Microsoft Sends Linux Survey 1051
GnrlFajita writes "According to Newsforge, Microsoft is sending Linux users a survey asking why they use Linux, and what can be done to make Windows better. The article suggests taking the survey (or surveys, one for business users and one for home users), then sharing your answers with others in the community." Newsforge and Slashdot are both part of OSDN.
How to make Windows Better... (Score:4, Interesting)
Free as in Beer (Score:2, Interesting)
Linux should send a Microsoft survey (Score:1, Interesting)
My answers (Score:5, Interesting)
I use linux because
1. I expect to own software I pay for
2. I expect software I pay for to work as advertised
3. I expect not to be foreced into downloading other components I don't want of said software to keep my machine secure. (IE media player has to be downloaded to make explorer secure)
4. I expect to not be forced to give up all and any reasonable legal rights when I open the package.
5. I do not want to deal with software that guarantees via the liscence agreeement that the publisher can remotely look at my computer at will.
As soon as the law makers get their opposable digit out of their anal orpheus, and restore a modicum of protection to consumers I don't have any faith that any of the points that I have outlined above will be addressed. Lets face it, you pay for the software, break open the box, and you have no legal expectation that the software will work, in any way shape or form.
AngryPeopleRule [angrypeoplerule.com]
Re:Odd, why surveymonkey? (Score:5, Interesting)
M$ and number of CPUs! (Score:2, Interesting)
please select from:
1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8
anyone saw a mobo with 5 CPU slots?
You must enable cookies (Score:4, Interesting)
I found this odd. (Score:3, Interesting)
This makes me wonder about the integrity of their claims, because it's hard to imagine that anyone at Microsoft believes that the best way to reach their customers is via Linux Users Groups. So, if that's not really their intention, what ARE they trying to do?
One of the guys in our local user's group, Anthony Earl, suggested that we give them some ideas that will slow them down, like strict security on the desktop. James DeWitt suggested "Clippy, only MUCH BIGGER!" Sean
Re:Open the source code. (Score:0, Interesting)
Microsoft (and others) publish their interfaces to their COM objects. Why exactly do I need the source? (Keeping in mind that even if I fixed the OS on my machine, getting the patch to all machines, like my customers', would be a bear.)
Re:Not to be pro-microsoft, but... (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:this makes MS looks stupid (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Microsoft Sends Linux Survey (Score:5, Interesting)
When entering processor speed, 1.1Ghz to 2Ghz is two options.
The whole thing just feels somewhat unprofessional and hacked together. The options just don't gel.
Given the amount of time and effort real marketing men put into surveys (and I've been on the wrong end of far too many), it just doesn't feel like something microsoft would put out.
Plus, they would normally use microsoft.com to do the survey; http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/commun
fo
I smell hoax.
Re:Not to be pro-microsoft, but... (Score:5, Interesting)
Its not that microsoft doesnt know their weakness or why people go after linux. They know the reasons behind all these. And people have on so many occasions shown them what is the problem with MS softwares and the business practice followd by MS and why they dont like it. But the response from MS have been less than encouraging at best and bullying at worst. This survey is also, I suspect not something to know the "heart and mind" of linux users and tailor their software according to that. But I would suspect that they will use the informations from such linux studies to look in to ways to CIRCUMVENT these problems in a clever way. MS cannot and will not change their busniess tactics easily. Their entire business culture is build upon un-ethical and shoddy practices. To expect any revolutionary or fundamental change from them is naive at best. They have never even admitted their wrong doing any time despite being found guilty on so many occasions. That itself shows what sort of a mindset the people at the holm of Microsoft does have.
Re:doh! (Score:3, Interesting)
Anyway, if this is truly from Microsoft, it is an extremely interesting development.
Re:this makes MS looks stupid (Score:5, Interesting)
If MS shows respect and tolerance to the open-source community, it can win over many Linux fans. Too often, they've spread FUD about Linux, and they write off Linux users any chance they can. If they show signs of friendship, and even show interoperability with open-source products, that would lessen many people's hatred of Microsoft.
please microsoft... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:How to make Windows Better... (Score:4, Interesting)
The bottom line for me is exactly what you stated. They have a legal statement at the beginning that says they can make use of your answers however they want. Frankly, my comments about both Windows and Linux are professional opinions. People pay me for those. Microsoft explicitly stated that they weren't paying.
Also, when it comes to a decision about what OS to put on my own hardware, they must discuss it on my terms, not theirs. Here's what Windows would have to have to compete with Linux:
There is nothing to trust about Microsoft.
Since they monitor slashdot (Score:2, Interesting)
All of my gripes are related to server use. You want too talk about desktop use, send the survey to OSX users.
Microsoft list reasons for Linux (Score:5, Interesting)
This is golden. Right off the survey, written by microsoft employee(s), suggested reasons you might not like M$!
Fill it out randomly (seriously) (Score:2, Interesting)
If this survey were actually going to be used to improve Microsoft's _products_, then giving them helpful advice might be fine. But Linux is just one small factor in their long-term product strategy, and your answers aren't going to turn that very large ship around. What this _will_ be used for is marketing. You might well see Linux-user-targeted marketing materials come out of this that mention the top three reasons people have given for being dissatisfied with MSFT products, even if the product itself hasn't been changed at all.
If you don't want their marketing efforts to combat Linux more effectively, then add some noise to their data. Make random choices from the multiple-choice sections, and write something inoffensive but inaccurate in the essay portions.
Re:this makes MS looks stupid (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes, these are bigger problems that Windows doesn't have. In Windows, installation is easy, package management is (now) painless, and there are no major missing features or bugs that can't be solved with either some GUI workaround (as opposed to Linux's often "edit some obscure config file") or a quaint third party program.
Despite these problems though if you can muddle through them Linux is still better than Windows. It's filesystems are vastly better written, the kernel is ten times more stable, and best of all it's the most configurable operating system in existence. You can make Linux look any way you want.
I'm nowhere close to being a guru on Linux. I still can't even make it through a Debian installation (partly because my internet connection sucks). I despise portage and apt-get. RPMs, IMO, would be far better if they didn't suck with their can't solve their own dependencies problem. And worst of all, I have 10 years of experience with Windows. But despite all of this against Linux, I still prefer it over Windows.
So, as you can see my from my post, it's easy to both critisize and love linux at the same time, and that is exactly what I believe Microsoft is doing.
Trouble with Firebird (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Not to be pro-microsoft, but... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Microsoft Sends Linux Survey (Score:1, Interesting)
while your asumption might be true, it may in fact be a hoax, but i have seen surves and microsoft.com and webpages that are just as shaky. for a while there, if youe screen resolution wasn't a certain size thier little javascript floater things in the webpages would overlap the text of the articles and they weren't veiwable, even in IE. they fixed that since then but,...
Open letter to Microsoft (Score:0, Interesting)
Back in the 80's you made the decision that you would gain more marketshare by turning the PC hardware market into a commodity market. That is fine. That is a business decision. The open source community is now turning your cash cow market niches into commodities. Furthermore, we are setting the price per unit at as close to zero as we can manage. I don't want to hear a peep out of you about it being unfair. And if you make any claims about your products or open source that aren't true or that are in any way misleading, expect us to challenge them, loudly and in open forums that are not sympathetic to you.
If you want to sell to us, you will have to recognize one thing: the customer is always right. That applies to every customer, all the time. If you disagree, it isn't our fault. You have repeatedly told the open source community that we are wrong. We told you we don't need you. Retract every lie you have ever told to us or about us. Repudiate them publicly. Then, refund all of the money we've had to pay for hardware that came with Microsoft products we never wanted. After you are done with that, we might be willing to fill out a survey explaining why we don't ever want to use your products and why we look forward to your eventual bankruptcy.
Sincerely,
One happy Linux user.
If I cared to answer them... (Score:4, Interesting)
#2 Webserver - I've been known to run a website off my cable modem, and while Windows could handle this, the 10 concurrent connections thing is ridiculous. They can't figure out how to license it to make money, without making is useless to me, that's their problem. And don't even get me started on IIS/PWS exploits.
#3 Command line - It's taken a few years for me to become competent with it... but I never want to go back to the control panel bullshit. I don't why they're so scared of it, short of being ashamed of dos.
#4 Developer tools - Let's face it, I'll never be a kernel hacker. The little coding I do, does suck, and that will never change. But I can, with so many languages, I couldn't even list them all. And for free. Compare this to $600 for a non-crippled Visual Studio. C'mon... something is wrong here. No provision is made for the hobbyist developer. Trying to wring money out of someone that is constantly broke like I am, or maybe even a teenager, just so they can write little doodad programs, it stinks. Hell, maybe even a crippled VS would do, if it were free. Even command line tools. The only guy I know who can honestly be called a guru, says that he might never have tried linux, if there had been some sort of hobbyist Visual C in win3.11/95...
#5 You never innovate. Ever. Just steal ideas... I can think of 20 things off the top of my head that windows could improve, if it cared to. For brevity's sake, here's one example: Why can I only copy/paste one thing at a time? I'd much rather have a queue-based copy, so that it doesn't overwrite the last clipboard object. To select which to paste, hold the control, and keep tapping V until my correct paste appears. This is so simple, so obvious, that a loser like me sees it. Why can't the geniuses at M$? And don't even start with the little graphical widget in Office, not only is it Office specific, but it's the wrong idea. Duh.
Survey taylored with Slashdotters in mind :) (Score:2, Interesting)
The satisfaction of not giving Microsoft more money.
I don't trust Microsoft.
I don't want to use proprietary software.
I don't want to use commercial software.
I was almost taking the survey seriously until I saw those options.
Re:Who Sent Out This Survey??? (Score:1, Interesting)
the best reply to this has been: (Score:5, Interesting)
The best reply to this has been one that Jonathan Hutchins posted to our KCLUG mailing list:
Re:Why help microsoft at all? (Score:4, Interesting)
I use Linux because you've never listened to me. (Score:5, Interesting)
At any rate, if they truly want to know why I don't like Windows and why I as a sysadmin would refuse to run it on any of our servers, here it is (again):
I'm not going to submit it to their damn survey. I'd rather do it this way. It's called an open letter. But then I guess they just don't like *anything* that's open.
Re:How to make Windows Better... (Score:5, Interesting)
I took the survey on my windows xp notebook, answered truthfully, and when I clicked "done", IE crashed, and closed all IE windows instantly. No error messages, nothing, just desktop.
I am not sure if this is Microsoft saying "screw you then, go ahead and migrate" or if this is yet more evidence as to WHY I am migrating to begin with.
Re:How to make Windows Better... (Score:2, Interesting)
Linux users wont fill it out, so why bother? (Score:2, Interesting)
I see lots of people posting their comments here; why not just fill out the survey? Are you afraid that MS might take your ideas and *gasp* build their OS better and more secure, adding competition to the market which benefits everyone?
I'd like to see all you armchair referees tell MS what you really think. MS is literally "asking for it", so tell them their OS sucks and why Linux is better. Isn't this what you always wanted to do?
Re:How to make Windows Better... (Score:5, Interesting)
- Clear, documented interactions between components
- Error messages that can be traced back to the faulting component, rather than just to the error reporter. (Microsoft crash error messages have become progressively less useful. Windows NT blue screens, and Win95/98 application crash errors were actually useful. Windows XP blue screens, and application crash messages are useless.)
- Documentation of all registry settings, regardless of if they should be modified manually or not. Most Linux apps have all the configuration settings documented in the appropriate man pages, or when that fails, there's the source code.
These are the three things that get in my way more often than not when trying to troubleshoot a problem. The answer to format, and reinstall is rarely, if ever, acceptable.All Seeing Eye survey (Score:3, Interesting)
How to improve Windows:
Improve the company that makes Windows: Were we to develop a multimedia product for Linux, we could be far more certain that our Linux vendor would not eventually take over the whole market pie (like a Commie Dictator) by obscuring the API to Linux and using other draconian tactics.
You have embittered the very people who once rallied to your banner and helped you build a once great product. We don't fear Open Source for any reason; We fear Microsoft.
How to improve Linux:
Take over 99.9% of the consumer, embedded, laptop, desktop and server markets -- faster than it has been. Put the Destroyer of free and open computing markets out of business. BTW, this survey feels like being watched by an All Seeing Eye...
[end]
(Just felt good to get 5+ years of bitterness off my chest.)
SCO would LOVE this data (Score:5, Interesting)
Nobody's going to tell SCO directly that they are strapped for cash (can't afford licenses or lawyers) so they have a couple thousand linux boxen instead. So MS puts out this 'improve windows' survey to do that job. Then they 'publish' the results to 'select partners' , SCO being one of them.
Then SCO knows who will be a pushover for setting precedent. Maybe that or get the 'proof' that IBM is able to refute accepted by another judge in another venue.
In other words, don't fill out this survey unless you've got a few hundred million dollars laying around and the will to spend it on lawyers.
Re:How to make Windows Better... (Score:5, Interesting)
No, GPL is a great license. It's the only way you can get major corporate investment in a Free Software project.
Look at big companies like IBM and SGI, or small ones like Red Hat. Why do they spend their own R&D dollars improving Linux, and then releasing the source code publicly? Why didn't they do the same thing with a BSD Unix?
It's because no rational company will willingly release code another company can close on them. With BSD licenses, corporations might use parts of Free Software projects in their work, but would only give out binaries.
But the GPL license gives them dual motivators: an obligation to release new code as payment for using old, and an assurance that code they do give out won't be turned against them by a competitor.
Re:How to make Windows Better... (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm not one who feels that apps should use wine rather than be converted to a native implementation, but there are alot of apps which neither have source code available nor a company still around and/or supporting them on the platform they were written for, let alone porting them to linux!
I mean after all, what is this survey for if it's not to convince microsoft to open it's protocols so that it's easier to make replacement apps and replace windows in every aspect of computing?
Re:Actually, the only way... (Score:1, Interesting)
They would shake their heads, chuckle, and say "So I guess they really are just a bunch of tinfoil-clad malcontents. To hell with them." Then, they'd get back to work and, within the hour, make more money than you ever will.
VBA (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:How to make Windows Better... (Score:2, Interesting)
I took that one further. I pointed out that no program should be allowed to change the registry settings for any other program. That makes it much harder for malware to hijack your startpage or for a trojan to change another program's settings to call the trojan.
Developers, Developers, Developers... (Score:5, Interesting)
But, then... it wouldn't be "Microsoft" would it? If Microsoft does these things... will Microsoft keep "Microsoft-like" control over the software market?
People are lazy. If you could do everything you do now on Linux without having to learn Linux
I doubt it. But, I think that it's still early enough for Microsoft to do a complete 180 and hold it's market share virtually indefinately. Try this on for size: GNUM, GNUM is Not Unix by Microsoft. I'm sure they'll call it something different.
Mutually exclusive... (Score:4, Interesting)
10. Rank the importance of server operating attributes to your organization. (1 indicates a preference for low product cost and more administive and end-user time. 5 indicates a high up-front product cost but less user effort)
What gives? I already use mutiple servers that are FREE: E-Smith [e-smith.org] AND Easy to set up. It takes, honestly, 15 minutes to set up (Includes formatting drives), and 15 minutes to install filters if it will be used as a web proxy. Then I leave it set for 6 to 8 months. It doesn;t get any freer withless effort.
Yes, you can have it both ways.
Microsoft Survey (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:How to make Windows Better... (Score:2, Interesting)
Funny, I listed that as the thing they _should_ do. Hell, I don't use Windows - what do I care about the sheep that do?
What I do care about are the morons who are too inept to update their computers. The morons who are still forwarding about viruses and who are still vulnerable to Code Red. Its those types of users that make me wish Microsoft thought a little less of its users.
What region are you from? (Score:1, Interesting)
9. What region are you from?
USA/Canada
Africa
Asia
Europe
Middle East
South America
Carribean
Mexico/Central America
Australia is sort of Asia, but not really. How am I meant to answer this survey if they don't even put an Oceania region to choose from.
I smell a rat (Score:2, Interesting)
low price and greater complexity vs little easy setup and administration with high price
easy setup & lousy administration vs difficult setup and great administration
since both seem to imply that you can only get one or the other. I don't feel the questions really describes the current situation with Windows vs. Linux in more than a very superficial way. Also I take isssue with the comparison being against 2003 which relatively few people have any experience with yet.
The alternatives for desktop linux use look random as well.
My guess is that the survey is either a hoax or some department outsourced a request for information in linux vs windows.
A Joke (Score:1, Interesting)
Opening up Word resulted in an error stating that Word did not have any Office assistants installed on the system
and that it required at least one to function (or something similiar).
If stupid random shit like that isn't an excuse to be upset with Windows then nothing is.
Re:How to make Windows Better... (Score:3, Interesting)
were ever present before me, inciting within me a desire to become an actor
in the busy scene where so many admirable qualities were called forth
and displayed. But in giving an account of the progress of my intellect,
I must not omit a circumstance which occurred in the beginning of the month
of August of the same year.
Frankenstein's creation is a wordy mofo. (read it for yourself [gutenberg.net])
Re:the best reply to this has been: (Score:3, Interesting)
Even if your personal motives are pure, even if the infomation you collect is used for good, it will also be picked over by the best experts in the world for any scrap that can be used against Linux - and ultimately against us.
Yawn.
So what? Who cares? That kind of crap only matters when you're engaged in a typical marketing battle of half truths and outright lies, and F/OSS is essentially immune to that sort of thing.
Oh, sure, people can be misled for a while, but the truth will come out in the end, and the liar will just look stupid and/or evil. In the commercial world, this sort of thing is often effective because by the time the truth comes out the competition is over, the target has been put out of business and the question is moot.
But with Linux, there is no target to kill. You can't put Linux out of business, because Linux isn't in business. There are businesses built around Linux, and businesses using Linux, but Linux, itself, is a community, a movement composed of enthusiasts who are not going to be affected by any marketing campaign, no matter how precisely directed.
And since Linux cannot be destroyed, the most that even the most clever campaign can do is to sow some temporary uncertainty and slow adoption. But, in the end, the truth will become obvious to everyone.
No, the only way that MS can compete effectively with Linux is to produce a better product. And if they do, that's great! Everyone wins if Windows gets better.
So, I answered their surveys. I hope they take the responses to heart and work on improving their OS. The key way I told them Windows can be improved is by making it more transparent. One of the advantages of Unix systems is that they use tons of little scripts to glue all of the various bits together, which makes it possible to hook into the OS in various useful ways -- even without modifying the kernel -- and makes it much easier to diagnose and debug problems. For me, Windows, would be a much better OS if it were to do the same.
Re:Actually, the only way... (Score:3, Interesting)
You could say this in an indirect manner. You could mention, in the section that asks for ways to make Windows better, that Windows would be better if it were "Free as in Speech."
Two Words (Score:2, Interesting)
Make it easy, with options like in some of the linux installers (Anaconda, whatever slackware uses). Have a 'install all', 'install sets', 'expert (select individual packages)'. Divide everything up into logical sets, and make sure that you have to install required components (and I don't mean IE or Windows Media Player). Perhaps have an 'Express Install' option that will install all the basic sets. You should also have the ability to add/remove sets or packages after the install.
Just my $0.02,
Landrocker
Re:How to make Windows Better... (Score:1, Interesting)
Windoze and Linux/*nix (Score:2, Interesting)
1. I can back up and restore the entire box effortlessly. You can't do a full disk backup on Windoze that I know about. There is even a page on the M$ site that says it can't be done.
2. Security Security Security
3. Stability Stability Stability
4. I don't need to reboot after every little change with Linux.
5. Patches and upgrades don't render existing services and applications broken and require days or weeks to recover.
That's enough for me to keep using Linux/Solaris/*nix systems.
JavaScript required (Score:1, Interesting)
They also try to argue that their JavaScript will be nice to me, and refer me to their privacy policy - a nonexistant page...
If I have one suggestion for Microsoft, it's for them to stop insisting that my computer should run other people's code without asking me (the user) for permission.
The one thing Microsoft could do (Score:1, Interesting)
Of course, they have all the knowledge about secret APIs and whatever to make their Wine run perfectly with almost all Windows applications. They could just start with a BSD-licenced Wine variant or save time by buying out one of the companies with closed variants.
This offer would make Linux users stop ignoring sour grapes like unplayable games and applications. It would stop people that don't actually want Windows for reasons other than insufficiently deep pockets from buying Staroffice out of necessity instead of Office. It would certainly not reduce revenue much since most people get their paid Windows versions nowadays as OEM on new machines, and new machines would probably come without a perfect Wine which would have to be paid for separately.
And if people acquired the perfect Wine from Microsoft, they might be more inclined to actually buy instead of pirate further software, if you want to call copying, checking that it does still not run satisfactorily under Wine, and forgetting about it "pirating" in the first place.
The next step of lethal embracing would be to make a later generation Windows as distributed actually run on top of Linux instead of standalone. They would get enterprise-level operating system and security features and performance for free. They could compile their Linux kernel with proprietary compilers that would make Microsoft Linux run quite faster on average than Linux kernels compiled elsewhere. They could put code into the kernel that would not compile except when using those proprietary compilers, keeping the main Linux kernel compilations unable to catch up to MSLinux or Lindows (oops, name taken already), even though Microsoft would provide the source of their kernel changes and additions on demand.
Of course, the favorite Linux distribution would then become Microsoft Linux, since it would come bundled with Microsoft's Windows personality emulator, and since that would be the Linux variant most guaranteed to cooperate with it, even if they sold it separately as well in order to placate antimonopolist laws. But would they be applicable if Microsoft just offers some Linux distribution and a Windows emulator, like quite a few competitors do already?
Be very, very glad that Microsoft currently only thinks about how to improve Windows rather than Linux. They would have the means to succeed with either. And it's one of my worst nightmares to think about what would happen if they gave the latter a serious try.
IBM is also a heavyweight, and they have been very careful about how to get involved with Linux, not wanting to kill the goose that is laying golden eggs and opportunities.
Microsoft would have no qualms in that respect.
Two simple answers that don't need a questionaire. (Score:3, Interesting)
It's free, it works and does what I need it to (which is a lot more than 90% of computer users need)without crashing
and
2: What can be done to make Windows better
Make it free, make it work and do what I need it to without crashing.
Seriously, this is what it boils down to at base level. I have a free OS, free upgrades, I give and receive free support, submit bug reports etc. and I have not needed to use Win98 on my desktop or WinXP on my laptop for anything. People want documents, send them a PDF and I can say all I need to in spreadsheet with OO.org and no macros and it'll open in Excel.
For me to pay hundreds or thousands of pounds to do the same things I do now with MS would make me either so rich that I don't know what to do with my money or certifiably insane.
This seems like a hoax (Score:3, Interesting)
I don't think this is from Microsoft.
On a somewhat related topic...
I was contacted by phone, from an outside company (not Microsoft) but sponsored by Microsoft to answer development questions. I was suppose to get $25 for their "brief" survey. I remember the last question.
"What could Microsoft do to get you to use their software?"
My anwer
"GPL all your software"
I never got my $25... Shocker!!!!
Re:Developers, Developers, Developers... (Score:4, Interesting)
As I said, the
I would have had to pay $139 for Visual C++ if I wanted to do windows development. Even that was too much. I could barely afford a computer! The reason I learned GNU and OSS software was because I was poor. I stuck with it because I'm a cheapskate.
Visual C++ is an excellent full-featured IDE, what do you expect? It's so much more than a compiler. This is like asking for a car and then complaining because it doesn't fly. $139 is a pretty damned good price for an IDE of the quality that the Visual Studio suite. Nothing open source matches it in terms of quality and features. I know. I've looked.
That said, I still use vim for most of my development on Windows.
So now I hear that MS gives away this stuff! That's great! Where do I download my copy of Visual C++ for free? Where do I download my free windows SDK so I can write windows software?
Again, Visual C++ is an IDE, not just a compiler. I said the
As far as SDKs, what do you want to do? There are tons of SDKs (As well as DDKs for driver development) available for free off of MSDN.
Now if Microsoft had been giving away this stuff from the beginning (like I said) then they would have prevented droves of lazy programmers from getting lazy and learning Linux and then being lazy and staying with Linux. Today, for many Linux programmers, the path of Laziness is to "just stay with Linux" or unix or whatever.
I believe MS gained its dominance with developers by practically giving away the dev tools away for free, initially. However, I could be wrong as I have been a UNIX user for a long time, and didn't "switch" to Windows until a year ago.
I cannot comment on the rest of this snippit as I am not lazy, and I abhor the lazy. In fact, most decent open source coders (myself included) aren't lazy. We, well, they write good tools for no compensation.
So, I believe that you are incorrect in this respect. Tinkerers are lazy, and they lack enough motivation to really put anything of use out, so its of no harm to Microsoft OR the open source community. Those who truly want to hack, will hack, regardless.
Do you know what CPAN is?
Yes. I've been using Perl and Linux much longer than you have, so I'd better!
A microsoft CPAN would have tons of objects and C/C++ code that you could download for free. These objects would do things like SMTP, LDAP, PostScript, or TK for you. Microsoft has the MFC but last I checked I couldn't submit anything to the MFC. I couldn't modify my own version of DirectX and submit it to Microsoft for approval.
Microsoft has a "CPAN", it's called MSDN, and it's full of code snippets and examples and miscellaneous cruft. Objects and C/C++ code included.
MFC isn't a repository, MFC is a base library for high-level C++ code development, which is significantly different than CPAN, which is a repository.
You're right, though. You couldn't modify DirectX and submit the changes to Microsoft. I find this argument silly and stupid, in most cases.
The first reason being that most people aren't going to modify DirectX, or they don't have a need to. I'd bet that you've never modified the source for
an open source
What. I. Wrote. (Score:3, Interesting)
The surveyor might want to put a little note at the top of this survey, pointing out that Javascript must be enabled for the form to work properly.
From a technical standpoint, I would advise Microsoft to continue working towards greater reliability and security.
But even if Windows leapfrogged far ahead of Linux in both those areas, I wouldn't switch. As I answered earlier in the survey, I don't trust Microsoft. I don't trust their business practices. I don't trust them to be open and honest about what is going on inside my computer. I don't trust them to do anything other than find ways to derive the maximum revenue from me personally.
It's nothing personal. Give Sun or IBM the same sort of complete control over 95% of the desktops out there, and the situation wouldn't be significantly altered. The thing is, Microsoft is forced to reconcile two orthogonal goals: Doing what is best for the users of Microsoft products, and doing what is best for their own bottom line.
They don't know me, and they don't know what is best for me or any other individual. With Linux, I can choose exactly what my computer does, to the extent that my own computer skills will allow. Under the Microsoft paradigm, I can't tinker. I can't experiment. I might be able to study the source under their Shared-Source license if I meet certain requirements, but I can't make improvements. Hell, the rumor mill says that even suggesting improvements can be an ordeal [I can't say I have firsthand experience].
I trust Linux and Open Source because I don't have to worry about other agendas. This isn't because everyone involved is agenda free, but because the process is transparent and no one agenda can dominate.
The big fixes cannot be made to Windows; they must be performed on Microsoft itself. They must stop trying to take over every market, eliminate every competitor, and control the direction of an entire industry. If they open their file formats, become more responsive to reports of security threats, and begin supporting open standards, they'll find they have a huge role in the future of computing.
More likely, I believe they'll stick with the same strategy that put them on top: Crush the competition, embrace/extend/extinguish any good ideas that come along, and do whatever it takes to "maximize shareholder value." If that's the case, I'll continue supporting Linux with my time and dollars, and watch as the world rejects their demand for total control.
16. List the top one or two improvements that you would like to see made to Linux.
More vendor support for hardware. Open source drivers often have to be written blindly because the manufacturer doesn't care to support it.
More application and game support. Especially game support. For example, Microsoft has Windows/DirectX, which is certainly a powerful game development platform. Unfortunately, we're never going to see DirectX ported to Linux, and so long as game developers target only that framework, I think Linux will have to be content with a few crappy ports long after the original.
Linux isn't without its problems. However, the biggest ones that I've mentioned aren't a problem with Linux per se, but with how others choose not to support it.
Re:Two Words (Score:2, Interesting)
How about ... (Score:1, Interesting)
SCO, BSA, and head counting (Score:2, Interesting)