linux box, I spent ages trying to get my Hauppauge WinTV 150 to work with the "ivtv" driver (which at the time was the only driver that *claimed* to work with it.) It never worked; the best I ever got was a tiny postage-stamp sized video window with no audio.
After consulting with numerous Linux experts, the best they could come up with is that maybe Hauppauge changed the chipset in the card from the one in the card "ivtv" was designed to run with. Whatever; the point is, it didn't work. (The same card worked perfectly in Windows with IIRC EyeTV, natch.)
I had the same thought. Does he also pick and choose which Windows security fixes to install?
Windows makes it blatantly obvious which updates are:
* Required (security fixes)
* Recommended (driver updates)
* Optional (things like Vista's Ultimate Extras)
He was just presented with a huge-ass list of confusing stuff with no clue which was important and which wasn't. Maybe he should have updated, but the designer of that dialog should have done a better job making it, if his goal was to get people to update. (Evidently it doesn't work as-is.)
GUIs have such a thing as "labels" and "text fields." You do realize this... right? Somehow, Google manages to use a GUI *and* have a way of typing in text! AMAZING!
Vista is organized that way. (Mostly; it uses the term "Music" instead of "Media." Then again, Joe Six-pack is more likely to understand "Music" than "Media," since media has dozens of definitions.)
Assuming you're using the following definition of "prompts": Computer Science. A symbol that appears on a monitor to indicate that the computer is ready to receive input...
The only thing "prompts" give you is knowledge that you're allowed to input a command. With a GUI, if you can't input a command "that little icon" is grayed-out, and so that isn't an issue. I have no idea why you would say this is some great advancement of the CLI unless you've actually never used a GUI.
http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1020981&cid=25669351
I noticed you ignored the Zune example.
It is completely irrelevant to the conversation. Yes, Microsoft sometimes has problems with the same thing, and that has *what* to do with this topic?
http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1020981&cid=25669351
In *nix, you don't *need* Group Policy.
Of course you don't. You don't "need" it in Windows, either. But having it is a lot more convenient for people like the submitter than not having it, and if Linux wants to get more copies in the enterprise, they should figure out some standardized way of emulating it.
Applying windows technology in this case is like calling a spreadsheet a database.
From a practical perspective, a spreadsheet is a database. Just not a relational one.
Well 17 comments in one thread desperately trying to excuse the Vista UAC whitelist exploit here two days ago show your not above a bit of unapologetic hand waving yourself (when it suits).
You obviously didn't read my UAC comments.
I don't necessarily think UAC is the best solution to Microsoft's security problems, but when I consider the problem I can't think of anything better. Those 17 posts were all in a thread to get suggestions about what Microsoft should have done instead of UAC, and most of them are pointing out to people ways in which their plans were flawed or simply unrealistic.
So yes, I'm excusing it, because I think UAC was the best solution to a difficult problem. It's not like I'm randomly just supporting everything Microsoft does because I love them and hug them and keep a poster of Ballmer over my bedstand, it's because, in this case, they made the right decision.
I suppose the real problem is that this is too subtle for you, actually having independent thought on Slashdot. Here, let me try it the Slashdot way: "HUR LINUX RULES M$ SUX GOAT CHEESE!"
Not to mention you must have missed the 10 comments in this thread currently at +5 explaining exactly how to stop people running unwanted programs in Linux.
Currently now. Not at the time I posted that. At the time I posted it, the thread was nothing but dodging the question.
The fact that it's a dumb idea has *nothing* to do with answering the question. He works for a large corporation, of COURSE it's a dumb idea... 80% of the stuff their IT does is probably a dumb idea (at least in the Slashdot view.)
When someone focuses on that instead of answering the question, they're giving me strong vibes that they're avoiding the question because they don't have an answer, it can't be done. If it could easily be done, why would they go on about how you "shouldn't" need to do it? If it's something that can be easily done in Linux, why were there 60 posts on this forum about avoiding the issue and zero that provide the answer? (At the time I posted that.)
Well, for one thing, you can restrict applications from saving specific settings. For (an arbitrary) example, say that you want to make sure that everybody who uses IMs keeps smilies turned off. You can find the registry key that controls this setting in every IM client people run at your business and lock down its value so it can't be changed by users.
Now, in Linux, using those tools, you might be able to lock down the entire file that stores the preferences, but you can't lock a single feature without locking all the others. The only alternative would be to hire a programmer to alter a specific IM program to your needs, then deploy it, but that is orders of magnitude more work and you restrict the IM clients your users can use.
Disclaimer: I've never used puppet. I'm basing this partially on the knowledge that there's no Registry-like system in Linux that would make this example possible.
Have you ever actually sat down and (tried to) *use* Lotus Notes? It's like pulling fingernails, except you somehow end up with even more blood on the floor. Unspeakably crappy software.
If you don't even KNOW what group policy is, why are you posting here? Get a knowledge injection of how NT and AD works, then come back.
No, not everything group policy does can be done in Linux.
Oooh, this is by far my favorite, that's why I saved it for last. If you're to the point where you're seriously considering disabling solitaire, this reveals a number of things about the organization:
1) The I.T. staff and/or managers are unapologetic control freaks and perhaps even proud of it.
2) You don't trust your employees to actually be productive on their own.
3) Your hiring standards are probably pretty low.
4) You have unrealistic expectations of employee efficiency.
5) Morale must really be in the toilet already.
6) It's solitaire for fuck's sake, possibly the most boring game ever devised. If your employees are playing it instead of whatever they should be doing, that means they have no motivation to work, which means management should be the ones to get their lunchtime games taken away, not the employees.
And yet, all this is just a distraction from the fact that this type of task is MUCH EASIER to do in a Windows environment than a Linux environment... I thought Linux was the "more powerful" OS?
(Actually, the "doing this is a bad idea" is a pretty common response from Linux fans when confronted by something their OS doesn't do well, or at all. It's really quite annoying, because it distracts from the real issue: Linux isn't as powerful as Windows, despite the open source philosophy.)
It has nothing to do with "working correctly", it has to do with enforcing policies.
Frankly, I love articles like this, because maybe some Linux programmers will get it into their skull *why* so many businesses are using Windows... if you replicate Windows features, you'll get into businesses running Windows. And then we're all better off.
1. A TV with HDMI and Scart input, and a computer with VGA and DVI output.
Spend $5 (or whatever currency you use in a place that has "Scart" inputs) on a DVI->HDMI adapter. One probably came with your computer/video card, if you dig in the box.
2. I don't feel like trailing cables across my entire house, and how would the remote control work?
Well, the idea is that you buy a *second* computer to run your TV. Computers are cheap, most likely half the price you spent on your sound system. Most HP models come with the remote control, it works with RF. If you spend more on a remote, you'll get better features (like control of the mouse pointer), but the one that HP packs in works fine with something like Media Center.
(Note: I'm not really recommending buying a HP computer; they load a lot of crap on them. Just saying that remotes are basically pack-in items at this point.)
3. Reliable OSes have a tendency not to work with your hardware and software.
I have no idea what you're talking about. I run Media Center on Windows Vista on my TV, and it's never crashed. (Although, my USB HDTV antenna thing has crapped out a couple times-- I think it overheats.) With the reputation Vista has on this site, you'd think it would crash if you looked at it funny, yet it's perfectly reliable.
Maybe you just have a shitty computer?
4. An average one.
And it craps out often enough for this to be a concern? Seriously? You do not have an average Internet connection if you're even slightly concerned about this. At this moment, my (cheap) DSL has had a solid 2 years of non-interrupted service. Even with the record snows and nasty weather we had in Washington State this winter, it didn't go out for a single hour.
5. I don't have one in the living room.
Yeah, I typoed. I meant to say the one you'd already mentioned in the back room.
Flamebait, but I'd respect your opinion a lot more if you were less ignorant of how Windows actually works.
There's lots of other ways. Putting out a tool to verify that things run as limited user. Warning them in Visual Studio.
That tool already exists, but Microsoft can't force people to run it.
1. There's no connector in common between my computer and the TV.
2. My computer is upstairs in a back room, the TV is in the living room.
3. I don't want my TV viewing to be interrupted by error messages, screensavers, energy-saving features turning the video card off, programs crashing etc.
4. I don't want to miss out on watching a live show because the Internet connection is down.
5. What if someone wants to use the computer whilst someone else watches TV?
6. Problems with remote controls etc.
1. What kind of crappy-ass TV/Computer do you have?
2. And...?
3. Then turn off the screensaver and use a reliable OS.
4. What kind of crappy-ass Internet connection do you have?
5. They use the one in your living room that you already mentioned.
6. Like...?
Face it, you're just making excuses at this point.
You're describing UAC. When a program decides it wants to violate normal security principles, UAC pops up and asks you to either let it, or deny it.
Are you just saying that UAC should always deny by default?