Microsoft's 'Hands-On' Linux Lab 416
aneroid writes "eWeek has a story on Microsoft allowing a third party to present a 'hands-on lab' that allowed attendees to play with a range of Linux desktop software at its annual worldwide partner show in Minnesota this weekend. It was run by Don Johnson (not the actor), who explained in true MS style how the things that are considered wrong with Windows are planned or an advantage. Whether it's for the desktop or server, wasn't clear. People did get to 'see the Apache Web server in action' and a KDE desktop.Is this more of a preemptive strike where the Linux experience is so bad (slow machines, old software) they wouldn't bother to check it out in the future, thus securing an existing partner/client? Or are they that confident people won't stray if they're invited to sample the competition? According to the Register, 'Microsoft is unlikely to stop developers moving to Linux and open source so its best hope lies in articulating a strategy of co-existence to limit the 'damage' to its business.'"
In... (Score:3, Funny)
Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:5, Insightful)
Linux is only a small part of their competition. Their own installed base is much bigger
Re:Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:3, Insightful)
That's dangerous because lots of people still use windows NT and 98. They might decide to upgrade to linux instead.
Re:Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:5, Funny)
You forgot WinME!
Oh wait - it's better if everyone forgets WinME. We all know MS are trying to...
Re:Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:5, Insightful)
You could make a very unflattering comparison out of that. Just sit the different eras of Windows (95, 98, 2000, XP) alongside the version of Linux from that year.
Windows 98 would be sitting alongside say Redhat 5.2 - you know, back when AfterStep and FVWM95 were the default window managers. Windows 2000 would be sitting alongside Redhat 7.2, so we have the beginnings of a decent GNOME environment, but still a long ways to go on real ease of use. Windows XP would be, what, Redhat 9? I don't really recall the release dates. Then you could have the brand new Longhorn beta next to Fedora Core 4.
There is a very startling difference in the rate of improvement there, and Linux isn't showing any sign of slowing down. Cairo and Beagle (equivalent to Avalon and WinFS) will be standard in distros by the time Longhorn actually comes out, and there are plenty of other interesting developments going like SELinux, Xen, Redhat's Stateless Linux, and plenty of things that I'm sure I haven't heard of yet.
* Disclaimer: I have tended to use Redhat, so that's mostly what I know. I am not trying to short change other distros (some of which I've tried, and I agree are excellent), I simply don't know enough about them to speak with any confidence.
Jedidiah.
Re:Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:5, Interesting)
Jedidiah.
Re:Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:4, Interesting)
What it should say to you is Linux had a lot further to come.
Improvement rates tend to slow dramatically as the product reaches the "good enough" point. Another example is OS X, which for a few years had very quick releases with major improvements - but the flipside is it had a lot further to go. OS X's release rate has slowed dramatically as less things have needed improving. The same will happen to Linux.
Good Enough^W^WBetter (Score:4, Insightful)
In the above picture, I've naturally left out the commercial interest in improving Linux. Suffice to say that distros and tools are now embedded in a far more competitive environment, because of the relative ease of transition between distros and tools. This means that good enough is no longer good enough, especially if the free tools are perpetually playing "catch-up". Perpetual innovation is now the rule for a successful company that is using Linux as a base.
Re:Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Maybe they should look at their past too (Score:3, Informative)
Granted - some people prefer FVWM95; nothing wrong with that. Although I was wowed by E, I ended up choosing Windowmaker as my WM of choice when I first started using Linux as my desktop. That was sometime around 98.
That kinda defeats the point... (Score:5, Interesting)
Too simplistic comparison (Score:5, Insightful)
The whole reason that $50/h Linux admins (and therefore Linux itself) makes sense is that it doesn't require as many hours to admin.
The other thing you're overlooking is the consequences of "you get what you pay for". A $12/hour Windows admin just isn't going to be able to provide the same quality of work as a $50/hour Linux admin (otherwise, why wouldn't they charge more than $12/hour ? If they're good, they should be able to at least charge something like $30/hour ?), which again will increase the number of hours that you'll have to pay the $12/hour Windows admin. The quality of the functionaly equivalent jobs won't be the same with such as disparity between the per hourly rates.
Comparing the platforms based purely on a per hour admin rate, irrespective of the actual time and effort involved, is a way too simplistic comparison to be useful.
Not an assumption (Score:4, Insightful)
My comment is directly based on how often I have to upgrade my Linux box due to security updates verses how often I read about "critical" MS security patches on Slashdot. It is also based on what my friend says about the Linux servers his work run verses the windows servers and desktops they run. I'm fortunte that I got out of Windows desktop / server administration before the Internet became popular, and therefore these problems became common.
Windows advocates are more likely to make assumptions than Linux advocates. Windows advocates usually haven't used Linux at all, yet they're willing to repeat what other people say about it, without having any personal experience to indicate to them that what they are saying is the truth. It is hard to provide realistic or credible criticisms of something that you don't have any experience with.
Linux advocates are usually ex- or even current Windows users (sometimes not by choice, due to their work situation), so they're typically speaking with a level of experience.
Re:That kinda defeats the point... (Score:5, Informative)
I wish I still had the link but it was reported on zdnet australia web site.
Re:That kinda defeats the point... (Score:3, Insightful)
For example, I know many small/mid-size businesses that run Windows servers and have one server for each service (mail, file server, etc.). Comparable businesses with Linux or BSD solutions often merge all these onto a single server.
My only point being that # of machines (servers,
D'uh (Score:5, Insightful)
Talk about redundant 101.
Microsoft are giving customers a chance to look at linux running in an environment of their choosing because they damn well know if they don't there's a good chance this sampling will take place in an environment not of their choice, by people with a passion for the alternative.
Talk about business 101.
Re:D'uh (Score:4, Funny)
I can just picture how they'll be sure to give everyone an objective view of their competitor:
"Now, here's a machine running Linux. See that icon sitting there on the desktop? Now, if you double-click that, it will annihilate all of space and time in a single instant. Is that really the type of thing you want built into the OS all your employees are using? Also, did I mention that Microsoft-sponsored studies indicate a strong causal connection between Linux and the bubonic plague? Although I'm told the OS is becoming quite popular among people who beat their wives and kick cute little puppies."
Positive press? (Score:2, Interesting)
Does the Slashdot membership's interest in any involvement of Microsoft with Linux further the positive press of Linux, Microsoft or both?
Step right up! Hurray Hurray Hurray! (Score:4, Funny)
RTFA (Score:5, Informative)
"...who explained in true MS style how the things that are considered wrong with Windows are planned or an advantage."
That's hardly accurate. The article says he was MS-biased. It also outlines tradeoffs between Windows and Linux. It's brief, but it fairly states the differences between Windows & Linux. Those are: integration vs. flexibility; user friendly vs. expert friendly; & propriety or single architecture vs. open architecture that runs on multiple platforms.
According to the article, Don Johnson makes no more assumptions than the parent as to what is "wrong" with Windows and "better" about Linux.
Userfriendliness (Windows is not) (Score:5, Informative)
When I worked at MS (PSS), you would be surprised how many people calling tech support mentioned that their first reaction on reading this error message was that the police had been notified. Fortunately with ME and XP the inappropriate tone of the error was finally fixed.
Then comes the fact that many versions of Windows allow you to go ahead and destroy your system because there is no concept of permissions (Win 9x) and so users have become quite resonably afraid of destroying their system and losing their work.
Say what you will about Linux and userfriendliness. However, I have found that novices are quite easily able to feel comfortable quickly on Linux. Intermediate users take a little longer. And there have never been any of these alarmist error messages that bring to mind swat teams coming to one's door... I guess the most alarmist error message one can see in Linux is a "Kernel Panic" but for people who spend their lives in X, they never see the text of the error message.
Linux provides a more comfortable environment for learning how to use the computer for many users. I can't tell you how many of my customers are now using it for this reason. My cusotmers know that they can accidently delete their work, but they can't crash their system unless they are logged in as root. So they tend to be more adventurous about learning new things.
* Compare with a transparent system like Linux where often the error messages are very descriptive, but the user doesn't have to know what they mean. But when you call support, it is usually *extremely easy* to pinpoint the cause. For example error messages like "Error in line 156 of httpd.conf: tomcat.so Is this really a valid dynmaically shared object?"
Re:Userfriendliness (Windows is not) (Score:4, Funny)
Well, I would agree except perhaps for "lpt on fire!!"
Re:Userfriendliness (Windows is not) (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Userfriendliness (Windows is not) (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Userfriendliness (Windows is not) (Score:5, Insightful)
You know, you should go to work for NASA. After all, the solution to the shuttle crashes is to make a shuttle that can't crash. No, wait, you should go to work for aviation industries instead, and tell them that the solution to planes being hijacked is to make a plane that can't be hijacked. While you're at it, design a ship that can't sink and a building that can't collapse - japanese would pay a lot for that.
Most people couldn't care less about what mushrooms are poisonous and what edible either, they just want to eat everything that looks good. Most will learn the difference anyway after being stomach pumped a few times.
There is a very limited amount of possible inputs a processor can take. It is quite possible to predict all possible situations a processor can encounter. It is impossible to predict all possible situations an operating system can encounter. Therefore, it is possible to ensure that processor works correctly in all circumstances, but it is impossible to ensure that an operating system will correctly handle all possible circumstances.
Does your palm pilots need to deal with thousands of (often buggy on hardware level) peripheral devices that can be plugged in in almost any combination ? Or multiple processors that differ from each other a bit ? Or a hundred different memory maker with their different timings ? Or overheating components, since the user added a new graphics card that generates more heat than your average fireplace ? Or a trillion programs the user might want to install, some of them actively malicious ? Or a power supply made inadequate by the new graphics card, causing random resets in components ? Or being unable to read a system library because the hard disk generated a bad sector where it was stored ? Or a user program locking an important file against concurrent modifications and then entering infinite loop ? Or different keyboard layouts ? Or high-speed Internet connection being bombarded by a constant stream of malformed packets ? Or swapping ? Or trying to deal with all this and maintain an interactive feel to the user while not sacrificing much throughtput ?
Re:RTFA (Score:3, Interesting)
Is it just me, or is this something of a false dichotomy? For example, let's pick, say, KDE. Now, here we have an absurdly flexible environment (there's a kind of joke that is sometimes crops up whenever someone asks which DE he should choose out of GNOME or KDE: roughly paraphrased, it goes like: "Imagine a taskbar clock that has four tabs worth of configuration options. If you think th
This is odd.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Now they seem to really believe that Windows is superior. They believe it to the point of "proving" it to the users. I'd be interested to hear the reaction from the attendees. My guess is that a few PHBs got a reality check, linux is actually better off than Microsoft claims. A gutsy move for Microsoft IMHO.
I refer to my boss as the typical PHB candidate. 5 years ago my boss boldy told me "we will never be a linux shop". Last week I got our 3rd RHEL server up in production, and he's loving the cost savings. What made him change his mind? Opinions of other IT directors were a good part of it, but Microsoft helped a little too. He realized that linux was a viable product as soon as Microsoft started their anti-linux campaign. For Microsoft to launch a campaign against another OS must mean it has the potential of market share. A free OS with market share is worth checking out in his opinion.
Re:This is odd.... (Score:2, Funny)
And in other news, Microsoft has announced that corn flakes is not Enterprise Ready.
Re:This is odd.... (Score:4, Interesting)
I attended the conference and this demo... (Score:5, Funny)
Despite M$ stacking the deck against Linux the audience was captivated by the capabilities of the system and the posibilities of FOSS. I even saw two MBAs port Linux to their iPAQs, pull some code off the Internet, teach themselves C and perl, and write a complete ERP system for their business (which they are submitting to SourceForge soon) all before lunch (as an aside, in that same time they grew beards, joined
Amazing how Microsoft's attempts to undermine the community were undermined by the community.
Re:I attended the conference and this demo... (Score:5, Funny)
Where you there? I don't remember the exact times, but I remember them running that demo. They ran the shoe and the toaster against two Windows 2003 boxes (dual-processor 4GB of RAM I think) connected via four teamed gig-E fiber connections. The shoe and toaster were running NetBUI, Samba
Re:I attended the conference and this demo... (Score:2)
Mixing lies with truth (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Mixing lies with truth (Score:2)
That's certainly been a successful formula for article summaries on slashdot.
Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:5, Interesting)
My parents have used Linux since Red Hat 6.2 (what, 7 years now?) and have been quite happy with it.
They don't have to know how the command line works. If that is necessary, I will walk them through it (haven't had to in years) but I do the same for WIndows customers so that doesn't matter.
Of course if you want to run a web server, you might want to know the basics of the OS you are working on and be willing to learn the command line, but that is another matter...
2) Integration of user experience: Both KDE and GNOME offer this sort of integration to a large degree. Larger OSS projects like OpenOffice also offer such integration within themselves.
3) The flexibility of Linux does NOT just come from the ability to tweek and recompile the software. Instead it is the fact that you have a lot of pieces that do things well and can easily strung together (by someone know knows the system) into more complex systems. There is no reason I could not write a Perl/GTK program that could take a large number of programs and automate them behind the scenes. For other examples, see FileRoller, SimpleCDR-Tools, and a number of other packages that can make people's lives a lot easier when it comes to Linux. But this is more of a RAD environment than a user environment.
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:2)
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:2)
Their HP LasterJet 3L worked fine, no problems.
The bigger issue was getting someone who could order the right modem when their modem died... But that was not that bad. They just went to a guy who was clueless and went out of business (he couldn't repair Windows either).
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:2)
FUD alert
How difficult is it really? On my Gentoo system:
emerge cups hpiijs
fire up a web browser and point it to http://localhost:631/ [localhost]
Add new printer, selecting HPIIJS driver.
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:2)
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:2)
THINK about the message relayed by the article: KDE + Apache = No integration
Now, is Apache going to eventually recognize KDE as an important FOSS GUI and write a configuration KPart for Control Panel or Konqueror? Possibly, but I doubt it. The same goes for X11 and Samba and many, many other pieces in a typical distro.
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:2)
Exactly (though Linuxconf has an apache plugin, iirc, and we used Linuxconf when they were running RH 6.x). Most of your resistance comes from intermediate to advanced Windows users. Beginners are simply too intimidated by computers to try something new, but once they try it find that it is at least as easy and are ready to switch.
But when you as "what is user-friendly" and "
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:2)
Would you trust a webserver that was setup and maintained with linuxconf? Maybe I'm wrong, but it was written by RedHat not Apache. Also ver
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:2)
Personally I don't care whether there are some admins who prefer GUI's. Personally, I would prefer not to hire them. The reason is actual
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:4, Insightful)
Even as a Linux fan I can say 'forget it'. Your POV will be history a few years after Monad debuts. Then the only OS taking over *nix server marketshare will be Windows. And it will be a sad thing.
There is just no F-ing reason why the snobs at Apache and Xorg cannot write (or borrow) a simple API to change the subsystem's settings and handle the serialization to disk! Only then can they reasonably expect KDE and Gnome people to write and maintain GUI frontends for them. Individual distros are attempting to fill this gap -- with very mixed results.
Apache all but bars a small-office manager from setting up their own LAN webserver. Windows IIS does not.
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:3, Insightful)
And that's why they don't just use it for LAN webservers, but also for public webservers. Which leads to the huge number of compromised IIS systems out there.
Sorry, there's some things that better be hard. I don't want people driving near me who built their car in their garage, unless they know what the heck they're doing, and I don't want a badly cobbled-together IIS server in my net segment for quit
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:3, Interesting)
The Monad-enabled shell will have many of the familiar 'short' commands used in system admin. Plus the OO paradigm provides assurance that services and subsystems can be configured just as with the GUI. And THAT is Windows' second toolset.
Now, if you overlapped Ruby with a sort of bash environment that would be something to compete with Monad.
"Third," the distro-specific config GUIs are very uneven in their completeness and reliability. Each group will have a different approach and cer
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:4, Insightful)
Shells will compete with Monad ? You MS zealots are amazing. So now, shells, like bash, which are extremely powerful, extensively used and improved, cross-platform will compete with something that is not even in stable state yet ? Compete with sth that is not even cross-platform ? Compete with sth that does the same mistakes as csh ?
If you want a universal config GUI for Linux and its servers, there is webmin. Distros don't actually need to overload anything in Apache server config files, Apache already interoperates pretty well with anything, there is a plugin API available for that. Now, could you please have an interesting topic ?
KDE would, given the chance. It could take a while for the KPart to be officially accepted, but thats par for the course.
I don't know, the config file of Apache is easier to understand than any GUI I have seen.
Actually, I still haven't seen sth easier and safer than a config file to configure a server.
For doing small office things I would. Snob. In fact, anyone with a PC on their desk should be able to 'publish' web pages to the rest of their LAN as long as a sysadmin hasn't specifically disabled such services.
Even though everyone with a PC is not a sysadmin
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:2, Interesting)
Very basic example: I prefer to use KDE instead of GNOME - no biggie, just select KDE when logging
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Microsoft and allies are wrong about experience (Score:4, Interesting)
I recently upgraded the laptop I'm typing this on to Fedora Core 4 by wiping Windows XP and Fedora Core 3, which worked well, completely off the drive first to ensure a totally clean install. Fedora Core 4 installed properly, but I could not get the wireless card to work with my 128-bit WEP network to save my life. It worked in FC3, but not in FC4. Oh, and don't get me started with all the other hardware and software that I would have to get working in FC4 manually, including the soft-modem, sleep mode, RealPlayer, DVD playback, and Java. I use FC4 at work and it works well, but getting FC4 working on a laptop made me so frustrated that I ultimately destroyed my FC4 DVD on a mad rampage and then discarded it.
Looking for a replacement distro, I decided to give Novell SuSE Linux Professional 9.3 a try through its free FTP-download-based installation method.
Until Fedora Core gets its act together, I'm not going back after having the extreme pleasure of installing and using SuSE Linux Professional! Really, it's that much better. SLP 9.3 and Fedora Core aren't even in the same league. Seriously, it's like comparing Windows 3.1 in all its AUTOEXEC.BAT, CONFIG.SYS, and WIN.INI glory with Mac OS X, with FC being Win 3.1 and SLP 9.3 being Mac OS X.
Not only did SLP's YaST, the system's comprehensive configuration management tool, detect _all_ of my laptop's hardware, it noticed that my eth1 was a wireless network card and graphically prompted me for the WEP settings. And it worked! No futzing with
I believe that I have finally found an OS besides Mac OS X that I can recommend to others. I was previously a FC fanboy, and I still like FC3, but I could never recommend FC to others, and I certainly cannot recommend FC4, especially on laptop computers.
It's really hard to describe the awesomeness that is SuSE Linux Professional 9.3, so try it out for yourself! Go to http://www.novell.com/products/linuxprofessional/d ownloads/suse_linux/index.html [novell.com] , scroll to the bottom, and read the instructions for the "SUSE LINUX 9.3 ftp version." One caveat that I must mention is that the autopartitioner, at least on my system, didn't automatically create a
Oh, and SuSE includes Sun Java 1.4.2 and 1.5, Java Eclipse (not a buggy GCJ compiled version), Macromedia Flash, RealPlayer, Adobe Acrobat 7, and other goodies built-in; no hacks or editing of files
Which future? (Score:2)
Smart move, indeed (Score:3, Interesting)
Windows administration is all about graphic tools, integrated with the interface. Personaly, I don't like them... but there are people who find them usefull.
I know that KDE has pretty advanced frontends to configure stuff, but they're not as "easy" as the Windows ones. For instance, there is no frontends readly avaliable for Apache, LDAP administration, DNS, DHCP and others...
While I know that tools like Webmin exists, and are very capable, an average person will expect something integrated into KDE.
Also, there are dozen of minor fauts, and rought edges on a default Linux/KDE installation that can be used by them to show Windows still has "superiority" on the desktop.
Re:Smart move, indeed (Score:5, Interesting)
I always thought it might be a good idea to create some form of text -> dialog parser, with basic structure data in the configuration file. Something kinda like doxygen except with support for some basic elements like checkboxes, radiobuttons, drop-downs, spinboxes and the like, as well as grouping elements like tabs, groupboxes etc.
#[Download]
#T: Foo means it will do foo, bar means it will do bar.
#C: With foo
foo = 0
#C: With bar
bar = 0
And then you'd get a dialog with a "Download" box, with text "Foo means it will do foo, bar means it will do bar." and two checkboxes "With foo" and "With bar". As they are checked/unchecked the text file is updated.
If you're editing directly in the text files, simply don't touch that. If you're editing in the dialog mode, you can't touch that. That could hopefully become a standard, using either a GUI or TUI (text UI, for SSH and the like). That way noone would really need to see the junk.
That way, you could also dress it up natively any way you want it.
Kjella
Daniel Robbins at work? (Score:5, Interesting)
the fog of war (Score:5, Insightful)
"Linux runs on just about anything, whereas Windows has a targeted platform focus," he said, adding that one of the main reasons people started looking at Linux was to avoid vendor lock-in.
No. Try again.. People quit M$ because they are sick and tired of dishing out bucketloads of money everytime they want to do anything, because they are sick of rebooting 400 times a day, because they are sick of BSODs.. And on and on and on...
An entire OS on a single CDROM that does NOTHING out of the box except get you on the internet and get infected before you can patch it..
I didn't want to spend hundreds and hundreds or even thousands of dollars on a word processor, a paint program, virus protection, firewall, etc...
For the cost of a blank DVD and an hour or so to download an ISO, I can have everything I want and more.
And the absolute best part is is that I no longer have the big pain in my wallet and my ass called M$..
Oh yeah, and I have ZERO pirated stuff.. ZERO...
No warez, no serialz, no gamez, nothing...
Re:the fog of war (Score:2)
Umm, not my experience. I run a small company with 6 machines running Win XP pro, two servers running Server 2003 and a few old Win98 boxes. None of them "reboot 400 times a day", in fact, none of them reboot even once a day. The Windows machines are solid, and
Re:the fog of war (Score:2)
Re:the fog of war (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:the fog of war (Score:2)
Abusing a monopoly (Score:5, Insightful)
Microsoft is a monopoly on the Operating System market. This has been proven in court.
Microsoft have a relatively featureless, uninnovative browser compared to the competetion. Why is it so popular? It is because Microsoft are using their desktop OS monopoly to force people to use Internet Explorer (see Windows Update for example). Browsers like Firefox and Opera are put at a huge disadvantage.
If you were the boss of a browser company, I am sure you be complaining too.
Why is it ok for linux to include everything but the kitchen sink
Including multiple options is OK. I think there would be less complaints if Windows said 'Would you like to install Internet Explorer, Firefox or Opera?'. It's not going to happen though, unless forced by the courts.
Re:Abusing a monopoly (Score:3, Insightful)
Actually Microsoft were only found to have a monopoly on a very specific part of the market - "intel compatible desktop operating systems".
Note also that things "proven in court" do not necessarily mean "things that are true".
Microsoft have a relatively featureless, uninnovative browser compared to the competetion. Why is it so popular?
Because from approximately mid 1997 until late 2003, it had nothing that could r
Re:the fog of war (Score:2)
Funny that, I don't recall Microsoft changing to a rental model. I usually have a ton of updates waiting, but they all wait politely until I reboot myself on my schedule, and it can literally run for weeks if I ask it to. Apart from a piece of faulty hardware, I have
Re:the fog of war (Score:2)
Re:the fog of war (Score:2)
Sorry, BSOD is a WINDOWS ONLY feature. Linux can not BSOD.. They say Linux can crash but that's only a rumor.
I have never had my Windows XP laptop ever infected
I presume you've never connected it to the Internet?
The firewall and the paint program are free.
You get what you pay for. The Windows XP firewall is proven to be lame, OOTB.. And the paint program? Man,
Well (Score:2, Funny)
Well, now he is.
Re:Well (Score:3, Insightful)
And considering the multi-year, multi-faceted MSFT attack on F/OSS, GPL, and GNU/Linux, I have no doubt that the MSFT "road show" in Minnesota must have had a carnival atmosphere. AFAIK, in every other aspect of "modern" civilization excepting politics and marketing, snake oil salesmen are run out of town or thrown in jail.
Why didn't this happe
most people would chose msft in that situation (Score:5, Interesting)
I run various versions of linux, and windows, on the same PC all the time. Franking, in a 5 minute demo, I think windows would win. Especially if viewed by a total newbie, or somebody who only knew windows.
Windows has a sharp, snappy, display. Plenty of eye candy. Applications launch fast. Linux is okay, but I think windows would win *that* sort of comparison.
After a few months, of going back and forth between both systems; I think a lot of people would chose Linux. With Linux you don't get the software rot, or the adware/spyware/viruses. Also, once you learn a little bit about how to use linux, it's more powerful and flexible. And with Linux, you don't have msft on your back.
Again, all totally based on my guess.
Re:most people would chose msft in that situation (Score:2)
Assuming they've got properly licensed MS software that came on their PC when they bought it, how many PC users do you think really think they have "msft on their back"?
When they're pissed at Microsoft, it's because stuff doesn't work. If they get pissed, and talk about it to a Mac user, they'll switch(tm). But the average user doesn't feel oppressed by Microsoft.
Re:most people would chose msft in that situation (Score:2)
They do when they lose their Certificate of Authenticity and their Windows CD and have a software problem...
Honestly, I have had *consumers* switch over this one.
Re:most people would chose msft in that situation (Score:2)
Re:most people would chose msft in that situation (Score:2)
Makes too much sense for MS to work with Linux (Score:5, Interesting)
Microsoft should get in bed with Linux and go to work. They keep trying to play with it. Microsoft could clean up if they had a Microsoft desktop environment or something similar. They did it with the Mac? With Office, why not write software for Linux?
They are acting like a bunch of babies, "We are Microsoft, we are better, so we won't worry about Linux.". What a bunch silliness. Same thing happened when they didn't take Java seriously. What JVM does Microsoft support, version 1.1? A 10 year-old could write an update to date virtual machine. Microsoft, get a clue.
Re:Makes too much sense for MS to work with Linux (Score:4, Insightful)
As it is, the switch is still a scary decision, and rightly so. Interoperability and familiarity are a big deal.
Just in case... (Score:2, Interesting)
The article didn't say but just in case this is what they are up to, I think real Linux users need to show up at these things with well configured modern laptops running the latest versions of Linux.
That way if Microsoft tries to "prove" Linux is inferior by running old and misconfigured versions we can say "An
Re:Just in case... (Score:2)
The problem is, of course, that these "Linux users" will show up with heavily customised installs that are the end result of days (if not weeks) of setup and configuration requiring non-trivial knowledge.
The Linux community will stack the deck just like Microsoft (or anyone else, for that matter) does. To claim otherwise is (at best
Not for the AVERAGE USER (Score:3)
What developers? (Score:2)
What exactly is the source of these claims? Where is a report or a study of some kind that does not involve the beloved anecdotal "my friend Floyd used to code MFC but now he's a PHP developer, Cum hoc, ergo propter hoc" bullshit everyone loves to quote around here?
As a consultant I deal with a lot of companies and a lot of developers in the US southwest reg
Re:What developers? (Score:2)
It's not about the current crop of developers, but the new blood coming in and what platform they prefer.
MS Touts Interoperability (Score:5, Insightful)
Microsoft isn't willing to open up its source but by flying the flag of interoperability it's suggesting FOSS people can "seamlessly" move data across platforms.
Recently I've been doing alot of reading about The Xen virtual machine monitor [cam.ac.uk] and The Xen virtual machine monitor [cam.ac.uk], interestinly MS is/was involved in both projects. There's never any doubt in my mind that the wet dream of every large corporation is to own everyone from the cradle to the grave. I've no doubt MS will never give up the idea of owning the web, and, further that interoperability is just another way to say "come into my web said the spider to the fly."
Behind it all, I suspect, is a gameplan that has MS software as a utility piped into thin clients in each and every household and business.
Re:MS Touts Interoperability (Score:2)
Driver Issues? (Score:3, Interesting)
I believe that this is a falicy. I feel that sometimes that Linux-based Operating Systems (Especially Ubuntu) do have the same, if not more, hardware support. I have Ubuntu 5.04 and it picked up all my Centrino hardware, which pleased me to no end. XP picked up the hardware, but did not configure it correctly as Ubuntu did. I mean honestly, the balls on Microsoft must be big to say such a statement without checking out the competition thuroughly.
My 2 cents, take it or leave it...
wanna guess who the 3rd party was? (Score:3, Insightful)
Novell and microsoft seem to get by with each other well enough, and I could see them allowing them to make a demonstration.
That said, I'm sick of the lack of innovation on Microsoft's behalf in their OS department. That ALSO said, I don't think that there's much more that a desktop OS should offer that Win2000 doesn't already offer.
Longhorn will be a step in the right direction, but 2000/XP are minimal enough to leave a very low overhead and not be noticed too much. Personally, I like it when the OS isn't in your face. Until Microsoft can justify the whiz-bang features in longhorn that will suck up my resources, I'm quite content to devote my processor time to the applications i'm using.
Yes, I also use a mac and love that too, and I find it hard to have some sort of happy medium where you have the minimalism/low overhead that I like. Windows sucks at managing multiple windows -- this could be improved, and linux/macOS have a definite advantage.
But, on a whole, since switching back to windows from my mac after 2 years for work reasons, I'm finding that despite the loss of all of the cool producitivity-boosting features MacOS has (dashboard, iPhoto, Expose, etc.), Win2000 satisfies my needs just fine.
Microsoft is going to have a hell of a time pushing OS upgrades to corporations from now on. Windows as an operating system would seem to be almost complete (apart from a few glaring security things). All they can do now is tack stuff on top.
Linux on the other hand, needs to figure out what it wants itself to be. It's in an eternal conflict between being super-feature-rich(KDE/Gnome), and being uber-minimalistic (you're forced to go to the command line on a daily basis. this is something that almost never happens on other platforms, and rightfuly so). Comparing a linux desktop to Windows is just embarrasing for linux.
Comparing linux to MacOS is humiliating. With a tiny team of developers (compared to MS/Linux), apple built an OS in 5 years that is considered by most to be the most 'modern' operating system available to consumers. Sure you can debate this, but OSX/Darwin has stuff that windows and linux are hurrying awfuly fast to copy.
Don Johnson (Score:4, Funny)
Why should I change my name? He's the one who sucks.
An Anti-Linux Strategy for Microsoft (Score:2, Informative)
There's a good article on Groklaw about Anti-Linux Strategy for Microsoft [groklaw.net].
MS Windows VS Linux Anecdote (Score:3, Interesting)
Regardless of your opinion of Linspire as my choice, he prefers it to windows. He loves the Click-and-Run. According to him, "it has EVERYTHING you could possibly want to run".
I like the fact that he's much less likely to get viruses and spyware.
True, he only uses it for surfing the web and playing solitaire, but still... Linux on the desktop is going to make a bigger and bigger splash.... no matter what Microsoft does or doesn't do.
Microsoft doesn't co-exist ... (Score:2)
Coming soon (Score:5, Funny)
Changing Definitions (Score:3, Interesting)
From the article:
What?! How on earth is the difficulty of installing a new operating system IN ANY WAY comparable to the difficulty of being physically prevented from doing something because of vendor-installed hardware, or even just vendor-installed proprietary software? Much of the vendor-installed software is specifically engineered to make it more difficult to alter or remove it. Unless I'm mistaken, no one in the Linix distro world does that... not even Apple. Is the author of this story changing the definition of "vendor lock-in" now?
This Integration Thing. (Score:3, Insightful)
What I think they're overlooking is that the "Integration" problem of Linux is something that used to be, and still is, a problem for the Computer Operator (he who came before 'sysadmins'), and that seperating this 'problem' into different roles of administration, you actually put the User/Operator positions into a better perspective.
Integration isn't supposed to be a user problem. Its supposed to be a problem of the person who is setting up and responsible for the computing system being used in the business case.
Microsoft have made a great deal of hoop-lah over the years over the fact that "you don't need a sysadmin to run Windows"
But it seems to me that, conveniently, they're overlooking the fact that Linux, in fact, makes better Computer Operators; you don't really get a fully-Integrated computing system based on Linux without at least performing some of the 'old-school' functions of the Computer Operations hat. And, if you put that hat on and do the job properly, regardless of if its full-time or not, while using Linux you actually learn the bits you need in order to maintain the operator function during the course of use of the system by the business.
I believe in the separation between "Operator" (what some people call 'Administrator') and "User", and I believe that OS's that provide modular functionality for the "Operator" to apply in building a working, productive computing system end up in a better "User" experience. One thing I have always abhorred about the Microsoft way is that they seem to have tried to build one tool that does many jobs; e.g. I don't want to have to use a GUI if all the machine is going to do is serve files
Running people off... (Score:3)
Microsoft has been trying to push people away from their systems for years by making awful software. Not that many people seem to be straying away. The way I see it, people will suffer greatly before they switch to anything different.
I have a friend that I setup with a really nice Linux system. It does everything he needs. It does not crash, it does not blow up. Yet he still fights with his Windows system and the Linux system just sits there. Every time I talk to him his Windows system is doing something like crashing or rebooting.
I had a business partner that has a Windows computer with a virus that calls europe every 10 minutes. He can't install a virus scanner because windows is so busted that all the install programs crash. He has to unplug the phone cable then mess with it then get back online to do things. The funniest thing is that he has a brand new Mac Mini still in the box that has been sitting there for over two months.
I'm not kidding about either of these folks. What I have wrote is true. Maybe I just don't understand because I haven't used Windows in 10 years.
Re:Shock, horror (Score:2)
Re:Shock, horror (Score:3, Funny)
One day they'll invent a key that allows you to delete previous characters, so that people will no longer have to type "^H" or "^W." I imagine it will be called a "delete previous character" key, or perhaps a "backspace" key.
Who knows! The future is limitless.
Re:Shock, horror (Score:2, Funny)
Proposed names for this fabulous new key:
Re:Shock, horror (Score:5, Funny)
I think we would be better served by a drop down menu with choices about deleting the last character, word, sentence, paragraph, etc. Perhaps this could be a new feature developed for Longhorn and backported to XP.
Oh, don't forget lots of "Are you sure?" boxes to click on.
Sorry for the rant, I've spent the last 8 hours supporting crappy MS programs for stupid people.
Detypinator 4 : Rise of the Clippys (Score:3, Funny)
Backgrounder - still needs some work before it can become a proper movie treatment
Following on from the lowering of T1 into the foundary cauldren at the end of "Terminator 2 : Judgement Day", the steel was eventually used to make 1000s of paper clips. These paper clips each inherited a small part of the T1 intelligence, however, because of the heat, the software resorted to the evil, malicious intent of the T1 originally shown in "The Terminator".
Individually, these paper clips were harmless. However,
Re:The best thing for Linux (Score:2)