Linux-Advocacy Digest #618, Volume #32 Sat, 3 Mar 01 15:13:03 EST
Contents:
Re: [OT] .sig (was: Something Seemingly Simple.) ("Kelsey Bjarnason")
Re: KDE or GNOME? (Donovan Rebbechi)
Re: Crimosoft will get off scot-free (Pete Goodwin)
Re: Windoze Domination/Damnation (Pete Goodwin)
Re: Breaking up is so very hard to do... (Pete Goodwin)
NEEDED: A Loadlin Distro. (WAS: Microsoft dying, was Re: Microsoft seeks government
help to stop) (Bloody Viking)
Re: Another Linux "Oopsie"! (Pete Goodwin)
Re: Another Linux "Oopsie"! (Pete Goodwin)
Re: Richard Stallman what a tosser, and lies about free software (Isaac)
Re: Another Linux "Oopsie"! (Pete Goodwin)
Re: Mircosoft Tax (Tim Hanson)
Re: Why Linux Is Giving Microsoft a Migraine (Bloody Viking)
Re: NT vs *nix performance ("Nik Simpson")
Re: Microsoft dying, was Re: Microsoft seeks government help to stop Linux ("Joel
Barnett")
Re: Mircosoft Tax (Donovan Rebbechi)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: "Kelsey Bjarnason" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.lang.c
Subject: Re: [OT] .sig (was: Something Seemingly Simple.)
Date: Sat, 03 Mar 2001 19:05:48 GMT
"The Ghost In The Machine" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in
message news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Barry Schwarz
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> wrote
> on 2 Mar 2001 02:12:46 GMT
> <97mviu$r9d$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> >On Thu, 01 Mar 2001 17:13:01 -0500, Aaron Kulkis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> >wrote:
> >
> >>> An 8th grade education, history of antisocial behavior, and a three
> >>> foot long criminal record?
> >>
> >>In the US Army, that's 2 reasons that will bar you from even being
> >>able to enlist as a private.
> >Since the army no longer requires a high school diploma, anti-social
> >behavior is not recorded unless it is also illegal, and a criminal
> >record is only one thing (and possibly irrelevant since neither
> >traffic nor parking offenses are impediments to enlisting), what two
> >did you have in mind?
>
> How the heck is the recruit going to handle all the nifty neato
> useful gadgetry the Army's going to have online in the next couple
> decades if he can't even figure out which button to push? :-)
"Point at enemy. Press green button. When finished, press red button and
store."
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Donovan Rebbechi)
Subject: Re: KDE or GNOME?
Date: 3 Mar 2001 19:11:18 GMT
On Sat, 03 Mar 2001 14:49:20 +1300, Adam Warner wrote:
>Hi Martigan,
>
>> I have used both, but for me Gnome seems better, Well haven't tried KDE
>> 2.1 yet but what does every one else think? Why is one better than the
>> other? I'm not looking for Windows similarity!
>
>GNOME has a superior architecture. KDE is more polished.
How so ? I don't see that much difference between the two architectures,
besides the implementation language. (the implementation details are also
very different)
For development, I prefer Qt because the documentation and C++ support seems
better.
However, I like the way that GNOME modularises their libraries. For
example, you can use glib, CORBA and libxml without having X installed.
To get comparable functionality from the KDE stuff, you need X. The
collection classes, XML library, and CORBA replacement (DCOP) needs X.
The other cool feature GNOME has is libglade (dynamically loaded GUIs).
Despite this annoyance, I still like Qt.
--
Donovan Rebbechi * http://pegasus.rutgers.edu/~elflord/ *
elflord at panix dot com
------------------------------
From: Pete Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft,alt.microsoft.sucks
Subject: Re: Crimosoft will get off scot-free
Date: Sat, 03 Mar 2001 19:38:38 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, [EMAIL PROTECTED]
says...
> OTOH, the timing of the case could not have been better -- it's
> forced them to back off, and this has probably made it easier
> for Linux to drum up third party support. For example, over the
> last few years, several hardware vendors and OEMs have announced
> Linux support. This would have been a more difficult choice if
> they'd been threatened.
And if they are let off, won't they start cracking down on Linux?
--
Pete
------------------------------
From: Pete Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Windoze Domination/Damnation
Date: Sat, 03 Mar 2001 19:40:29 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, [EMAIL PROTECTED] says...
> Can't reject something that isn't even offered by the OEM.
There's absolutely NOTHING stopping people from buying Linux or BeOS
seperately.
--
Pete
------------------------------
From: Pete Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Breaking up is so very hard to do...
Date: Sat, 03 Mar 2001 19:42:00 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, [EMAIL PROTECTED] says...
> Previous Supreme Court decisions say nothing bad about Judge Jackson's
> behavior nor post-testimony comments.
Well, they do now!
--
Pete
All your no fly zone are belong to us
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Bloody Viking)
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: NEEDED: A Loadlin Distro. (WAS: Microsoft dying, was Re: Microsoft seeks
government help to stop)
Date: 3 Mar 2001 19:46:04 GMT
Is booting the last frontier on the desktop? We all know about LILO, but on
some machines it doesn't work. Like mine.
Donal K. Fellows ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
: Everyone has the right to waste their free time and energy how they wish.
And the legal-to-do attempts at destroying Microsoft are never a waste of
time. Coding FreeDOS as an effort to destroy the Antichrist is an effort on
the part of the forces of Good to triumph over Evil.
FreeDOS at an absolute minimum means that Linux users who always use Losdlin
have a choice and be 100 percent MS-Free. If I wanted to make my own Linux
distro, I now could, being a Loadlin Slackware variant. I never got LILO to
work except for rawriting install floppies, so a freedos is an important
invention.
With a FreeDOS, I now could build as many Linux boxes as I want, all using
Loadlin if I please, while without, you must use LILO to boot or a kernel
floppy or a small partition with a kernel rawcopied to it. A freedos means
that a large techonolgical improvement comes to those that don't use LILO as
the small partition need not be wasted on a kernel rawcopy. (a rawcopy kernel
partition can't be mounted as anything) One can readily argue that a 10M
partition wasted on a 40G hard drive is nothing, but it's still 10M going to
waste to solve a LILO problem.
And suppose one who doesn't use LILO wants to make a custom distro? The
instructions for LILO's workaround would give the users the impression that
the maker is clueless or something. I never had luck with LILO (yes, I know
most people do) so any attempt at making a homebrew distro to sell would have
whatever workaround I use, as well as LILO for the daring. Apart from
Slackware, all distros I tried attempt to install LILO and temporarily ruin
hard drives. (use DOS fdisk /mbr to un-ruin) So, my computer may be flaky I
suppose, but I'm sure others have flaky computers and a LILO debacle is a loss
of a new Linux fan.
The ultimate distro, that being the one that is as easy to install as a
Windows "distro", is within reach becuse of the efforts at inventing FreeDOS.
It would be based on Slackware of course. We all can quibble until we return
to the trees about the best distro, but to overcome the evil that is
Microsoft, we must build a distro that is easy to install on ALL computers,
and a Loadlin based distro is the key, given the flaky hardware out there.
LILO works fine on MOST computers while DOS works on ALL computers. Big
difference.
It seems there is ONE problem of open sourse. The users of such systems will
tend to be techies or at least techie-like. The LILO bit is an example of a
result. It has its quirks but techie types generally will be willing to deal
with it. Not so with the typical desktop user. I may never solve my own
personal LILO problem, but I came up with workarounds. If a typical computer
owner tries LILO and his desktop has a wierd BIOS (always cheap hardware) the
user will be put off by a LILO problem and resort back to Winblows. Since
Loadlin always works, a Loadlin distro would be perfect for a "untar into
place" distro.
My conclusion is that to conquer the desktop to slay the beast known as MSFT,
we need these items in a Linux distro:
A booting system that ALWAYS works on ALL hardware, not just most hardware
with messing with it like LILO. LILO can be optional.
A pre-configured filesystem ready to untar into place, with the GUI at the
ready as the default when you login. (edit the .login script)
We can quibble about apps until *, but something as the boot sequence must
work out of the box on all machines and the rest being a nice easy install.
Winblows is after a fashion like that now, and with FreeDOS, we can have it
too. As an owner with a computer with a flaky BIOS, it became imperative that
I found a workaround for LILO problems. Loadlin and a free DOS is the
remaining choice, apart from convoluted methods like Loadlin floppies, hacking
install floppies, rawcopying kernels onto partitions, and any other boot
method I ever experimented with.
--
FOOD FOR THOUGHT: 100 calories are used up in the course of a mile run.
The USDA guidelines for dietary fibre is equal to one ounce of sawdust.
The liver makes the vast majority of the cholesterol in your bloodstream.
------------------------------
From: Pete Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Another Linux "Oopsie"!
Date: Sat, 03 Mar 2001 19:43:21 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, [EMAIL PROTECTED] says...
> Then explain PageMaker for Windows.
Difficult, since I don't have that product.
--
Pete
All your no fly zone are belong to us
------------------------------
From: Pete Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Another Linux "Oopsie"!
Date: Sat, 03 Mar 2001 19:45:12 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, [EMAIL PROTECTED] says...
> > I'm surprised any OS or application needs extra or multiple drivers in
> > this day an age. All the drivers (and there should just be one set) ought
> > to be in the OS, not in an application. Is that clear enough for you?
>
> But that is just your opinion. Other people may have different ideas about
> what they prefer (I know e.g. that I do like the fact that Applix Office
> has native, fast drivers for PCL printers which bypass the Ghostscript
> pipe).
My opinion? What???
Any OS that requires multiple copies of drivers per applications has got
to be the DUMBEST OS around!
> So we come to the conclusion that this entire thread, which you have
> baptised as an example of a linux flaw, has been about the fact that _you_
> prefer things done differently than others.
So I come to the conclusion you're happy with an OS that REPEATS drivers,
when every other OS around has learnt NOT to do that?
--
Pete
All your no fly zone are belong to us
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Isaac)
Crossposted-To: gnu.misc.discuss,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,misc.int-property
Subject: Re: Richard Stallman what a tosser, and lies about free software
Date: Sat, 03 Mar 2001 19:33:23 GMT
On Sat, 03 Mar 2001 17:33:10 +0000, Edward Rosten <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>You are from the US. According to the letest spate of laws or rulings or
>whatever, source code does not seem to be considered an expression of
>free speech.
I'd suggest the results are mixed on this. While there are some trial
court (district court) decisions that have gone the way you say, there
are two appellate court rulings that have held that cryptography
source code is speech.
What latest spate of rulings are you refering to which suggest the
opposite?
Isaac
------------------------------
From: Pete Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Another Linux "Oopsie"!
Date: Sat, 03 Mar 2001 19:46:23 GMT
In article <97r9bc$hmc$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, [EMAIL PROTECTED] says...
> > I'm surprised any OS or application needs extra or multiple drivers in
>
> It doesn't.
The Gimp does!
> Is this clear enough for you:
>
> The OS has plenty of drivers. The GIMP provides its own regardless. THIS
> IS NOTHING TO DO WITH THE OS
But WHY does The Gimp feel it is necessary to provide its own drivers?
Doesn't The Gimp think the OS one's are good enough?
--
Pete
------------------------------
From: Tim Hanson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.linux.sux,alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Mircosoft Tax
Date: Sat, 03 Mar 2001 19:58:06 GMT
The Ghost In The Machine wrote:
>
> In comp.os.linux.advocacy, Amphetamine Bob
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> wrote
> on Fri, 02 Mar 2001 22:46:51 -0800
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> >Craig Kelley wrote:
> >>
> >> "Erik Funkenbusch" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> >>
> >> > "Craig Kelley" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> >> > news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> >> > > > >
> >> >
> >> > Wordperfect can read and write word documents just fine.
> >
> >Wrong again, Erik. Gong! There is no product on the market that can
> >read and write Word docs, or any other evil proprietary MS formats.
>
> Pedant point.
>
> There are a few programs (OpenOffice/StarOffice for one, WP for another,
> as you already mention) that attempt to read Word documents. It's not
> clear how successful they are, of course -- especially since Word
> can't read its *own* (older) format(s) at times, never mind its
> competitors.
Just adding: The filters for the other Office Suites are just "chasing
taillights." This means that the protocols are proprietary, and those
attempting to access must reverse engineer to make them readable.
Microsoft has long practiced the art of changing protocols, unannounced,
for the purpose of breaking these filters, as a competitive act. Unless
Microsoft is legally required to publish these protocols in a timely
way, competitors will always be behind the ball, catching up, devoting
resources strictly to this task, when they could use the resources to
better advantage elsewhere.
> [snip for brevity]
>
> >> If they
> >> weren't so *afraid* of losing (Bill Gate's paranoia at work, I
> >> suppose) all the time, they could actually work with other
> >> companies and people instead of against them all the time.
> >
> >This will never happen. Anyone that knows anything about MS knows
> >they are evil to the core. The only solution is total destruction.
> >Hence the name of this newsgroup. ;)
>
> I for one would hope that Microsoft self-destructs because they
> lose their market monopoly. Ideally, Linux would do them in!
> (If not Linux, a combination/panoply of Linux, FreeBSD, Freedows,
> BeOS (if they're still around), JavaOS (ditto), etc.)
I'd like to see a situation where all these alternatives exist, yet no
one has the market share which allows them to dictate "standards." This
would force everyone to either get along or lose market share.
> One can dream, anyway. :-) Of course, by then Microsoft may have
> spread to other locales -- the X-box is a clear attempt for them
> to attempt to get into the gaming market, for example.
I'm counting on their lack of success in areas where they don't have a
monopoly and can't leverage the PC monopoly to wedge into these areas.
If they can be kept from leveraging, their influence will slowly wane.
> [rest snipped]
--
Once at a social gathering, Gladstone said to Disraeli, "I predict,
Sir, that you will die either by hanging or of some vile disease".
Disraeli replied, "That all depends upon whether I embrace your
principals or your mistress".
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Bloody Viking)
Subject: Re: Why Linux Is Giving Microsoft a Migraine
Date: 3 Mar 2001 19:59:50 GMT
Adam Warner ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
: Amazing isn't it. But it always makes me pine for a larger floppy disk
: standard. If this can be achieved with a 1.44MB floppy imagine what could
: be achieved if 100 or so megabyte floppies were now standard!
Like the single floppy router, the single install floppy of many distros is
amazing too. I remembering mounting a Red Hat install floppy to hack it. I was
hoping to find an install script to edit out LILO enforcement (always my pet
nemesis with Linux) but alas, found an executable. Sadly for me, I couldn't
find that install proggie source to try to edit it. Slackware uses an install
script instead of an executable but doesn't enforce LILO so it's no problem. (I
messed with install disk hacking to learn about the ever-mysterious LILO
booter.) That router floppy would be interesting to mount and inspect like I
did with install floppies over the years.
A bigger floppy standard would be nice as it'll allow easier LILO install. If,
say we has 100M floppies, the boot partition to rawcopy to would be exactly
fillable unlike 1.44M and a 2M partition, wasting some hard drive space. (not
that's much of an issue by now)
--
FOOD FOR THOUGHT: 100 calories are used up in the course of a mile run.
The USDA guidelines for dietary fibre is equal to one ounce of sawdust.
The liver makes the vast majority of the cholesterol in your bloodstream.
------------------------------
Reply-To: "Nik Simpson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
From: "Nik Simpson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
alt.destroy.microsoft,alt.linux.sux,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: NT vs *nix performance
Date: Sat, 3 Mar 2001 15:01:29 -0500
"." <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > Amazing... but I think you are lying. Why? Well, how do you figure that
you,
> > joe blow average user, using a piece of crap pentium pro scraper can get
> > 4200 but it takes IBM a quad Xeon 700 to get 4200? You really expect me
to
> > believe that you generated 4200 rps on a PP200? ahahahaha
> > Where is your gigabit ethernet? Did you have 4 nics and 6 10k scsi
drives in
> > it? or maybe your just such a software guru that you figured out how to
do
> > what all the engineers at IBM couldn't.
>
> 4200 requests per second, if we assume about 512 bytes per request and
> the server is serving up 2k static pages, could easily be done over a
> single 100Mbit connection.
>
> 4200 * 512 + 4200 * 2048 = 10752000 bytes per second
>
> 10752000 * 8 = 86016000 bits per second, easily doable with 100Mb.
But I'd hazard a guess that the web hits being measured by JJS are not the
same thing as measured by TPC benchmark which is really measuring database
lookups when front-ended by webservers, not simply hit/s a-la Webstone. I
ran some Webstone tests a few years on an NT 3.51/Netscape combo and got
numbers not dissimilar to those that JJS gets, but its not the same
benchmark or even close.
--
Nik Simpson
------------------------------
From: "Joel Barnett" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Microsoft dying, was Re: Microsoft seeks government help to stop Linux
Date: Sat, 3 Mar 2001 12:00:06 -0800
"Karel Jansens" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> Joel Barnett wrote:
>
>
> >
> > I understand it all, it's just that it isn't true. In fact I recently
> > bought a new AMD Duron 700 based pc with no OS, MS or otherwise. I
already
> > own W95 and do not need to buy it or another version of Windows.
> >
>
> I believe you. So how much cheaper was it, compared to a system with an
O/S
> already installed?
>
I don't recall the exact amount. I believe that if I had had W9x installed
it would have cost about $80 more, W2k would have been more. Plainly, if you
need one of these OS's it is less expensive to get it as part of the pc
purchase, for my needs the W95 I already own is fine. I use W95 for work
related stuff that requires it. For my personal use I use Linux Mandrake
7.2.
> --
> Regards,
>
> Karel Jansens
> ]]] "Go go gadget linux!" Zzzooommm!! [[[
jbarntt
------------------------------
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Donovan Rebbechi)
Crossposted-To: alt.linux.sux,alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Mircosoft Tax
Date: 3 Mar 2001 20:05:17 GMT
On Sat, 03 Mar 2001 18:27:20 +0000, Peter Hayes wrote:
>On 3 Mar 2001 13:34:12 GMT, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Donovan Rebbechi) wrote:
>"Excessive" never entered anything I wrote. Just that with 93% control of
>the market they can "price as freely as they choose".
"Excessive" entered into things the other posters wrote. The thread
discusses complaints that "computers have become cheaper" but "Microsoft's
operating systems haven't".
I'm not saying that MS does not have a monopoly. I'm claiming that the
complaints about their alleged "high prices" do not seem well founded.
There are plenty of valid complaints one could make about them without
resorting to silly arguments.
>One of these packaged box sets could be used on thousands of machines
>within an organisation.
Depends on the box set. Also depends on how the box sets are purchased
(if they're purchased from a Linux OEM, there may be one per machine).
However, as you suggest, it's possible to have one CD for several machines.
At the place I work, I've seen it done both ways (the machines have Linux
preloaded and ship with a box set, but we do upgrades from the one CD)
--
Donovan Rebbechi * http://pegasus.rutgers.edu/~elflord/ *
elflord at panix dot com
------------------------------
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