Posted on 07/24/2010 2:24:29 PM PDT by Willie Green
Now is a particularly good time to ditch Windows for good, for workstations as well as servers. For instance, now that Microsoft stopped supporting Windows Server 2003 on July 13, you'll need to find something different to use for your servers. Whether it's switching from Windows Server 2003 to 2008 or to Linux-based servers--or changing out tired and faulty Windows Vista desktops for the alien Windows 7 or something more user-friendly--Linux provides you with freedom and freedom of choice.
You might believe that dumping Windows and switching to Linux is a difficult task, but the change in thought and the perception of that switch are the most difficult. If you've attempted an upgrade from Windows XP to Windows 7, you know what pain is.
Business owners find that Linux, for what was once a "niche" operating system, provides the necessary components and services on which many rely. Linux continues its entry into the world's largest data centers, onto hundreds of thousands of individual desktops, and it represents a near 100 percent domination of the cloud services industry. Take the time to discover Linux and use it in your business. Here are ten reasons to give Linux at least a second look:
(Excerpt) Read more at pcworld.com ...
The one quibble I have with your response list (which is good, don’t get me wrong) is that the skills in hacking a Unix or Unix-like system are necessary if one is going to get into s/w development on anything but a Windows system. eg, if you’re going to work on routers or security appliances, web servers, etc - you’ll likely be working on some manner of Unix system as either your development environment or the server.
The “back end” side of computing is very heavily controlled by Unix now. If a person is interested in writing s/w for the server/blade/embedded market, they’d better learn Unix.
Your point about differences between various flavors of “Unix” is very important. For those who aren’t Unix aficionados, they should know that there are two major camps in Unix-land: POSIX/Linux and BSD. They’re nowhere close in terms of file layout on the disk, or the programming API’s. When was a young noob on Unix, it was in the infancy of the AT&T SysV vs. BSD 4.2 wars, and the internecine warfare in Unix-land was just heating up.
After using or hacking on many flavors of Unix from Seventh Edition on PDP-11’s to OS X and Linux/*BSD, I can say that the beauty of Unix is that you can write one base of software.... and debug it everywhere after you re-compile and link it.
I used Ubuntu.. but they still have driver issues with my laptop wifi
PDP-11/60. With the writeable control store installed. Micro-code a-go-go. ;-)
Completely agree — most end users need Unix like they need a socially communicable disease.
Scott’s stuff is so funny because it is so true. He’s used quips and story lines I’ve sent him, and just about everyone I knew in Silly Valley can say the same thing.
Scott Adams is shamelessly profiting off the social misfits of the tech world. ;-)
BTW - while I never hacked seriously on PDP-8’s, I did get to use RTE-IV on a HP-2100S, which had an architecture like a PDP-8 with another four bits shoved on the word. Two accumulators, goofy jump instruction setup, magnetic core main store, lots of incandescent lights on the front panel. Pretty cool machine, actually. A forerunner to the HP-1000 series of 16-bit mini’s in the 80’s. Built like brick outhouses, just like the ‘8s.
The HP-3000’s were a wholly different beast - never worked on them.
I wish Microsoft sold a slimed-down version of an OS that was aimed exclusively at gamers.
Where’s the “not this crap again” guy?
Biggest issue for most companies with replacing your old Server 2003 box and your Windows XP/Vista/7 PCs with Linux: Active Directory and GPOs (not to mention Exchange integration). IMHO, you will not find a better solution for managing settings, shares, security, app deployment, etc for thousands of systems in multiple locations. Microsoft pulled the directory services rug right out from under Novell by making it easy to use and maintain.
As far as OS support goes, Server 2003 is almost 8 years old, and Windows XP is almost 9. I was esctatic at moving away from both (Server 2008/2008 R2 are phenomenal). Better performance, better hardware support, did I mention better performance?
Stick with XP. Unix is an outstanding industrial operating system, but Unix on a PC for personal use is only something true geeks can enjoy.
In fact, stick with XP over Vista or Windows 7 for that matter. If you’re happy with XP for hosting Word and a web browser to surf the web and read email, you don’t need anything else. Businesses and government never bought into the marketing hype of vista and are still sticking with XP for the most part. Windows 7 is just Vista that works, and Vista/W7 is mostly marketing hype. Fundamentally, for the average PC user, Windows 7 has no real advantages over XP, and as far as I can tell, does most everything slower and worse than XP.
Thanks for the additional information. I appreciate your time and input.
You really ought to be charging for this information. It’s incredibly valuable to me. Thank you SO much!
Same here. That was a stupid statement. Windows 7 is about as easy to use as you can get.
I have an older Dell Dimension that I play around with. I had Red Hat on it but couldn’t find any drivers that would make my wireless card work. I tried PC Linux and Ubuntu but couldn’t get either to boot on this box.
Guess it will stay XP.
I find the .NET reason almost pathetic. Don’t get me wrong, I like Linux, Mono, C# & .NET—but the fact remains that Mono is a clone of .NET and as such, it will always be a step behind. Consequently, it will never be quite the platform that native .NET is.
That's one of the great things about OS X. A user never has to know he's working on certified UNIX™.
Fundamentally, for the average PC user, Windows 7 has no real advantages over XP, and as far as I can tell, does most everything slower and worse than XP.
It is quite a bit better. One simple thing is those annoying UAC boxes that popped up everywhere when you tried to do the least little thing. Those are a security feature of the OS above XP, but they were so annoying people turned them off. The security of various abilities and components has been completely refactored for Win7, in fact much of the security model has been overhauled under the direction of Mark Russinovich. So now you have the security without so many dialogs popping up. Other than that there are literally hundreds of improvements so that a user is likely to find something positive. Font handling finally got improved, Windows Media now natively handles H.264, DNSSEC is built in, etc.
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