MAC I'd love to run linux on a G3. I wish there was a Mac version of SuSE. Love Linux Like Mac Loath Windows any and all versions. [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: > >>I agree with Karsten. >> >>Look for instance what Microsoft did with Apple. They made out of office >98 an >>important application for Mac OS. Then they told Apple if the don't make >IE >>their preferred browser they won't support Office 98 anymore. >> >>I think it's best and most safe to use public domain and shareware >product for >>Linux if possible. And certainly don't support the MS monopoly at this >time. >> > >The MS Office/ Apple question is (from my perspective) a bit deeper than >you describe. >For one thing, the decision to do IE as the default browser predates the >release of Office 98. >Office (more specifically Word and Excel) were made important applications >on the Macintosh (at least in part) by distributing copies of Office (Word >5 and Excel) for free in the early 1990's. MS gave everyone at the LA Mac >User Group meeting a free copy of Office (~$395 at the time ; aprox 800 >people at the meeting) and I know that this was not the only user group >that got this special promotion. They effectively dumped this product into >the Mac world by making it very inexpensive (even if you did pay something >for it) >To their credit, Word 5.1 was a very good word processor. The problem is >not with the quality of Word 5.1, but the effect of their 'dumping' >product >into the market. The landscape for word processors and spreadsheets dried >up so that Word Perfect, Nisus, Write Now and others had no market to sell >to. Each of those programs had advantages over Word, and to this day, >Nisus >is a very powerful word processor with no market. >After MS killed the market for office products by dumping Word 5.1 on the >world, the came out with Word 6 which was almost completely unusable. I >find it hard to believe that software that bad could be released. Of >course, by this time there were no other alternatives on the Mac so to get >office applications, you had to move to Windows, where the full suite of >Office products works just fine thank you. > >Now we are at Office 98 which is not bad and in many respects very good. >That does not mitigate the fact that the market is dead. >I am concerned that any OS that has MS support in the way of applications >is vulnerable to this sort of market-cide. >The evolution of IE is a similar story. (Even with the mistakes of >netscape, IE was no competition until version 4 ... and any other product >that couldn't compete until the fourth generation would never have gained >any market share). >When Microsoft has killed all credible browser alternatives on a platform, >they will make your only option to move to Windows to use their browser. -- To get out of this list, please send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with this text in its body: unsubscribe suse-linux-e Check out the SuSE-FAQ at http://www.suse.com/Support/Doku/FAQ/ and the archive at http://www.suse.com/Mailinglists/suse-linux-e/index.html
