Posted on 11/06/2003 11:28:52 AM PST by antiRepublicrat
Is there any significance to what Web server/platform combinations 2004 presidential candidates are using?
As we swing into the thick of the 2004 electoral playoffs, it's interesting to see what kinds of platforms are running under the candidates' official campaign Web sites. Netcraft has a handy feature called "What's that site running?" that lets us see combinations of Web servers and OS platforms. So here's a quick rundown, in alphabetical order:
As of this writing, November 5, 2003, the RNC has an uptime of 4.26 days (maximum of 39.04) and a 90-day moving average of 16.91. The DNC has an uptime of 445.02 days (also the maximum) and a 90-day moving average of 395.38 days.
Draw your own conclusions.
Barney Frank is getting behind Linux?
Linux better not drop the soap.
Linux guys do this all the time. Even worse, they think market share is more important. LMAO!
What they've effectively done by eating away at Unux market share is flat out hand Microsoft an even BIGGER percentage of overall software dollars and profits. Too funny they don't even realize it.
ROFLMAO!!!
Par for the course, for Novell to be "buying somebody". They've ruined how many companies now, and how many did they want to ruin but weren't able to get control of. So they're just going about their normal business, trying anything, this time it's Linux, another product with little proof of profit and more hype than anything.
I keep hoping for Novell to do something right with a company they buy, and this time, they just might do it... The reason that Novell is getting interested in Linux (they've been very interested in Linux for some time now, more than 6 years, with their involvement with (the real) Caldera) is that they've announced that the next release of NetWare network services will be unbundled from the NetWare OS. It will be offered to run on NetWare OS or natively on Linux.
Now, I'm a "survivor" of the Novell/UnixWare fiasco (hell, I'm a survivor of AT&T's "Unix PC," the 7300!), and if any company could screw something like this up, it is Novell, but I'm quite hopeful that they will get their act together. They've already shown a great commitment to OSS in NetWare 6.0, replacing the Netscape Enterprise Web Server with Apache 1.3, and in NW6.5, featuring Apache, Tomcat, MySQL, and Pearl/PHP.
Mark
Do you have a source for you allegation? I'm just curious, no accusing you of anything. The reason that I ask is that although Red Hat is the #1 US distribution of Linux, SuSe is the #1 European distribution. And it's not unusual for non-microsoft OS to be commonplace in Europe. OS/2 Warp, both server and desktop, are extremely popular in Europe, far more so than here in the US.
Mark
Actually, they can't do Windows on mainframes... VM and MVS, sure... But Windows hasn't been ported to that architecture. On the other hand, Red Hat Linux has. You should see it run on some of IBM's "big iron!" I saw one implementation where there were 165 VMs all running RH Linux! Awesome.
And speaking of R&D, IBM has been doing all sorts of R&D in conjuction with Red Hat, just like DEC and then Compaq did with Microsoft, before MS abandoned the Dec Alpha. In fact, that's exactly what SCO claims, except they claim that the code was stolen.
Mark
Aren't you aware that in the world of IT, the initial cost of hardware and software are often far less than the total cost? It would well be that given the MS licensing model, as well as management costs, that over a 5 or 10 year period that there could be significant savings, even thought the initial cost is higher? Something that I am finding interesting is something similar to what AT&T did in the 70's and 80's. AT&T made the source code to UNIX available to universities for a very low price. While that led to a bazillion different versions of UNIX, it also meant that every college kid in computers or engineering was familiar with the internals of UNIX. Basicly, it gave AT&T a "pre-trained" employment pool to choose from. I'm seeing more and more of that in the Linux world. I know of 3 local governments who have hired on high school kids in tech schools as interns, and these guys know Linux backwards and forwards. So the cost of the "experts" is kept down.
Mark
Now that IBM and UNIX are in the game on the Mac side, Wintel is hurting.
I never thought I'd say it, but if and when the time comes for me to buy a new laptop (I just finished paying off the one I'm using now!), I've decided that it will be either an iBook or if I can afford it, a powerBook. Especially with Virtual PC, which will allow me to run any Windows based software that I happen to need...
Mark
Take out the crack pipe for a minute. According to Gartner and IDC, most people spend around $800 to $1200 on a new machine. Not $3000. So it really makes no sense -- and no difference -- to compare the high end. It's a niche market. Like the Mac.
Actually, if you compare laptops, you get much better performance for the same or less in a Mac. I was amazed at just how fast etherreal was on a 700MHz iBook with 256MB of RAM, compared to my 2GHz Dell inspiron w/ 512MB RAM running Win98 (couldn't get Win2K drivers I needed) and Sniffer, or Red Hat Linux 8 and etherreal. Plus, when I'm on the road, or upgrading servers and just sitting around for hours at a time while data is migrating, it's nice to be able to watch a DVD movie... And the DVD playback is far superior on the Macs...
When I bought my Dell, it ran about $2800. That iBook, at the same time, was about $1600. Now, it goes for about $1200 for the 900MHz version.
Mark
What do you consider to be an "average user?" I have to deal with support calls from end users asking why nothing is happening on their screen ("you need to turn the computer on first") to advanced network and server troubleshooting for fortune 500 companies. I see all sorts of different "average users."
For a user outside of a corporate environment, where they don't need (and don't know) MS Office apps, or in a small office environment, nothing beats a MAC. If a home user doesn't need to use their computer for work, and if Apple would reduce the price, I would have to say that there's no better "average home user" computer than a Mac. The level of frustration I see on home users with Windows computers where I work is unbelievable. We had a guy who was livid when we told him that it appeared that his brand new WinXP Home system got hit by Welchia while he was registering it with Microsoft over his dial-up line! He didn't even have the time to download any patches or install his anti-virus software. Macs simply aren't as vulnerable to virus infections because there aren't that many out there for Macs right now.
And I hate having to deal with clients who I call us angrilly about being told by Dell that to fix their problem they need to back-up their data and reload the system (on the average, 2 or 3 a week). Usually, it's due to something that they did, but they blame windows, microsoft, dell, and occasionally, us. We've got a large installed base of Macs at a few of our clients, and we rarely get support calls... Mostly regarding hardware problems.
Mark
I read that on a foreign website from the UK, proably the register or vunet I believe it is. I don't blame them for this, in fact I dislike Linux for similar reasons (the fact that it isn't made here in our country for those lurking).
I don't see any reason why anyone would want to, either. There's sufficiently other H/W platforms for Windows that perform at the top of the TPC.
I saw one implementation where there were 165 VMs all running RH Linux! Awesome.
Distributed network resources and servers have always worked better for us, not only because of the quantity of clients (several thousand) but because of the diverse set of applications in use.
just like DEC and then Compaq did with Microsoft, before MS abandoned the Dec Alpha. In fact, that's exactly what SCO claims, except they claim that the code was stolen.
Not really that similar, since Microsoft didn't go partner with another vendor and use the Alpha designs in the new project.
That's really not encouraging to hear, that governments are relying on high school interns to manage their systems! I know budgets are tight, but gee wiz, hire an experienced guy for a fair wage how about. You see, all this 'cost savings' that Linux advertises is really the threat of US high paying tech jobs going away. If you are in this field, you should be very aware of this.
I'm waiting for the G5 to get into the Powerbook before I do that. Anyway, my wife keeps bugging me to get a dual G5 PowerMac, so that'll be first.
As does the general marketshare of Mercedes, but their market share in upscale merchandise is doing quite well.
No it isn't. I gave a perfect previous example where the large trucking firms would use their deep pockets to make shipments at a loss in order to drive the independent truckers out of business. I believe such behavior is illegal under the RICO statutes.
Somehow I fail to understand where Linux=socialism. I thought the volunteer spirit of free software fit quite well into the generous nature of individual Americans, plus the idea that it's all the better if you can make money off of it as well.
Documentation was always a problem, back in the NetWare 2.x (and for that matter, 3.x, 4.x, and 5.x... However, their new version is pretty thouroughly documented... Each release did get better, much like the installation programs). As far as support went, back in those days, if you needed help, you really needed either a CNE, who could get help directly from Novell, or help through a distributer. It was difficult for someone who wasn't certified to get help from Novell.
So we used Netware for a few years, all of us attending their courses but none getting certified, simply because it wasn't a product we particularly liked. We attended those training classes because of outright need, and frustration, and the thought of spending additional time to get certification simply maddening.
I know what you mean, but it did help in getting help from Novell. Being a CNE really meant something back then (in the late 80's, when the Novell tests were still "open book," but if you had to look up more than 2 or 3 answers, you'd run out of time and fail the test). Being certified as a CNE meant that you had a special telephone number for tech support which got you into 3rd level tech support, getting past the "script readers" who answered the phone, and the 2nd level tech support who usually knew less than you did. If the 3rd level couldn't get the problem solved, it would be immediately escallated to engineering... Damn, I miss those days!
Once Windows for Workgroups and ultimately NT came out, we dumped Netware like a bad dream, now running Microsoft and a few flavors of Unix for customized apps. But we feared for Unix's life when Novell got control of it, and IMO the technology was just way over their head. Do you remember how long we were waiting for Netware SMP? We didn't get the earliest version but rumor was the first processor had to be near 100% saturated before the second even would even began to utilize itself much.
Novell has a bad habit, worse maybe even than Microsoft (and much more damaging to their business) of releasing software LONG before it's ready! It seems like they would often set a target date to release software and would send it out no matter what... Good examples include the old NetWare SQL which ran as a NLM on top of NetWare 3.0. The main problem was that the NW3.0 system was great for file and print services, but didn't really take advantage of "real" memory protection that the 386 processor provided (for additional speed), and consequently, it was unstable as hell. In fact, they carried that architecture over until NetWare 5, although some remnants to still exist in NW6.x... But it's MUCH BETTER now! lol You mentioned SMP, and that's just one example of disasters that Novell's had... Another is clustering! Both were announced and shipped LONG before they were ready. Now, they actually work pretty darned well. But there are a lot of companies that got burned early on, and never came back.
What Novell did with UNIX is a crime! I got all excited when I found out that Novell had bought USL from AT&T. Novell had been pushing the concept of using NetWare as an application server for years, even though nobody trusted it, for good reasons! What better platform for an application server than "real" UNIX (I had been working primarily in the *IX world for years... Starting on Version 6 and later BSD on PDPs, and later working with Altos XENIX on Altos 586 and 2086 systems, eventually going to SCO XENIX and SCO UNIX on PCs, as well as a little bit of Microport UNIX. In a marketing move that would have made AT&T or XEROX proud, they decided to position UnixWare, not as an application server to add services to your existing Novell network, but as an alternative server to their #1 product, and as a desktop solution, no matter that memory was still several hundred dollars a MB, and no desktop office applications really existed for X! To this day, I'm convinced that somebody at Novell subcontracted out their UnixWare marketing to Redmond, WA!
I didn't realize they were already packaging mysql, are they still even fully Oracle compatible? Without a true enterprise DB they could be hurting.
I'm not sure that anybody really trusts Novell as an app server any more. That's what Win2K and UNIX (as well as "big iron" IBMs and DECs) are for. A version of NetWare DID ship with some enhanced commercial web commerce support... It shiped with Oracle 8i and IBM's WebSphere. However, it only lasted one release. Novell really didn't advertise the fact that they had an "eCommerce solution," and worse, 99.9% of their channel didn't know how to demonstrate all these nifty new features! After all, how many Novell certified techs are Oracle DBAs or WebSphere programmers! So, when a salesman would say, look at this wonderful bundled software that will allow you to expand your business to "the net," the client would say, "Show me what it can do..." The dealer would usually say, "well, we don't really know how to set up applications... Sorry." I actually sent some very angry emails to Eric Schmit while he was CEO, since I didn't feel that anybody at Novell was taking me seriously when I said that I was a Master CNE and a Master CNI, working with Novell since 1989, but I was going to have to stop working with Novell to come up to speed on Microsoft and Cisco products, because Novell isn't selling any more. Eric had a marketing droid contact me, as did the director of NetWare and NetWare related products. But I didn't get anywhere (at the time). Well, I fired off a really nasty email, and it seems to have gotten out (probably through some pissed off product development people who felt the same way) to Compaq and HP (before the merge). It seems that Compaq called Novell, asking why they should continue to develop software and drivers for Novell if their Platinum Dealers were looking at dropping selling Novell... I got 3 calls from Provo in one day, and they offered to fly me out to talk. They eventually sent two guys from Provo to talk to me... Not too much has changed, with one exception. They finally took my suggestion in making available a completely "pre-configured" system, for demo use. You can install it on a computer, and they have a demo web site .
NetWare 6.5 ships with Apache 2.0 (since it runs on NW, it has fewer exploitable "issues" than Apache on Unix/Linux), Pearl/PHP, MySQL, and Tomcat4. It also ships with development software for developing eCommerce sites. In fact, NW6.5 ships on 4 or 5 CDs! There's a lot of stuff there... And it is pretty well thought out... Still, I think that it's hard to beat Novell for file and print services, and eDirectory is a terrific directory. NW6.5 has something called Virtual Office, which is web based collaberation software that while is a first release, shows some real promise. I think that the best part of the "new" Novell is the fact that you don't have to have a NetWare server on your network to use Novell's services, and you can even eliminate the NetWare client from your workstations and still use most of the novell services. Novell's getting back to "making their stuff work with everyone elses." I just hope it isn't too little, too late.
Mark
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.