Linux-Advocacy Digest #974, Volume #34 Tue, 5 Jun 01 03:13:02 EDT
Contents:
Re: The beginning of the end for microsoft (Philip Neves)
Re: Time to bitc__ again ("Peter T. Breuer")
Re: The usual Linux spiel... (was Re: Is Open Source for You?) (Stephen Edwards)
Re: Windows XP Ushers in New Era of Communications (LShaping)
Re: The beginning of the end for microsoft (cjt & trefoil)
Re: Just when Linux starts getting good, Microsoft buries it in the dust! ("JS \\
PL")
Re: UI Importance (GreyCloud)
Re: The beginning of the end for microsoft (Patrick Schaaf)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
From: Philip Neves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The beginning of the end for microsoft
Crossposted-To: comp.arch,misc.invest.stocks
Date: Tue, 05 Jun 2001 05:43:03 GMT
I've made this point before on news groups a couple of years ago but I'll
make it again because you obviosly are new to the Linux movement. Microsoft
signifies everything that is wrong with the industry. They are a big
monopoly that eats up smaller companies and doesn't contribute to the
public good. Most of their so called inovation is really a result of raping
an pilliging of smaller companies. For example take Microsoft Access, they
wouldn't have had the technology to create that program if they hadn't
purchased Fox pro and stripped it for its technology and this isn't even
the first example. More recently the company that put out Visio was
purchased and even soft L'Image.
In the eighties Apple computers sued Microsoft for taking Apples software
and passing it off as thier own. They would have got away with it if it
wasn't for the fact that Apple hadn't embeded their copywrite notice into
the software itself. Even MS DOS wasn't their own creation but a creation
that Mr Gates payed $50,000 for. So you see they do put out good software
but it is the good software that other people have worked hard and slaved
over only to have Microsoft turn around and take their hard work. I imagine
that there will be a day when Microsoft will try to do the same with Linux
and pass it off as their own work. This is not good for the industry. For a
long time before the big anti-trust law suite I noticed that companies
hadn't been inovating as much as they used to. The reason for this was
obvios. Microsoft had scared all these companies so much they were affrad
to put something new out. In fact It was said that when Microsoft comes
knocking on your door you sell because if you didn't in a couple of years
your business wouldn't be worth anything.
When Linux first began to be popular about five years ago Microsoft
attempted a FUD (Fear, Undermining and Doubt) campain to get people to stop
using the system. In fact I've personaly replied to messages of people
comming on to this news group and spreading fear about the Linux system.
Thier FUD campaign still continues to this day. Steve Balmer just did an
interview a few days ago where he said that Linux is a Cancer and that
commercial companies can't use the system to develop their own projects.
This couldn't be further from the truth because although it is true that
the GPL doesn't allow people to take code and incrementally make it your
own. You can use libraries to create commercial software under the LGPL.
When you stand back and look at all the facts and see what has happend over
the last 10 - 15 years you begin to realize something. We the open source
community didn't begin this fight they did. We didn't throw the first punch
they did. They are a big bully that needs to be kicked around a bit and the
free software community is the only group that is equiped to do that!
longhaul wrote:
> Not to try and belabor the point but why do all you techies gang up on
> Gates' company and yell for government intervention. Are your anti
> thoughts based upon pride of Unix? Do you not believe that the
> fundamentals of MSFT offer a good investment? This seems to be a very
> emotional stock. Kind of like the environmentalists vs. big oil.
> It's the Unix guru's vs. MSFT. Me? I'm just looking for a good
> investment and thought I had one (finally, way of the fact) in MSFT at
> about $60 this year.
>
> On Tue, 29 May 2001 13:35:37 -0400, unicat <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>>The following are the editorial opinions of the author- no more
>>no less...
>>
>>While the bloated giant Microsoft is buying favorable publicity
>>in News-fluff magazines with promises of big chunks of
>>advertising for the X-flop video game, smart firms are realizing
>>the truth - Microsoft is in serious trouble.
>>
>>Not that they don't have loads of cash on hand, they can create
>>imaginary cashflow any time they want just by moving their own
>>money from one pocket to the other...
>>
>>But they are not capturing the hearts and minds of the techno-
>>savvy, and their standards are going over like the proverbial turd
>>in a punchbowl. Active directory, the MS proprietary version of XML,
>>and the .net initiative, all are seeing adoption rates down around 1/5th
>>
>>of the overall market.
>>
>>But worse, major manufacturers are beginnning to break ranks. IBM will
>>spend a billion dollars beefing up Linux this year, and HP is not far
>>behind.
>>
>>Sun, which has done the best of any of the UNIX vendors mostly because
>>of their
>>steadfast refusal to corrupt their product line with MS pollution, has
>>now bought
>>a manufacturer of Linux servers to augment its low-end systems.(Sun, by
>>the way,
>>is roughly the same size as MS, why everyone gets so excited about a
>>pipsqueak company like MS is beyond me).
>>
>>But one development that should have rocked the newsworld is that
>>struggling
>>UNIX maker SGI is dropping all support for MS Windows based platforms.
>>
>>This is so illustrative of the real nature of the computer marketplace
>>that it bears
>>more examination. Two years ago, a troubled SGI fell under the influence
>>of MS, and
>>was seduced into adding a WNT workstation to its product line. But
>>instead of a windfall
>>the new systems caused a near collapse of the company. Customers lost
>>confidence in
>>SGI's core UNIX systems, fearing that they would eventually be phased
>>out, sales
>>plumetted, and the stock fell from $24 to $2. Finally coming to their
>>senses, SGI has excorsized
>>the MS demon, refocused on UNIX (and Linux) and is now on the road to
>>recovery.
>>BTW - their stock is an incredibly undervalued bargain, you could buy
>>the whole company for
>>less than the value of their assets.
>>
>>SGI is hardly a market leader, but their realization of the detrimetnal
>>effect of supporting
>>windows simply reinforces the mass move away from Microsoft being
>>carried out more
>>surreptitiously by the larger manufacturers.
>>
>>Microsoft isn't laying still, they are hedging their bets by
>>diversifying into hardware. They
>>have announced the X-box (how you make money by selling a box that you
>>have to subsidize
>>by 1/3 of its sales price remains a mystery, but it might explain rumors
>>that production levels
>>are being held back significantly - bad news for games authors, but hey,
>>dance with the devil,
>>and you deserve what you get). And of course there is the new Microsoft
>>PC, which will attempt
>>to do away with all legacy standards(ISA, PCI, parallel ports, serial
>>ports, etc.) so that everyone
>>is forced to upgrade to it in order to run the new version of Windows
>>Xtremely Proprietary.
>>
>>Or... the hardware makers that MS is betraying MIGHT, just might, decide
>>to fight back by investing
>>in Linux as an alternative OS..... wait a minute, they're already DOING
>>THAT. Maybe PC makers
>>aren't as dumb as they look.
>>
>>Any way, enough MS bashing for now. We'll just close by saying that the
>>author will bet anyone reading
>>an imaginary nickel that MS stock is down to $10/share by 2003....
>>
>>
>>
>
>
------------------------------
From: "Peter T. Breuer" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Time to bitc__ again
Crossposted-To: alt.os.linux.mandrake,linux.redhat
Date: Tue, 05 Jun 2001 05:50:04 GMT
In alt.os.linux.mandrake daniel <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> some devlopers in the Linux community. Listen, just because you may
> have wanted to devote hours of your time to figure out why some
> subsystem component wasn't functioning doesn't make you any better or
> more knowledgeable - in fact, in many instances I consider spending
It certainsly does indicate you are better, since obstinacy, persistence
and capacity for sustained attack are prerequisites for success in any
walk of life .. but spending hours instead of minutes also indicates a
certain incompetance. If it needs hours one ought to develop a bandaid
immediately and go investigating the now-other problem in tandem with
normal working (e.g. why can't I get Eterm to behave transparantly, for
example, and show the desktop root gif? - I dunno, it's had me puzzled
for a week).
> hours delving into this sort of thing to be a waste of time and also a
> bad alloction of my priorities. I'm sure my employer wouldn't be
> happy either that I spent several hours of my precious time dealing
> with something as inane as getting Gnome to run with the proper window
He wouldn't be, but then getting your desktop the way you like it is
something you do once in ten years, so it's an investment. I certainly
couldn't work until I had my desktop as it should be. Fortunately
that's just one config file.
> manager under Debian (or setting up a system which has no window
> manager at all - something that admittedly might not be needed but is
> certainly nice to have).
?? This is the default situation. It needs no setting up.
> I have the experience of configuring Linux desktops for over 200
> people for a large company. I also come from an accounting background
Desktops? What do you mean? People do their own configs.
> and still consider, in the desktop realm, the spreadsheet and basic
> word-processor to be the most killer apps ever developed which will
I've never used either, in twenty years of work.
> likely never be surpassed by any others. I operate from a point of
> view of functionality. Many systems administrators do not think of
> efficiency for the enduser and their comments in this area often show
That's because it's none of their business. The enduser gets to choose
what makes them happy, not the admin!
> greatest leap forward that computers have provided for society is
> probably the spreadsheet. Many people cannot imagine how vastly the
Ha ha haaaa. Euhh ... oh boy.
> the world and forever changed the face of accounting (I suppose the
> When things are developed to a stable point and then become unstable
> again this is a serious concern. When basic functionality of
What's unstable? If you don't like something new, you always have the
option not to use it! I run slackware 3.0 quite happily all day long
on my workstation, and use debian stable for lab machines.
> interfaces seems to have not been subjected to what would be
Interfaces? Ethernet adapters?
> they are doing (yes I can just get the source from kernel.org and not
> rely on a "mandrake" kernel (which is probably a silly idea anyway but
> would be neat if it actually worked, but why put my faith in someone
> else to patch and build a kernel for me?)
Precisely. Why put your faith in anyone else?
> I have ideas as to why there were some problems with Mandrake: I have
So don't use it. Mandrake is by definition an unstable experimental
distribution aimed at the single home user. Like redhat, it won't work
in a networked environment unless you hold it down flat on the floor
in a pinfall.
Peter
------------------------------
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy
Subject: Re: The usual Linux spiel... (was Re: Is Open Source for You?)
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Stephen Edwards)
Date: Tue, 05 Jun 2001 05:56:16 GMT
Seven rabid koala bears with eucalyptus spittle dribbling from their mouths
told me that [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Edward Rosten) wrote in <9fh70e$mke$1
@news.ox.ac.uk>:
>>> OK, well GPL spiel aside - may I ask why you think why the Linux kernel
>>> is "completely" substandard ? In the interests of fairness I would like
>>> you to compare 2.4.x V Win2k, so we are on the same ground.
>>>
>>> May make for a more interesting thread :)
>>
>> That's easy. No central distribution point of development
>> (ala NetBSD, FreeBSD, OpenBSD), and therefore, a severe
>> variance in code quality.
>
>Everything that ends up in the Linux kernel goes through the kernel
>development team, that's as central as you get.
I don't mean to pit free OS against free OS here,
but I still find Linux's development model to be
rather undesirable.
I know of no central core development team for the
Linux kernel. AFAIK, additions are often just
added if other developers "like" them.
NetBSD has a core team, that verifies, and if need be,
corrects the code, to make sure that the kernel remains
of a clean design. Have you noticed how many arch's
that NetBSD runs on? *grin*
Right now, the only advantage that I can see in running
Linux is that they are a bit further ahead in areas like
threads, and SMP. But I honestly don't trust the product
of developers who announce the release of a new kernel
with "ho hum... here you go. Enjoy!"
IMHO, Linux developers don't seem to take what they do
very seriously, and that bothers me on some level.
Then again, maybe they do, and I'm just no fun. :-P
But hey, that just me... I'm merely evaluating Linux
by what I can observe and have experienced, and I am
very cynical and picky on top of that.
------------------------------
From: LShaping <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: alt.destroy.microsoft
Subject: Re: Windows XP Ushers in New Era of Communications
Date: Tue, 05 Jun 2001 05:49:53 GMT
The Queen of Cans and Jars <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>Frank wrote:
>>
>> If the appeals court in the DOJ suit sides with Microsoft (and most
>> people think they will),
The pundits also thought the Supremes would expedite the case. The
prior 2/3 appeals court decision was that tying Internet Explorer to
Windows was benificial to consumers. How did they reach that
conclusion? That part of their judgement is not part of this case,
AFAIK. Also, Microsoft is back before the courts, partly because of
the prior 2/3 judgement and lack of corrective action.
>> the incessant leveraging of Windows will not
>> only continue but get much worse. Get those credit cards ready folks.
>>
>The one thing that will not be overturned is the decision that
>Microsoft is a monopoly.
Yup. Duh. But Microsoft still argued that it is not. Go figure.
>And in many ways, that is really
>crucial...for example, there are numerous class-action suits underway
>at this moment, Brazil has recently found MS to be a monopoly, the EU
>is about ready to screw MS royally, there is an investigation in
>Japan, and Sun has indicate they will sue MS. There may be others,
>too.
Whoever is guiding Microsoft's attorneys does not understand that it
is in a court of law.
------------------------------
From: cjt & trefoil <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.arch,misc.invest.stocks
Subject: Re: The beginning of the end for microsoft
Date: Tue, 05 Jun 2001 01:09:24 -0500
Ayende Rahien wrote:
>
> "Dean Kent" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:L_YS6.6256$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
>
> > If you are fortunate, the registry doesn't get trashed by your first boot
> on
> > new hardware. Windows keeps all hardware, software and user options in a
> > single relational data base file (as far as I can tell), and when it gets
> > corrupted... well, you could be completely screwed and need to reformat
> and
> > reinstall..
>
> No, the registry is a hirercial database, not a relational.
> The difference is that in a relational database you ask:
> "give me all the people with brown hair"
> In hirercial database you ask:
> "give me all the people stored in the \brown_hair."
>
> Hirercial database are *really* fast.
... for certain types of queries. For others they're abysmal.
>
> BTW, about shortnames in NT, you can disable those, solving the problem.
------------------------------
From: "JS \\ PL" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To:
alt.destroy.microsoft,comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.os.ms-windows.advocacy
Subject: Re: Just when Linux starts getting good, Microsoft buries it in the dust!
Date: Tue, 5 Jun 2001 02:34:00 -0400
"Bryan C" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> "JS \\ PL" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
news:<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>...
> > "T. Max Devlin" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> > news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > > Said Aaron R. Kulkis in alt.destroy.microsoft on Wed, 23 May 2001
> > > >JS \\ PL wrote:
> > > >>
> > > >> I have to say, Linux Mandrake 8 was looking real damn good. Support
for
> > all
> > > >> my hardware (for once) easy set-up, even seting up networking and
> > connection
> > > >> sharing was painless. Good newsreader - Knode, pretty stable OS. I
even
> > > >> liked the fact that it stayed connected to the Internet when
switching
> > users
> > > >
> > > >this has been a fact of Unix family operating systems since they were
> > > >first networked (i.e. 1970's)
> > >
> > > The fact is, the very idea that a network connection would be broken
> > > because a user logged out (pardon me; because THE user logged out) is
a
> > > Windowsism to begin with.
> > >
> > > >> (unlike Win2K)
> > > >
> > > >Another admission that Mafia$oft is over 30 years behind in basic
> > technology.
> > >
> > > More than that. Microsoft says XP will have it; nobody really knows
if
> > > it is ever going to actually work.
> >
> > Microsoft doesn't "say" they will have it. They HAVE it!
> > And it seems to work pretty good for my big 5 (five) users. All five can
be
> > logged on, with programs open, and switching between users is very
quick.
> > It's not a matter of saving a list of programs to be opened when that
user
> > logs back in. The programs are open just as you left them. That word
> > document you have open is STILL open with the cursor still blinking
right
> > where you left it. Half installed programs are STILL half installed when
you
> > return. The only thing I've found is that a half played mp3 (in Winamp)
is
> > closed down when a user switch takes place. But who knows, maybe Media
> > Player (tm) will automatically pause in the final version. :-)
> >
> > I believe MS is on to something with Windows XP. Hell it even plays my
OLD
> > dos games perfectly. Way to go Microsoft! Still #1 into the new
millenium!
>
> A few questions...
>
> First off, what if that word document is open and the machine crashes
> or is shutdown while another user is using the system? If on reboot,
> everything is fine than I suspect a list of some sort is saved.
The OS won't crash so I guess we'll never know the answer to "what if it
crashes". If you shut it down it warns of all active users, and asks if
you'd like to save whatever programs are open (that's what shutting down
IS).
>
> Second, all those programs open seems like alot to ask of any MS OS on
> a typical PC.
Actually last week I had Mandrake installed on an antique 233mhz Packard
Bell with 60 mb of edo ram. On board 1mb video chip, on board sound 800x600
resolution. It was SO DAMN SLOW I had to take it off the HD. I then
installed WinXP beta on the exact same system and it runs about as fast as
Win98 did on it and about 5 times as fast as Mandrake did. One note of hope
for Linux though, while Madrake was installed I ran test websites using
Apache and it served pages up in it's usual "sub second" quickness.
>I wonder what kind of hardware requirements are
> necessary to successfully support this feature if nothing is being
> saved to non-volatile memory as you suggest.
More RAM would be required for each user. I've got four users logged on
right now, there's 24 open applications and 78 total processes running. This
is taxing my 224mb ram. Task manager is showing 275mb memory in use with
32mb of available physical memory, so it's doing a little HD writing.
The processor is still hovering about 3-7%.
Now if I go in and close all the open apps by the other users memory usage
drops to 154 mb with 117mb of available physical memory.
> Third, can all five users USE the XP box simultaneously via remote
> connection?
<paste>
Remote Desktop overview
With Remote Desktop on Whistler Professional, you can have access to a
Windows session that is running on your computer when you are at another
computer. This means, for example, that you can connect to your work
computer from home and have access to all of your applications, files, and
network resources as though you were in front of your computer at work. You
can leave programs running at work and when you get home, you can see your
desktop at work displayed on your home computer, with the same programs
running.
When you connect to your computer at work, Remote Desktop automatically
locks that computer so no one else can access your applications and files
while you are gone. When you come back to your computer at work, you can
unlock it by typing CTRL+ALT+DEL.
Remote Desktop also allows more than one user to have active sessions on a
single computer. This means that multiple users can leave their applications
running and preserve the state of their Windows session even while others
are logged on.
You can easily switch from one user to another. For example, suppose you
have logged on to update an expense report, and someone else needs to log on
to perform another task. You can disconnect your Remote Desktop session,
allow the other user to use the computer, and then reconnect to find the
expense report exactly as you left it. This ability to switch between users
works on standalone computers and computers that are members of workgroups.
Remote Desktop enables a variety of scenarios, including:
Working at home - Access work in progress on your office computer from home,
including full access to all local and remote devices.
Collaborating - Bring your desktop to a colleague's office to debug some
code, update a Microsoft PowerPoint slide presentation, or proofread a
document.
Sharing a console - Allow multiple users to maintain separate program and
configuration sessions on a single computer, such as at a teller station or
a sales desk.
To use Remote Desktop, you need the following:
A computer running Whistler Professional ("remote" computer) with connection
to a Local Area Network or the Internet.
A second computer ("home" computer) with access to the Local Area Network
via network connection, modem, or Virtual Private Network (VPN) connection.
This computer must have Remote Desktop Connection, formerly called the
Terminal Services client, installed.
Appropriate user accounts and permissions.
</paste>
------------------------------
From: GreyCloud <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Crossposted-To: comp.os.ms-windows.nt.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.advocacy
Subject: Re: UI Importance
Date: Mon, 04 Jun 2001 23:59:33 -0700
Ayende Rahien wrote:
>
> "GreyCloud" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> news:[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > Ayende Rahien wrote:
> > >
> > > "Edward Rosten" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote in message
> > > news:9fg0bg$s2a$[EMAIL PROTECTED]...
> > > > >> Not if they're using bash under cygwin.
> > > > >
> > > > > Cygwin on 9x sucks, period. And I like CMD's filename completion
> > > > > betterthan I like bash.
> > > >
> > > > What's different?
> > >
> > > I can't get Bash's to work :-D
> > >
> >
> > How come? What environment is bash installed on?
> > I usually just type in at least a few characters and then hit the tab
> > key.
>
> Cygwin & Slackware 7.1
I never used Slackware 7.1... one would think that bash would be
consistent across unix-like platforms. It works ok for me on Solaris
and it worked under Caldera and RedHat. strange....
--
V
------------------------------
Crossposted-To: comp.arch,misc.invest.stocks
Subject: Re: The beginning of the end for microsoft
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Patrick Schaaf)
Date: 05 Jun 2001 07:07:26 GMT
[EMAIL PROTECTED] (Maynard Handley) writes:
>(As for Linux, I have no first hand experience, but it wouldn't surprise
>me if the job is no simpler in that case.
First, you move your home directory. In the case that the new installation
contains apps with modified preferences syntax, they will break. I cannot
remember seeing such breakage during the last few moves, but it can
certainly happen - even Linux apps are ordinary software...
Next, you probably find the new installation doesn't have some of the
apps installed that were installed on the old system. I hear (not used)
that Debian Linux has solved this, if you used nothing but Debian packages:
A single command dumps a package list, and a second command on the new
system reads that package list, and installs all that's neccessary.
Of course, nowhere in this process does anything on the machine,
hold your hand. But, given the mechanism described for Debian
works well, it should be almost trivial to write a small GUI
automating the task, while rendering paper clips. Go ahead, if you
see a market. I don't.
regards
Patrick
------------------------------
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