Linux-Advocacy Digest #110, Volume #27 Fri, 16 Jun 00 00:13:10 EDT
Contents:
Re: An Example of the Superiority of Windows vs Linux (The Ghost In The Machine)
Re: Run Linux on your desktop? Why? I ask for proof, not advocacy lies....
(R.E.Ballard ( Rex Ballard ))
Re: What UNIX is good for. (David M. Cook)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (The Ghost In The Machine)
Subject: Re: An Example of the Superiority of Windows vs Linux
Date: Fri, 16 Jun 2000 03:07:20 GMT
In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Aaron Kulkis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote on Thu, 15 Jun 2000 21:18:47 -0400 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
>Craig Kelley wrote:
[snip]
>> Of course, the corresponding Win32 program takes up 5 pages of
> ^^^^^
>Lose32
Now now, let's not insult the protocol. Even if it does do
palettes in a peculiar manner [*], requires that a user register
a window class before actually opening a window, includes unrelated
crap such as "MulDiv()" (????), thinks in terms of thunks because of the
32-16 bit backward compatibility and horrible segmenting issues of
the ix86 processor, takes 10 (?) parameters to create a process when
none are really needed, can't handle a hung process properly [+],
doesn't know network transparency from a hole in the wall, is
restricted to at most three processor types (one of which is no
longer officially supported, and the other which is probably better
off running MacOS or Linux :-) ) and is different between WinCE, Win3.1,
Win95, Win98, Win98SE, WinNT3.51, WinNT4, and Win2K. :-)
Then again...hmm...maybe we *should* insult the protocol.... :-)
At least X11R6 doesn't mutate from Unix to Unix (although there are
different extensions).
I also don't know if Windows handles passive mousebutton window
grabbing properly -- in X, if you ask for both button down and
button up, you'll *get* button down *and* button up for the *same*
window. Guaranteed. (On Linux, this works even if the user presses
two buttons; the second button goes to the same window as the first.
When both buttons are released, only then is the grab neutralized.)
And I hate the behavior of the scrollbars in Windows -- move the cursor
too far, and the button snaps back. (But that's apparently a matter
of taste.)
[rest snipped]
[*] Win32 has built-in dithering. While this is kind of nice, it
also means that one may have to exercise care in certain
situations during programming, in order to maximize performance.
[+] a process in X11R6 which isn't responding to user events such as
mouse presses or keyclicks can be iconified out of the way
if necessary. A process with a window on Windows NT or Win95 will
not allow that window to be moved, iconified, or resized, if
the process hasn't taken special care to have the message handling
in a separate thread from the computations. This is one of
the uglier warts of Windows.
--
[EMAIL PROTECTED] -- Win32. Linux64.
------------------------------
From: R.E.Ballard ( Rex Ballard ) <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Run Linux on your desktop? Why? I ask for proof, not advocacy lies....
Date: Fri, 16 Jun 2000 03:04:45 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> So exactly how is Linux going to unseat
> the already 90 or more percent
> of home/SOHO/desktop users from Windows
By getting the OEMs to install BOTH Linux AND Windows on
the machines they manufacture, before they are shipped.
Hard drives have to be replicated anyway, a few extra seconds
for 10% more value is worth it. Linux machines typically cost
10-20% more than Windows-only machines, with much lower royalties.
> and entice them into running Linux?
When the machine boots, the user will have the option of booting
Windows or Linux. When they boot Windows, they will have the option of
starting Windows applications from within Linux. Sure, not every single
application will work exactly the way it does on native Windows (the
system won't crash, burn, hang, and die if the application goes nuts),
but most of the software (including most of the software no longer
supported by Microsoft) should run reasonably well.
> How about Office suites?
>
> Sure StarOffice is free, it is free
> for Windows users also but
> virtually nobody uses it. Why is that?
StarOffice is one of several office suites available for
Linux, and one of several Office suites available for both
Linux and Windows.
StarOffice is written in Java, eats a great deal of memory, and
runs all applications under a single MDI. Some people like that,
I don't.
WordPerfect for Office is also available for Linux and Windows. The
import/export features leave a bit to be desired, but you can publish
pretty sharp documents that can be read by Microsft Office.
Furthermore, you can export documents from Office into standard
formats that work pretty well for other suites.
Most of the native Microsoft Office formats shouldn't be used for
interorganizational circulation anyway. The risks of Microviruses,
Stealth viruses, and Trojan Horses is far higher with Microsoft Office
formats than with more conventional formats.
There is also Applix, which has very nice import/export
capability, can be customized to suit user's tastes, and
has been configured to look and feel so much like Microsoft
Office that it's hard to remember which you are using.
> MSOffice carries a hefty price
> tag but is still the standard by
> which all office suites are gauged.
> Why is that?
Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that despite
the best efforts of the DOJ, Microsoft has managed to put
either Microsoft Works or Microsoft Office on nearly every
PC manufactured before it is shipped by the OEM. Furthermore,
Microsoft only charges a modest $300 (MSRP) for the upgrade
from Works to Office, which makes it a Bargain compared to
the $600 MSRP that only fools and Consultants on the road
who have forgotten their Office CD-ROMS and have just had
Windows blow away their disk drive - - would pay for.
> Figure it out for yourself.
What's to figure. The user has the choice of using the "complimentary"
copy of Works/Office and using the proprietary Office-only libraries
embedded in the Windows Operating system (reducing the Office
footprint to less than 60 meg) or paying $100 for Lotus SmartSuite
or $200 for WordPerfect Office, having to install it by hand,
and having to make room for the libraries used by these applications
(because the ISVs can't trust Micrsoft not to hack it's own libraries
without giving proper notice.
This is one of the reasons that Microsoft is convicted of criminal
charges, it's executives have already committed criminal contempt of
court, and it's executives are now at risk of facing further sanctions.
Microsoft offers notepad - which drove brief, emacs, and vi off the
Windows platforms as text editors. Do you actually want to maintain
that Notepad is better than Brief? You've probably never used it,
you've never had the chance, and you don't even care. Linux has 30
outstanding text editors, including commercial versions.
> How about hardware support.
Let's talk about that.
> Still using that Daisywheel printer?
> Dot-Matrix job you bought at an IBM fleamarket?
I do still have a dot matrix in storage, but I don't use it.
I used to use it with Ghostscript to print postscript files
that I wanted to proof before printing it on the laser printer
at work.
> I doubt it. Today's PC's come with state of the art
> hardware built in to the system.
A PC with a built in printer - what, the Coleco Adam? :-)
Today's PC's come with hardware built to Microsoft's specifications.
Microsoft pushes IDE over SCSI, so you settle for a slower buggier
hard drive.
Microsoft pushes USB over Fire-Wire so you get a slower peripheral bus.
Microsoft pushes Pentium/PCI so you get slower more expensive chips.
Microsoft pushes Winmodems, so you dedicate 30% of your processor to
feeding a dac and sucking an adc.
Microsoft pushes SVGA so you don't get an HDTV display.
Microsoft pushes proprietary file formats so you can't read
Postscript, LaTeX, SGML or DVI documents.
Microsoft pushes DirectX, so you don't get real-time VRML.
Microsoft pushes Powerpoint, so you don't get CGM.
It's not even that you don't have access to these formats, it's
only that Microsoft wants you to use formats, protocols, hardware,
and peripherals that only Microsoft could love.
Microsoft doesn't care about security, in fact they want to be able
to meter your PC usage so they can target which competitors to kill-off
next.
As a result:
You get DHCP, which makes it much harder to trace a malevolent hack
to the source.
You get Office Attachments - which make it easier to send viruses,
bugs, and trojan horses.
You get VBScript attachments - which makes it easer to do anything
to the hard drive and the registry.
Windows is hacker heaven, because Microsoft tells the OEMs to disable
all of the most secure settings, in the end user's best interest.
Many large Fortune 500 customers don't even trust OEMs to configure
the machines any more - they'd rather have it done by after-market
vendors who can "Lock Down" the configurations.
> Sure some of it (modem?) might be Win
> hardware, but who really cares? It works...
On a windows 98 machine, designed to do nothing but serve the
interactive needs of a single user, the winmodem works moderately
well with a 200 Mhz Pentium or better. You forfeit DMA channels
(that you could be using for your SCSI or Fire-Wire drive), Interrupts,
and IO ports.
On Windows NT, the winmodem becomes a pain in the neck.
> Try that same combination under Linux and see what happens.
What you are actually challenging us to compare is a Windows machine
designed for Windows against a Linux machine designed for Linux.
The Linux optimized machine would have:
SCSI or Fire-wire drives, so that additional drives could be added
(we love to store everything and search it dynamically).
USB for low-speed devices - what's the point of 100/T USB
ethernet adapter? The USB speed is slower.
Linux brought you the Full Duplex 100 mbit ethernet, and the FD 1 gig
ethernet card. Linux was using FD 100/T when Microsoft was still
trying to switch from 10base5 (coax) to 10baseT.
HDTV displays - big and wide. Linux uses X11 to set resolutions, and
the Xserver can be configured for pretty much any format display.
Stackable PCs - about the size of Zip drives. Linux users don't
replace systems, they attache the keyboard and screen to the fastest
machine and the remainder become virtual machines under X11,
application servers, and file-and-print servers.
Closet cases - stick the box somewhere convenient and
forget about it. The primary box just needs to be reachable by
the keyboard and display, the remaining boxes could be hidden
in a closet or a nice cool basement somewhere.
> How about all that fine software that was included with the price of
> your Walmart special PC. Guess what!! It won't work with Linux!!!!
What did you get. Works? A third-rate crippled spread-sheet, a
marginally functional word processor, a stripped down presentation
tool, and a few other crippled interfaces to the OLE/COM libararies
that were bundled with Windows. Too bad Microsoft keeps breaking those
libraries (making changes to the libraries that require at least a
recompile of the application).
Notepad? A fine example of a text editor - barely equivalent to xedit,
no macros, no configurability, no mass processing capabilities, and no
compatibility with other formats. Try editing that word .doc file under
notepad and see what word gives you when you're finished.
We have Paint. A fine example of a brain-dead tutorial program
that can't even deal with GIF files.
And Imaging, another brain-dead classic that has a hard time creating
useful JPEG files.
Doom, there's a career builder. Mom sure can't wait to get you
that computer so that you can get an A+ in Doom, Quake, and Solitaire.
In which grade are these subjects taught?
> So you have to try and acquire equivalent versions of everything near
> and dear to you.
There are about 1500 packages in the Mandrake 7.1 release, including
a number of "try before you buy" commercial applications. Granted,
it would take a store the size of CompUSA to put each one in a pretty
little VHS sized box, but then again, CompUSA charges about $200/cubic
foot per month for floor space. A few dozen "Linux Distributions"
and some really good compression and installation software requires
much less floor space. Of course, if YOU want to pay gigabucks to
sell a single-function application (because you've sold a few million
copies via the distribution CD-ROM and on-line registration/upgrade),
there might be a big market.
To get your product onto the floor of CompUSA costs about $1 million
per month in advertizing, co-op, floor space rental, and customer
support. Most Linux CEOs seem more interested in mergers and
aquisitions than paying rent to Microsoft-Centric retailers.
Last month, I actually went to a CompUSA and spent 3 minutes talking
with a CompUSA staffer who actually knew about Linux. But he had
to cut the conversation short because there was a guy looking at
the laptops. The floor people get commissions on the big-ticket
items, but they don't get anything for the shrink-wrapped boxes.
When we start to see Linux sitting on Laptops and Desktop machines
displayed in CompUSA and offering double the commissions, you'll see
CompUSA salesmen turning into rabid Linux pushers.
> Let's talk ISP's.
>
> Talk to Earthlink, Worldnet, FreeWeb, AOL, Compuserv and see what they
> think of Linux.
No problem with Earthlink, Worldnet, and MCI (though you do have to
set the MSChap option). Many ISPs don't like dealing with Linux
users because we stay on much longer. In some cases, our laptops
double as servers, our scripts can suck down data fast enough to keep
the bandwidth 100% occupied (because the desired pages can be sucked
down, cached, and read off-line). We also have squid which can do
read-ahead and write-behind.
They don't think much of Lynx either because it doesn't download the
banner pages (what's a text-only browser going to do with a 100kbyte
GIF file? Of course, we will follow the link the gif pointed to.
And robots. Some Linux robots are so fast and multithreaded that NT
servers think they're under a denial of service attack. It isn't to
hard to cause a DOS when the NT server is set to 10 concurrent
connections and Linux can fork 2000 concurrent queries (which it will
index later if the content appears meaningful).
> Try it yourself and see. Hint,,,,they are not happy......
Actually, they are often very happy. Linux automated preloaders
tend to make it look like there are millions of users hammering the
best parts of every advertizers pages. Sure, we don't look at the
Jpeg, but if the href points to relevant content, it bubbles up to the
front of the to-view list.
> How about Napster,
Sorry, Napster has a problem. They need to cut a deal with BMI, ASCAP,
and RIAA and provide playlists and about $10/user/month. Let them
charge the users, collect from advertisers, or sell soap during the
commercials, but they need work it out.
We went through the same problem in the early days of the Web. There
were web sites bulk loading news feeds from Dow Jones and Reuters and
offering searchable access. Once they realized that these services,
with appropriate restrictions, were available it reasonable rates,
they didn't have a problem paying for the content. And Dow Jones
still has WSJIE.
> Digital Audio,
Ever heard of IRC-II? Linux/Unix was doing streaming audio back when
Windows 3.1 was still trying to figure out how to run a TCP/IP
stack without blowing up on a 19.2k modem.
> Digital Video
Ever heard of MPEG? Guess who first started delivering
that format via IRC-II. Granted, it was mostly porno, and
most of the viewers were slow and quiet (sound on Sun SparcStations
left a lot to be desired). But later we delivered QuickTime to Macs.
RealAudio makes a better player, it caches for enough ahead to
deal with most of the bumps and grinds of Windows.
Linux plays MPEG video very smoothly, because the Linux scheduler
is much more sophisticated and doesn't leave the video player starved
while it tries to garbage collect for an interrupt handler.
> and so forth.
> Think the best programs and hardware are supported under Linux?
Actually, they are supported under UNIX! And from UNIX to Linux
is a very short hop.
UNIX workstations like the Indy dispay 4096x4096 (or thereabouts)
CAD and 3-d rendering are done in near-real-time at about 3
frames/minute (faster if you have a beowulf cluster in the back room).
UNIX is used in many video recording studios for digital editing and
visual effects (at one time it was the only system capable of real-time
capture | compress).
Some of the UNIX workstations used in Military installations, network
management centers, and critical control systems manage near-real-time
input signals at nearly 200 megabytes/second mean data rates on a 24/7
basis. They're providing real-time sampling, analysis, feedback, and
reporting that can be used to identify a link failure half a continent
away, out of 2 million links.
> Think again....
Think again.
You think because Microsoft spends $4 billion a year on advertising,
much of it focused on supressing the publication of UNIX related
research and innovation, that Microsoft is the only company who
produces any innovations?
Here's the bad news. Microsoft got most of it's "Innovations" from
the UNIX community.
Microsoft was still pushing MS-DOS 3.3 when UNIX was delivering
multi-window multitasking.
Microsoft was still trying to steal Mac technology when UNIX was
delivering multi-user-multi-window multitasking.
Microsoft was still using Busy-wait in Windows 3.1 when Linux was
delivering full-function fast switching preemptive multitasking at
100,000 context switches per second.
Microsoft was still trying to effectively function as a file and print
server (2 trivial applications) to 20 users when Linux was supporting
200 application-server users who routinely used as many as 20
applications concurrently.
Microsoft was still trying to get Windows 2000 to run reliably using
clever tricks, apartment threading, and object poors when Linux was
running 99.995% uptimes on nearly 10 million servers.
Linux was providing muli-user remote access to users who remotely
accessed multiple systems and providing managible desktops back
when Microsoft was still trying to support remote access by a single
user using PCanywhere, Citrix, and SMS. Early versions wouldn't even
let you access multiple servers.
> Windows has all the major players
Right now, Microsoft has Microsoft! Who else?
Some game manufacturers who offer free virtual machines for Linux
over the internet but can't put them in the shrink wrapped boxes
because Microsoft will pull the plug on support if they include
both in the same CD-ROM?
Symantic - but they are now making more money providing
covert Linux support than they make selling bandaids for Windows.
How about vendors?
Borland/Inprise - better off with Linux.
Sun/JavaSoft - better off with Linux.
IBM - better off with Linux.
Corel - better off with Linux
WordPerfect - see Corel.
> and Linux has nothing but a pile of
> promises.
And Microsoft ISN'T?
When was Windows NT 5.0 supposed to Come out? 1998?
When NT was first announced, it was? 1992?
It was supposed to be a "Better UNIX than UNIX"!
Cheaper - Linux killed that!
More reliable - Win2K is more reliable than Slackware 2.1
Faster - only if you tune the NT system to the bencharks and
tune the benchmarks against Linux's "default configuration".
More useful - most people spend most of their time today on UNIX
and Linux systems - via the web browser than they do on
Windows. And that's just the tip of the iceburg of what's
possible with Linux to UNIX.
More secure - even with B2 security settings, the entire security
system can be undermined with a trivial mail attachment,
a seemingly innocent web-site, or a "push" message
containing ActiveX or COM objects.
An Open System - posix compliant. Not even close an they don't
care! If you purchase the NT resource kit, you can
get Posix level one compatibility with a number of
qualifiers (no fork, no IPC, no functional shell...).
But then again, Microsoft has always been the master of vaporware.
Remember when MS-DOS 4.0 was going to have true multi-tasking?
It was finally delivered in NT 4.0 10 years later!
> Come to think about it Linux is all about promises and no
> deliveries....
That's unusually funny since Linux is notorious for it's
"release early and often" strategy. 80% of the time, it's
the user community that say's "It's done, call it release 1.0
so I can get it funded already".
GNOME and KDE were released less than 3 months after Linus requested
that the developer community take on going after the desktop!
Most of the time, the vendors don't even announce the new features
until AFTER it has been made generally available.
There have even been cases where features are "Discovered" because
they weren't considered important, but people ask a question and the
answer "It's already in there" makes headline news.
Actually, we should be grateful to Microsoft for circulating it's
"Linux is a brain-dead text-only buggy system written by college
drop-outs".
Because then it's HEADLINE NEWS when people discover that Linux has
a much more powerful graphical user interface than windows (more
features, better performance, remote access, custom look and feel,
tunable performance, and all available at the push of a drop-down
menu button - when you start XDM for the graphical log-in).
It's headline news when somebody successfully hacks into a UNIX
system! People hack DOS attacks against NT servers by accident.
In fact, when almost ANY significant UNIX server system fails,
it's headline news. It just doesn't happen that often.
When an NT server fails, it's not even a big event to the support
team - it's "After you reboot #47, could you reboot #32. The numbers
make the servers easier to find.
> Point is there is absolutely no reason to run Linux on your desktop
> unless you are too cheap to buy a real operating system.
He's right about that!
Nobody has to run Linux on their desktop. But the people who are
interested in having the benifits of a privately managed ISP
application server that isn't likely to be viewed by any tom dick and
mary who is a member of the "Administrators" group at the ISP. It's
not going to be read while it's drives become a public share to the
backup system.
If you don't care about privacy, security, reliability, performance,
flexibility, compliance with standards including state, federal, and
international laws and communications standards - and you don't need
any of those features, you shouldn't bother with UNIX.
One can only asume
You are like the following Microsoft Lover:
I like having my competitors read my e-mail, share my hard drives,
and my boss loves the x-rated GIFs I've stored on my personal laptop.
I don't mind if the guy who's competing with me for a promotion,
or a critical business deal gets into my computer with a spy-virus
that lets him see things that might knock me out of the running or
give him critical leverage.
I count on Windows crashing at LEAST once a day. After all,
he can't tell whether I'm goofing off, or whether my machine
really is just as buggy as his.
I don't mind spending $5000 every two years to get the same level
of basic effective performance that I got last year. It took
10 minutes to display the web page on Win3.1 with Mosaic on a 9600
feed in 1994, why shouldn't it take 10 minutes to display the same
basic information on Windows 2000 over a DSL line on a system which
has a 1000 times faster processor, a 2000 times faster video chip,
a 200 times faster hard drive, and 500 times more RAM. After all,
Memory and MIPS are cheap - right?
I love the Windows 9x interface. Hey, I used the Windows 3.1
interface for 6 years and never complained. Maybe I'll like the
one they come up with in 2002.
I never send anything to anybody electronically. It's too fast. If
you send it electronically, they'll be able to read the product,
review it, and ask for another revision by lunch-time. I'm smart,
I spend the whole afternoon getting it to look perfect so that I
can print it on my printer and mail it. If I'm really in a hurry
I can send it Federal Express.
Since I keep paper copies of everything, I never have to worry about
trying to find it on my computer. I print it up, give it to my
secretary, and then I can erase the electronic version. Besides,
who wants to look at some memo I sent to a customer two years ago.
If I can't find it tomorrow, Sue Me!
Who the hell wants to be on the Internet, it's nothing but a bunch
of college kids, dead-beats, and hackers. Ain't nobody going to
make any money on the Internet. Everybody knows that the smart
money is on Novell for LANS, Prodigy for dial-up, and Microsoft
Exchange for wide area networks. I got a great idea, let's send
the entire Wall Street Journal to every AOL, Prodigy, and Compuserve
user in Word format via Exchange - we'll make a FORTUNE!
I am quoting a former supervisor who loved Microsfot so much he
bet is job on the success of Exchange, and lost. He's now consulting
part-time as a web developer, using Linux.
> And again, isn't your time worth something?
Yes it is! I've spent almost 1000 hours band-aiding, recovering,
and rebuilding Microsoft Windows systems - THIS YEAR. And my
Billable rate is $280 an hour. Since I couldn't bill the customer,
Microsoft owes me $280,000 for this year and $4 million for lost
time over the last 15 years.
Furthermore, I typically generate $1000 in "bottom line impact" for
each dollar I'm paid. This means that Microsoft owes my clients
(30 of them Fortune 50 companies) $1 billion in bottom line impact.
Fortunately, I work 60 hours a week, not including time spent posting
to newsgroups, mailing lists, discussion/feedbacks, and my web site
so I don't think they noticed.
> Run Windows and come home to the family......
The Mansons?
--
Rex Ballard - Open Source Advocate, Internet
I/T Architect, MIS Director
http://www.open4success.com
Linux - 90 million satisfied users worldwide
and growing at over 5%/month!
Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (David M. Cook)
Crossposted-To: comp.unix.advocacy
Subject: Re: What UNIX is good for.
Date: 16 Jun 2000 03:17:23 GMT
On 15 Jun 2000 10:56:18 -0500, Tim Palmer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>UNIX is very good at shuffelling text aroumd. LinoNuts call that
"powerfull". I call it >"pointless".
Is there a point to your ridiculous spelling and formatting?
Dave Cook
------------------------------
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