Linux-Advocacy Digest #30, Volume #34 Sun, 29 Apr 01 02:13:04 EDT
Contents:
Re: IE (T. Max Devlin)
Re: IE (T. Max Devlin)
Re: IE (T. Max Devlin)
Re: there's always a bigger fool (T. Max Devlin)
Re: there's always a bigger fool (T. Max Devlin)
Re: Article: Want Media Player 8? Buy Windows XP (T. Max Devlin)
Re: Justice Department LOVES Microsoft! (T. Max Devlin)
Re: Intel versus Sparc (T. Max Devlin)
Re: Linux is paralyzed before it even starts (Pete Goodwin)
Re: Unwelcome changes in Linux advocacy. (Pete Goodwin)
Re: Blame it all on Microsoft (GreyCloud)
Re: Justice Department LOVES Microsoft! (Ed Allen)
Re: Winvocates confuse me - d'oh! (Ed Allen)
Re: Winvocates confuse me - d'oh! (Ed Allen)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.linux,alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: IE
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 05:49:57 GMT
Said Michael Pye in alt.destroy.microsoft on Sat, 28 Apr 2001 17:01:33
>"Bob Hauck" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote
>> As a user, unless the site is all *about* graphic design, I don't give
>> a flying fuck if it looks exactly as the designer intended, as long as
>> it is usable and I can find what I'm looking for.
>
>Maybe you don't, but many people do. You need to present a professional
>image to win across customers. I feel very uneasy giving my credit card
>details to company who's site looks ameturish or poor because it reflects
>badly on the company. Impressions are always important.
>
>You may not care, but then you have proven yourself to be an evangelist for
>complete simplism.
>
>Also, anyone who still says flying fuck doesn't deserve an opinion ;) It's a
>phrase that grated on my nerves since it was coined so many years back ;).
>Personally, if I don't gove a fuck, I don't give a fuck. Flying at the same
>time sounds like childishness or some sort of fetish... :)
>
>> Decent navigation, speed of loading on my slow connection, a search
>> feature, and useful content are far more important.
>
>All important, but to impress you need everything, including elegant
>presentation.
I gotta admit, Michael, you do seem to be a very level headed fellow.
You make good points.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.linux,alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: IE
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 05:49:59 GMT
Said Ayende Rahien in alt.destroy.microsoft on Sat, 28 Apr 2001 21:05:14
>"Bob Hauck" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
>news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>> On Fri, 27 Apr 2001 17:11:15 +0100, Michael Pye <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>> wrote:
>>
>> > User? You can't comment until you have tried to develop for it. How do
>you
>> > know how the sites are supposed to look?
>>
>> As a user, unless the site is all *about* graphic design, I don't give
>> a flying fuck if it looks exactly as the designer intended, as long as
>> it is usable and I can find what I'm looking for.
>>
>> Decent navigation, speed of loading on my slow connection, a search
>> feature, and useful content are far more important.
>
>Really? So you want HTML that would be contruct of <a name=> & <a herf=>
>only, right.
Whatever. It's supposed to be a WEB of information, not a series of
banner ads.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.linux,alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: IE
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 05:50:00 GMT
Said Ayende Rahien in alt.destroy.microsoft on Sat, 28 Apr 2001 21:06:49
>"T. Max Devlin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
[...]
>Then use Lynx.
>The fact that so many sites, when detect NS4, send you a page that IE2 could
>parse easily doesn't mean anything to use, right?
I'm not sure what the latter has to do with the former. Does lynx have
a very comprehensive bookmark system? NS4 seems to work perfectly well
for me, to be honest.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,soc.singles
Subject: Re: there's always a bigger fool
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 05:50:02 GMT
Said Johan Kullstam in alt.destroy.microsoft on Sat, 28 Apr 2001
>T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
>> Said Johan Kullstam in alt.destroy.microsoft on Sat, 28 Apr 2001
[...]
>> >every machine has a boot ROM. the problem is that backward
>> >compatibility trumps any design improvement. the IBM PC was designed
>> >to compete with the Commodore-64. IBM didn't even think they'd sell
>> >many with floppy drives. they were wrong, of course. still, we
>> >suffer from the short-sightedness of that time.
>>
>> Why?
>
>because
>
>1) microsoft is [...] incompetent [...]
Well said.
>2) backwards compatibilty is king. it trumps all else. microsoft
>plays the proprietary data format game better than anybody else.
Microsoft is the only one that plays games, as far as we know. You'll
have to get anyone else convicted of monopolization before it matters.
It isn't "backwards compatibility", it is simply artificial barriers
which prevent competition.
> part
>of the lock-in to microsoft seems to make for lock-in to ia16 and then
>ia32 PC architecture. "not having any applications" is a code phrase
>for "doesn't run ms-office".
Guffaw. Yes, monopolization is a bitch. That isn't the result of any
supposed short-sightedness of the past. 'Backward compatibility' is a
code phrase for "violations of the Sherman Act".
>the bios lives on (with minor patches for, e.g., larger harddrives)
>because it will boot the various flavors of windows. launching
>windows being all anybody (who counts) cares about, that's enough.
<*cough*> See what I mean?
>> >> think about it - i found out recently that PCI devices don't even require
>> >> an IRQ to function! it's Windows DOS/9x that freaks out if a device other
>> >> than a video card doesn't have an IRQ, so we have to have two sets of PCI
>> >> cards in the world - one for x86 architecture, and another for Alphas,
>> >> SPARCs, Macs and everything else.
>> >
>> >i dunno.
>>
>> I do. Want me to explain it?
>
>*requiring* an IRQ is stupid. however, *having* an interrupt line is
>just plain smart for many devices.
Smart for the device, stupid for the system. It's a hack for trying to
deal with limited resources which are no longer limited.
>as everyone know, windows is severely brain damaged in all kinds of
>ways. however, microsoft has the luxury of having hardward cater to
>and work around their flaws. this doesn't help the ia32 platform
>much.
Precisely the answer I was hoping for. Well said.
>> >ia64 has been coming real soon now for like 2-3 years. from what i
>> >gather from the net, ia64 has been totally blown away by recent clock
>> >speed advances in ia32. you can always re-layout ia64 for the smaller
>> >feature-size of todays process. however, my (totally wild-ass,
>> >unsubstatiated) guess is that intel will drop ia64 in its current
>> >form, take the lessons learned and make an ia64-2.
>>
>> That sounds more like an inevitable occurrence, then a wild-ass guess.
>> :-D
>
>thanks.
Think about it. Sooner or later, that's what's going to happen. I
think we've presented good reason for expecting that as long as
Microsoft has a monopoly, though, Intel's choice is not their decision,
precisely, and so its likely that the least efficient approach will be
selected, almost automatically.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy,soc.singles
Subject: Re: there's always a bigger fool
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 05:50:03 GMT
Said Zippy in alt.destroy.microsoft on Sat, 28 Apr 2001 19:09:56 GMT;
>i'm not sure linux (at least in its current form) is going to be the
>singular answer. different people have different needs, and linux in its
>current state is a little bit too sloppy for the average small businessman
>or office worker. i'm constantly getting advice and instructions from
>people running mandrake or Suse that don't work in RedHat. it's very time
>consuming.
Who said anything about "current state"? We're talking after the
monopoly is gone, and capital development is possible.
>nevertheless, linux is one of the first of the Unices that will actually
>run well as a desktop. hybrids such as OS X, RedHat (is it stil considered
>linux?) and yet unreleased operating systems may fill the void. or maybe
>linux itself will start to congeal more. who knows? but a diversity at
>least seems assured.
Linux will develop flavors to serve any diverse markets, but it will all
be Linux, because there's little reason for it not to be. Sure, it will
have to be better than it is now, but with both Sun and IBM working on
it, I don't think that'll be a problem.
>>[...]Years ago, computer scientists realized that the same
>>programs can run on different hardware platforms. It is only the
>>existence of the monopoly which has prevented the market from realizing
>>the same thing.
>
>yes this is the KEY to the whole question. the portable operating system
>was invented a VERRRRRY long time ago - but desktop machines don't share
>the same lineage as the rest of the computer world. the personal computer
>was born out of ingenuity and surplus calculator chips, not defense
>department grants, professional engineers and corporate board rooms.
No, that is where it was born, but Microsoft made it a still-birth, I'm
afraid. Most people don't realize how early MS was pulling the same
tricks they finally became aware of 12 years later, in the mid nineties.
>as much as i resent microsoft, i will grant that they share (or at least
>once did share) the "home enthusiast" mentality that is integral to the
>consumer desktop.
No, that's just a mirage caused by the fact that they monopolized a
brand new market, and their marketing of Gates.
>i don't attribute bill gates's enthusiasm about linux to the evil and
>sinister reasons others have assigned to him. bill gates is essentially a
>hacker, like you and me.
Oh, please. He's a megalomaniac, and it is obvious his instincts for
technology are as severely flawed as his ethics.
>he has as much interest in the hardware as he does
>the software (in fact, he's probably getting rather sick of the software
>right about now). it is right and just that microsoft (division I) should
>make hardware. and it is right and just that microsoft (division II) should
>make operating systems. and it is right and just that microsoft (division
>III) should make applications.
I don't care what they make, as long as they compete with somebody.
>split microsoft up, and we will have 150 thriving computer companies in
>this country (and the top three will still be the former divisions of
>microsoft), rather than just one. it's a win/win situation.
You haven't learned anything about computing if you think this is true.
>>[...]Sun and Apple and Dell will all just be different
>>computer manufacturers, and they will probably all make PCs, but there's
>>no need for their PCs to be similar in hardware (other than the market
>>efficiencies allowed by interchangeable components, of course), as long
>>as they run Linux.
>
>or OS X, or 2K/NT, or Oracle or RPG or SunOS, or SAP or SQL or Novell or...
No, just Linux. Not that these others couldn't survive as niches. Its
just that there are no niches that will need them, and no reason NOT to
use Linux.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Article: Want Media Player 8? Buy Windows XP
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 05:50:06 GMT
Said Donn Miller in alt.destroy.microsoft on Sat, 28 Apr 2001 14:56:34
>Chad Everett wrote:
>
>> Except, of course, if there are radio stations or other broadcast
>> entities that only push out Windows Media Player format. Microsoft
>> is really trying to corner this market. They wanted to do this
>> with Java and other Internet protocols too, but they seem to be
>> having more success with Windows Media Player. I don't know why
>> there isn't more outrage about this.
>
>It's because of who those entities are being managed by. They are
>mostly marketing people who have one or two "introduction to Windows"
>courses, so they are just falling back to whatever limited computer
>knowledge they have. They never look at the big picture at what impact
>their decisions may ultimately have. Plus, there's the advertising
>aspect of the whole thing. MS probably markets things like
>content-controlled Media Player pretty aggressively. It's how MS got to
>where they are today - aggressive marketing and strategically
>controlling the software market.
I think you mean "illegally controlling the software market".
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy
Subject: Re: Justice Department LOVES Microsoft!
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 05:50:07 GMT
Said "JS PL" <hi everybody!> in comp.os.linux.advocacy on Sat, 28 Apr
[...]
>Yes, after a 12,000 hour ass reaming, the DOJ couldn't find ANY illegal
>activity.
Cute rhetoric. It isn't known if any of the activity would have been
found illegal, of course, since MS agreed to a consent decree to avoid
prosecution.
>Microsoft then followed some very poor legal advice by signing a
>bullshit consent agreement, thinking it would help the DOJ save face and
>just go away.
MS carefully engineered the consent decree, fraudulently representing
themselves and purposefully ensuring that legally it was used tissue
paper.
>What they should have done was tell them to fuck off and go
>away the day the DOJ admitted they could find no prosecutable offences. If
>they had ANYTHING on MS I guarantee they would have attempted to prosecute
>(it's the DOJ way of doing things). They didn't have shit, and MS decided
>(wrongly) to be nice about the whole thing and throw them a bone.
Why was that, again?
>Lesson #1 - Don't ever give an inch when you have done nothing wrong.
Bwah-ha-ha-ha-ha. Lesson #1 is don't break the law. MS still hasn't
learned it, but sooner or later they will.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: T. Max Devlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: Intel versus Sparc
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 05:50:08 GMT
Said Tom Wilson in comp.os.linux.advocacy on Sat, 28 Apr 2001 15:48:27
>"Eddie Dubourg" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
>news:9c6r2n$26p$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>> > > Please, do you have any more valuable opinions you would like to share
>> > > about Linux or UNIX? We'd all love to hear more deep thoughts from
>the
>> > > "Enterprise Engineer" who doesn't know what a core dump is.
>> >
>> > I'm quite sure James Doohan and LeVar Burton know nothing about core
>dumps
>> > either.
>>
>> Unless its the warp core (dumped by 1701-D on many an occasion)
>
>Hmmm...And right you are!
>
>Seriously, what exactly IS an "Enterprise Engineer".
"Enterprise systems" are what you get when you replace traditional
corporate backbone technology (mostly mini-computer based) with Unix
system or, if you're incredibly stupid, Microsoft systems. An
application like SAP or PeopleSoft are called 'enterprise-wide', and
thus an "enterprise engineer" is a technologist who is familiar with
such systems.
--
T. Max Devlin
*** The best way to convince another is
to state your case moderately and
accurately. - Benjamin Franklin ***
------------------------------
From: Pete Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Linux is paralyzed before it even starts
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 05:52:41 GMT
[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> Take a P166 with 64 meg and load Linux Mandrake 7.x on it and Win98SE
> and see which one is more responsive. Linux is slow as shit...
Take a P166 with 32 meg and load Linux Mandrake 8.0 on it and Win98SE. At
the start of Installation, Mandrake 8.0 complains the system is "low on
resources" and may fail the installation (it did the same with Mandrake
7.2). Mandrake 8.0 recommended installation uses KDE, which performs like a
dog on this system. Much smaller window managers (and less functional)
perform much better. Windows 98 SE offers the full system and runs without
any problems.
> How about multimedia?
I've noticed on my faster machine (400MHz PII) Linux + XFree86 doesn't play
MPG files very well. On Windows 98 SE they work just fine. Overall graphics
on thius system performs poorly compared to Windows 98 SE.
--
Pete
------------------------------
From: Pete Goodwin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Unwelcome changes in Linux advocacy.
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 05:56:59 GMT
Brent R wrote:
> I've said it many times... the best thing that could happen to MS (and
> it's customers) is for Bill Gates to go. He's been steering that company
> in idiotic directions since Windows 95 and is just plain wrong about
> much of the marketplace. For example: in 1999 and 2k he was constantly
> saying that the PC was going to take a secondary role to PC's... but now
> it's clear that that was just more hype than anything else.
How can the PC take a secondary role to itself?
--
Pete
------------------------------
From: GreyCloud <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Blame it all on Microsoft
Date: Sat, 28 Apr 2001 22:56:58 -0700
WJP wrote:
>
> On Thu, 26 Apr 2001 19:34:02 -0700, GreyCloud <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> wrote:
> //snipolla//
> >
> >I heard that Xenix wasn't all that good. As a matter of fact, it was
> >the poorest O/S around at the time. Even DOD wouldn't accept it.
> >
> >
>
> Oh, contrare, at least "part" of DOD accepted it. From 1985 to the
> early 90's, we, at a U.S. Army Materiel Command separate reporting
> activity in Huntsville, Alabama used Xenix for some administrative and
> data base tasks. I produced one management analysis "final report"
> using their word processing program - a Wordstar "lookalike". I do not
> know who made the hardware - we just called it the "Xenix 310" - a
> mini-computer with many dumb terminals. I believe the same system was
> used extensively within Redstone Arsenal as well as the Army Materiel
> Command around this time-frame.
>
> Regards,
> Bill Powell
> USAF/USA (Ret) Management Systems Analyst
> [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
>
My condolensces to them then. The Navy did a lot of testing of various
O/Ses and when one of our depts. tried to justify an order NAVSEA turned
it down. So they ended up buying an HP system to do the job. Just the
way different branches work I suppose.
Of course the Gov. had a worse pig on its hands. They bought a bunch of
Perkins-Elmer systems that they thought would be a real cheap
solution... turned out to be a big fiasco. Cost over $2million to get
the O/S corrected in various areas just pertaining to terminals. The
real kicker was they turned around and gave them away to China. :-))
I used to be in the Army long time back, but when I got out I returned
to my old position in a Shipyard.
--
V
------------------------------
Crossposted-To:
comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Justice Department LOVES Microsoft!
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Ed Allen)
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 06:00:48 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, Rick <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>JS PL wrote:
>>
>> "T. Max Devlin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
>> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>> > Said Daniel Johnson in comp.os.linux.advocacy on Fri, 27 Apr 2001
>> > [...]
>> > >I see no evidence that the early differences between
>> > >GEM and Windows had anything to do with who owned
>> > >DOS. I admit that the transition to Windows 95 did
>> > >depend upon this- but had CP/M been king, Windows 95
>> > >would effectivaly have meant migrating everyone to
>> > >*Microsoft's* CP/M clone in the process.
>> > [...]
>> > >It's all hypothetical, but that's how I see it.
>> >
>> > I think you are mistaken in ignoring the impact of Microsoft
>> > force-bundling Windows with DOS, the very behavior that MS signed a
>> > consent decree to avoid ending up in court. Later, they paid Caldera an
>> > undisclosed amount (I speculate it could be up to two billion dollars)
>> > to avoid further investigation into Microsoft's actions to kill off
>> > DR-DOS.
>>
>> I speculate it was 2¢ because Caldera didn't have a shot in hell of winning.
>
>Then why did Micro$oft settle?
>
Yes. In another post you indicate that the accused should never give
up if they are innocent.
So do tell.
--
Linux -- The Unix defragmentation tool.
------------------------------
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Winvocates confuse me - d'oh!
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Ed Allen)
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 06:00:48 GMT
In article <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>, JS PL <hi everybody!> wrote:
>
>
>It's like a whos-who list of plagiarists!
>
>
Making fun of the established is an old tradition. Juveniles seem
to think it shows how stuffy and pompous the target is.
--
Linux -- The Unix defragmentation tool.
------------------------------
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Reply-To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: Re: Winvocates confuse me - d'oh!
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Ed Allen)
Date: Sun, 29 Apr 2001 06:00:49 GMT
In article <hgJG6.213908$[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
Chad Myers <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>"Ed Allen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
>news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>> From a Usenet signature:
>> **************************************************************************
>> "Those who do not understand UNIX are doomed to re-invent it--badly"
>> -Henry Spencer
>> **************************************************************************
>>
>> MS seems to be doing just that.
>
>It would appear Linux is doing it better (or worse as the case may be).
>
Undoubtedly better. Why else would the biggest names in Unix past
be scrambling to get parts of their technologies included ?
By being able to point to an area and say "We invented that so we
are the logical ones to adapt it to your needs" they hope to gain
access to customers who have already decided to use Linux.
As opposed to MS who says "That Unix stuff is old technology, we
have newer stuff" with the unsaid implication that it is "better".
That is why they are doing it "badly". Because they have no
understanding of why Unix has endured when the technology their
kernel is based on, VMS, has been relegated to the backwaters of the
Internet.
--
Linux -- The Unix defragmentation tool.
------------------------------
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End of Linux-Advocacy Digest
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