Roy Schestowitz <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> espoused:
> ____/ Mark Kent on Tuesday 07 August 2007 12:18 : \____
>
>> Roy Schestowitz <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> espoused:
>>> ____/ Mark Kent on Monday 06 August 2007 10:34 : \____
>>>
>>>> Roy Schestowitz <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> espoused:
>>>>> ____/ waterskidoo on Sunday 05 August 2007 18:51 : \____
>>>>>
>>>>>> On 2007-08-05, Roy Schestowitz <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Linux is more secure, stable, and less expensive. Once you put KDE on
>>>>>>> top of Windows, then you need to learn a new environment anyway. The
>>>>>>> only advantage then might be the ability to run Windows applications
>>>>>>> natively.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Well said! Linux's claim to fame if you will is the infrastructure that
>>>>>> it is built upon although I admit I am addicted to the eye candy.
>>>>>
>>>>> Really? I'm always afraid of installing /anything/ that might sip
>>>>> resources, awn included. I'm still using a 1.8Ghz box and a lot of
>>>>> resources are drained when indexing (in RAM) 120,000 USENET posts, running
>>>>> Firefox with dozens of plugins, and using Thunderbird which can be made
>>>>> equally 'fat'. At the moment, I maintain a fairly minimal KDE desktop. It
>>>>> used to be the opposite, with lots of panels all over the place and
>>>>> maximal eye candy.
>>>>>
>>>>>> Putting a Linux face on Windows is like building a mansion upon
>>>>>> the sand. It will look good until it starts to sink due to
>>>>>> the collapse of the underlying infrastructure.
>>>>>
>>>>> The thought of running a KDE desktop with KDE apps and having Norton
>>>>> anti-virus underneat is just bizarre (and resource-draining). Then you
>>>>> have the system updates with forced reboots, WGA, and the rest of these
>>>>> deficiencies. Registry bloat, defrag, and so forth...
>>>>>
>>>>> Weird...
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>> And yet you were agreeing with Peter K regarding having binary-only
>>>> portions to the Linux kernel...
>>>
>>> Huh? When? I would say that it's better than nothing at all, but like many
>>> people whom I talk to, I know that open source drivers are the way to go.
>>
>> Okay, but then, back to the mac sat next to me, it currently has /nothing
>> at all/ as its nvidia proprietary driver. It does, of course, have the
>> open-source nv driver, which does a jolly good job of accelerated 2D
>> graphics, but there's no 3D capability.
>>
>> Why? well, at least in part, there is the "divide and conquer" approach;
>> because nVidia produce a driver for the x86 32-bit platform, which is
>> certainly more popular (at the moment!) than the PPC, then they leave
>> the PPC owners out in the cold, and we even get those who claim to be
>> linux advocates genuinely arguing the "well, there aren't many people
>> with PPC, so they don't matter"!
>>
>>> Predictable devices which operate in a way that their owner /understand/. We
>>> should also be allowed to study the code that we run on our PC, especially
>>> when computers are all connected, so there's room for spyware, not just
>>> neglect and sabotage.
>>
>> Quite.
>>
>>>
>>>> have you really considered just how
>>>> risky this is? Once something is binary-only, you are completely at the
>>>> mercy of the vendor, they can drop support at any time, force you to
>>>> replace your card or your operating system or as nVidia do now, prevent
>>>> you from using certain hardware combinations.
>>>
>>> nVidia is not much of an issue. Not a critical one anyway, unless you work
>>> on rendering where Linux is a prime choice. To must people nVidia=multi-head
>>> or games.
>>
>> A lot of people are gamers, though, so it's important for them.
>>
>>>
>>>> The concept of free software is that people can do what they want with
>>>> it, they are guaranteed their four freedom areas. This means that if
>>>> they want to, they can port their code to Windows. We also know that,
>>>> just like the nVidia drivers which only work with certain Linux/hardware
>>>> combinations, Microsoft also have the power to prevent any top-end on
>>>> Windows working properly, and have exercised that power many times, and
>>>> will continue to do so.
>>>
>>> Yes, but that is not new. Microsoft (at least at the top) is just a bunch of
>>> greedy criminals in suits. They are too *blind* to even see their crimes, as
>>> Jason showed us some days ago when reacting to the Mass. fiasco.
>>
>> There have been several alternatives to Microsoft's own Windows shell
>> over the years. PCTools probably produced the first one, which would
>> replace the Wfw3.11 shell, it was okay, certainly more stable than the
>> Microsoft shell, but never really caught on. PCTools disappeared not so
>> long after that.
>>
>> There was a version of afterstep ported to the Win95/DOS7 version of
>> Windows, but Microsoft had done so much to gain vertical integration by
>> then that any shell replacement was a seriously risky business. Even
>> just installing software required a switch back to the Microsoft shell,
>> although the advantages of multiple desktops were significant, the
>> overall effect was mostly just inconvenience.
>>
>> By far the most successful shell replacement work for years has been the
>> Cygwin tools, which provide a neat KDE top end as well as the X-server,
>> and it is possible to run most things from the Cygnus shell, however,
>> the versions I was using were not aware of the windows menu system,
>> paths, and so on, so even then, it wasn't all that well "connected" to
>> the windows world. Other X-servers have been of limited use for the
>> same reason (exceed hummingbird, say).
>>
>>>
>>>> Freedom is not easy to come by, and it's very easy to give it up for
>>>> some jam today - but don't be fooled.
>>>
>>> True, but one has to be cautious. I don't need to lose my jobs because I
>>> refuse to do some things that are 'against then rules'.
>>
>> Other constraints always have to be considered, which is one area where
>> Microsoft have excelled over the last two decades. The whole MCSE
>> programme put in place a generation of Windows-only admins, many of whom
>> have risen to senior posts (how about at the BBC, National Archives,
>> British Library?), and are unable to do anything other than what
>> Microsoft tell them, because they never did learn about computing, they
>> learnt about installing and running Microsoft.
>>
>>> Leave that to Stallman, who
>>> truly needs to serve as a role model in that respect (he doesn't play
>>> computer games either, according to what I read earlier today).
>>>
>>
>> I recall reading about his kids playing one of the early D&D games, so
>> he's not entirely averse to games.
>
> He has kids? I did not know that. His 'personal ads' says something along the
> lines of I already have a child (GNU), so the woman whom he looks for is,
> well... not intended to start an extended family.
Ah, maybe I'm misrecalling, perhaps it was a nephew he was speaking of.
> As for MCSEs, I watched the
> most disgusting video on YouTube yesterday. It depicts a MCSEs as arrogant
> bastrads who always get their way in the office. I don't know if this video
> came from Microsoft because I didn't watch it until the end. I could not stand
> it.
>
Ah, push the irrational buttons: get an MCSE and get "noticed" in the
office! More marketing for the brain-dead.
--
| Mark Kent -- mark at ellandroad dot demon dot co dot uk |
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| My (new) blog: http://www.thereisnomagic.org |
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