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Mandriva Businesses Linux Business Microsoft

Israeli Gov't Begins Testing Mandrake Linux 397

Posted by timothy from the right-to-left dept.
DJStealth writes "According to this article on Arutz 7/Israel National News, the Israeli Gov't is beginning to move away from Microsoft and is testing localized versions of Mandrake Linux in the Treasury dept. as the contract with MS expires this month. This all despite a recent defense ministry contact with MS."
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Israeli Gov't Begins Testing Mandrake Linux More

Israeli Gov't Begins Testing Mandrake Linux

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  • Is this a growing trend in business? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by tx_kanuck ( 667833 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @04:28AM (#7743450)
    FTA: "Microsoft heaped scorn on the Commerce Department's decision to abandon Office for the software alternative."

    From other places "We'll sue our customers so that they have no money to buy our products"
    "We'll charge everyone a licence fee for OSS that we don't own"

    Evidently the economy has become an exercise in how much abuse consumers will take. I wonder how long it will take before consumers sit up and go "WTF Mate?"

    • Re:Is this a growing trend in business? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Crypto Gnome ( 651401 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @05:09AM (#7743573) Homepage Journal
      Unfortunately, in showing your surprise, you're also showing just how naive you have been to date.

      These are all aspects of "what the market will bear" which has been standard business practice since something like the 80s (or is that 70s?)

      There is zero concept of "fair market value" in the business world today, only "how hard can we screw our customers before they're no longer customers of ours?".

      Ask any economist, this is "the standard business model" today.
    • I wonder how long it will take before consumers sit up and go "WTF Mate?"

      I wonder how long it will take before people will realise how insulting the word "consumer" is as a label for a customer. Businesses used to deal with customers, and treat them well, now they deal with consumers, and so all they feel they need to do is produce stuff for consumption (and are insulted when people refuse to consume it, as exemplified by the RIAA). This dehumanization of business is what makes the corporate world suck so

  • Office 97 functionality (Score:5, Interesting)

    by MoonFog ( 586818 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @04:32AM (#7743462)
    From the article:
    Microsoft heaped scorn on the Commerce Department's decision to abandon Office for the software alternative. The procurement decision relegated users to second best, said local Microsoft officials, comparing Open Office 1.1 functionality to Word 97

    First of all, like has been mentioned numerous times on /., the functionality in Office 97 is sufficient for most users. Very few people use, let alone need, the extra functionality added in the later versions of office.

    Second, this just makes Microsoft sound childish. "Our latest product is better, they're just a rip off from our old products"

    • Re:Office 97 functionality (Score:5, Interesting)

      by mccalli ( 323026 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @04:46AM (#7743502) Homepage
      First of all, like has been mentioned numerous times on /., the functionality in Office 97 is sufficient for most users.

      Indeed. Here I sit in an Office of one of the worlds largest banks and what is my client box? NT 4, Lotus Notes, Exceed and Office 97.

      Though I'm no fan of Notes, the above is perfectly sufficent for me to do all the work required. You could switch it all to Linux underneath me and I'd barely notice.

      Cheers,
      Ian

      • Re:Office 97 functionality (Score:5, Insightful)

        by term8or ( 576787 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @05:19AM (#7743608)
        Frankly, as a software engineer VI, word 6, Mozilla and a compiler (GNU?) would give me everything I really need.

        As a writer / novelist I find that Word 2000 etc is so helpful that it gets in my way. My productivity is WAY higher using word 6. I've got everything set up just fine; why move all my macros?

        • Re:Office 97 functionality (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @07:05AM (#7743864)
          My productivity is WAY higher using word 6. I've got everything set up just fine; why move all my macros?

          Not to mention the fact that, in order to move your macros, they would effectively have to be rewritten! I used to solve quite a few problems for my customers with macros in Microsoft's Office products. One customer, after going through two rounds of this, balked at the third round and started doing the procedures by hand again. How's that for a productivity tool?
        • Yes, Word 6 is the best version of MS Word IMHO. Even the old Windows 3.1 appearance has a certain retro charm nowadays, while older Win95 applications just look tacky. (Compare styling changes in cars to make last year's model seem undesirable.) The 32-bit version of Word 6 is best. I have that running on NT 3.51 and it never goes wrong. A shame that neither product is still sold by Microsoft.

          • Re:Office 97 functionality (Score:5, Insightful)

            by ccp ( 127147 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:49AM (#7744722)
            Yes, Word 6 is the best version of MS Word IMHO.

            I believe that, in fact, Word peaked at 2.0.
            That version was lean and mean, and did everything an Office word processor should do.
            Each version afterwards just added cruft.

            Writing novels shouldn't be done in Word. It's a very different problem space.

            Cheers,

        • Re:Office 97 functionality (Score:4, Interesting)

          by Sire Enaique ( 637079 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @08:36AM (#7744248)
          I remember reading a novelist praising EMACS because it is the closest thing to a text-mode Wordperfect one can get today.
      • I'd be a tad concerned if my bank was running on an unsupported operating system :-P
        • I'd be a tad concerned if my bank was running on an unsupported operating system

          The majority of banks I know both here in the City of London and also in New York use NT4. Some have recently moved to 2000. There are vague rumours of XP upgrades here, but nothing definite.

          It's worth bearing in mind that when you're the size these banks are, you don't just get the standard consumer deal. I've seen Microsoft engineers dragged in behind me to look at why an SQL Server installation was running so slowly, and

      • PLEASE don't mention Notes... I have to use this POS everyday. I don't mean to go on a rant here, but, well yeah I do :)

        It has, without a doubt, the stupidest "feature" I've ever seen in a software program in my 20 years of using computers. Sometimes, I have to enter my notes password to EXIT THE PROGRAM. And it's insistent about it, it gets really, really angry if I don't. I understand what it is doing (I have stuff marked for deletion and my session has expired and it is trying to delete mail on exit, bu
    • First of all, like has been mentioned numerous times on /., the functionality in Office 97 is sufficient for most users. Very few people use, let alone need, the extra functionality added in the later versions of office.

      The "extra functionality" may even get in the way.

    • Sounds a lot like the recent Powerpoint article (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Kjella ( 173770 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @05:17AM (#7743600) Homepage
      The procurement decision relegated users to second best, said local Microsoft officials, comparing Open Office 1.1 functionality to Word 97
      First of all, like has been mentioned numerous times on /., the functionality in Office 97 is sufficient for most users. Very few people use, let alone need, the extra functionality added in the later versions of office.

      Indeed. It sounds much like the Powerpoint article, where the main argument is "blame the tool". In this case "blame the office suite". Of course you need the rudimentary features required to make it look like you want, but it's still the content that matters.

      I really don't see why so much focus is on the tool. Your average run-of-the-mill business letter will look pretty damn near identical if written in OpenOffice, KWord, Word 97 or Word XP. The tool can't do any better than the man wielding it. In case of a word processor, I'd say that nothing the word processor will do makes a significant impact, even with Clippy ;). All the work goes into forming the letter, not formatting the letter.

      Kjella

      P.S. All karma generated by this post dedicated to Opera 7.20. I never could have done it with any other browser. Yeah. Right.
      -
      • I really don't see why so much focus is on the tool

        It's not the tool, it's the file format that the tool uses. OpenOffice 1.1 still can't flawlessly im/export MS Office 2000 which is 3 year old software.

        • "It's not the tool, it's the file format that the tool uses. OpenOffice 1.1 still can't flawlessly im/export MS Office 2000 which is 3 year old software"

          If your priority is opening MS-Office documents, you should consider using OpenOffice. Not only is it often better at opening Word documents than Word itself, but when the file format is upgraded, it will be more likely to support the new format without additional cost.

          There are people asking for "completely the same" as if they can't find anything else

          • It's not the tool, it's the file format that the tool uses. OpenOffice 1.1 still can't flawlessly im/export MS Office 2000 which is 3 year old software

            If your priority is opening MS-Office documents

            Well, it's not. Otherwise, I'd have asked for "opening MS-Office documents". No, I asked for "flawless im/export". I want to be able to receive a word-document from a customer, edit it, and send it back.

            For some people, OOo does the job just fine. For me it doesn't. So I paid $55 for Crossover Office [codeweavers.com].

        • Exactly.

          I've recently had to either buy licences for MS Office or find an alternative. Neither Star Office or Open Office retained the formatting of an existing MS Word document. This sadly made them unusable.

          I have no problem with using Open or Star Office, I actually like them, but until they deal with MS Office formats perfectly, I can't justify their use in my company. Sad really, especially as we'd get Star Office free. Hey, at least the educational licence for MS Office is lower than the full prici

    • Re:Office 97 functionality (Score:5, Insightful)

      by david@ecsd.com ( 45841 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @05:19AM (#7743607) Homepage
      That's because--let's face it--the mine of the office productivity application has been emptied of its gold. It's gotten to the point where it's pretty damned difficult to screw up something like word processors and spreadsheets. The things have been around since nearly the beginning of the office PC and the wrinkles have been ironed out. What the hell more can a company add? Talking paperclips? Christ, if I were to put down a features table of the major office apps--MS Office, Star/Open Office, Wordperfect's bundle, and Lotus Smartsuite(does IBM even still sell it?)--you'd be hard pressed to find features in one that you can't find in another. Microsoft is milking the franchise; you know it, I know it, Microsoft knows it, and now their customers are starting to catch on to the fact that there are plenty of "just as good" applications out there for cheap, liscensed in such a way that you don't have to be a contract lawyer with 30 years experience to understand the terms. (How difficult is it to understand, "Oh, uhhh, yeah, it's free"?)

      Love,
      Dave

      • Re:Office 97 functionality (Score:5, Funny)

        by MoonFog ( 586818 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @06:26AM (#7743767)
        What the hell more can a company add? Talking paperclips?

        SHHH! They might hear you! ;)
      • >>What the hell more can a company add?

        You are right - as fas as basic edit-copy-paste word processing and spreadsheets there is nothing to add.
        However, look at what MS added in the newest Office - XML (for enterprise inter-op) and groupware (for sharing and collaboration). This is where the real innovation is. And I am afraid OO and friends are not even close and still trying to get to Office 97 levels.

      • I have found Microsoft Word to be the most frustrating program that I have ever used (with the possible exception of a Commodore 64 C compiler).

        Whenever I have to do something semi-serious in Word now, I always take a few minutes to get calm and detached from the anger that I know is going to come.

        It helped greatly to study repeatedly (on my own time and money) several thick manuals on the subject and the 'Word Annoyances' O'Reilly book.

        You just have to tell yourself "What you want to do, It ca
    • On my legacy Windows computer, I have Word 6.0 which was released in the early 90's! Still edits resumes and letters just fine.

    • Re:Office 97 functionality (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      My new job in a large corporation came with a brand new Dell desktop running Office 97. It's our corporate standard and nobody misses any of the features of the newer versions of Office.
      The only issues anyone has with Office 97 is that it has occasional incompatibilities with later version MS Word files and all of the later version MS Access files.
      Fortunately, Open Office can open all of these files and convert them to "standard" MS format. /Mark
    • The procurement decision relegated users to second best, said local Microsoft officials, comparing Open Office 1.1 functionality to Word 97
      This is a ridiculos arguement to make. Its not as if the so called "users" come for free. The government pays them to do their job the way the government pleases to get the job done. If they want each form to be filled in triplicate, the employees better do it unless there is a cheaper way to do it. If the Software costs exceed the cost of manual labor, better put mor
    • > the functionality in Office 97 is sufficient for most users

      Office 97??? Dude, around here there are still people discovering the hidden powers and depths of Notepad. Word Wrap? Status bar? What will they think of next?

  • OSL - licence ? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by HansF ( 700676 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @04:41AM (#7743494) Journal
    That's what you get with that new business model of OSL-license [microsoft.com]. The lease expires and your customer has to make a decision wether to renew the lease or to go to the competition.
    It's not like in the days a staff decided that since the budget was tight, they'll do another year with their NT4 servers.
    Now, it's pay or bug off.
    • You know, that's quite insightful. In the old days when companies bought software, nobody could take it away from them. So you ended up with legacy software 7, 10 years old. Halfway through that time, when somebody decided to upgrade hardware or software, they had to choose titles which worked with the legacy stuff. So they ended up locked into a vendor, unless they wanted to risk upsetting their whole IT infrastructure.

      But now, with leases that expire, those 7 to 10 year old pieces of software can't exis

      • Yes, but think further. Why did they seemingly shoot themselves in the foot? Maybe because they realize they won't be around much longer. Maybe they're trying to get as much money as they can before Linux takes over.

        • Re:Yes, but why? (Score:3, Interesting)

          by Monkelectric ( 546685 )
          I wish I had the link, but there is a paper out there about how Microsofts income is primarily derived from pension plans and tax breaks, and has very little to do with software. The author claims that when MS goes belly up it will make enron look like nothing.
    • Wow, that's a real professional web site design. If the browser won't accept cookies, serve a blank page instead. I guess that is innovation for you.
    • I can't view that OSL page with my Mozilla or Firebird web browser. I must need to upgrade to IE, NOT! Also, OSL sounds a lot like an acronymn for Open Source License :)

  • OSS Good (Score:5, Interesting)

    by fmlug.org ( 695374 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @04:50AM (#7743519) Homepage
    Its interesting where I go to school lots of people are only intersted in useing Microsoft products. Because they believe thats all that used so its the only thing worth using. Some people even get very upset that they have to use a term on a unix box to learn how to program and think that the Linux lab is a complete waste of time and space. I happen to tell then that Microsoft probably only has the majority share of users in the US. There are other countries where users dont have money to spend on an OS. I for on think that all governments should use Open Source software because gov's are for the people Y should they not use an os written by the people they protect. I see this as a good thing and hopefully someday the US will wake up and see the light. Now this post makes me seem like I am saying windows sucks and Linux/BSD rocks, well maybe it is. I believe in using the app the does the best job. Ok if you read this and like it good if not sorry about the rant. :)
    • I think the thing that annoys me the most is when certain classes require or exclusively teach certain Microsoft products. (Like Office)

      • I've got a better one (Score:2, Interesting)

        by Anonymous Coward
        The medical school at which I am affiliate faculty (University of South Florida) stipulates(http://hsc.usf.edu/is/standards/studen t s_med.html ) that students must have a copy of MS Office ("must be purchased") as a condition of attending medical school. No mention is made of "or compatible". From what I can tell from asking the students, the main impetus seems to be that the lectures for the first two years are all given as PowerPoint presentations.

        I don't have any problem with companies deciding to us

      • Re:OSS Good (Score:3, Insightful)

        by weave ( 48069 )
        I think that can be defensible depending on the type of class or curriculm. For a community college, for example, that teaches hands on office skills, using what the student is likely to find in the work place is probably a good idea. For other types of curricula, like programming concepts, using a certain IDE on a particular platform with a specific API doesn't seem too wise.

        Then again, I work for a community college and I remember in the 80s we taught Lotus 1-2-3 and dBASE III+ in the data processing de

    • Re:OSS Good (Score:3, Insightful)

      by mpe ( 36238 )
      I happen to tell then that Microsoft probably only has the majority share of users in the US. There are other countries where users dont have money to spend on an OS.

      Possibly the most interesting thing happening here is that the country in question is has very strong links with the US, is probably the US's strongest ally on the planet and would probably have little problem getting the US Government to give them whatever money they asked for.
    • I happen to tell then that Microsoft probably only has the majority share of users in the US.

      That would be nice, but I doubt it is true. It's only recently that some countries start to switch from MS to OSS. I don't think there is a single country were MS has a minority share yet. (Certainly not Germany, which for some reason is often named in that respect.)

    • Re:OSS Good (Score:2, Interesting)

      by zenpiglet ( 708412 )
      Its interesting where I go to school lots of people are only intersted in useing Microsoft products. Because they believe thats all that used so its the only thing worth using
      It is the best bet given that 95% of PCs run MS software. It would be a pretty poor school that taught its pupils to use software that was used by a tiny fraction of the world. Now software who's main use is to teach something else (say learning French) is ok, but if your aim is to teach IT skills, then surely using the most widely
      • It occurs to me that as an academic institution, you better be teaching your students how to program, period. As opposed to your plan of "how to program using MS tools".

        For CS, a variety of tools, languages and programming styles would seem to be the smartest way of going about it. Then 15 years from now when MS has gone Enron, you can still get a job.

        Unless you're at someplace like Devry where they're just trying to give you some job training.

  • In other news... (Score:5, Funny)

    by davidstrauss ( 544062 ) <david@UUUdavidst ... inus threevowels> on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @05:06AM (#7743566)
    Palestinian officials respond by rejecting Mandrake in favor of *BSD.
    • Palestinian officials respond by rejecting Mandrake in favor of *BSD.

      About an hour later, the Hamas and the Islamic Djihad made a joint statement in which they condemned the Palestinian Autority's decision on the ground that *BSD was "wholly anti-Islamic". The Hamas spokesman commented that "people who put pictures of smiling devils all over their software should be stoned to death - twice !"

      Twenty minutes later, the Palestinian Authority cancelled the previous announcement and made public a million-doll
    • Oh no they wont. They are planning to make it their official OS. Did you look at the mandrake logo? Its a crescent and a star. It surely has won support in the middle east (and surely in soviet russia). They even used it in their flags.

    • Re:In other news... (Score:4, Funny)

      by ccp ( 127147 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @12:13PM (#7746139)
      Palestinian officials respond by rejecting Mandrake in favor of *BSD.

      Well, when they discover VI vs. EMACS then they'll have a REAL war.

      Cheers,
  • Anyone knows if this is related to what was mentioned in yesterday's [slashdot.org] interview [linuxquestions.org] with Mandrake's founder Gael Duval:

    As for MandrakeSoft, the future looks very good because we recently got our first good successes in local administrations (details will be announced later), so at least we will have business in this field and in the corporate field.

    • Yeah, I was wondering about the connection myself. After all, Mandrake hasn't gotten a lot of air-time on Slashdot lately (not that it's a bad thing necessarily), but two articles in two days? I was thinking, "Wow!" And what do I find? A lot of polarizing bigotry here in the comments.

      I also find it disturbing that it's being associated with my preferred distro, Mandrake. I'd like to see more upbeat conversation of how Mandrake is helping people make the switch to Linux and open source, and not to argue o

  • Many governments are going for Linux saying it is free of cost, "open software", etc etc. But, the real reason I think is they believe Linux/Open Software has less chance of any "back door". They don't want every desk in their department to get electronically bugged. Now, imagine the scenario when MS offers for some sort of international code review/certification saying that it is as "safe" as open source (I don't mean "secure" and "bug free" but intentional sabotage..). It would be interesting to see if

    • Re:What if MS goes for code review? (Score:4, Funny)

      by KoolDude ( 614134 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @06:09AM (#7743723)

      Linux should market itself hard

      That's why we have the Advanced Linux Marketing System included in 2.6. It elevates the Linux Marketing to an all new level without compromising TCO, IP, ROI, .NET, XML and all other buzz words.

    • Re:What if MS goes for code review? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @06:35AM (#7743786)
      Code reviews by themselves are insufficient. If you want to trust your software you have to not only review the code but also compile it yourself.

      I doubt any governments are dumb enough to swallow a pre-compiled binary even after seeing the supposed source for that binary, and I doubt Microsoft is going to let their customers compile their own binaries of MS products any time soon either.

      Thus, verifiable/trustworthy software will continue to be a key advantages of free software for some time to come.

    • But, the real reason I think is they believe Linux/Open Software has less chance of any "back door". They don't want every desk in their department to get electronically bugged. Now, imagine the scenario when MS offers for some sort of international code review/certification saying that it is as "safe" as open source (I don't mean "secure" and "bug free" but intentional sabotage..). It would be interesting to see if they still adopt Linux.

      Yeah, I've thought that myself before. But for microsoft to get a

    • Because it would leak. Let's face it: after they've given out a dozen copies of the full "build this and burn it and install it yourself" source to certain countries, there'll be copies all over the net. It won't be OSS people either; it will be crackers. I mean, why bother cracking the latest copy prevention in an MS product when you can simply comment out a few lines and recompile?
  • ... and even Microsoft will see the light and switch to *nix
    • Surely you mean switch back to unix? Seems the world has forgotten xenix. Although having heard from people old enough to have used it this is a good thing. Look at the SCO case if you want to learn more about the history of xenix.

  • What? A Month? (Score:3, Funny)

    by sirReal.83. ( 671912 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @06:38AM (#7743792) Homepage
    They're only giving themselves a month to decide? It usually takes me a week to iron out the config on my own box after a fresh install. Squid this, adzapper that, make a GPG key, why won't iptables block Zope's port...

  • Power to tha Duck (Score:3, Insightful)

    by capn_buzzcut ( 676680 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @07:28AM (#7743928)
    I think it's great not only that they're looking at Linux, but also that they're considering Mandrake.

    To go along with their recent financial success, a win here would be absolutely huge for them.

    • Re:Power to tha Duck (Score:4, Interesting)

      by sniggly ( 216454 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @07:43AM (#7743984) Journal
      I agree, I like mandrake and wish them all the best.

      Redhat spawned fedora, fedora is "unsupported" and what remains are high priced RHELs. Fedora has a very strong community around it but its stated purpose is to be a labrat for RHEL.
      Suse never had ISOs for download which is their right as a company but a linux distribution usually is more than the company doing the distributing. Now that suse is a Novell company we'll have to see how true to the OSS Suse remains.
      Sun is a new linux distributor and we'll just have to see how true to the community they will be. After all they could have called it the Sun Gnome Desktop (which it is) instead of the Sun Java desktop (which it isn't as much)...

      Mandrake is the one remaining big linux distribution (still the biggest in terms of desktop install base) that is tightly interwoven with its supporting community.

  • 1 month? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by blanks ( 108019 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @07:32AM (#7743947) Homepage Journal
    Doesn't matter, 1 month isn't enough time to switch over a small office over to Linux, let alone an entire governments structure and closed source software.

    They may decide to switch over, but it will be over a few years, and will continue using their existing OS.

  • We better get another article to link here. Because the one I F. Read has almost zero about anything Linux, and is covered top to botton with microsoftish stuff.

    Mandrake linux is mentioned but once, and in this context: " and the ministry is testing localized builds of Mandrake Linux. ".

    I mean....there is by no ways a contrac, or anything. The only contractes mentioned on the F.A. are the ones signed to microsoft, both old and new.

    Nowere in the article it is said anything about money saving in changing i

  • When Diplomacy Fails (Score:5, Funny)

    by ReadParse ( 38517 ) <john@fun[ ]ow.com ['nyc' in gap]> on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @08:28AM (#7744193) Homepage
    WASHINGTON, DC - Only minutes after Secretary of State Colin Powell this morning announced that computing talks with Israel had broken down, Communications Minister Reuven Rivlin held a press conference to declare that Israel intended to go ahead with this week's planned Mandrake Linux testing.

    Minister Rivlin downplayed the computing tensions that might result along the Lebanese border. "Israel's computing sovereignty will not be challenged. If we want to move to BeOS, HP-UX, Solaris, PC-DOS... we cannot yield to world opinion when it comes to protecting our right to compute as God promised us we would be able to do."

    Israel's testing of Mandrake Linux comes on the tails of a 7-month period of testing of FreeBSD by most of that countries Arab neighbors. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had instructed Minister Rivlin in recent weeks to begin preparations for Linux testing, despite President Bush's calls for restraint.

    A Microsoft spokesman expressed sadness in a telephone conference call with the press this morning. "This is about more than a contract between the government of Israel and Microsoft," he said with a cracking voice. "It's about the stability of computing standards in the Middle East. I can't stop thinking about those kids." It is unclear at press time what in the world he was talking about.

  • Life in the day of an Israeli (Score:3, Insightful)

    by TheLoneCabbage ( 323135 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @08:44AM (#7744284) Homepage
    Sorry for the off topic, but I'm sick of this nonsense. If I can put some sense into one pea brain then I hve to . Mod me as you will.

    As we know all Israeli's are evil. After living here for a year, I thought I'd translate a days activities to you:

    Avi a dark skined man walks out of his mansion, onto a street filled with mansions, and climbs into his car. A 50 ton armourd bulldozer. Suddenly his cell phone rings.

    Avi: Shalom! (hi/peace/goodbye)

    Yitzak: Hey Avi, how's it going?

    Avi: Well it was a rough day yesterday. I was too busy studying the King James Bible in english to get any real work done.

    Yitzak: You know Sharons going to get really upset with you if you don't get your quota in.

    Avi: How am I supposed to kill 10,000 arab children a day and still have time to spend with my wife and kids?

    Yitzak: Well I was just calling you to let you know I'm building a new settlement.

    Avi: Don't you already have 5 already?

    Yitzak: Yeah, but I already drove the arabs out of those areas, so I thought I'd build another one. I could have chosen any of the thousands of hecktars of land that are empty, but it's just no fun without destroying a fellow human beings life.

    Avi: Oh that reminds me, did you get the buliten in the mail about the last Elders Meeting?

    Yitzak: Yeah, wow, were doing great! Bush even came this time! Even bowed down for Sharon. It was a real crowd pleaser. I'm telling you it's been gravey train ever since the Holocost. Best thing that ever happend to us.

    Avi: Ok I gotta go, and meet quota. Catch up latter at the cafe?

    Yitzak: Sure thing budy! The "Childrens Blood" is on me!

    Avi: Shalom!

    Yitzak: Shalom!

    Wake up call.

    Fact:

    * Israeli's don't drive bulldozers to work.

    * Israeli's are no fonder of seeing children die needlessly than anyone else.

    * Jews don't drink human blood, and if you believe this it's also a fact your a moron.

    * 50% of Israelis are from Iraqi, Syrian, Moraccan, Yeminite, Egyptian, Iranian, Jordainian, Afgani, Saudi, Lebanesse, and/or local descent. They tell no plesent stories from their home lands.

    * No arab village has ever been raized to make way for a jewish one, except in cases where the land was owned by "Israelies" pre-48, or in cases of tacticle need. In which case it's eminant domain, and the arab land owners are compensated.

    * 25% of Israelies are not jewish

    * 80% of Jewish Israelies, don't practice any religion. And half of those profess radical secularism. Despite the fact that they actualy speak hebrew, most have never read any section of the Torah (old testament), and have at best a vauge idea of what it is.

    * Most Israelies would rather just get on with thier lives. They neither hate nore care what happens to the "Palistinians" any more.

    * Arabs can and do, walk in Zionist shopping malls, grocerie stores, parks, and public schools. Jews who walkin Arab neiboorhoods are likley to be shot/stabed/beaten etc...

    If you've never been here, you have no right to comment and certainly no right to condemn. If you do live here, you still have no right to condemn, and certainly no right to spread lies and half truths.

    There, now I feel better.
    • How about the hundreds of dollars I personally pay each year that pays for the tanks and bulldozers that aren't demolishing the homes of those deemed insufficiently jewish to be citizens of the country in which they live? I'd say that gives me a right to comment.

  • Microsoft's mistake (Score:3, Informative)

    by Sire Enaique ( 637079 ) on Wednesday December 17, 2003 @09:20AM (#7744514)
    The Israeli decision probably stems from Microsoft's faux pas last year when they announced that Office XP for MAc would not be localized in Hebrew.

    See _Microsoft's Mac Hebrew snub prompts Israeli AntiTrust complaint_ from the register:
    www.theregister.com/content/archive/296 92.html

    Even if they apparently subsequently reversed their decision the damage was done.

    An important factor here is Israel has a buoyant IT industry and Microsoft's initial decision highlighted the danger of relying too heavily on one single software supplier.
  • Many companies still have yet to forgive MS for not sufficiently fixing bugs and they suffer from all the virii that have been criscrossing the internet. It's not enough to take any and all precautions becuase there's still the human element that can always get a virus past the best firewalls. Code red and friends have cost businesses millions and if I'm a IT consultant I would be quick to point out that Linux is free and the virii have cost us more than the license fees.

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