Linux-Advocacy Digest #688, Volume #25 Sat, 18 Mar 00 18:13:05 EST
Contents:
Re: Windows 2000 - the latest from work.... ("Erik Funkenbusch")
Re: gnome website sabotaged? (patrick hutton)
Re: An Illuminating Anecdote (Stefan Ohlsson)
Re: Enemies of Linux are MS Lovers (Roger)
Re: Windows is a sickness. Unix is the cure. (Mark S. Bilk)
Re: Salary? (Stewart Honsberger)
Re: Salary? (The Ghost In The Machine)
Re: which OS is best? (Roger)
Re: Can I do this with Linux? (Jeremy Randall)
Re: An Illuminating Anecdote (Matthias Warkus)
Re: Windows 2000: virus haven (abraxas)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Erik Funkenbusch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Windows 2000 - the latest from work....
Date: Sat, 18 Mar 2000 15:14:47 -0600
Nico Coetzee <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > > TRUE, it costs over $300 a copy to get it.
> >
> > Who cares? The cost of the product is miniscule in it's Total Cost of
> > Ownership, which includes training, support, maintenance,
administration,
> > etc..
>
> If another person tries to proof M$ products run at a lower TCO as Linux,
I'm
> going to crack...
Ever heard of trimming a response?
Are you trying to tell me that users do not need to be trained to use Linux?
And are you claiming that such training costs less than Windows?
------------------------------
From: patrick hutton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: gnome website sabotaged?
Date: Sat, 18 Mar 2000 21:17:11 +0000
Reply-To: na
Mig Mig wrote:
> patrick hutton wrote:
> > I went to gnome gnotices section and clicked on comments for various
> > news bits. On doing so I was sent to microsoft web page! What's going
> > on? I tried site at 13.00 hrs gmt 18/03/00.
>
> No problems there at the moment... 20:15 GMT
I tried again at 21.10 and everything was fine, maybe I'll e-mail gnome
site to enquire.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Stefan Ohlsson)
Subject: Re: An Illuminating Anecdote
Reply-To: Stefan Ohlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: 18 Mar 2000 22:15:44 +0100
Terry Murphy wrote:
>On Thu, 16 Mar 2000 10:31:37 -0600, mr_organic <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>help. Only when $LAME_DEVELOPMENT_TOOL barfs out obscure errors do
>>they realize their mistake.
>
>Just a heads up - using environmental variables in news posts is Unix dweeb
>rule number three, surpassed in pure annoyance only by using "fsck" as
>a swear word, and calling "X Windows" anything besides "X Windows".
>
I think it's entertaining and somewhat fun. After all, this /is/ a UNIX-
group! :)
>I have met EXTREMELY ignorant Unix programmers also. I have even met
>one or two Unix programmers who do not even know assembly language on
>the machine which they work on (I swear to god I am not kidding).
>
I think few programmers working with C and higher level languages know very
much about assembly, no? I know assembly for some processors I program on,
but not all. That's the general idea with C..
>If this is true, why is so much Windows software demonstrably superior
>to its Unix counterparts?
>
>For example, the Microsoft C Compiler, which is a Windows application,
>and by your claim is programmed using careless software engineering
>by programmers who do not know what they are doing using primitive
>development tools, produces code which is demonstrably approximately
>20% faster than GCC, which is a Unix programmed and developed using
>Unix principles. How do you explain this?
>
Well, one guess would be that hte MS compiler has more work put in to it,
more time and obviously more money. The programmers working for MS do it for
a living and don't have to set free time aside to tweak performance. They get
paid for it.
>If the Unix programmers have superior tools, why are Windows programmers
>able to produce significantly higher performance software?
>
Having worked both with Emacs/make and MSVC++, IMHO, both have their
advantages. I think that in debugging MSVC (and other similar packages)
are better, but in other aspects they are clumsier.
>Additionally, most Unix equivalents of desktop programs are considered
>to be far inferior to their Windows conterparts. For example, Netscape
>under Linux is considered considerably more buggy than the Windows
>version. Why is this? Star Office is considered much more fragile and
>crash-prone than Microsoft Office. If Unix programmers have superior
>tools, why is this?
>
Not all tools are superior.
>I have examined the source code of several Unix programs, including GCC,
>GIMP, and the GNU file utilities, and I found the code to be of amateur
>quality. None of these packages handled dynamic memory allocation errors
>properly. Some didn't even check the return code of malloc, and those
>which did simply exited if the condition occurred. Even the X Windows
>server does not properly handle failed allocations, and simply exits
>(bringing down the entire desktop along with it) when the condition
>occurs.
>
That's... bad. I've never had it occur on me though, that I know of.
/Stefan
--
[ Stefan Ohlsson ] · http://www.mds.mdh.se/~dal95son/ · [ ICQ# 17519554 ]
Ace Ventura: I'm looking for Ray Finkle.
[A shotgun cocks and is pointed at his head.]
Ace Ventura: ...and a clean pair of shorts.
/Ace Ventura: Pet Detective
------------------------------
From: Roger <roger@.>
Crossposted-To: alt.microsoft.sucks,alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Enemies of Linux are MS Lovers
Date: Sat, 18 Mar 2000 21:31:01 GMT
On 16 Mar 2000 11:27:16 -0500, someone claiming to be Norman D. Megill
wrote:
>In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
>Roger <roger@.> wrote:
>>On 14 Mar 2000 23:06:05 -0500, someone claiming to be Norman D. Megill
>>wrote:
>>[...]Unless you have made changes to your BIOS setup, which you don't
>>mention having made elsewhere, 5 6 and 7 can be eliminated altogether.
>I do often make some changes after installation. So I want to get
>everything back to a known state to be on the safe side. Anyway these
>steps consume a trivial amount of time.
What changes do you make to the BIOS / how are you certain that these
are not contributing to your problems?
>>> fdisk /mbr <- if boot sector is corrupted
>>And since you have not mentioned that the boot sector is corrupt, this
>>could be skipped in any case.
>Again, this is almost instant. So why not do it anyway - how do I know
>it's not corrupt? I am doing a clean reinstall because the computer
>won't boot, or Windows crashes every hour instead of once a day, etc. -
>I have no idea what is corrupted and what isn't. It also gets rid of
>any boot sector viruses. But yes, sometimes I do skip this.
You know, based on the behaviour of the box / the error message you
get. If, indeed the boot sector is simply corrupt, likely none of the
rest of this is needful.
>>> 4 (Delete Non-DOS Partition - says: No Non-DOS Partition to delete)
>>If you know that there is not a non-DOS partition, why would you try
>>to delete it?
>Precaution. With a badly corrupted disk, who knows how FDISK will
>interpret it.
You do, if you use FDISK /STATUS.
>>>10A. (Continuation point if just reinstalling Windows)
>>> Note: the /u is important because Windows is (more) flaky if
>>> there is old random background data on the disk.
>>Proof of the above assertion?
>(1) I experienced it - once I could not even get through the complete
>install without the OS hanging at some point. (2) Gateway confirmed it
>could happen and told me not to try to save time by omitting this step.
>My theory: there may be some code where the developer forgot to
>initialize data after reading a new disk block, and a certain peculiar
>background random data pattern will trigger a bug. Just my theory
>though.
But if it is not in the directory/ doesn't have an entry in the FAT,
and assuming those structures to be good (which the format by itself
basically guarantees,) one would have to go out of their way to access
this random data.
IF this is a bug, then it is a bug in your theoretical app.
>If you think "random data" can't trigger MS bugs, just try to read a
>randomly corrupted Word document (e.g., send it through an ASCII FTP
>filter). Most of the time Word will crash with Illegal Instruction
>faults, etc., sometimes locking up the whole OS. An app that doesn't
>completely validate its own binary format is truly appalling design IMO.
>Even StarOffice can read corrupted Word documents better than Word:
>
> http://x43.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=453801472
A corrupted file is not the random data you posit in your original
statement.
>>> CTRL+ALT+DEL
>>Or simply type "autoexec" at the a: prompt, since you seem to need the
>>batch processes.
>7 keystrokes instead of CTRL+ALT+DEL
But no wait for POST and boot.
>>> copy *.* c:\cabs
>>Not necessary -- Win95 installs just fine from CD.
>This is to avoid constantly swapping the "Windows 95 CD" and the
>"Multimedia Notebook System CD" later on.
I know why you're doing it, but it is not "necessary,' as you claimed.
>>> cd win95\solo2300\vxdinf
>>> copy *.* c:\cabs
>>Likely not necessary, since this will install from CD as well.
>See above.
ditto
>>> Yes (System Settings Change ...restart your computer now?)
>>This restart in unnecessary, since you have other things to configure
>Some restarts are, and some aren't. I didn't want to spend the time
>experimenting with every possible combination. Since the video, in
>particular, seems so touchy, I wouldn't risk not doing it here.
YOu have to look at dependencies. Is making the next change dependant
on the change you just made (for example, installing video card utils
which require the driver to already be loaded?) If not, skip the
reboot.
>By the way Gateway told me to do it here. I know it's starting to sound
>like a mantra but they've done a lot more installs than I have. You
>dismiss them as a bunch of dumb techs reading a script - but if they do
>this constantly all day long, why have they not optimized the script?
>They have to wait on the phone line for the reboot just as long as I do.
>Perhaps you can convince them to pay you big consulting $$ by showing
>how much money they would save over 1,000,000 installs.
Because they get paid the same whether waiting for the box to boot or
actively making configuration changes with the customer?
>>Why the restart here -- you've just restarted and not made any
>>changes?
>Well, it is one way of getting the user name/passwords entered. I
>agree it is not an efficient one.
You've already entered that. At most, it is a way to confirm that
they were cached.
>>If you're installing a printer here, why did you cancel out of it
>>earlier?
>Because the floppy disk drive was installed in the printer port at that
>time.
And? Just skip the printer test until you've removed it, and test it
then.
>>Why go to Configure, etc. when you are not making any changes?
>These are just to verify it is set up correctly. That's a good idea,
>don't you agree?
Since almost everything is that way by default, no -- it just wastes
time.
>But I still have to make a few changes like:
>
>>> Primary DNS: xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx
>>> Secondary DNS: yyy.yyy.yyy.yyy
So go directly there.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Mark S. Bilk)
Subject: Re: Windows is a sickness. Unix is the cure.
Date: 18 Mar 2000 21:35:39 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
Donn Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>[EMAIL PROTECTED], net wrote:
>>
>> Excellent book!
>>
>> I got a real kick out of that GreenBlatt guy.
>>
>> Steve
>
>Check this posting out. First, the name in the headers is
>"heather69". Then, the person signs it "Steve". Steve, you'll have
>to get a newsguy account or something. With newsguy, people can only
>trace your posting back to Newsguy's servers (which is newsdawg,
>iirc), and not to your ISP.
Steve/Mike/Heather/8-million-stories-in-the-Naked-City has
such a distinctive style and one-track mind that he could post
from an account in Outer Mongolia and we'd know it was him.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Stewart Honsberger)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.networking,comp.os.linux.misc
Subject: Re: Salary?
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sat, 18 Mar 2000 22:09:01 GMT
On 18 Mar 2000 17:57:31 GMT, Donovan Rebbechi wrote:
>>I have the same stand-point on this issue as Howard Stern. I heard him, one
>>morning, talking about the Bill Gates scholarship for "minorities". Howard
>>complained that this was rediculous, and that some minorities had more
>>money than they knew what to do with so "Why not just give it to poor people?
>>There are poor white people out there too, y'know!"
>
>Howard Stern is an ass.
How very tactfully put.
>You would have been wiser not to cite him.
Why, because you don't agree with him?
>I won't flame the illiteracy in this post
Again, quite tactful.
>I will assume that you are merely faithfully conveying Mr Stern's ignorance.
You mean you disagree? You believe that advantages should be given to
a person merely because of their skin colour? Isn't that the basis of
racism in the first place?
>Helping poor white people isn't going to help minority communities obviously.
When did I say that poor white people are the only ones who should be
helped? I was merely stating that assistance should be given to those
in need, rather than those with a particular skin colour.
Racism, just as sexism, are both two way streets. It is my belief that
we as a society are over-compensating for years of injustice. I say the
playing field should be leveled - and those with the ambition to succeed
in life should be helped along the way; irregardless of background or
skin colour.
--
Stewart Honsberger (AKA Blackdeath) @ http://sprk.com/blackdeath/
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Remove 'thirteen' to reply privately)
Humming along under SuSE Linux 6.0 / OS/2 Warp 4
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (The Ghost In The Machine)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.networking,comp.os.linux.misc
Subject: Re: Salary?
Date: Sat, 18 Mar 2000 22:12:45 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Donovan Rebbechi <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote on 18 Mar 2000 17:58:59 GMT <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>On Sat, 18 Mar 2000 16:00:43 GMT, Stewart Honsberger wrote:
>>On Thu, 16 Mar 2000 22:08:18 +0100, Matthias Warkus wrote:
>>>what is affirmative action again?
>>
>>"White males need not apply."
>
>Bullshit. Then again, what can we expect from someone who cites Howard
>Stern in his arguments ?
"Argument by kielbasa"? :-)
[.sigsnip]
ObLinux: Does Howard Stern use Linux anywhere in his organization?
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED] -- or was that "argument by private parts"?
------------------------------
From: Roger <roger@.>
Crossposted-To:
comp.sys.mac.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: which OS is best?
Date: Sat, 18 Mar 2000 22:07:52 GMT
On Thu, 16 Mar 2000 18:49:57 GMT, someone claiming to be JEDIDIAH
wrote:
>On Thu, 16 Mar 2000 03:52:33 GMT, Roger <roger@.> wrote:
>>On Wed, 15 Mar 2000 17:41:38 GMT, someone claiming to be JEDIDIAH
>>wrote:
>>> OS/2 : Forced IBM to not preload their own OS. This
>>> was is a matter of public trial record.
>>Then it should be no effort at all for you to post reputable citations
>>that MS somehow forbade IBM from preloading OS/2.
> This is just a convient way to avoid addressing something
> that recieved quite a bit of press attention. Although, there
> is likely a specific cite to all the things I mentioned buried
> in this group within the dejanews archive.
No, this a way to avoid having to back up a statement that * you *
made.
>>Here's a hint: IBM did such a preload. It didn't sell.
> That's funny, Ralph Nader couldn't seem to get IBM to
> preload OS/2 for him. This was also well covered in
> the computing press at that time.
Very recently. IBM * did * preload OS/2 shortly after the split, and
those boxes did * not * sell
>>> Desqview/drdos : Forced OEMs into contracts that charged
>>> for ANY machine that was sold regardless
>>> of whether or not it went out with MS product.
>>> Public record: first DOJ consent decree against MS.
>>These per-processor agreements were initiated by the OEMs to simplify
>>accounting, and the DOJ agreed that no harm had come to the industry
>>because of them.
> Who's talking out their ass now?
Deja appears to be having problems this afternoon, remind me and I'll
get the ciite later.
>>> They sat on their asses from 1985 to 1995 not bothering
>>> to fully exploit the IA32 instruction set and not
>>> bothering to fully deploy gui based systems.
>>Hmmn. I must have imagined Windows 3.1 and NT.
> Windows 3.1 came out in the 90's and was still primitive
> when compared to earlier rivals.
And the 90's were not in your timeline of '85 to '95? Interesting.
And "primitive" was not your claim. You said "failed to deploy." You
were wrong.
> Furthermore, NT was never
> offered as an alternative for the bulk of consumer users.
Which supports "failed to deploy" ... how?
> Today, end users are specifically being discouraged from
> using NT5 .
MS is not specifically discouraging users from W2K, just \saying that
it is not for everyone -- which it is not.
>>>>Please explain how they rammed anything down your throats.
>>> They conspire like Coreleone's to make it impossible to choose
>>> anything else. Part of it is a fundemental nature of intellectal
>>> monopolies. Part of it is legal manuvering specifically intended
>>> to prevent other companies from doing business.
>>>
>>> Undermining any other company's ability to derive a revenue stream
>>> from http clients while being able to fund the development of their
>>> own client, force bundled with the natural monopoly product they use
>>> to fund that development.
>>Not to mention the black helicopters...
> Your weak attempt at attacking the messenger is not useful here.
So, you can support your contention that MS has put a horse's head in
Ray Nooda's bed?
------------------------------
From: Jeremy Randall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Can I do this with Linux?
Date: Sat, 18 Mar 2000 14:34:32 -0800
Have you looked at MySQL. Great open source database [manager], used on
sites like freshmeat.net. Run it with Apache, Perl (and the appropriate
modules) and you could build a web-front end for your users.
Jeremy
Bruce Loving wrote:
> I have a busnessman who wants to set up a database and have
> 4-10 users updating it simultaneously.
> I could do it using NT Server, MSSQL and VB6 but he
> wants to go cheap.
> Can I use Linux and dumb terminals or what?
> What programming language would be best for writing the user interface
> programs?
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Matthias Warkus)
Subject: Re: An Illuminating Anecdote
Date: Sat, 18 Mar 2000 23:40:03 +0100
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
It was the 18 Mar 2000 22:15:44 +0100...
...and Stefan Ohlsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >For example, the Microsoft C Compiler, which is a Windows application,
> >and by your claim is programmed using careless software engineering
> >by programmers who do not know what they are doing using primitive
> >development tools, produces code which is demonstrably approximately
> >20% faster than GCC, which is a Unix programmed and developed using
> >Unix principles. How do you explain this?
> >
> Well, one guess would be that hte MS compiler has more work put in to it,
> more time and obviously more money. The programmers working for MS do it for
> a living and don't have to set free time aside to tweak performance. They get
> paid for it.
The Microsoft C Compiler is single-platform. gcc supports pretty much
everything in the known universe that accidentally happens to contain
a CPU.
Work on gcc back-ends gets spread thinly.
mawa
--
Echtnichttollfinder!
Sitzplatzerkämpfer!
Neuwagenschoner!
Leiserülpser!
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (abraxas)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Windows 2000: virus haven
Date: 18 Mar 2000 23:06:28 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy Erik Funkenbusch <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> rm_rupert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>> Windows 2000: closed source virus haven. Why oh why, would any
>> company in their right mind want this OS for doing business?
>> http://cnn.com/2000/TECH/computing/03/17/melting.worm.idg/index.html
> This is being called a worm rather than a virus. Viruses infect other
> files. This doesn't, it just transmits itself.
With the help of exceedingly poorly concieved and executed microsoft
software.
> Worms are possible on any OS. Are you forgetting the most famous worm in
> history? The Morris Internet Worm from the late 80's which brought the net
> to it's knees?
Write one that breaks linux--*without* user knowledge. Just like the one
stated above.
I'll just wait right here while you open up Visual C++ and get clicking.
=====yttrx
------------------------------
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