A friend of mine sent me a link to this article. I've read about half of it so far and it seems to be a very interesting read. So, I thought I'd share and see what thoughts you all have on this.

Thanks for posting this. I found it very informative, and unlike other articles about Microsoft, this one had a ton of references to back it's claims up with. Although most people on this BBS are "enlightened", it is still a good read, and if you have influence in your company over what kinds of software you use, it should be read.

While I agree with most of what's said of which I have any first-hand knowledge, I hesitate to assume a person's an expert who claims that ``Linux is a more modern version [of Unix]''.

A bit of an eye opener for the average guy who knows slightly more than the average about computers. I'm only about a 3rd of the way through the article and am disgusted with myself for running Win2K. Anyone have suggestions on running Linux at home for a guy like me?

I was just disgusted at the quality of the article. He makes some bold statements without backup. Sure, he footnotes some items. Others are just preached. too much hot air and too strong a sentiment of "alarm!" Don't like the writing style and don't like the content. There's an agenda and it bugs me.

Bruno

Our internal news server at work had a thread on this article. Basically, all the Linux supporters praised the article as 'eye-opening' and all the Windows supporters said it was biased, not enough facts, etc, etc.

I didn't even bother to read it

As far as I'm concerned, the guy is obviously a Microsoft/Windows hater. But that doesn't bother me. Not too long ago I was starting to look into Linux for no good reason.

A good reason, though not completely thought out or finished yet, is in this brain somewhere. But you can't blame a guy for wanting to do something for no good reason, can you? As long as it hurts no one else, why can't I do what I want? Up to and including driving ridiculously fast to loud music on an empty road.

I am simply asking anyone with a good understanding of the Linux universe how much trouble it would be to switch. And more specifically, which version would be best for a home user like me. I'm not your average barely computer literate schmoe (sp?), but I'm no programmer, either.

I am simply asking anyone with a good understanding of the Linux universe how much trouble it would be to switch.

The answer is dependant on what you do with a computer. If all you do is surf the web and use IRC then switching isn't a problem. If you play a lot of games, or use specific software packages, then you might not have as easy a time. It all depends.

I'm sure it's not all going to be easy. But it is something I've been interested in for a while. So if someone could point me in the right direction, I'd appreciate it.

I also liked the "for Office, much of the work for a Linux version has already been done in creating the Apple Macintosh OS X (Unix) version".

This couldn't be more false. Sure, it runs on a Unix OS, but it's tied to the Carbon API, aka an Apple specific API that was made to bring OS 9 and older apps into OS X with minor work. To make a Linux version of Office, MS would probably be better off starting from scratch then converting the Mac version of Office.

So if someone could point me in the right direction, I'd appreciate it.

That's a religious question right up there with Ford/Chevy, Windows/Mac, emacs/vi etc...

For a no-commitment play-around test, try Knoppix. It's a Linux distribution that can run from CD, no installation to the drive at all. Things are a bit slow - CD is slower than drive and stuff is also compressed to cram more than 2GB of software onto the CD - but it's very useful for a look around. Auto detects an impressive amount of hardware...

It can also be installed to disk if you want - Knoppix is based on Debian, with a mix of packages from stable, unstable and testing branches (stability as to which version of software included, not necessarily stability - though stable tends to be just that...), so after installation you can convert it to a Debian system.

Debian is often not a first time Linux users choice due to perceived installation difficulty, but many switch to it after a while, and few seem to switch away...

For ease of first installation I'd look at RedHat or SuSE, Debian is trickier to install but easier to maintain/upgrade.

All IMHO.

/Michael

too much hot air and too strong a sentiment of "alarm!"

Well, this guy probably wouldn't have gotten Slashdotted if he wrote a nice, meek review article! For all I know his business is a one-person shop and this article might have drawn enough attention to double his list of paying customers!

A friend sent me this article a week or so ago after seeing it on /. and I read it all the way through. It certainly seems small-business and VAR-oriented and is certainly also biased and opinionated, but (and pehaps this is just because some of his biases align with mine) I thought it wasn' t a half-bad review of the overall situation WRT small-business servers, desktops and relevant decisions. There were some minor spots where I thought his bias came close to being wrong on facts, say:

"Short battery life is the bane of devices that approach full Windows PC function, and also plagues smaller PDA (Personal Digital Assistant) devices running Microsoft's Pocket PC version of Windows."

I mean, short battery life doesn't plague my Zaurus, too? *Overall* though, alarmist as some of it seems, I don't see where he is way out of line on facts or interpretation. *Are* there any Windows ISVs left other than Intuit and Symantec? Does Microsoft make serious money on anything other than Office and Windows? (Mice, maybe??) What was MSFT's motive for Licensing v6 and how should businesses react to it? Will future MSFT OS and architecture (Longhorn and .NET) force customers to make a "'Yer either fer us of agin us!" choice? -- attempt to lock customers in to a Microsoft-centric computing environment?

What I would say is that when it comes to the MSFT-related parts of his opinionated piece, history backs this gent up and I am waiting for someone to pick substantive bones with the bases of his arguments.

Tim,
I'm running Mandrake Linux on my machine now and my biggest question is a word processor. I have to write documents that other people can open using MS Word and so I have to use my wife's (windows) computer to get it done. Is there a legitemate option to do this in Word? The two word processors installed (OpenOffice and KWord) don't export to MS Word format very well. I'd really like to give Linux a chance, but if I can't do what I need to I'm going to have to re-install windows (which would really stink as I've gotten use to a few of the nice features in KDE).

Depending on the features you use in Word, that is one of the limitations

One solution might be to save the file in an older format that Word can open. The trick comes in to seeing what formattting gets broken between the transfers.

I just finished the article. I agree with some of the other’s who have said that there was some bias in the article, however it did offer some insights as well.

On thing I thought revealing was the author’s blaming Microsoft for being “tied down” to a crummy OS structure because they have to support old versions, and then slamming them for coming up with a new version that doesn’t support older version of software.

He also really seems to believe that soon you won’t be able to run anything on Windows but Microsoft products, an idea I find preposterous. Though Microsoft has done this in selected applications (IE being a prime example), they can’t do it for every application and expect to survive. Creating an OS where every non-Microsoft programmer can’t write software would force us all to either develop for another OS (read: Linux) or create another one (read: Linux ). An OS is only as good as the software you can run on it, and if there’s only one shop that can write software for an OS, it is doomed.

He also seemed to lump together a lot of Microsoft’s legitimate business practices with the clearly unethical (and unlawful) ones. Creating a product that doesn’t play well with other software isn’t unethical, especially if it makes the end product easier to use in the end. That’s a decision Microsoft has to make, though I think if they alienate everyone they’ll be in a world of hurt. Stealing other people’s work, however, is illegal (and unethical), even if you attach a NDA to it.

Like I said before, I’m now running Linux as a desktop OS at home and my biggest complaint is Word processing. If I didn’t have a compelling reason to do so (like trying to become more familiar with technologies other than Windows) I’d have to stick with Win2K. As it is, I still have to use my wife’s computer half the time.

I did find it interesting that he mentioned Delphi toward the end of the article. I don’t think that Borland will allow itself to be bought out so that Kylix (the Linux brand of Delphi and C++ Builder) can be discontinued, though sometimes the almighty dollar can change minds. I have noted that Kylix hasn’t taken off very well: when we bought Delphi 7 we got Kylix for free (which I’ve used and is quite good, actually); in the past Kylix was a separate product.

Ultimately the consumer is in charge of all of this and so far the average consumer has been happy enough to follow Microsoft wherever it leads. If M$ continues in the way this article suggests, however, there will be a point the critical numbers won’t follow.

If you require the full functionality of Word I'd recommend using CrossOver Office. It allows you to install Office 97 or 2000, and run Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook using a modified Wine binary under Linux.

On thing I thought revealing was the author�s blaming Microsoft for being �tied down� to a crummy OS structure because they have to support old versions, and then slamming them for coming up with a new version that doesn�t support older version of software.

Well, that's not his fault that it happens. And by "not support" I believe he means two things: (1) the older s/w won't run, and (2) the newer s/w won't always work with data files from the older s/w -- a problem I frequently run into when helping unfortunate friends with upgrades.

soon you won�t be able to run anything on Windows but Microsoft products, an idea I find preposterous.

That's definitely the goal. Initially, it will just mean you cannot build apps that run without a big WARNING pop-up, unless you fork over $$$ for a certificate or something --> kinda like trying to do independent SSL on a website today (who'd have thought..). This is intended to shut out Open Source.

The next phase will be not being about to build apps at all without coughing up blood for a certificate. This is intended to grab revenue and completely shut out Open Source for good.

And finally, they just stop issuing certificates outside of MS, or just raise the certificate price to the stratosphere (nearly the same effect).

No doubt whatsoever.

Well again, if M$ really thinks it's a good idea to put every programmer out of a job who doesn't work for them, they can go right agead. M$ can sit on high and do all the work to write great windows apps with no competition (which they've already demonstrated they won't do), meanwhile every other programmer in the world will be competing to come up with something better. If Bill wants to practice total technological facism (I say "total" because he's already started down the road), he'll be forcing the rest of us to engage in technological capitalism which I have no doubt will build the better product. You can argue the Linux is the better product now, but it does lag behind in some key areas. MS Office is a great product that works very well and it'll have to be defeated. Linux isn't as user-friendly as windows, though it's comming close. If Bill forces our hand though, imagine what we'll do!

soon you won�t be able to run anything

Oooh, nice character set screwup! My guess is that the original post used the Microsoft CP1252 code point for right single quote, your browser helpfully made that more portable by translating it to the Unicode code point U+2019, but then unhelpfully translated it back into UTF-8 when submitting the reply.

[whines]Drakeeeeno, pleeeease can we have character entities in posts?[/whines]

Peter

soon you won�t be able to run anything on Windows but Microsoft products, an idea I find preposterous.

And so it begins.. or rather, continues..

http://slashdot.org/articles/03/03/24/2125236.shtml?tid=109&tid=185&tid=187