Linux-Advocacy Digest #598, Volume #25           Sat, 11 Mar 00 21:13:04 EST

Contents:
  Re: Microsoft migrates Hotmail to W2K (Wolfgang Weisselberg)
  Re: Giving up on NT (Karel Jansens)
  Re: The Windows GUI vs. X (Re: Windows 2000 is pretty reliable) (Donn Miller)
  Re: Fairness to Winvocates (was Re: Microsoft migrates Hotmail to W2K) (Wolfgang 
Weisselberg)
  Re: Why Linux is doomed to fail ... ("Colin R. Day")
  Re: Disproving the lies. (A transfinite number of monkeys)
  Re: I need Linux for Morons... (A transfinite number of monkeys)
  Re: Why not Darwin AND Linux rather than Darwin OR Linux? (was Re: Darwin or Linux 
(Sal Denaro)
  Re: Top 10 reasons why Linux sux (A transfinite number of monkeys)
  Re: Top 10 reasons why Linux sux (Marada C. Shradrakaii)
  Re: Top 10 reasons why Linux sux (The Scotts)
  Re: Buying Drestin Linux Was (Re: Drestin: time for you to buy UNIX for DumbAsses 
(The Ghost In The Machine)

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Wolfgang Weisselberg)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Microsoft migrates Hotmail to W2K
Date: 11 Mar 2000 23:22:25 GMT
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]

On Wed, 8 Mar 2000 15:35:38 -0500,
        Drestin Black <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
 
> Please show us when MS ever claimed NT was C2 when it wasn't? They announced
> the successful evaluation at C2 level the day it was done. Prove me wrong.

Haven't we just been through that?  

Every time that MS claims _NT_ is C2-certified (instead of a
system X running NT Y with patches Z and setup in the way A is
C2-certified), they lie.  An OS as such can not be certified, only
a complete system.

Or do you claim that an OS, devoid of hardware, was ever C2 (or
better) certified?  Or that it could?  If so, mind sharing the
source?

-Wolfgang

------------------------------

From: jansens_at_ibm_dot_net (Karel Jansens)
Crossposted-To: 
comp.os.os2.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Giving up on NT
Date: 11 Mar 2000 23:31:56 GMT

[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Wolfgang Weisselberg) wrote:

> Well, compare the features and the speed of say, word processors.
> Between 1990 and 2000, the speed's almost the same and the useful
> feature range has not increased that much, either.  However the
> compting power has been increased very much.  Kinda makes you
> think ...
> 
Comparing WordPerfect 6.0 for DOS (or, in a pinch, even 5.1) with 
WordPerfect 8 for Linux, I have to agree loudly and enthousiastically.
They added a confusing "shadow cursor", to allow for even sloppier 
documents, a spel sheker i dont use <G>, a grammar checker that's 
completely useless for non-English documents, spreadsheet functions 
that were available as a freeware addon for 5.1 and a drawing program 
they had lying about anyway.

For truly innovative things in wordprocessing, you better not look to 
the "Bloatware Trio", but try out something like LyX: a package that 
will actually _help_ to produce professional documents, and not 
jazzed-up marketing flyers.

I still use WP8 though, 'cuz I've got all those function keys still in
my fingers, and at least this one - contrary to that inaccurately 
named package from Microsoft - will read my documents from ten years 
ago.

Flawlessly.

Karel Jansens
jansens_at_attglobal_dot_net
========================================================
"How to make God laugh?"
"Tell Him your plans."
(paraphrased from "Foundation's Fear" - Gregory Benford)
========================================================



------------------------------

Date: Sat, 11 Mar 2000 18:42:09 -0500
From: Donn Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The Windows GUI vs. X (Re: Windows 2000 is pretty reliable)

Roberto Alsina wrote:

> > But, I think there's still advantages with Xt-based toolkits.  For
> > one, the API is predictable.
> 
> What's unpredictible about the Qt or Gtk+ API? Is QButton randomly
> refusing to accept it has a setGeometry(int,int,int,int) method?
> 
> Or you mean that the API of all Xt toolkits is similar? That's a
> non-advantage, since there are about two toolkits (Xaw, Motif), and one
> is widely recognized as a proof of concept (Xaw).

Well, all I guess the API is predictable for me.  Don't worry -- hold
you pants on.  I'll be trying to learn Qt.  I'm not very good at C++. 
I mean the API for Xm is predictable in the sense that you have the
widget creation functions that are predictable:

XmCreate{Label,Form,PushButton,{Error,Message.Information}Dialog,Form,BulletinBoard,RowColumnWidget}.
 
This gives Xt some predictability.  Really, I never mentioned Qt
wasn't predictable;  I just said that I though Xt was.

This sounds like a toolkit flaming war, and I want out of here. 
Obviously, Xm and/or Xt doesn't work for you.  That's OK.  I had a
pretty easy time learning Xm and Xt, but Qt was pretty tough for me to
get a grasp of.  I don't know why.  But, of course, maybe motif is
going to be outdated soon, I don't know.  But, I think you'll have to
admit that, as someone who really doesn't like Motif, that Lesstif is
a great thing. :-)  I would never spend the money for something like
that, and I acknowledge that the commercial version of Motif has
memory leaks.

I'll be working a little bit with Lesstif, but probably not much.  Xt
based toolkits have flaws, such as sometimes the widgets disappear
from the window if the callback functions don't return fast enough.

I think Lesstif is a great thing, and it's a pretty decent alternative
to the commerical Motif.  Even if various toolkits suck, it's still
great that we have a choice.  All I'm saying is that ALL toolkits have
the right to be considered for projects, although some may be better
than others.

- Donn

------------------------------

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Wolfgang Weisselberg)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Fairness to Winvocates (was Re: Microsoft migrates Hotmail to W2K)
Date: 11 Mar 2000 23:47:48 GMT
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]

On Sat, 11 Mar 2000 17:38:01 GMT,
        Chad Myers <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> 
> "Wolfgang Weisselberg" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > Note that it was also given in this thread's precursor that any OS
> > would have to be adjusted, 'even' W2K.

> Hmm... who said that? The whole point I was trying to make is, that
> Win2K is scalable enough it wouldn't have to be modified (in it's core,
> meaning the filesystem or the TCP/IP stack) like Solaris was.
 
So you basically say that you don't have to change any bit in
the registry?  Cool.  Or did you misread "adjusted"?

And even if you had to adjust it, why is hotmail still running an
obviously arcane and substandard solution?  An will be running it
for at least the next half year (my wild guess, proof me wrong!)

-Wolfgang
 

------------------------------

From: "Colin R. Day" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Why Linux is doomed to fail ...
Date: Sun, 12 Mar 2000 00:13:01 +0000

[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:

> On Thu, 9 Mar 2000 00:13:29 +0200, "James McLaren"
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> >Well if my own experiences are representative then Linux is doomed. I got
> >the impression that the Linux community would descent on a nubi en masse if
> >they requested help. Well after several ignored questions on .help I'm
> >calling it a day.
>
> You only wasted a day on Linux? Most people waste months before they
> finally give up....
> >How you can expect first time computer recruits to embrace Linux I just
> >don't know. Not with the current level of support that's for dammed sure :)
>
> Ain't no support in Linux. Everybody has an answer but so few of them
> are correct.
>
> >James <- Asbestos jox in situ
>
> Fuck Linux...It plain suxs
>
> >

Eat flaming death, troll!!

Colin Day
--

I find it ironic that the government has a monopoly on antitrust legislation.


------------------------------

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (A transfinite number of monkeys)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Disproving the lies.
Date: Sun, 12 Mar 2000 00:33:11 GMT

On Thu, 9 Mar 2000 01:30:08 -0500, 
        Drestin Black <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
: refused to identify themselves? Oh puhlease, you are asking us to believe
: this? Someone called you out of the blue, said: "Hi, we complete strangers
: who will not identify ourselves but we work for satan, um, MSFT and have
: mysteriously been able to get a list of beta sites and want you to answer us
: questions about your operations?" and, you said: "OK" ??

Actually, it went more like:

Them: Hi, we're calling on behalf of Microsoft to talk to the coordinators
      at Windows 2000 beta sites.  We need about 15 minutes, blah blah 
          blah..

Me:   Ok, what research group do you work for?

Them: I'm not permitted to say.

: > Everyone - Full Control anyone?
: Everyone - better than the original!

Heh?  If the default umask on Unix systems was 000, that is, every file was
automatically created as world readable/writable, the Unix vendor would
be laughed out of existence.

: > The whole digitally signed driver thing is cute, but kind of dumb, if
: > you ask me.  I haven't seen a single driver, other than the ones that
: > shipped on the CDs that was signed.
: 
: SoundBlaster Live drivers for 1... do you need others?

Heh again?  According to Creative Labs' site, there have not been any
SB Live! drivers released for Windows 2000, other than the drivers that MS
shipped on the w2k CD.

: oh, just DirectX and the MSI ... you say that like... oh, and just awesome
: SMP and just a journaling file system... yawn...

SMP performance that nearly approaches Linux..  Yep, that's true, I suppose
I neglected to account for that.  You say "journaling file system" like it's
supposed to be some sort of amazing innovation.  Linux already has several
journaling file systems available (ext3, reiserfs, jfs), and more coming,
such as xfs.  Is that another MS "innovation", like their recent claims of
innovating such amazing things as symbolic links and window managers that
are seperate from the display layer?

-- 
                 Jason Costomiris <><
            Technologist, cryptogeek, human.
jcostom {at} jasons {dot} org  |  http://www.jasons.org/ 

------------------------------

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (A transfinite number of monkeys)
Subject: Re: I need Linux for Morons...
Date: Sun, 12 Mar 2000 00:50:13 GMT

On Fri, 10 Mar 2000 19:16:21 GMT, Sage Kim <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
: I managed to run natescape (by typing in "netscape", wow...).  But at
: this point, I do not even know how to move or resize the netscape
: window.  

The same way you do under Windoze..  Grab the handle in one of the corners
of the application's window and drag it...

-- 
                 Jason Costomiris <><
            Technologist, cryptogeek, human.
jcostom {at} jasons {dot} org  |  http://www.jasons.org/ 

------------------------------

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Sal Denaro)
Crossposted-To: comp.sys.next.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy
Subject: Re: Why not Darwin AND Linux rather than Darwin OR Linux? (was Re: Darwin or 
Linux
Date: Sun, 12 Mar 2000 00:58:41 GMT
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]

On Sat, 11 Mar 2000 06:41:05 GMT, JEDIDIAH <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>Linux has 4% of the desktop and 25% of servers shipped last year. What
>
>       A Linux port would also cover the gruntwork for any posix
>       compatible system including ALL the other Unixen and quite
>       likely BeOS.

And what percent of the desktop market is that? I think if you added
BeOS desktops, all *nix system on the desktop, and all Linux desktops, 
you'll still be looking at a maket that is less that 1/10 the size of 
the windows desktop market.

>>Second, in order to port Quicktime to windows, Apple had to port a large
>>amount of Quickdraw. After all, CARBON is based on QuickTime. This might
>
>       That sounds like they could stand to do some fundemental 
>       re-architecting. This sounds as silly as IE on Solaris
>       requiring a win32 subsystem to go along with it.

Probably a lower priority than OSX and carbon, at least in the short term.
A portable QT engine would be a good idea. The market for quicktime on
things like TiVo or WebTV style set top boxes might be pretty big in a 
few years.

>>The Quicktime _file format_ is a published standard. In fact, it is the
>>basis of the MPEG4 file format standard. The CODECs on the other hand
>>are owned by others. It might cost Apple money to port the CODECs to
>>Linux. 
>
>       This is the real rub. Linux developers are willing to do this
>       work, even under NDA, yet they're being snubbed. Apple isn't
>       even being open with it's CODEC licencing, nevermind source
>       or specs...

Huh? Apple is open with the specs. It doesn't _own_ the CODECs so it
can not give specs or code for them away. As far as licencing, Apple
pays to use the CODECs. It might even have some exclusive deals on
some CODECs but it can not stop the CODEC owners from porting to
Linux in cases where it doesn't have an exclusive deal on a CODEC

>       They're quite the hypocrites when they drone on about 'freeing' 
>       an OS core which they got most of for free to begin with...

They opened up a little bit more than just Mach+BSD. QTSS, NetInfo
OpenPlay. Maybe something else I missed.

-- 
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Salvatore Denaro

------------------------------

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (A transfinite number of monkeys)
Subject: Re: Top 10 reasons why Linux sux
Date: Sun, 12 Mar 2000 01:23:47 GMT

On Thu, 09 Mar 2000 22:01:51 GMT, 
        [EMAIL PROTECTED] <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
: 10. X-Windows fonts look like shit. Go "borrow" true-type fonts and
: they still suck. Mac looks great. Windows looks good. Linux looks like
: shit. Not to mention X-Windows is slow as shit.

http://www.helixcode.com/desktop/gnumeric.jpg
http://www.helixcode.com/desktop/screen-dia1.jpg

Looks pretty good to me...

: 9. Sound Blaster Live is supported in an abortive manner, if you can
: even make it work at all. Top selling card for over 2 years and still
: semi-supported. Corel announces alliance with Creative to develop
: multimedia applications (ala Sound Forge, WaveLab, Cakewalk etc) and
: yet Corel still can't provide a binary on their website that works.
: Damm shame, but typical "wait till it's obsolete to support it" Linux
: fluff.

That's funny, it's very simple, actually.  Read:

http://opensource.creative.com/cvs.html

By my count, by typing a few simple commands, I can have my sblive
happily working.

export CVSROOT=:pserver:[EMAIL PROTECTED]:/usr/local/cvsroot
cvs login (pass is cvsguest)
cvs -z3 checkout emu10k1        # to fetch the code
cd emu10k1
make                                            # build the driver
make install                            # install
depmod -a                                       # update the system's driver info
echo "alias sound emu10k1" >> /etc/conf.modules
                                                        # To make it start up when the 
system boots.
modprobe sound                          # Load the driver right now.

Note that you didn't even have to reboot.  Also, between the simple
directions on Creative's site, and the very detailed documentation that
accompanies the driver, you can have sb live! support (including downloading
the software) in about 5 minutes.

: 8. Postscript printers are really the only ones that fully function
: easily under Linux. What you save in dollars on the OS, you will pay
: for on the printer.

Better not tell that to my HP Laserjet 5L...  It's a PCL only printer.
It cost me a whole $300 too.  It even does 600dpi.

: 7. Scanners. SCSI scanners still rule in the Linux world although they
: offer no advantage over parallel port scanners, except being supported
: using a crude but appropriately named program called inSANE. This does
: not even touch on the fact that all of that great software included
: with your new scanner (Adobe Photoshop, Cannon Greeting card and so
: forth) won't run under Linux. You pay one way or the other....Just
: make sure to send all of those "useless under Linux" programs to me :)

USB scanners work just fine as well, provided you use a newer kernel, or
the patches to provide USB support in older kernels.

: 6.Dial up's and Free ISP's as well as AOL. First point AOL does not
: work. That automatically eliminates millions of users from using
: Linux. Secondly, most Free ISP providers require surveys and scripts
: to be run that only run under Windows or Mac. Linux does not work and
: no amount of begging will change anything.

No AOL for Linux, and you say this is a bad thing?  I call it a gift from
God.  As for the Free ISP's of the world, a sizable hunk of your 
bandwidth is chewed up by the ads that their software downloads constantly.

: 5.Netscape. If you hate Netscape, you'll hate Linux cause you have no
: choice except KDE, a poor substitute or a text based browser, and
: believe it or not there are folks running these. Mostly in the Linux
: community, because that's the best they can do. Opera will be
: out....anyday....anyday......anyday.......
: Mozilla.....anyday.....anyday.....anyday........

You're free to use a pre-release of either Opera or Mozilla *TODAY*.

: 4.Compatability with the rest of the free world. No Lotus Notes
: Client. Domino server, but no client. Compatibility with Office and
: Lotus is a joke. Some things work ok others die at the starting gate.
: Do YOU want to be the one to tell your boss to send you a Power point
: presentation as a text file? How about begging a software or hardware
: manufacturer to support Linux. Get used to it. It is the Linux way.

I for one never understood the need for a 50+MB piece of email software.
Sure, you can create "databases", which aren't really useful databases at
all, but Notes is more a plague than a blessing.  StarOffice happily reads
and writes Office documents just fine.

: 3. No real group ware. Star office is ok for a single user and one
: could hardly argue with the price but it is hardly group ware.
: It also looks crude an boxy, like most Linux applications.

No groupware?  There are plenty of group scheduling solutions, and as for
discussions, newsgroups.  Works fine for lots of companies.

: 2. Multimedia is way, way behind even the crudest Windows
: applications. Want to use a far outdated Real Player? Try Linux cause
: that's what it uses. DVD? Coming real soon now...yea right.....

My DVDs play just fine under Linux.  RealPlayer?  Real just agreed to 
release RP7 on Linux.  I'm more a fan of mp3 streams though.

: As a result RPM's don't work with deb's, 

You've obviously never heard of "alien".

: libraries
: are incompatible 

Like all of the wonderful DLL conflicts that Windoze inflicts upon us?

Maybe it's time you did some actual research...

-- 
                 Jason Costomiris <><
            Technologist, cryptogeek, human.
jcostom {at} jasons {dot} org  |  http://www.jasons.org/ 

------------------------------

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Marada C. Shradrakaii)
Subject: Re: Top 10 reasons why Linux sux
Date: 12 Mar 2000 01:28:31 GMT

>If AbiWord didn't have so many incomplete dialogs.

(Defending my claim)

It looks really good, and that's apparently what matters in an app; not how
well it works.  At least judging by someone making "the boxy appearance" a
reason not to choose an app.
-- 
Marada Coeurfuege Shra'drakaii
members.xoom.com/marada   Colony name not needed in address.
"New Windows feature:  distributed.microsoft.com--  Fifty million machines
generating random C code in an attempt to produce the next version of Windows."

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 12 Mar 2000 01:49:17 +0000
From: The Scotts <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Top 10 reasons why Linux sux

I'm just a 3 month Linux newbie, but my Netscape 4.72 does allow copy
and paste to the location bar, just did it to verify.

Bob Scott

Jim Ross wrote:
snip> 
> I guess I'm saying that for me the Netscape Location Bar doesn't accept a
> paste at all.
> I commonly under Windows copy URLs from text files and often paste into IE
> Address Bar.
> This is very convenience and hurts when not available in Linux.
>

------------------------------

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (The Ghost In The Machine)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Buying Drestin Linux Was (Re: Drestin: time for you to buy UNIX for 
DumbAsses
Date: Sun, 12 Mar 2000 01:59:32 GMT

In comp.os.linux.advocacy, 5X3 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
 wrote on 11 Mar 2000 20:44:09 GMT <8aeb6p$3oq$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>In comp.os.linux.advocacy George Marengo <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> On Sat, 11 Mar 2000 13:08:59 -0500, "Drestin Black"
>> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> <snip>
>>>Yes, it installed, I have no idea if it installed right because I haven't
>>>really done anything with it, there isn't really anything to do with it
>>>other than type shit at the CLI or fire up a browser in the windows-clone
>>>GUI and be impressed that even if X crashes I can telnet in, kill the task
>>>and try again!
>>>
>>><click>
>
>> IOW, you did this with a chip on your shoulder. Just like the
>> LinVocates that you complain about who install Windows just 
>> to find every problem they can with the install or the OS itself, 
>> with no intention of actually using it with an open mind to see if
>> they might actually <gasp> like using it.
>
>There is no chance that Dresden will ever, ever give linux a fair chance.

Well, it's not like he has to; that's the whole point of choice,
after all. :-)

I'll admit, there is a lot of functionality in NT ... although it's
not clear whether it's reliable, or standard.  (What standard *is*
ADO from, for example?)

Ditto for Win9x, which is even more unstable.  (Win98 and
Win2K I haven't used; Win98 is the same as Win95 with a little
extra flavoring; Win2K is similar to WinNT, with a lot of
extra flavoring :-) ).

Use whatever feels right, but make sure it's used for the right reasons;
it would be pointless, for example, to ask Linux users to play games
(although I hear Quake III runs very well there :-) ), and Win9x and
NT users probably shouldn't be trying to do silly things like
the curses terminal library, and fork(), (instead of GUI stuff,
CreateProcess(...), and threading).

*shrug*

Whatever is used, it should play to its strengths.

>
>p0ok

-- 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] -- who likes curses, actually, with all of its quirks :-)

------------------------------


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