Posted on 03/05/2009 8:21:14 AM PST by ShadowAce
Starve the Beast — don’t buy Microsoft products. Today I’m online and posting here after booting up from a Puppy Linux live CD.
Haven't missed them at all.
Buy a good compass. Learn how to read a map and tell time.
It may be a race between starvation and suicide...
I thought M$ already lost its grip on the FAT patent...
That's a good point. I think I remember something about them losing a patent lawsuit against Samba as well.
anti--what do you know about this point?
They have bought their own press. Businesses were not deploying Vista for a number of reasons, none of which, at this time, seem to be answered in 7.
So what do we have, 50% or better of the corporate customer base may well be running XP as much as it can, especially on desktops, 10 years after it's roll out and looking to move on with nothing in the pipe from MS worth consideration...
XP sucks too though. It’s a time waster, not a time saver.
Been MS-Free since 1993.
If at least one team somewhere can get it's act together with support/ease of use and familiarity, there is a possible entry point forming to really take on MS..
Well, until some one comes out with a widely accepted and cost effective replacement for Microsoft Windows that’s what we have.
Everyone tries to use the lawsuit rout against MS (Yes, they do the same in defense)instead of creating a cost effective competitor that’s easy for the average person to install and use.
Yes there are many Linux Distros out there that can do everything MS does, but the drivers are often shaky or non-existent for allot of hardware, and the software is great but it’s also hard to install, uninstall, or use some times.
Don’t get me wrong, I love Linux, I run OpenSuse at home on my laptop, but in the end it’s still an MS world until some one finds a way to beat them in the market and not the court room.
It’s good to see that M$ is getting exposed on moves like this.
I’ve been virtually M$-free since mid-2007 - switched to Ubuntu Linux. I convinced my parents to switch around this past Christmas.
My Garmin works that way--though why the companies can't just download them through the satellite I don't know.
Software patents are stoopid and EVIL!
I would hazard a guess that the TomTom is using flash disk cards to supply map databases that can be updated by swapping out a card. Most cards of that variety come formatted with a FAT FS. I have embedded Linux systems that have a USB port. I include the FAT FS driver so I can connect a "thumb drive" to collect log data or exchange software when there isn't a network connection available.
It wasn’t FAT, but the long file name extensions of FAT32 that’s used in practically everything now. I remember at least one of the several patents covering FAT32 was declared invalid, but later reinstated. There was also something about an EFI spec where Microsoft gave permission to use the patents, but I don’t know whether that clears OS vendors to implement FAT32 overall.
This could mean war, but Microsoft has already signed patent deals with two of the richest Linux vendors, Novell and Red Hat, so the biggest players with the biggest bank to fight probably won’t be in it.
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