Linux-Advocacy Digest #608, Volume #29 Wed, 11 Oct 00 21:13:04 EDT
Contents:
Re: Gutless Wonder ("David T. Johnson")
Re: Advocacy NGs == Trollvilles
Re: Why is MS copying Sun??? ("Simon Cooke")
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "David T. Johnson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.os2.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy
Subject: Re: Gutless Wonder
Date: Wed, 11 Oct 2000 17:24:03 -0400
"." wrote:
>
> In comp.os.linux.advocacy David T. Johnson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> > "." wrote:
> >>
> >>
> >> Please suck me and quit crossposting to groups that dont give a shit
> >> about your petty-fag insinuated threats.
> >>
> > Your words are as empty as your tag. Coward.
>
> "tag"?
>
> Ahem. Come get me, bitch.
>
Where are you, coward?
------------------------------
From: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Advocacy NGs == Trollvilles
Date: Thu, 12 Oct 2000 00:24:12 GMT
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> skrev i meddelandet
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Cannon Fodder <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>
. Does it come with a sticker that says "Microsoft GNU/Linux"?
> That in itself would be worth the price of a few CDs.
bear truth to my words...(or something like that ;))
a MSLinux is not far away... ;)
------------------------------
From: "Simon Cooke" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.lang.java.advocacy
Subject: Re: Why is MS copying Sun???
Date: Wed, 11 Oct 2000 17:38:42 -0700
"Weevil" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:Iz6F5.122$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Even the rumors that MS might be engaging in this underhanded (and
illegal)
> activity served their purpose. Whether it was intentional or not, the
> reasoning went, it's still better to stay away from DR DOS.
>
> It was a year later before it was finally proven that there had never been
> any errors or incompatibilities at all between DR DOS and Windows. By
then,
> though, their cute little FUD campaign had done all the damage it needed
to
> do. DRI was dead in the water, and Gates & Co were again free to charge
as
> much as the market would bear.
>
> And then, as now, Microsoft had apologists all over the place. So you
would
> have had lots of company back then, too.
As you have lots of company now, Mr. FUDspinner.
BTW; here's the official Microsoft line on it, from Dr. Dobb's Journal,
Jan94, Letters.
"
Dear DDJ,
The lawyers have finally given me the green light to describe why the MS-DOS
detection code discussed in the article "Examining the Windows AARD
Detection Code" by Andrew Schulman (DDJ, September 1993) was in the
Christmas beta. I hope you will keep an open mind, listen to the truth, and
accept it. It may not make such good press, but sometimes the truth is like
that.
It has never been a practice of this company to deliberately create
incompatibilities between Microsoft system software and the system software
of other OS publishers. I am not aware of any instance where Microsoft
intentionally created an incompatibility between Windows and DR DOS. Windows
is tightly coupled to the underlying MS-DOS operating system. It relies on a
number of very precise behavioral characteristics of MS-DOS which have
nothing to do with the Int 21h API. Because of this tight coupling, an
MS-DOS imitation must have exactly the proper behavior, or all sorts of
subtle and not-so-subtle problems will occur, including data loss.
Microsoft does not test Windows on anything other than Microsoft's MS-DOS.
We don't have the development or testing resources, nor do we consider it
our job to test Windows on other systems. If you're the developer of an
MS-DOS imitation, you shouldn't expect your main competitor to do your work
for you. If Windows works on your imitation, it works; if it doesn't, it's
your problem to fix. That may not give you, Andrew, the warm and fuzzies,
but this is business, not a giveaway.
During the developing of Win 3.1, a great deal of thought was given to ways
to reduce the high support burden associated with Windows. During the betas,
we got a few bug reports about Windows not working correctly on some of the
MS-DOS imitations. So it seemed like a very small portion of the market
might have problems running Win 3.1 on something other than genuine MS-DOS.
In order to be fair and up-front with them, we considered that it might be a
good idea to let them know--before they encountered problems or even data
loss--that they were running Win 3.1 on a system we hadn't tested. The
intended purpose of this disclosure message was to protect the customer and
reduce the product-support burden arising from the use of Windows on
untested systems. The plan was to include an "off switch" in the commercial
release that the end user could use to prevent the message from being
redisplayed every time Windows was run.
In order to preserve the option of putting a disclosure message in the
commercial release of Win 3.1, some MS-DOS detection code was implemented
and inserted into the relevant modules of the "Christmas" beta. This code
only detected the presence of MS-DOS; it did not detect any competing OS.
The wording of the message that was displayed if something other than MS-DOS
was detected in the Christmas beta has been the subject of accusatory
speculation. Our intention for the final release was to warn the user that
Windows (and that includes all Windows components) is being run on a system
we have not tested. The message in the beta, however, was carefully crafted
to produce a desired effect. Since this code was inserted very late in the
development schedule, we were very concerned about making sure it worked
properly, and especially that it did not have "false positives," i.e., that
it did not "misfire" when there really was genuine MS-DOS underneath. As a
result, we wanted to make sure that anytime it triggered, the beta tester
would call us so we could follow up and confirm that the code was reliably
detecting MS-DOS, or if instead it was returning false positives. In fact,
the message says to contact the Win 3.1 beta support.
The language of the message was not alarming; it did not mention the nature
of the "nonfatal error" nor the name of any competitor. Moreover, the
message either disappeared in a matter of seconds or with a single
keystroke. Nor did the message stop Windows from running.
Of course the code was concealed. This should not be surprising at all. If
it can be easily circumvented by an imitation (which I remind you we haven't
tested against), then its purpose has been defeated.
Neither the detection and concealment code nor the nonfatal-error message
created any incompatibility with DR DOS.
Prior to the March 9, 1992 RTM date for Win 3.1, we decided not to include
the disclosure message in the commercial release of the product because we
didn't want to run the risk that it would be misinterpreted and thus divert
attention from the new features of Windows 3.1. We were in a tough
competitive battle with OS/2 and wanted the attention focused on the great
new features of Win 3.1, rather than artificial "controversy" whipped up by
the press or our competitors.
In fact, the planned disclosure message was never coded into the product.
Because this decision was made so late in the development cycle, and we
didn't want to risk introducing instability into the product, we left the
detection and concealment code and the nonfatal-
error message in the product, but disabled it from printing onscreen. As a
technical person, Andrew, you know that a NO-OP is a NO-OP. Even though the
code remains in Win 3.1 in a "quiescent" state, the fact remains that no
messages are printed. You insinuate that we could somehow, sometime "turn it
on." How? ESP? Remote control? If we could get people to execute a patch
that would turn the code on, we could certainly figure out a way to patch
the whole thing in.
Finally, the detection and concealment code and the nonfatal-error message
code have been stripped out of the versions of Windows currently under
development. That's the story. Surely not as interesting or controversial as
you or others would have people believe, but it's what really happened.
Brad Silverberg, Vice President
Microsoft Corp.
Redmond, Washington"
Here's stuff from a 1998 Editorial:
"According to Microsoft e-mail subpoenaed by the government and reviewed by
the WSJ, the AARD code was the result of an orchestrated plan in which,
according to a Microsoft response published by DDJ in January 1994 and
reiterated in the WSJ article, Microsoft hoped "to help reduce product
support costs by determining whether 3.1 was running on a version of DOS for
which it had been tested." Whatever.
In fairness, it should be repeated that the AARD code was only present in
the "Christmas" beta release, and not included in shipping versions of
Windows 3.1. If you're interested, both our AARD article and Microsoft's
response are available at
http://www.ddj.com/ddj/1993/1993_09/9309d/9309d.htm and
http://www.ddj.com/ddj/1994/1994_01/9409o/9409o.htm, respectively. "
And frankly, working for a company which receives support calls, and having
dealt with others' technical support, this is a typical industry manoever;
they don't provide support on anything other than what they stick on the
box. If you're not running the certified system, you lose the support.
Note that the exact text of the message was:
"Non-fatal error detected; error #4D53;
(please contact Windows 3.1 beta support)
Press Enter to Continue"
Does this say that Dr.DOS caused it?
Does it say that anything won't work with it?
No, it just says, and I quote: Please contact Windows 3.1 beta support.
Simon
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