Posted on 05/13/2005 9:50:18 AM PDT by Halfmanhalfamazing
"Lintel," or the Linux operating system and Intel, is now encroaching on this empire, and behind it is the entire open-source software movement, which threatens to overthrow the Windows industry. Faced with this challenge, Microsoft is showing classic symptoms of "incumbents' disease." Rather than remaking itself, Microsoft is using legal threats, short-term deals, and fear, uncertainty, and doubt to fortify its position. But this strategy probably won't work. The Linux operating system and the open-source model for software development are far from perfect, but they look increasingly likely to depose Microsoft.
May the best product win. As it sits now, it seems like the best product is set to do just that. There's already a larger installed userbase for linux than the mac.
Linux Ping
I hate to admit this, but I tried switching my home pc to SuSE 9.3 this week, and gave up. The load went fine, but I had an extremely tough time configuring cable modem access. In fact, I never did get it to run. While troubleshooting that, my mouse inexplicably stopped working. By this time I was sufficiently po'd and frustrated and loaded XP where everything worked fine and wrapped up in about an hour and 15 mins. I'm an AIX admin, so I like to think I should have had a better time of it too.
My next computer is going to be a 'Lintel'. I've been real ticked off by the fact that ServPack2 limits the number of internet connections-- I can't get any work done always having to shut things down when I want to check some thing else.
The local computer shop here has a special on low-end stations using a Lintel configuration. I swear-- the way of the future!
The CPU box & keyboard/mouse cost all of what ... $250? $300?
I've heard alot of horror stories coming from current SuSE installs. Apparently Novell hasn't gotten their game going yet.
There...... is a reason why Red Hat is the market leader. You tried that on a spare machine/hard drive yet?
Sorry, but with anything new(novell/linux) there's always problems, which is why I'm still hearing recommendations from some in the field to not install XP XP2.
Haven't hada problem with Suse at all..I like it better than RH and Drake..I run 64 bit as well..
First, there's no law that says they can't co-exist pretty nicely, each serving its own niche. I think there are some obvious places in the market for Open Source to do well.
Second, I can't tell that the Open Source movement has the capability to invest in the radical innovation that is required for the software industry to move forward. It follows pretty well, but I can't see it leading. Take the Tablet PC, for example. How is Open Source supposed to innovate on a level like that?
Third, Microsoft is not standing still even in traditional OS and application areas. .NET is quite an advance, copying the best ideas of Java and adding some new ideas on top, and development tools that allow complex software to be created very quickly.
I think this guy gave away his position pretty throughly with the following line:
...open source takes the bu11$hi+ out of software. It severely limits the possibility of proprietary "lock-in"--where users become hostage to the software vendors whose products they buy...
I don't see being "locked in" to iTunes stopping sales of iPods.
Heck, every large corporation in the world is "locked in" to a bunch of their software systems, and that's not going to change. I don't see any Open Source efforts to make ERP systems.
I'd wager this guy has never made decisions in the real business world. He has that communitarian outlook that just feels that making money off of software is bad. Hey, it all ought to be free, dudes! Well, that might work for an Apache web server, but it's a long way from a viable mental model of the way the whole software business works.
You don't even install it. It boots from CD and autoconfigures your hardware. With the latest version you can create a persistent home directory on your hard drive if you like, even on NTFS.
You might be amazed.
Good luck with that.
Good for you. I personally had alot of problems with drake. I guess it depends on your personality. :-P
I employ SuSE in several applications as a print server and a mail server on my network, and so I thought I'd stick to something I'm used to. I think the main problem with me using that distribution is that in Germany, cable-modem use is almost non-existent, and the OS seems better able to deal with DSL or ISDN.
The problem with trying all these different distributions is that I work all dang day on computers and don't want to take the time to hack away all night. I may experiment with another distribution later on, maybe Lintel or Red Hat.
Linux already has it's foot in the door with industrial process control systems.
We ran with Mandrake 8.1 for a couple of years without any problems, and then we tried Suse 9.1 32 & 64bit and had a number of problems with sendmail, apache and others. If it wasn't for these issues we would have stuck with Suse, despite issues we had with Novell, patches and upgrades.
Then we tried Mandrake 10.1 Powerpack and everything seemed to work fine, except no matter what mouse I tried, it wouldn't work unless I first booted into single user mode and ran some setup commands, but even then it wasn't guaranteed.
Then we loaded RedHat ES version 4 and have been completely satisfied with it, both in 32 and 64 bit versions. At this point, we're sticking with Redhat for years... although if Solaris 10 had support for our RAID controller, we would have migrated to Solaris 10.
who wants to spend all night futzing with an 'open-source' alternative when there are lots of better things to do?
mash this'n...http://www.linspire.com/...you'll have NO trouble with cable modem...wireless etc
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