On Tue, 17 Feb 2004, ME wrote:
> One of the amazing things with software is that it can grow beyond the > confines and limitations that people try to impose on it. Luckily, since > we use Linux, we do not need to "limit" ourselves to only use software as > it was expected. Hmmm. Your use of the word limit in quotes comes dangerously close to being condescending, but I'll assume that's not how it was meant. Anyway, I was asking a question, not making a statement. I asked 'What is?'. I didn't make the statement 'There is no such thing...' > > Consider a laptop that is used at installfests to act as a server of files > for installs, a gateway/masquerading unit, and a shell server for > multi-user access. I don't see why any of the above machines require dual-boot with Windows. > > Also, consider hybrid systems with wine being used remotely. Depending on how your run Wine, yes, but not neccesary. > > Just because a person cannot see a use for something does not mean that a > use does not exist for it. You want more examples? Read on... > I didn't suggest that a use didn't exist. I just suggested the solutions being offered got off the track of answering the original question, which sounded to me like it was coming from a desktop user. But I would never suggest that a desktop can't scale into something more, or that security shouldn't be considered because of some vague definition of how a computer is used. > Our uni Networking and CS labs are this way. 1 Windows install and 2 > different Linux installs. Yes, we do utilize the multi-user functions on > these systems in our experiments. Yeah, experiments, not real multi-user machines that also happen to dual-boot. Perhaps I'm muddling multi-user with REMOTE-user, but I would suggest for unix boxes that's more often the case than not. > > Well, we have different machines that have specific purposes. Also, there > are still some systems out there that require the admin to boot to windows > > Other cases for having a bootable windows systems: > BIOS Upgrades for the system > SCSI Card Firmware updates that only run from DOS or windows > System hardware initialization for hardware that uses proprietary code to > start the hardware working so that Linux can use it > Being required by the hardware vendor to run diagnostic software that > only runs in windows before you can have parts replaced All but the last of the examples above suggests dual-booting DOS, not Windows, or even booting from a DOS floppy when possible. I made myself a DOS bootable CDROM which I find comes in handy every now and then... I don't know. I just consider dual-booting something that you grow out of as a desktop user and not really something appropriate for production Linux boxes. That's why I asked the question about the lab or public access computer, which was a scenario I thought up where a dual-boot, multi-user system made sense. > > (many more reasons if you think about it) Or not so many, or perhaps you would have listed them to back up your argument. _______________________________________________ vox-tech mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.lugod.org/mailman/listinfo/vox-tech