www.opensource.org and other sites (The Register) and www.globetechnology.com (Globe & Mail's technology news site) mentioned that MS considers LINUX a threat.
Last week I attended an OS security class where each student had two PCs, one was a Windows2000 machine, one was a LINUX machine. The LINUX machine came with Gnome, which doesn't look all that bad. I would argue that the LINUX GUI needs a bit of streamlining but you can see that it has dramatically improved. LINUX still has software compatibility problems, the courseware referred to a LINUX configuration program that (for some unknown reason) wouldn't work on our LINUX machines. The LINUX machines seemed to have older hardware, I have the impression that they were the ones the training center had "replaced and upgraded" to Windows2000, but now had turned around and were using them for teaching OS security on LINUX. Speed was comparable. The irony is that as LINUX becomes more streamlined, vendors start charging for it... Will there be a meeting in the middle of open source OS and Windows? If Microsoft has to reduce its prices for Windows, how will it maintain its revenue growth? Advanced LINUX is not free either, I don't know how its price compares with the Windows2000 offering though. Regards, Patrice Boivin Systems Analyst (Oracle Certified DBA) -----Original Message----- Sent: Thursday, February 27, 2003 7:40 PM To: Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L As long as I'm not replaced by an open source (cheap) DBA .... Stephane Paquette Administrateur de bases de donnees Database Administrator Standard Life www.standardlife.ca Tel. (514) 925-7187 [EMAIL PROTECTED] <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> -----Original Message----- [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, February 27, 2003 5:04 PM To: Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L I don't believe MS will ever give up. Isn't that part of American Capitalism? Your competitor does you one better on some test, therefore you've got to better them. Give Oracle a couple of weeks and we'll here that one too. But seriously, how many of us really care about the TP-C benchmark? It's great for marketing and the sales droids but how do I relate that to the business needs of where I'm working? Great, we can push the database to 400K+ transactions per second, wow. Now if I could just get those 300 testers on the floor to take advantage of that when their tests are 5 minutes long!! Somehow the capabilities of the server/database combination has gotten SOO big that it can't be filled anymore or so the users think when they release the query from hell. BTW: As I look down the road to the future, I wonder how much of the commercial software industry is going to survive the wave of open source stuff coming down the pipe? Here I am, today, sitting at a MS Win2K desktop with Oracle running on the database server. A couple of years down the road I can see a Linux, or some derivative of it, as the desktop and PostgreSql on the database server. Processing data will still have to happen and relational data will still be around, but will MS and Oracle?? Damn good question I'd have to say. /* rant mode off, cool mode on */ Dick Goulet ____________________Reply Separator____________________ Author: DENNIS WILLIAMS <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: 2/27/2003 11:26 AM For your amusement, MS thinks they can "now" equal Oracle in performance (wasn't that what they claimed 3 years ago?). Anyway, I tend to think of these benchmarks like the NASCAR winners. Yeah I'm going to go by a Chrysler because it won the NASCAR championship. http://www.entmag.com/news/article.asp?EditorialsID=5707 <http://www.entmag.com/news/article.asp?EditorialsID=5707> Dennis Williams DBA, 40%OCP, 100% DBA Lifetouch, Inc. [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- Please see the official ORACLE-L FAQ: http://www.orafaq.net -- Author: DENNIS WILLIAMS INET: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fat City Network Services -- 858-538-5051 http://www.fatcity.com San Diego, California -- Mailing list and web hosting services --------------------------------------------------------------------- To REMOVE yourself from this mailing list, send an E-Mail message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (note EXACT spelling of 'ListGuru') and in the message BODY, include a line containing: UNSUB ORACLE-L (or the name of mailing list you want to be removed from). You may also send the HELP command for other information (like subscribing). -- Please see the official ORACLE-L FAQ: http://www.orafaq.net -- Author: INET: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fat City Network Services -- 858-538-5051 http://www.fatcity.com San Diego, California -- Mailing list and web hosting services --------------------------------------------------------------------- To REMOVE yourself from this mailing list, send an E-Mail message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (note EXACT spelling of 'ListGuru') and in the message BODY, include a line containing: UNSUB ORACLE-L (or the name of mailing list you want to be removed from). You may also send the HELP command for other information (like subscribing). -- Please see the official ORACLE-L FAQ: http://www.orafaq.net -- Author: Stephane Paquette INET: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fat City Network Services -- 858-538-5051 http://www.fatcity.com San Diego, California -- Mailing list and web hosting services --------------------------------------------------------------------- To REMOVE yourself from this mailing list, send an E-Mail message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (note EXACT spelling of 'ListGuru') and in the message BODY, include a line containing: UNSUB ORACLE-L (or the name of mailing list you want to be removed from). You may also send the HELP command for other information (like subscribing). -- Please see the official ORACLE-L FAQ: http://www.orafaq.net -- Author: Boivin, Patrice J INET: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Fat City Network Services -- 858-538-5051 http://www.fatcity.com San Diego, California -- Mailing list and web hosting services --------------------------------------------------------------------- To REMOVE yourself from this mailing list, send an E-Mail message to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (note EXACT spelling of 'ListGuru') and in the message BODY, include a line containing: UNSUB ORACLE-L (or the name of mailing list you want to be removed from). You may also send the HELP command for other information (like subscribing).