Linux-Advocacy Digest #239, Volume #31 Thu, 4 Jan 01 11:13:04 EST
Contents:
Re: Why Hatred? (T. Max Devlin)
Re: Profitability of Linux being a challenge (*)
auto run (ZippiZ)
Re: Could only... ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Re: Could only... ([EMAIL PROTECTED])
Re: Red hat becoming illegal? (chrisv)
Almost 60% Surveyed Plan To Install Windows 2000 (Larry R)
Re: Microsoft hurts the reputation of software engineers. ("Walter Hill")
Re: Uptimes (Craig Kelley)
Linux can be made unstable, too. (Donn Miller)
Re: Uptimes (Craig Kelley)
Re: Why NT? (Craig Kelley)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Why Hatred?
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Thu, 04 Jan 2001 14:35:50 GMT
Said Pete Goodwin in comp.os.linux.advocacy on Mon, 1 Jan 2001 09:18:44
>Donn Miller wrote:
[...]
>> One of many problems with Windows is that it is a proprietary standard.
>
>It is strange that at a time when it appeared as though everyone was
>yelling for "open" standards and open systems, along came Windows, a
>proprietary standard and it dominated the world of home PC's.
[...]
>What I found was I could port an application from UNIX to Windows easily
>enough, and make it multitasking, multithreaded with relative ease. As for
>going back the other way, yes, I can see there would be difficulties, but
>not with standard libraries but with the more exotic libraries like video
>or audio or whatever.
>
>> I'm much more at ease knowing that I'm programming on a system that is a
>> standard.
>
>Standards can be a two edged sword. If the standard is decided by comittee,
>then it can evolve very slowly whilst other non-standard features done by
>one company can be racing ahead, leaving the standards crowd standaing. I
>think that's what happened with Windows. Because Microsoft went their own
>way, they managed to achieve a lot more - however, they also introduced a
>strange arrogant culture that may bring about their own downfall.
Actually, it might sound like I'm being a fanatic, but it appears
there's a very large amount of rather convincing evidence that it was
anti-competitive, indeed, illegal, behavior which is how, at a time when
the industry was yelling for open standards and open systems, and having
a great deal of success with it, "along came Windows", and Microsoft's
proprietary system dominated the industry.
[...]
>Linux does not have a GUI standard. It has GNOME, KDE and whole bunch of
>others. They all work differently and you can't interchange source code
>between them. If you strip away the GUI, then Windows is nothing.
You said earlier that it was all sorts of threading and multi stuff that
made re-implementing a program a breeze. And then you pointed out that
by using this proprietary system, you lock yourself into it, because
Microsoft doesn't have a good track record, shall we say, of supporting
interoperability on 'exotic' libraries like audio and video.
>> It's only natural that we programmers should choose a standard over a
>> proprietary system, which is why I like unix systems better than Windows.
>
>Why is that natural? I long recognised that standards can be a good thing
>as well as a bad one. In some cases standards like the C or C++ language
>are a good thing. However, where are the GUI standards? Microsoft did
>follow one for keystrokes, menues etc. I seem to remember IBM had a hand in
>that one. Where are the GUI standards on Linux?
You confuse the inherent benefits of proprietary products with some
vague and unsupported acceptance of a proprietary *platform* for other
products. It is natural for a programmer to choose the standard system,
because it is the most reliable and dependable way to go. Proprietary
products are OK for the proprietary features they provide, but allowing
yourself to get locked in to using them is more short-sighted than you
would expect a person capable of programming adequately to be.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
Sign the petition and keep Deja's archive alive!
http://www2.PetitionOnline.com/dejanews/petition.html
------------------------------
From: * <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,alt.linux.sux
Subject: Re: Profitability of Linux being a challenge
Date: Thu, 04 Jan 2001 14:40:06 GMT
J Sloan wrote:
> > > > well stop asserting. easily 60% of the population uses their computers for
> > > > 1 of 3 things: web browsing, game playing and entertainment, or multimedia
> > > > development.
> > >
> > > >all 3 are things linux does worst.
>
> I don't know which wintroll wrote this, but it's classic ms
> propaganda - "there is no desktop but windows"!
actually. it says who writes what at the top of a message.
you. did know that. didn't you?
if it isn't quoted you can follow the thread back to the original post in about 2
clicks.
i think you should do that and then check the header.
so you can feel as stupid as you look.
> LOL!
don't hurt yourself.
> I switched from windoze to Linux because I prefer the
> Linux environment over windows.
fair enough
> Linux rocks as a gaming platform, especially networked
> games, and the growing number of games is encouraging.
only if by 'rocks' you mean 'is gay'
if you were a serious gamer why would you ever bother with linux when it doesn't
have a fraction of the titles available for pc or even the hardware support?
> I much prefer Linux/Netscape to the pc/ie web browser.
i think it's fair to say you stand alone with this. as netscape-linux is regarded
as just about the most unstable offering of a mainstream browser on any platform.
by pretty much everyone.
> Most vendors preferred netscape as well, but microsoft
> did a good job of bullying, threatening and twisting arms
> and forced the vendors to screw netscape and preinstall
> ms ie instead. we all know what happened to netscape
> as a result: a fine and innovative company was ruined.
hm. that's interesting. i thought netscape was ruined by it's increasingly shoddy
product.
y'r pal -kK
------------------------------
From: ZippiZ <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.linux.misc
Subject: auto run
Date: Thu, 04 Jan 2001 23:14:28 +0800
I am using Turbolinux and Debian, I know the way to set the program to
autorun at startup is the rc.local in Turbolinux, but what is that in
Debian? Thanks for any suggestion!
ZippiZ
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Could only...
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: 5 Jan 2001 01:45:54 +1100
"Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>Guns are freedom and safety.
>Look at Australia...they banned guns, and the murder rate TRIPLED.
I don't know where you get your numbers from, Aaron. Certainly not from
the Australian Bureau of Statistics, which one would think is the first place
to look....
Year murders in Oz of which with firearm attempted m. with f.a.
=============================================================================
1993 300 21% 369
1994 288 26% 334
1995 321 21% 301
1996 312 335
1997 321 23.4% 318 28.3%
1998 285 19.0% 387 19.4%
1999 342[1] 358
I think the worst one can say is that murder rates didn't particularly
go *down* after the banning of guns. But it certainly didn't increase,
either, especially when you consider that between 1993 and 1999, the population
grew from 17.7 million to over 19 million.
>This indicates that private ownership of guns PREVENTS more murders
>than it causes.
Too bad that "this" isn't true, and thus "this" indicating anything means
absolutely nothing.
Bernie
[1] This includes 12 bodies discovered in an abandoned bank vault (and
on related property) which had quite clearly been dead for a long
long time.
--
The man who makes no mistakes does not usually make anything
E.J. Phelps
American diplomat
London, 24 January 1889
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Could only...
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: 5 Jan 2001 02:00:57 +1100
"Aaron R. Kulkis" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>Hint: it's not the gun that's the problem...it's the sick brain in
>control of it.
And vice versa --- it's not the sick brain that is the problem, it's
that it is in control of a gun. Cut's both ways.
On new year's eve, I was taking the Met into the city (think "local public
transport", whatever you call it where you live). I ended up right next
to a woman who was drunk beyond the point where she could even feign the
following of normal social behaviour (in other words: She was screaming
obscenities during the whole trip), as well as next to three young girls,
two of who were stoned to the point of being unaware of their surroundings.
Did I feel uncomfortable --- yes, for sure. It's no fun standing in the Met,
having booze spilled over your shoes and wondering which of those people
is about to collapse on me the next time the train brakes.
Did I feel unsafe --- no way. These people might have been way past the
point where their brains temporarily turned to mush, but that's OK. They
will wake up the next day, with one hell of a hangover, and that's that.
Later in the night, a couple of blokes were having a rather serious fist
fight right in front of me (well, it *is* Oz, and it *was* NYE, and I *was*
in city central...). At that moment, it was quite clear they hated each
other's guts and were trying to inflict as much pain as possible. Was I
annoyed? Yes, sure --- I went there to listen to the music. Was I at any
point feeling unsafe? Nope, no risk for anyone uninvolved. And apparently,
everyone else around me thought the same thing, as nobody dived for cover.
>Notice how when Australia banned guns, the murder rate TRIPLED.
No, I didn't. I live here, you don't. I looked at the statistics from
the Australian Bureau of Statistics, you didn't.
>Why? Because criminals realized that their intended victims, if
>law abiding citizens, would be unable to use enough force to
>credibly deter them.
*Laugh* You have never been to Oz, now have you?
Bernie
--
I have been underestimated for decades. I have done very well that way
Helmut Kohl
German Chancellor since 1982
------------------------------
From: chrisv <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Red hat becoming illegal?
Date: Thu, 04 Jan 2001 15:39:18 GMT
T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>Said chrisv in alt.destroy.microsoft on Wed, 03 Jan 2001 16:57:13 GMT;
>>T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>
>>>"Democrats were doing their best, at every turn, to break, manipulate,
>>>and work around the law"
>>
>>Sounds like a good summary of what was happening in Florida.
>
>Another troll heard from. Look, buddy; if you want to join in on the
>discussion, how about you review the last few days exchanges, consider
>your opinion seriously, maybe do some research, come up with a decent
>presentation, and then respond to our *positions* in a cogent and
>reasonable reply to one of the summary comments that someone has posted.
Hey, I'm just part of the audience, the jury, if you will. I've heard
the arguments written here, and I've come to a personal conclusion. I
think you're just upset that your opponents made a much better case
than you did.
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Larry R)
Subject: Almost 60% Surveyed Plan To Install Windows 2000
Date: 4 Jan 2001 15:25:40 GMT
I don't know who they surveyed, but I don't believe them. Excerpt from
Information Week email subscription:
** Almost 60% Surveyed Plan To Install Windows 2000
More than half of InformationWeek readers are either running Windows
2000, installing the Microsoft operating system, or plan to deploy
the software by the middle of this year, according to a survey of
232 IT managers. Enterprise Management Associates Inc., a market
research firm, conducted the November 2000 telephone survey of
InformationWeek subscribers who have technology or budget
responsibility for Windows 2000 in their companies.
According to the survey, due to be released in March, 13.8% of IT
departments are running Windows 2000 in production environments, and
another 9% are rolling out the operating system in production.
Microsoft shipped Windows 2000 Professional, Server, and Advanced
Server editions last February; the high-end DataCenter Server
edition shipped in August. Microsoft has said adoption of its new
server systems, among the most complex software the company has ever
delivered, will increase this year as companies complete lengthy
planning and testing cycles.
The EMA study shows that 57.3% of respondents plan to install
Windows 2000 eventually?about half of them (28.9%) within six
months. Another 19.4% say they have no plans to upgrade to the
system. Sponsors of the survey include BindView, Cognet, Computer
Associates, EDS, FastLane Technologies, Hewlett-Packard, Intel,
NetIQ, Unisys, and Veritas.
Among a narrower sample of 100 IT managers at companies with 1,000
or more employees that are either running or deploying Windows 2000,
or plan to deploy within six months, 23% of respondents say their
Windows 2000 rollouts are part of regular upgrade cycles, and 21%
say they're upgrading to achieve better system reliability. Sixteen
percent of respondents say their decision was driven by application
software that requires the new software. Other reasons cited include
staying current with industry standards and the competition (18%)
and better security (11%).
But installing Windows 2000 is expensive, IT managers say. According
to the 100 respondents with complete, current, or near-term upgrade
projects, 51% cite cost as a barrier or challenge to migration?the
No. 1 reason cited. Hardware costs are the most frequent complaint,
cited by 22% of respondents, followed by software (17%). In
addition, 39% of IT managers name difficult migration of servers as
a challenge. The most common difficulty in that case: limited
expertise on staff, cited by 15% of respondents. - Aaron Ricadela
System & Network Administrator
lrosen at att dot com
------------------------------
From: "Walter Hill" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Microsoft hurts the reputation of software engineers.
Date: Thu, 4 Jan 2001 15:50:26 -0000
mlw wrote in message <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>...
>Microsoft's lack of quality, and view that software is, at best,
>ephemeral, make all software engineers look bad.
>
>When my mom works on her computer (No commercial TAX applications for
>Linux yet.) It crashes. She hates windows, but has to use it. She says
>things to me like, "why can't they make this work right?" meaning
>software engineers in general.
>
>People say things at work like "I hate computers" right after Windows
>locks up or crashes. People view software as crap, and under Windows are
>generally correct.
>
>This "reboot your computer to fix a problem" mentality is stupid. We
>have an IT department, smart guys, but been using Microsoft too long.
>Their first response to a problem on Linux was to reboot. Slowly, they
>are coming around because they see that if something doesn't work on
>Linux, it is because of a problem, and rebooting does not make the
>problem go away.
I agree - is'nt it amazing how the first response is always to reboot. I was
amazed how intelligent, experienced and otherwise rational IT guys would
automatically suggest a reboot - and be almost bewildered by the
concept that there was no need, that a reboot really would not cure
the problem.
However, it is gratifying to watch them learning to accept that a reboot
invariably changes nothing except the uptime.....
As you may have gathered, my company is making a substantial shift
from NT to Linux and UNIX for its server requirements - not before
time in my opinion....
>
>Is Linux right for the home computer? Maybe not yet. But it is very
>acceptable for the workstation and server market. One could easily
>deploy a full Linux network infrastructure, right to the desktop, in a
>company and improve reliability and reduce costs.
>
>--
>http://www.mohawksoft.com
------------------------------
From: Craig Kelley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Uptimes
Date: 04 Jan 2001 08:50:34 -0700
"JSPL" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> Last I heard CNN had reported that amazon.com was down the day after
> Thanksgiving ( and a few other suspicious times of the year) but
> microsoft.com or any other huge and popular IIS site has never been down.
I beg to differ, microsoft.com goes down all the time -- I'll get
connection refused on one attempt and then the next attempt goes
through. Anyone can throw 60 machines into a connection pool and
claim unlimited uptime -- it says nothing about how long each
operating system gives out service.
Ditto for Apache connection pools.
Look at Slashdot -- it runs on *one* machine.
--
The wheel is turning but the hamster is dead.
Craig Kelley -- [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.isu.edu/~kellcrai finger [EMAIL PROTECTED] for PGP block
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 04 Jan 2001 10:53:21 -0500
From: Donn Miller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Linux can be made unstable, too.
Yes. Just run a lot of svgalib apps, and keep switching back and forth
between the console and XFree86. Sometimes, XFree86 totally destroys
the console video driver, and if it goes deep enough, it can also wreck
the keyboard driver as well. Note that I am always able to telnet in to
my box when XFree86 wreaks the console/keyboard, and kill XFree86.
Machine operation goes back to normal.
Unfortunately, it's just a home machine, so I have logins disabled, so I
have no choice but to press the reset button. Granted, it doesn't
happen very often (maybe once a year), but XFree86 can wreck a Linux
box. It seems like XFree86 4, 4.0.1 have been making this happen more
often. On a single-user box with logins disabled, this is as good as a
crash.
I say that even if it were possible to make a Linux box crash like this,
it's still way faster and more responsive than a Windows box.
I don't like Windows very much, as I am very much a Linux and FreeBSD
advocate. But, I do try to be objective. I'm probably going to get
blasted out of the window with the responses to this. 8-) Probably I'll
see a lot of "well, what the hell were you doing running svgalib in the
first place?????!!!!" The answer is in order for Linux to be an
all-around good OS, a user should be able to use svgalib and alternate
windowing systems on it if he/she chooses. In fact, I think it would be
need to develop new graphics systems on Linux that are alternative to
X. X is the best Windowing system for networked applications, to be
sure. But, it sure would be neat to see some alternative ones being
developed. Linux has to be good for more than just running X. You
should be able to do whatever you want with it. The sky is the limit
for open source systems.
====== Posted via Newsfeeds.Com, Uncensored Usenet News ======
http://www.newsfeeds.com - The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World!
======= Over 80,000 Newsgroups = 16 Different Servers! ======
------------------------------
From: Craig Kelley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Uptimes
Date: 04 Jan 2001 08:56:13 -0700
"Erik Funkenbusch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> "J Sloan" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > OK, let me get this straight: Unix is capable of reliably hosting
> > muitiple sites, but windows servers should be limited to a single
> > site - and why does this appear to you like some kind of moral
> > victory for windows? It's clearly a stinging indictment of windows
> > poor performance and reliability as a mission critical web server.
>
> Windows most certainly can host multiple sites on the same server. It's just
> that most commercial sites are a single site.
>
> For instance:
>
> www.troublewithsam.com
> www.statictaxi.com
>
> Both run on the same Win2k box.
>
> Having done the same thing with Apache just now on my own site, I can tell
> you quite clearly that configuring multiple sites is far easier under IIS.
> Just open the properties for the site and fill in the hostname value.
>
> Under Apache it required adding about 8 lines to the httpd.conf file, which
> took a bit of experimentation and searching to find what to add (not to
> mention restarting the httpd daemons after every change). Total time in
> Windows, 3 minutes. Total time in Linux, 2 hours.
Now, just spend the next half hour writing a script to do it for you,
then you can create and delete sites in whatever manner you choose.
You needn't be using a Windows 2000 professional workstation either,
or even running Windows at all, to remote-admin UNIX Apache.
> > > IIS sites tend to be eCommerce and one site to a domain/location.
> >
> > Unix sites e.g amazon tend to be huge, fast and always on.
>
> Ahh yes, that's why ebay was down today for hours. The web servers were
> working, but no auctions. Clearly their Sun box died again. They claimed
> to have switched to a backup server, but it was somehow also effected by the
> same failure.
They really need to distribute their database over more than one
machine. Regardless, I would wager that a single Windows 2000 machine
running Microsoft SQL Server in the same situation would be down more
often. Can I prove it? No, but I can tell you that *our* NT box is
down more often than any of our Linux machines -- and it does far less
serving as well.
[snip]
All this arguing over Netcraft seems silly to me. The numbers are
meaningless, even if they are the best numbers available. Nobody is
going to implement a new solution based on a popularity contest.
--
The wheel is turning but the hamster is dead.
Craig Kelley -- [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.isu.edu/~kellcrai finger [EMAIL PROTECTED] for PGP block
------------------------------
From: Craig Kelley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Why NT?
Date: 04 Jan 2001 09:05:57 -0700
Nick <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> We keep a NT box around to run Win32 Based daemons / programs on. Also,
> our primary domain controller and (gasp!) our web server are NT servers
> (don't ask).Other than that, Samba & Linux across the board. All of our
> desktop systems with the exception of mine are Winboxes, however.
Our NT box runs eFacts and Micromedex -- 2 closed-source, proprietary
web applications. Linux does everything else (including domain login
support).
[begin off-topic rant about NT]
Speaking of domain login support, who designed this incredibly stupid
system? I forgot to include packet filter support when I upgraded our
main machine's kernel and DHCP didn't start up. All the NT boxes got
the cute little "your server isn't available, I'm going to use a local
profile" dialog box. Well, it took me 5 minutes to fix my bonehead
mistake (make -j4 on a dual P3/800 takes less than 2 minutes!) and the
server came back up.
We told everyone on NT to re-login or re-boot as they saw fit, and
when they logged out of the domain the stupid machines *saved the new
profiles back to the server*! When they logged back in, they didn't
get an error message, but their old profiles (along with their Outlook
stuff and all their settings, icons, Start Menu, screen saver, etc.)
were gone and replaced by the handy-dandy new ones.
I had to untar the backup from the previous night, have everyone
*logoff* (lest we repeat the problem), swap the profiles and then log
back in.
NT profiles are dumb, very dumb. Anyone who claims that the Windows
registry is easy or handy, hasn't ever had anything go wrong with
their profile server before.
[thank you for your time]
--
The wheel is turning but the hamster is dead.
Craig Kelley -- [EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.isu.edu/~kellcrai finger [EMAIL PROTECTED] for PGP block
------------------------------
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