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Grex > Jelly > #70: Microsoft rolls out "Vista" |  |
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twenex
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response 86 of 203:
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Feb 1 16:33 UTC 2007 |
People are lazy, and they want things to be easy- for minimal usage
requirements- Windows fits the bill. Sure, some things don't work right-
at which point people either work around it, scrap the idea, or consider
getting help. The user doesn't WANT to fiddle with settings, or
recompile kernels- they want to plug and play.
OK, we're back in FUD territory here. There's no need to do that these days.
They also manage to
forget about all the time spent actually making Windows work the way
they (mostly) want it to.
Which if true only proves my argument that Windows is very far away from being
judged on its merits.
Similar to the memory deletion of the time it
takes to search for that special key stroke command.
I don't know what this is referring to.
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edina
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response 87 of 203:
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Feb 1 16:36 UTC 2007 |
I really have no opinion on Windows v. Linux. I'm sorry - that gene
has just never been stimulated. That being said, I find this:
"re #53 oh c'mon twenex, you don't support Gates' philanthropic work
because he's a flaming liberal. He and his buddy, the world's second
richest man warren buffett, are both supporting Barack Obama in fact"
to be one of the FUNNIEST things EVER written.
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jadecat
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response 88 of 203:
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Feb 1 17:05 UTC 2007 |
resp:86 someone posted a link awhile back to a study on which was really
faster- using only a keyboard and special combination keystrokes, or
switching to using a mouse. People thought kayboard only would have to
be faster, but the adherents 'forgot' about the time it took to remember
the specific combination keystrokes they needed to achieve what they
wanted. The time spent moving touse a mouse ended up being about the
same or faster than keyboard only. That's what I mean.
And I do agree, I don't think that Windows is really being judged solely
on it's merits.
People may need a license to drive a car- but that doesn't mean they
know how the car really works. That's why they have mechanics. ;)
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twenex
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response 89 of 203:
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Feb 1 17:09 UTC 2007 |
resp:86 someone posted a link awhile back to a study on which was really
faster- using only a keyboard and special combination keystrokes, or
switching to using a mouse. People thought kayboard only would have to
be faster, but the adherents 'forgot' about the time it took to remember
the specific combination keystrokes they needed to achieve what they
wanted. The time spent moving touse a mouse ended up being about the
same or faster than keyboard only. That's what I mean.
?It takes far less time to learn the limited amount of commands you had to
use to learn Linux years ago (not now) than to deal with a repeatedly crashing
Windows machine. If you solve a problem by rebooting or reinstalling, you can
bet your bottom dollar it is going to happen again.
People may need a license to drive a car- but that doesn't mean they
know how the car really works. That's why they have mechanics. ;)
Notwithstanding the fact that typing commands into a computer is most
certainly not necessary with Linux, it's not "knowing how it works" either.
Yes, I can get around the commandline in Linux, but ask me how all the bits
fit together and I'd be stumped.
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vivekm1234
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response 90 of 203:
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Feb 1 17:23 UTC 2007 |
Re #73:
" I would argue that makes it a POS from everyone's point of view,.."
Not necessarily. See shit is useful as manure..Windows may contain
shitty code and may have bugs but that does not necessarily imply
that it is less useful than Linux.
"But note that history is repeating itself - Unix grew in use on DEC's /despite
the fact/ that DEC hated it, wouldn't supply it, and wouldn't support it."
Oh yeah, i feel that Linux/Unix will get better with age unlike Windows
which has saturated. Well unless they come up with new stuff and not just
eye-candy.
"Word doesn't format Word documents reliably either. "
The question is to what degree - my personal experience with OpenOffice
is that it horribly slow and mangles complicated word doc's. Whereas with
MS-Word it's not too bad..in fact i've never noticed it till date.
" since although neither Grex nor Gardenweb is forced on people, Windows
most certainly is."
Your idea of something being forced on you is the fact that it comes pre-
packaged with hardware. However i would like to point out that you could
just as easily toss it out and put Linux. Also note that you don't HAVE
to buy from said dealer. No one is blackmailing, threatening you to buy
the darn thing. It's like advertisement - it's in your face between shows.
What you are actually saying is that "Linux does not come pre-packaged"
or "i'm not getting a blank machine". Well you can only blame Linux for
that - if they could market better or if there was greater user demand..
see what i mean
Re #84:
"attitude that if you go into a store, and buy pc hardware, most times you
/don't get/ to choose the OS software.""
Because it isn't a right. It might be bad business practise but that's
something the market should decide and right now the winds of fortune blow in
favour of MS.
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remmers
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response 91 of 203:
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Feb 1 17:24 UTC 2007 |
When you install Vista, you agree to some licensing terms that are
pretty far reaching, and go even farther than Microsoft has gone before
in limiting what you can do with your computer and its software.
Michael Geist's blog about legal matters has a posting on this.
(http://www.michaelgeist.ca/index.php?
option=com_content&task=view&id=1641&Itemid=135 or if you prefer,
http://tinyurl.com/29ohhb). Some tidbits that caught my eye:
Vista's legal fine print includes extensive provisions granting
Microsoft the right to regularly check the legitimacy of the
software and holds the prospect of deleting certain programs
without the user's knowledge.
...
Once operational, the agreement warns that Windows Defender will,
by default, automatically remove software rated "high" or
"severe,"even though that may result in other software ceasing to
work or mistakenly result in the removal of software that is not
unwanted.
...
For those users frustrated by the software's limitations, Microsoft
cautions that "you may not work around any technical limitations in
the software."
...
...numerous limitations in the new software [were] seemingly
installed at the direct request of Hollywood interests. . . .
[There are] restrictions associated with the ability to playback
high-definition content from the next-generation DVDs such as Blu-
Ray and HD-DVD (referred to as "premium content"). . . .
Vista intentionally degrades the picture quality of premium content
when played on most computer monitors. . . . the technological
controls would require considerable consumption of computing power
with the system conducting 30 checks each second to ensure that
there are no attacks on the security of the premium content.
No thanks. I'll pass.
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twenex
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response 92 of 203:
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Feb 1 17:35 UTC 2007 |
Well it looks like Vivek and I will have to just agree to disagree on the
subject of whether you have the right to do what you like with stuff you
purchase.
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vivekm1234
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response 93 of 203:
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Feb 1 18:29 UTC 2007 |
Res #91 #92: Wow! Note however that i use Win2K and have no intentions of
ever upgrading so long as there is support for 2K by the various software
companies. As to: "right to do what you like with stuff you" i don't know
depends on what the courts say. Logically you have no such right..
Look it's a agreement with the devil. Devil's told you what's in the contract.
It's upto you to decide. However there are plenty of instances where the
benefit of the common good dominates..so..might is right.
BTW are there any stats comparing KDE/Gnome with Win2K - in terms of memory
and CPU? Also, things like start up time between SUSE and 2K. Not to mention
StarOffice and MS-Office..
I found this but it looks flaky: http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/Ou/?p=14
0
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twenex
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response 94 of 203:
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Feb 2 01:46 UTC 2007 |
might is right.
Responses like that are why half the planet is still stuck in the sociological
stone age.
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twenex
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response 95 of 203:
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Feb 2 01:59 UTC 2007 |
Linux applications typically start up slower than their Windows counterparts
(it's a function of the split between "fork" and "exec") but they typically
stay up longer. There was some discussion a while back about investigating
how to make start up times quicker, but it doesn't seem to have come to
anything.
Regardless, without being able to compare with W2K, when Windows starts up
it takes a LONG time before the computer is usable after the desktop comes
up. In Linux the desktop takes longer to come up, but is actually usable when
it does and is therefore probably faster than Windows. The only case when this
might not be true is when you have a LOT of programs set to start up on login,
but as far as I can tell, even in that pathological case it's still possible
to interact with the desktop (starting up other applications, etc.)
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vivekm1234
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response 96 of 203:
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Feb 2 15:13 UTC 2007 |
Re #94: "might is right" that was wrt to society imposing it's will on
individuals for the greater good.
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twenex
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response 97 of 203:
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Feb 2 15:22 UTC 2007 |
Ah. Communism.
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richard
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response 98 of 203:
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Feb 2 15:55 UTC 2007 |
re #97 no, he said "the greater good" You do believe there is or could
be a "greater good" than your own individual needs don't you? Or are
you an Ayn Rand Objectivist?
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twenex
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response 99 of 203:
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Feb 2 16:03 UTC 2007 |
Yes I do believe there can be "a great good than my own individual needs".
However, I trust no man or group of men (or women) smaller than the human race
to know what that is. Situations in which "a Food Good Men" have controlled
society for its "benefit" have inevitably lead to the deaths of A Lot of Good
Men (and Women).
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richard
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response 100 of 203:
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Feb 2 16:27 UTC 2007 |
So unless there is unanimous consent among the entire human race, you
won't accept laws impacting you that are passed for the "greater good"?
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sholmes
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response 101 of 203:
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Feb 2 16:31 UTC 2007 |
greater good reminded me of this definition of democracy:
"two wolves and a sheep voting on what to eat for dinner"
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cough
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response 102 of 203:
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Feb 2 17:11 UTC 2007 |
thats stupid
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remmers
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response 103 of 203:
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Feb 2 19:02 UTC 2007 |
If I may be so bold as to post something relevant to the topic of this
item (Microsoft Vista)...
ComputerWorld has an interesting article by Scot Finnie on some of the
things baked into Vista that he considers to be problems (DRM stuff and a
number of other things). You can read it here:
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?
command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9009961
(also at http://tinyurl.com/2xcbmy)
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richard
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response 104 of 203:
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Feb 2 19:55 UTC 2007 |
bill gates really threw down the gauntlet when he declared Vista the
safest o/s system in history. Basically saying its hole-proof. I mean
I know he's got the best software engineers working on it, and he's
probably had them looking for holes in the beta version for some time
and maybe they finally got to the point where they couldn't find any.
But how can you possible write that much code and not leave some sort
of maze that leads right through it?
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remmers
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response 105 of 203:
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Feb 2 21:20 UTC 2007 |
You can't. For an interesting exploit, see:
http://www.techtree.com/India/News/Vista_Speech_Recognition_has_Flaw/
551-78904-580.html (or http://tinyurl.com/2kbbkg).
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twenex
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response 106 of 203:
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Feb 2 21:28 UTC 2007 |
Re: #100. No, I simply put my faith more in evolution than revolution.
Re: #103. How dare you?!
Re: #104. My, you do enjoy making us laugh. Most secure OS ever? That's what
he said that last time. Best engineers? They must spend most of their time
playing pocket billiards. They certainly can't be putting much effort into
creating decent code.
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tod
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response 107 of 203:
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Feb 2 22:59 UTC 2007 |
re #104
I've sat in lectures from both James Whittaker and and Mike Howard. Both of
these gents have been on the development/security of Vista. Mike's pitch was
that they employed a file fuzzing for malformed data, threat modes and
blockbox testing, memory defenses and stricter services, block header
integrity checks, heap terminations on corruption, and rooted over at least
1.2 million annotations. Even through all of that, Mike knows and admits that
Vista will have bugs which will show up after shipping. He also admits though
that they will patch and fix whatever pops-up much more efficiently than is
done with any other flavor of OS you see on the market.
James Whittaker on the other hand..he's the guy who breaks the stuff before
it ships. He's a hell of a lot of fun and I'm envious of his job at
Microsoft. He discussed the origin of bad things, noticing the environments
of applications as well as their inputs and logic within. At the end of the
lecture, we explored an IE 7 bug in the internet options security tab where
you could set all sorts of restrictions against porn sites to protect your
kids at home only to have them create their own msrating.dll file in the
iexplorer.exe directory which is blank but bypasses your original settings.
>;)
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vivekm1234
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response 108 of 203:
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Feb 3 15:30 UTC 2007 |
Re #106: Ahem! I think it was James Gosling that said that MS coders were
pretty good in some article ages back.
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kingjon
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response 109 of 203:
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Feb 3 17:02 UTC 2007 |
Re #106, #108: It all depends on what the coders are putting their effort into.
Q.v.:
http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html
"A Cost Analysis of Windows Vista Content Protection"
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gull
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response 110 of 203:
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Feb 3 22:09 UTC 2007 |
Re resp:32: It's not just that alternatives weren't user-friendly.
Remember OS/2? It was actually pretty user-friendly, and for a while
had a loyal following at some businesses. The problem is the
application support just wasn't there. More new software got written
for Windows, so people bought Windows to run it. OS/2 made a last-ditch
attempt at salvation with a version that could run some Windows 3.1
applications, but it never caught on and the operating system disappeared.
Then there was BeOS. Very pretty, very user friendly. But the hardware
and software support wasn't there. Software companies didn't write apps
for it, hardware companies didn't write drivers for it, and it disappeared.
The fact is, hardware and software companies *like* having an OS
monopoly. It means fewer support issues for them. It also means
cheaper development, because they don't have to port their code to other
operating systems. They don't want to go back to the bad old days where
a major app might have to support half a dozen platforms. For that
reason the Windows monopoly is fairly self-sustaining even absent
Microsoft's dirty tricks.
Re resp:36: Linux has come a long way. I've done a few SuSE installs
recently and they've worked out of the box, just like Windows XP
(usually) does. Actually, I've had fewer driver issues with SuSE than I
have with XP. This represents a major effort on the part of the kernel
developers to support new hardware as it appears, often without any help
from the hardware manufacturers.
BUT, ease-of-installation is nearly irrelevent to Windows. Almost no
one actually ever installs it themselves. They buy a computer with it
pre-installed.
Re resp:93: Software support for Windows 2000 is going to dry up pretty
quickly now that it's been end-of-lifed. I'm already seeing new
hardware that doesn't have drivers for it, and Microsoft isn't going to
be providing security patches anymore.
Re resp:95: That's not what I've found. My experience is that Windows
2000 takes far longer to boot than Linux, but apps come up quicker once
the boot process is done. This is probably because a lot of Windows
apps pre-load during boot to get faster launch times. IE and MS Office
are in that category.
Now, it's true the Windows *desktop* appears quicker. But at first the
Windows desktop is unresponsive. You're wasting your time trying to
click on anything until that little hourglass goes away. By the time
all the apps pre-load, the virus checker loads and updates, etc., it's
taken almost five minutes for my Win2K box to stop thrashing its disk
and be responsive enough to be useable.
As an IT worker, what bugs me most about Windows is its black-box
nature. This gets worse with every release. It breaks in subtle ways
that are often impossible to fix without reinstalling the whole OS,
because the internals are walled off and largely unknown to everyone
outside of Microsoft. (In fact, it's so big and complex there probably
isn't any one person at Microsoft who understands it, either.) In many
cases you couldn't fix it if you did understand them, because files that
are open are untouchable, and most of the critical files are open
whenever the OS is loaded. Worst of all, it's non-deterministic -- you
can do the same procedure twice and get two different results. It's an
intensely frustrating operating system to work with.
I'm also often faced with a choice between security and functionality,
with Windows XP. Many Windows apps simply refuse to run without
administrative privilages. But if I give someone admin privilages and
walk away, I'll be coming back two months later and spending hours
removing the spyware from their computer.
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